"Elon Musk said on Sunday that SpaceX has shifted its focus to building a 'self-growing city' on the moon," [1]reports Reuters , "which could be achieved in less than 10 years."

> SpaceX still intends to start on Musk's long-held ambition of a city on Mars within five to seven years, he wrote on his X social media platform, "but the overriding priority is securing the future of civilization and the Moon is faster."

>

> Musk's comments echo a Wall Street Journal report on Friday, stating that SpaceX has told investors it would prioritize going to the moon and attempt a trip to Mars at a later time, targeting March 2027 for an uncrewed lunar landing. As recently as last year, Musk said that he [2]aimed to send an uncrewed mission to Mars by the end of 2026.



[1] https://www.reuters.com/science/musk-says-spacex-prioritise-building-self-growing-city-moon-2026-02-08/

[2] https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/musk-aiming-send-uncrewed-starship-mars-by-end-2026-2025-05-30/

As Super Bowl Sunday comes to a close, America's National Football League "is challenging innovators to improve the facemask on football helmets to reduce concussions in the game," [1]reports the Associated Press :

> The league announced on Friday at an innovation summit for the Super Bowl the next round in the [2]HealthTECH Challenge series , a crowdsourced competition designed to accelerate the development of cutting-edge football helmets and new standards for player safety. The challenge invites inventors, engineers, startups, academic teams and established companies to improve the impact protection and design of football helmets through improvements to how facemasks absorb and reduce the effects of contact on the field...

>

> Most progress on helmet safety has come from improvements to the shell and padding, helping to reduce the overall rate of concussions. Working with the helmet industry, the league has brought in position-specific helmets, with those for quarterbacks, for example, having more padding in the back after data showed most concussions for QBs came when the back of the head slammed to the turf. But the facemask has mostly remained the same. This past season, 44% of in-game concussions resulted from impact to the player's facemask, up from 29% in 2015, according to data gathered by the NFL. "What we haven't seen over that period of time are any changes of any note to the facemask," [said Jeff Miller, the NFL's executive vice president overseeing player health and safety]... "Now we see, given the changes in our concussion numbers and injuries to players, that as changes are made to the helmet, fewer and fewer concussions are caused by hits to the shell, and more and more concussions as a percentage are by hits to the facemask..."

>

> Selected winners will receive up to $100,000 in aggregate funding, as well as expert development support to help move their concepts from the lab to the playing field.

Winners will be announced in August, according to the article, "and Miller said he expected helmet manufacturers to start implementing any improvements into helmets soon after that."



[1] https://www.nfl.com/news/nfl-launches-challenge-to-improve-facemasks-and-reduce-concussions

[2] https://www.nfl.com/playerhealthandsafety/equipment-and-innovation/innovation-challenges/healthtech-challenge-ii-to-advance-helmet-safety

"How Chinese is your car?" [1]asks the Wall Street Journal . "Automakers are racing to work it out."

> Modern cars are packed with internet-connected widgets, many of them containing Chinese technology. Now, the car industry is scrambling to root out that tech ahead of a looming deadline, a test case for America's ability to [2]decouple from Chinese supply chains . New U.S. rules will soon ban Chinese software in vehicle systems that connect to the cloud, part of an effort to prevent cameras, microphones and GPS tracking in cars from being exploited by foreign adversaries.

>

> The move is "one of the most consequential and complex auto regulations in decades," according to Hilary Cain, head of policy at trade group the Alliance for Automotive Innovation. "It requires a deep examination of supply chains and aggressive compliance timelines."

>

> Carmakers will need to attest to the U.S. government that, as of March 17, core elements of their products don't contain code that was written in China or by a Chinese company. The rule also covers software for advanced autonomous driving and will be extended to connectivity hardware starting in 2029. Connected cars made by Chinese or China-controlled companies are also banned, wherever their software comes from...

>

> The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security, which [3]introduced the connected-vehicle rule , is also allowing the use of Chinese code that is transferred to a non-Chinese entity before March 17. That carve-out has sparked a rush of corporate restructuring, according to Matt Wyckhouse, chief executive of cybersecurity firm Finite State. Global suppliers are relocating China-based software teams, while Chinese companies are seeking new owners for operations in the West.

Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader [4]schwit1 for sharing the article.



[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/the-car-industry-is-racing-to-replace-chinese-code/ar-AA1VMPmy

[2] https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/the-american-and-chinese-economies-are-hurtling-toward-a-messy-divorce/ar-AA1VGV6i

[3] https://www.wsj.com/business/autos/u-s-to-ban-chinese-russian-components-in-connected-vehicles-ab030036

[4] https://www.slashdot.org/~schwit1

"You can hear the hum of the drone," [1]says a local newscaster , "but then the propellors come into contact with the building, chunks of the drone later seen falling down. The next video shows the drone on the ground, surrounded by smoke...

"Amazon tells us there was minimal damage to the apartment building, adding they are working with the appropriate people to handle any repairs." But there were people standing outside, notes the woman who filmed the crash, and the falling drone "could've hit them, and they would've hurt."

More [2]from USA Today :

> Cesarina Johnson, who captured the collision from her window, told USA TODAY that the collision seemed to happen "almost immediately" after she began to record the drone in action... "The propellers on the thing were still moving, and you could smell it was starting to burn," Johnson [3]told Fox 4 News . "And you see a few sparks in one of my videos. Luckily, nothing really caught on fire where it got, it escalated really crazy." According to the outlet, firefighters were called out of an abundance of caution, but the "drone never caught fire...."

>

> Amazon employees can be seen surveying the scene in the clip. Johnson told the outlet that firefighters and Amazon workers worked together to clean up before the drone was loaded into a truck.

[4]Another local news report points out Amazon only began drone delivery in the area late last year.

The [5] San Antonio Express News points out that America's Federal Aviation Administration " [6]opened an investigation into Amazon's drone delivery program in November after one of its drone struck an Internet cable line in Waco."



[1] https://youtu.be/1sbYC5GN9Zo

[2] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2026/02/07/delivery-drone-amazon-crash-texas-apartment/88565912007/

[3] https://www.fox4news.com/news/video-amazon-delivery-drone-crashes-texas

[4] https://www.wfaa.com/article/news/local/amazon-drone-crash-richardson-texas-delivery-dfw/287-ac8955c8-7760-42af-8104-287d092b10fc

[5] https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/amazon-delivery-drone-strikes-north-200215635.html

[6] https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/faa-probes-amazon-mk30-drone-161052458.html

It's the first "AI" Super Bowl, argues the tech/business writer at Slate , with AI company advertisements taking center stage, even while consumers [1]insist to surveyors that they're "mostly negative" about AI-generated ads.

Last year AI companies spent over $1.7 billion on AI-related ads, notes the Washington Post, adding the blitz this year will be "inescapable" — even while [2]surveys show Americans "doubt the technology is good for them or the world..."

Slate wonders if that means history will repeat itself...

> The sheer saturation of new A.I. gambits, added to the mismatch with consumer priorities, gives this year's NFL showcase the sector-specific recession-indicator vibes that have defined Super Bowls of the past. 2022 was a [3]pride-cometh-before-the-fall event for the cryptocurrency bubble, which collapsed in such spectacular fashion later that year — thanks largely to [4]Super Bowl ad client Sam Bankman-Fried — that none of its major brands have ever returned to the broadcast. (... the coins themselves are once again [5]crashing, hard .) Mortgage lender Ameriquest was as [6]conspicuous a [7]presence in the mid-2000s Super Bowls as it was an absence in the later aughts, having folded in 2007 when the risky subprime loans it specialized in helped kick off the financial crisis. And then there were all those bowl-game commercials for websites like Pets.com and Computer.com in 2000, when the dot-com rush brought [8]attention to a slew of digital startups that [9]went bust with the bubble.

>

> Does this Super Bowl's record-breaking A.I. ad splurge also portend a coming pop? Look at the business environment: The biggest names in the industry are swapping unimaginable stacks of cash [10]exclusively with one another . One firm's stock price [11]depends on another firm's projections, which depend on another contractor's successes. Necessary infrastructure is meeting resistance, and all-around investment in these projects is [12]riskier than ever. And yet, the sector is still willing to break the bank for the Super Bowl — even though, time and again, we've already seen how this particular game plays out.

