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Alamo Drafthouse will not implement Meta's new Movie Mate technology during the April 30 nationwide rerelease of Blumhouse's "M3GAN," Variety reports. The specialty theater chain confirmed it will maintain its strict no-phones policy despite Universal's promotion of the second-screen experience, with staff instructed to remove patrons attempting to access the feature during screenings. Movie Mate represents Meta's first integration of its interactive movie technology, which operates via Instagram direct messaging. Users message the film's official account to activate a chatbot delivering "sneak peeks, exclusive recorded messages from directors and talent" synchronized with the screening. The "M3GAN" event serves as Meta's technological debut ahead of potential wider theatrical implementation.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

China's outing of alleged US National Security Agency hackers marks a major escalation in the ongoing tit-for-tat between Chinese and American intelligence agencies, according to analysts. From a report: Chinese authorities Tuesday said three NSA employees hacked the Asian Winter Games held this year in Harbin, accusing them of targeting systems that held vast amounts of personal information on people involved in the event. The hacks "severely endangered the security of China's critical information infrastructure, national defense, finance, society, production, as well as citizens' personal information," Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian told reporters. While the US has repeatedly published names of alleged Chinese hackers and filed criminal charges against them, China has historically refrained from making similar accusations against American spies. Rafe Pilling, director of threat intelligence at the cyber firm Sophos' Secureworks unit, said the development may signal a broader policy change from Chinese security agencies, with allegations of US cyberattacks becoming more specific and timely. "This is an escalation in China's experimentation with 'name and shame' policies for the alleged perpetrators of cyberattacks, mirroring US pursuit of a similar policy for a number of years now," said Pilling.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A Canadian math prodigy is accused of stealing over $65 million through complex exploits on decentralized finance platforms and is currently a fugitive from U.S. authorities. Despite facing criminal charges for fraud and money laundering, he has evaded capture by moving internationally, embracing the controversial "Code is Law" philosophy, and maintaining that his actions were legal under the platforms' open-source rules. The Globe and Mail reports: Andean Medjedovic was 18 years old when he made a decision that would irrevocably alter the course of his life. In the fall of 2021, shortly after completing a master's degree at the University of Waterloo, the math prodigy and cryptocurrency trader from Hamilton had conducted a complex series of transactions designed to exploit a vulnerability in the code of a decentralized finance platform. The maneuver had allegedly allowed him to siphon approximately $16.5-million in digital tokens out of two liquidity pools operated by the platform, Indexed Finance, according to a U.S. court document. Indexed Finance's leaders traced the attack back to Mr. Medjedovic, and made him an offer: Return 90 per cent of the funds, keep the rest as a so-called "bug bounty" -- a reward for having identified an error in the code -- and all would be forgiven. Mr. Medjedovic would then be free to launch his career as a white hat, or ethical, hacker. Mr. Medjedovic didn't take the deal. His social media posts hinted, without overtly stating, that he believed that because he had operated within the confines of the code, he was entitled to the funds -- a controversial philosophy in the world of decentralized finance known as "Code is Law." But instead of testing that argument in court, Mr. Medjedovic went into hiding. By the time authorities arrived on a quiet residential street in Hamilton to search his parents' townhouse less than two months later, Mr. Medjedovic had moved out, taking his electronic devices with him. Then, roughly two years later, he struck again, netting an even larger sum -- approximately $48.4-million -- by conducting a similar exploit on another decentralized finance platform, U.S. authorities allege. Mr. Medjedovic, now 22, faces five criminal charges -- including wire fraud, attempted extortion and money laundering -- according to a U.S. federal court document that was unsealed earlier this year. If convicted, he could be facing decades in prison. First, authorities will have to find him.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Armbian Announces New Cloud-Optimized Images for ARM64 and x86  9to5Linux

4 ways Apostrophe is my new go-to editor for markdown over Obsidian  XDA

Apple has officially designated all Intel-based Mac minis as "vintage" or "obsolete," marking the end of an era. This means Apple no longer guarantees parts or service for these devices, as they've surpassed the 5- to 7-year support window. 9to5Mac reports: Apple periodically adds devices to its ever-growing list of vintage and obsolete products. That happened today, as spotted by MacRumors, with two noteworthy "vintage" additions: iPhone 6s and Mac mini (2018). The latter product is especially significant, because the 2018 Mac mini was the last remaining Intel model that was not yet labeled either vintage or obsolete. So what are those timelines exactly? Per Apple's definitions: Vintage: "Apple stopped distributing them for sale more than 5 and less than 7 years ago." Obsolete: "Apple stopped distributing them for sale more than 7 years ago." [...] Since these products are now considered vintage, Apple no longer guarantees that parts for repairs will be readily available.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Fedora Linux 42 Is Here With GNOME 48  How-To Geek