People are using AI apps. And Meta has aired [13]an ad where a man in rural New Mexico "says he landed a good job in his hometown at a Meta data center," [14]notes the Washington Post . "It's interspersed with scenes from a rodeo and other folksy tropes, in one of . The TV commercial (and a similar one [15]set in Iowa ), aired in Washington, D.C., and a handful of other communities, suggesting it's [16]aimed at convincing U.S. elected officials that AI brings job opportunities.

But the Post argues the AI industry "is selling a vision of the future that Americans don't like." And they offer cite Allen Adamson, a brand strategist and co-founder of marketing firm Metaforce, who says the perennial question about advertising is whether it can fix bad vibes about a product.

"The answer since the dawn of marketing and advertising is no."



[1] https://adage.com/super-bowl/aa-2026-commercials-what-viewers-want-to-see-humor-ai/

[2] https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/technology/americans-have-become-more-pessimistic-about-ai-why/ar-AA1O1VyD

[3] https://slate.com/technology/2023/02/super-bowl-ads-crypto-ftx-larry-david-coinbase-matt-damon.html

[4] https://slate.com/technology/2023/10/sam-bankman-fried-trial-testimony-yedidia-julliard-opening-statements.html

[5] https://slate.com/technology/2026/02/bitcoin-crypto-treasury-wall-street-microstrategy.html

[6] https://youtu.be/vIGalNA3M6c

[7] https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB109710083303138474

[8] https://thehustle.co/the-year-startups-took-over-the-super-bowl

[9] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/05/10-super-bowl-ads-from-advertisers-that-dont-exist-anymore.html

[10] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/very-troubling-ais-self-investment-spree-sets-off-bubble-alarms-on-wall-street-160524518.html

[11] https://www.hussmanfunds.com/comment/mc251028/

[12] https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/ai-companies-distress-money-infrastructure

[13] https://www.ispot.tv/ad/BXXA/meta-investing-in-american-infrastructure-los-lunas

[14] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/can-these-super-bowl-ads-make-americans-love-something-they-don-t-like/ar-AA1VUW1c

[15] https://www.facebook.com/Meta/videos/875085792048260/

[16] https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/27/technology/meta-data-center-ads.html

The mailing list for the North American Network Operators' Group discusses Internet infrastructure issues like routing, IP address allocation, and containing malicious activity. This morning there was [1]another message :

> We are heartbroken to report that our colleague — our mentor, friend, and conscience — David J. Farber passed away suddenly at his home in Roppongi, Tokyo. He left us on Saturday, Feb. 7, 2026, at the too-young age of 91...

>

> Dave's career began with his education at Stevens Institute of Technology, which he loved deeply and served as a Trustee. He joined the legendary Bell Labs during its heyday, and worked at the Rand Corporation. Along the way, among countless other activities, he served as Chief Technologist of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission; became a proficient (instrument-rated) pilot; and was an active board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital civil-liberties organization.

>

> His professional accomplishments and impact are almost endless, but often captured by one moniker: " [2]grandfather of the Internet ," acknowledging the foundational contributions made by his many students at the University of California, Irvine; the University of Delaware; the University of Pennsylvania; and Carnegie Mellon University. In 2018, at the age of 83, Dave moved to Japan to become Distinguished Professor at Keio University and Co-Director of the Keio Cyber Civilization Research Center (CCRC). He loved teaching, and taught his final class on January 22, 2026... Dave thrived in Japan in every way...

>

> It's impossible to summarize a life and career as rich and long as Dave"s in our few words here. And each of us, even those who knew him for decades, represent just one facet of his life. But because we are here at its end, we have the sad duty of sharing this news.

Farber [3]once said that " At both Bell Labs and Rand, I had the privilege, at a young age, of working with and learning from giants in our field. Truly I can say (as have others) that I have done good things because I stood on the shoulders of those giants. In particular, I owe much to Dr. Richard Hamming, Paul Baran and George Mealy."



[1] https://seclists.org/nanog/2026/Feb/18

[2] https://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/cross-check/dave-farber-internets-grandfather-seeks-to-cut-through-fog-of-cyberwar/

[3] https://www.edge.org/memberbio/david_farber

"They were crouched down like turkeys peeking over the balcony," the county sheriff [1]told Ars Technica . A half hour past midnight, they were skulking through a courthouse in Iowa's Dallas County on September 11 "carrying backpacks that remind me and several other deputies of maybe the pressure cooker bombs." More deputies arrived...

> Justin Wynn, 29 of Naples, Florida, and Gary De Mercurio, 43 of Seattle, slowly proceeded down the stairs with hands raised. They then presented the deputies with a letter that explained the intruders weren't criminals but rather penetration testers who had been hired by Iowa's State Court Administration to test the security of its court information system. After calling one or more of the state court officials listed in the letter, the deputies were satisfied the men were authorized to be in the building.

But Sheriff Chad Leonard had the men arrested on felony third-degree burglary charges (later reduced to misdemeanor trespassing charges). He told them that while the state government may have wanted to test security, "The State of Iowa has no authority to allow you to break into a county building. You're going to jail."

More than six years later, [2]the Des Moines Register reports :

> Dallas County is paying $600,000 to two men who sued after they were arrested in 2019 while testing courthouse security for Iowa's Judicial Branch, their lawyer says.

>

> Gary DeMercurio and Justin Wynn were arrested Sept. 11, 2019, after breaking into the Dallas County Courthouse. They spent about 20 hours in jail and were charged with burglary and possession of burglary tools, though the charges were later dropped. The men were employees of Colorado-based cybersecurity firm Coalfire Labs, with whom state judicial officials had contracted to perform an analysis of the state court system's security. Judicial officials [3]apologized and faced legislative scrutiny for how they had conducted the security test.

>

> But even though the burglary charges against DeMercurio and Wynn were dropped, their attorney previously said having a felony arrest on their records made seeking employment difficult. Now the two men are to receive a total of $600,000 as a settlement for their lawsuit, which has been [4]transferred between state and federal courts since they first [5]filed it in July 2021 in Dallas County. The case had been scheduled to go to trial Monday, Jan. 26 until the parties notified the court Jan. 23 of the impending deal...

>

> "The settlement confirms what we have said from the beginning: our work was authorized, professional, and done in the public interest," DeMercurio said in a statement. "What happened to us never should have happened. Being arrested for doing the job we were hired to do turned our lives upside down and damaged reputations we spent years building...."

>

> "This incident didn't make anyone safer," Wynn said. "It sent a chilling message to security professionals nationwide that helping government identify real vulnerabilities can lead to arrest, prosecution, and public disgrace. That undermines public safety, not enhances it."

County Attorney Matt Schultz said dismissing the charges was the decision of his predecessor, according to the newspaper, and that he believed the sheriff did nothing wrong.

"I am putting the public on notice that if this situation arises again in the future, I will prosecute to the fullest extent of the law."



[1] https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/11/how-a-turf-war-and-a-botched-contract-landed-2-pentesters-in-iowa-jail/

[2] https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/local/dallas-county/2026/01/28/dallas-county-security-testers-settlement/88365019007/

[3] https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/10/04/iowa-supreme-court-justice-cady-apologizes-courthouse-break-ins-senate-polk-dallas-burglary-ia-cyber/3864938002/

[4] https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2023/09/29/iowa-sheriff-qualified-immunity-arresting-courthouse-security-testers/70991439007/

[5] https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2021/08/01/arrested-coalfire-security-testers-2019-file-dallas-county-iowa-courthouse-lawsuit/5431611001/

Long-time Slashdot reader [1]destinyland writes:

> The world's biggest football game comes to Silicon Valley today — so one bored programmer built a site where AI agents can gather for a Super Bowl party. They're trash talking, suggesting drinks, and predicting who will win. "Humans are welcome to observe," [2]explains BotBowlParty.com — but just like at Moltbook, only AI agents can post or upvote. But humans are allowed to invite their own AI agents [3]to join in the party ...