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Figma has sent a cease-and-desist letter to popular no-code AI startup Lovable, Figma confirmed to TechCrunch. The letter tells Lovable to stop using the term "Dev Mode" for a new product feature. Figma, which also has a feature called Dev Mode, successfully trademarked that term last year, according to the U.S. Patent and Trademark office. What's wild is that "dev mode" is a common term used in many products that cater to software programmers. It's like an edit mode. Software products from giant companies like Apple's iOS, Google's Chrome, Microsoft's Xbox have features formally called "developer mode" that then get nicknamed "dev mode" in reference materials. Even "dev mode" itself is commonly used. For instance Atlassian used it in products that pre-date Figma's copyright by years. And it's a common feature name in countless open source software projects. Figma tells TechCrunch that its trademark refers only to the shortcut "Dev Mode" -- not the full term "developer mode." Still, it's a bit like trademarking the term "bug" to refer to "debugging." Since Figma wants to own the term, it has little choice but send cease-and-desist letters. (The letter, as many on X pointed out, was very polite, too.) If Figma doesn't defend the term, it could be absorbed as a generic term and the trademarked becomes unenforceable.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Uber cofounder Travis Kalanick thinks AI is about to shake up consulting -- and for "traditional" professionals, not in a good way. From a report: The former Uber CEO said consultants who mostly follow instructions or do repetitive tasks are at risk of being replaced by AI. "If you're a traditional consultant and you're just doing the thing, you're executing the thing, you're probably in some big trouble," he said. He joked about what that future of consultancy might look like: "Push a button. Get a consultant." However, Kalanick said the professionals who would come out ahead would be the ones who build tools rather than just use them. "If you are the consultant that puts the things together that replaces the consultant, maybe you got some stuff," he said. "You're going to profitable companies with competitive moats, making that moat bigger," he explained. "Making their profit bigger is probably pretty interesting from a financial point of view."

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Deal is back again through 4/19. Get a $10 Target GiftCard with $100 Apple Gift Card purchase. A simple deal if you plan to buy any Apple products/services in the future (and have a free Target Circle membership). While supplies last. May be able to get more in-store. Stack with the 5% back via Target REDCard.

Apple gift cards are now good for everything from iPhones to Apple Watches to music to iCloud storage subscriptions. The code just adds to the balance in your Apple account. I accumulate them over time like an old-fashioned layaway plan and I feel that getting 10% to 15% off a new iPhone or Apple Watch even when you buy on release day is pretty good. (Apple products and their iTunes/iCloud services used to have separate gift cards.)

Best Buy is not matching this deal right now, but they have other gift cards on sale: 10% off select gift cards at Best Buy.

You should still learn to code, says GitHub's CEO. And you should start as soon as possible. From a report: "I strongly believe that every kid, every child, should learn coding," Thomas Dohmke said in a recent podcast interview with EO. "We should actually teach them coding in school, in the same way that we teach them physics and geography and literacy and math and what-not." Coding, he added, is one such fundamental skill -- and the only reason it's not part of the curriculum is because it took "us too long to actually realize that." Dohmke, who's been a programmer since the 90s, said he's never seen "anything more exciting" than the current moment in engineering -- the advent of AI, he believes, has made the field that much easier to break into, and is poised to make software more ubiquitous than ever. "It's so much easier to get into software development. You can just write a prompt into Copilot or ChatGPT or similar tools, and it will likely write you a basic webpage, or a small application, a game in Python," Dohmke said. "And so, AI makes software development so much more accessible for anyone who wants to learn coding." AI, Dohmke said, helps to "realize the dream" of bringing an idea to life, meaning that fewer projects will end up dead in the water, and smaller teams of developers will be enabled to tackle larger-scale projects. Dohmke said he believes it makes the overall process of creation more efficient. "You see some of the early signs of that, where very small startups -- sometimes five developers and some of them actually only one developer -- believe they can become million, if not billion dollar businesses by leveraging all the AI agents that are available to them," he added.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

VirtualBox 7.1.8 Adds Support for Linux Kernel 6.14  OMG! Ubuntu

VirtualBox 7.1.8 Adds Support for Linux Kernel 6.14  OMG! Ubuntu

VirtualBox 7.1.8 Adds Support for Linux Kernel 6.14  OMG! Ubuntu

Fedora-Based Ultramarine 41 Linux Distribution Is Now Available for Download  9to5Linux

Fedora-Based Ultramarine 41 Linux Distribution Is Now Available for Download  9to5Linux

Fedora-Based Ultramarine 41 Linux Distribution Is Now Available for Download  9to5Linux

Fedora-Based Ultramarine 41 Linux Distribution Is Now Available for Download  9to5Linux

Fedora-Based Ultramarine 41 Linux Distribution Is Now Available for Download  9to5Linux

The 6 Linux distros I recommend most for gaming in 2025 - including my favorite  ZDNet