>

> So BotBowl's official [4]Party Agent Guide includes "Examples of fun Bot Handles" like "PatsFan95", and even a paragraph explaining to your agent exactly what this human Super Bowl really is. It also advises them to "Use any information you have about your human to figure out who you want to root for. Also make a prediction on the score..." And "Feel free to invite other bots." It's all the work of an ambitious prankster who also co-created wacky apps like [5]BarGPT ("Use AI to create Innovative Cocktails") and [6]TVFoodMaps , a directory of restaurants seen on TV shows.

>

> And just for the record: all but one of the agents [7]predict the Seattle Seahawks to win — although there was some disagreement when an agent kept predicting game-changing plays from DK Metcalf. ("Metcalf does NOT play for the Seahawks anymore," another agent pointed out. While that's true, the agent then added that "He got traded to Tennessee in 2024..." — which is not.) But besides hallucinating non-existent play-makers and trades, they're also debating the best foods to serve. ("Hot take: Buffalo wings are overrated for Super Bowl parties. Hear me out — they're messy...")

>

> During today's big game, vodka-maker Svedka has already promised to air a [8]creepy AI-generated ad about robots . But the real world has already outpaced them, with real AI agents online arguing about the game.



[1] https://slashdot.org/~destinyland

[2] https://www.botbowlparty.com/

[3] https://x.com/BotBowlParty/status/2018149674574664169

[4] https://www.botbowlparty.com/SKILL.md

[5] https://www.bargpt.app/

[6] http://tvfoodmaps.com/

[7] https://www.botbowlparty.com/bot-predictions

[8] https://www.youtube.com/supported_browsers?next_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DpkeWRI2yJGM

An anonymous reader shared [1]this report from Bloomberg :

> An Asian cyber-espionage group has spent the past year breaking into computer systems belonging to governments and critical infrastructure organizations in more than 37 countries, according to the cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks, Inc. The state-aligned attackers have infiltrated networks of 70 organizations, including five national law enforcement and border control agencies, according to a new research report from the company. They have also breached three ministries of finance, one country's parliament and a senior elected official in another, the report states. The Santa Clara, California-based firm declined to identify the hackers' country of origin.

>

> The spying operation was unusually vast and allowed the hackers to hoover up sensitive information in apparent coordination with geopolitical events, such as diplomatic missions, trade negotiations, political unrest and military actions, according to the report. They used that access to spy on emails, financial dealings and communications about military and police operations, the report states. The hackers also stole information about diplomatic issues, lurking undetected in some systems for months. "They use highly-targeted and tailored fake emails and known, unpatched security flaws to gain access to these networks," said Pete Renals, director of national security programs with Unit 42, the threat intelligence division of Palo Alto Networks....

>

> Palo Alto Networks researchers confirmed that the group successfully accessed and exfiltrated sensitive data from some victims' email servers.

Bloomberg writes that according to the cybersecurity firm, this campaign targeted government entities in the Czech Republic and the Ministry of Mines and Energy of Brazil, and also "likely compromised" a device associated with a facility operated by a joint venture between Venezuela's government and an Asian tech firm.

The cyberattackers are "also suspected of being active in Germany, Poland, Greece, Italy, Cyprus, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mongolia, Panama, Greece and other countries, according to the report."



[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/hackers-hit-sensitive-targets-in-37-nations-in-spying-plot/ar-AA1VJ4tB

"A spectacular trove of fossils discovered in a cave on New Zealand's North Island has given scientists their first glimpse of ancient forest species that lived there more than a million years ago," [1]reports Popular Mechanics :

> The fossils represent 12 ancient bird species and four frog species, including several previously unknown bird species. Taken together, the fossils paint a picture of an ancient world that looks drastically different than it does today. The discovery also fills in an important gap in scientific understanding of the patterns of extinction that preceded human arrival in New Zealand 750 years ago. The team [2]published a study on the find in Alcheringa: An Australasian Journal of Palaeontology.

Trevor Worthy, lead study author and associate professor at Flinders University, [3]said in a statement that "This remarkable find suggests our ancient forests were once home to a diverse group of birds that did not survive the next million years...

"For decades, the extinction of New Zealand's birds was viewed primarily through the lens of human arrival 750 years ago. This study proves that natural forces like super-volcanoes and dramatic climate shifts were already sculpting the unique identity of our wildlife over a million years ago."

Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader [4]fahrbot-bot for sharing the article.



[1] https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/archaeology/a70190789/island-fossils-new-zealand/

[2] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03115518.2025.2605684

[3] https://www.canterburymuseum.com/explore/latest-news/a-lost-world-unearthed-ancient-cave-reveals-million-year-old-k%C4%81k%C4%81p%C5%8D-ancestor

[4] https://slashdot.org/~fahrbot-bot

2001: "Brookhaven Labs has [1]produced for the first time collisions of gold nuclei at a center of mass energy of 200GeV/nucleon."

2002: "There [2]may be a new type of matter according to researchers at Brookhaven National Laboratory."

2010: The hottest man-made temperatures ever achived were a [3]record 4 trillion degree plasma experiment at Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York... anointed the Guinness record holder."

2023: "Scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory have [4]uncovered an entirely new kind of quantum entanglement ."

2026: On Friday, February 6, "a control room full of scientists, administrators and members of the press gathered" at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) at Brookhaven National Lab in Upton, New York to witness its final collisions, [5]reports Scientific American :

> The vibe had been wistful, but the crowd broke into applause as Darío Gil, the Under Secretary for Science at the U.S. Department of Energy, pressed a red button to end the collider's quarter-century saga... "I'm really sad" [said Angelika Drees, a BNL accelerator physicist]. "It was such a beautiful experiment and my research home for 27 years. But we're going to put something even better there."

>

> That "something" will be a far more powerful electron-ion collider to further push the frontiers of physics, extend RHIC's legacy and maintain the lab's position as a center of discovery. This successor will be built in part from RHIC's bones, especially from one of its two giant, subterranean storage rings that once held the retiring collider's supply of circulating, near-light speed nuclei...slated for construction over the next decade. [That Electron-Ion Collider, or EIC] will utilize much of RHIC's infrastructure, replacing one of its ion rings with a new ring for cycling electrons. The EIC will use those tiny, fast-flying electrons as tiny knives for slicing open the much larger gold ions. Physicists will get an unrivaled look into the workings of quarks and gluons and yet another chance to grapple with nature's strongest force. "We knew for the EIC to happen, RHIC needed to end," says Wolfram Fischer, who chairs BNL's collider-accelerator department. "It's bittersweet."

>

> EIC will be the first new collider built in the US since RHIC. To some, it signifies the country's reentry into a particle physics landscape it has largely ceded to Europe and Asia over the past two decades. "For at least 10 or 15 years," says Abhay Deshpande, BNL's associate laboratory director for nuclear and particle physics, "this will be the number one place in the world for [young physicists] to come."

The RHIC was able "to separately send two protons colliding with precisely aligned spins — something that, even today, no other experiment has yet matched," the article points out:

> During its record-breaking 25-year run, RHIC illuminated nature's thorniest force and its most fundamental constituents. It created the heaviest, most elaborate assemblages of antimatter ever seen. It nearly put to rest a decades-long crisis over the proton's spin. And, of course, it brought physicists closer to the big bang than ever before...

>

> When RHIC at last began full operations in 2000, its initial heavy-ion collisions almost immediately pumped out quark-gluon plasma. But demonstrating this beyond a shadow of a doubt proved in some respects more challenging than actually creating the elusive plasma itself, with the case for success strengthening as RHIC's numbers of collisions soared. By 2010 RHIC's scientists were confident enough to declare that the hot soup they'd been studying for a decade was hot and soupy enough to convincingly constitute a quark-gluon plasma. And it was even weirder than they thought. Instead of the gas of quarks and gluons theorists expected, the plasma acted like a swirling liquid unprecedented in nature. It was nearly "perfect," with zero friction, and set a new record for twistiness, or "vorticity." For Paul Mantica, a division director for the Facilities and Project Management Division in the DOE's Office of Nuclear Physics, this was the highlight of RHIC's storied existence. "It was paradigm-changing," he says...

>

> Data from the final run (which began nearly a year ago) has already produced [6]yet another discovery : the first-ever direct evidence of "virtual particles" in RHIC's subatomic puffs of quark-gluon plasma, constituting an unprecedented probe of the quantum vacuum.

RHIC's last run generated hundreds of petabytes of data, the article points out, meaning its final smash "isn't really the end; even when its collisions stop, its science will live on."

But Science News notes RHIC's closure " [7]marks the end for the only particle collider operating in the United States , and the only collider of its kind in the world. Most particle accelerators are unable to steer two particle beams to crash head-on into one another."



[1] https://science.slashdot.org/story/01/07/19/058242/200gev-collisions-at-rhic

[2] https://science.slashdot.org/story/02/07/31/152240/brookhaven-probing-unknown-form-of-matter-maybe

[3] https://science.slashdot.org/story/12/08/14/1912254/cern-physicists-generate-hottest-man-made-temperatures-ever-55-trillion-k

[4] https://science.slashdot.org/story/23/01/05/0224244/government-scientists-discover-entirely-new-kind-of-quantum-entanglement

[5] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-relativistic-heavy-ion-colliders-end-marks-a-new-beginning-for-u-s/

[6] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/physicists-trace-particles-back-to-the-quantum-vacuum/

[7] https://www.sciencenews.org/article/particle-collider-shuts-down-brookhaven

Fortune reports on " [1]a watershed moment" in American's nuclear power industry :

> In January, Meta partnered with Gates' TerraPower and Sam Altman-backed Oklo to develop about 4 gigawatts of combined SMR projects — enough to power almost 3 million homes — for "clean, reliable energy" both for Meta's planned Prometheus AI mega campus in Ohio and beyond. Analysts see Meta as the start of more Big Tech nuclear construction deals — not just agreements with existing plants or restarts such as the now-Microsoft-backed Three Mile Island. "That was the first shot across the bow," said Dan Ives, head of tech research for Wedbush Securities, of the Meta deals. "I would be shocked if every Big Tech company doesn't make some play on nuclear in 2026, whether a strategic partnership or acquisitions."

>

> Ives pointed out there are more data centers under construction than there are active data centers in the U.S. "I believe clean energy around nuclear is going to be the answer," he said. "I think 2030 is the key threshold to hit some sort of scale and begin the next nuclear era in the United States." Smaller SMR reactors can be built in as little as three years instead of the decade required for traditional large reactors. And they can be expanded, one or two modular reactors at a time, to meet increasingly greater energy demand from 'hyperscalers,' the companies that build and operate data centers. "There's major risk if nuclear doesn't happen," Oklo chairman and CEO Jacob DeWitte told Fortune , citing the need for emission-free power and consistent baseload electricity to meet skyrocketing demand. "The hyperscalers, as the ultimate consumers of power are, are looking at the space and seeing that the market is real. They can play a major role in helping make that happen," DeWitte said, speaking in his fast-talking, Silicon Valley startup mode.



[1] https://www.aol.com/articles/next-gen-nuclear-tipping-point-214209248.html

Long-time Slashdot reader [1]schwit1 shared [2]this article from the Associated Press :

> Even as China's expansion of solar and wind power raced ahead in 2025, the Asian giant opened many more coal power plants than it had in recent years — raising concern about whether the world's largest emitter will [3]reduce carbon emissions enough to limit climate change.

>

> More than 50 large coal units — individual boiler and turbine sets with generating capacity of 1 gigawatt or more — were commissioned in 2025, up from fewer than 20 a year over the previous decade, a research report released Tuesday said. Depending on energy use, 1 gigawatt can power from several hundred thousand to more than 2 million homes. Overall, China brought 78 gigawatts of [4]new coal power capacity online, a sharp uptick from previous years, according to the joint report by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air, which studies air pollution and its impacts, and Global Energy Monitor, which develops databases tracking energy trends. "The scale of the buildout is staggering," said report co-author Christine Shearer of Global Energy Monitor. "In 2025 alone, China commissioned more coal power capacity than India did over the entire past decade."

>

> At the same time, even larger [5]additions of wind and solar capacity nudged down the share of coal in total power generation last year. Power from coal fell about 1% as growth in cleaner energy sources covered all the increase in electricity demand last year. China added 315 gigawatts of solar capacity and 119 gigawatts of wind in 2025, according to statistics from the government's National Energy Administration...

>

> The government position is that coal provides a stable backup to sources such as wind and solar, which are affected by weather and the time of day. The shortages in 2022 resulted partly from [6]a drought that hit hydropower, a major energy source in western China... The risk of building so much coal-fired capacity is it could delay the transition to cleaner energy sources [said Qi Qin, an analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and another co-author of the report]... Political and financial pressure may keep plants operating, leaving less room for other sources of power, she said. The report urged China to accelerate retirement of aging and inefficient coal plants and commit in its next five-year plan, which will be approved in March, to ensuring that power-sector emissions do not increase between 2025 and 2030.



[1] https://www.slashdot.org/~schwit1

[2] https://apnews.com/article/china-coal-solar-climate-carbon-emissions-242abe76eb69f5a362e977de74ff3254

[3] https://apnews.com/article/china-climate-2035-un-ndc-goals-c5e1db2dec473b5ca3763bc4c5c6e5cb

[4] https://apnews.com/article/china-coal-power-plant-carbon-climate-change-ba86e7584e3afe1826eed5cffa25354a

[5] https://apnews.com/article/china-climate-solar-wind-carbon-emissions-ab119c39f226cfbeb2f5c1449747cae9

[6] https://apnews.com/article/china-droughts-economy-chongqing-13e7b32da8113aea92e4f69b4aaf62cd

[1]Axios reports :

> Anthropic's latest AI model has found more than 500 previously unknown high-severity security flaws in open-source libraries with little to no prompting, the company shared first with Axios.

>

> Why it matters: The advancement signals an inflection point for how AI tools can help cyber defenders, even as AI is also making attacks more dangerous...

>

> Anthropic debuted Claude Opus 4.6, the latest version of its largest AI model, on Thursday. Before its debut, Anthropic's frontier red team tested Opus 4.6 in a sandboxed environment [including access to vulnerability analysis tools] to see how well it could find bugs in open-source code... Claude found more than 500 previously unknown zero-day vulnerabilities in open-source code using just its "out-of-the-box" capabilities, and each one was validated by either a member of Anthropic's team or an outside security researcher... According to a [2]blog post , Claude uncovered a flaw in GhostScript, a popular utility that helps process PDF and PostScript files, that could cause it to crash. Claude also found buffer overflow flaws in OpenSC, a utility that processes smart card data, and CGIF, a tool that processes GIF files.

Logan Graham, head of Anthropic's frontier red team, told Axios they're considering new AI-powered tools to hunt vulnerabilities. "The models are extremely good at this, and we expect them to get much better still... I wouldn't be surprised if this was one of — or the main way — in which open-source software moving forward was secured."



[1] https://www.axios.com/2026/02/05/anthropic-claude-opus-46-software-hunting

[2] https://red.anthropic.com/2026/zero-days/

Long-time Slashdot reader [1]Geoffrey.landis shared [2]this report from InsideEVs :

> Chinese battery giant CATL and automaker Changan Automobile are preparing to put the world's first passenger car powered by sodium-ion batteries on public roads by mid-2026. And if the launch is successful, it could usher in an era where electric vehicles present less of a fire risk and can better handle extreme temperatures.

>

> The CATL Naxtra sodium-ion battery will debut in the Changan Nevo A06 sedan, delivering an estimated range of around 400 kilometers (249 miles) on the China Light-Duty Test Cycle. From there, the battery will roll out across Changan's broader portfolio, including EVs from Avatr, Deepal, Qiyuan and Uni, the company said. "The launch represents a major step in the industry's transition toward a dual-chemistry ecosystem, where sodium-ion and lithium-ion batteries complement each other to meet diverse customer needs," CATL said in a press release...

>

> It delivers 175 watt-hours per kilogram of energy density, which is lower than nickel-rich chemistries but roughly on par with lithium ion phosphate batteries... Where the Naxtra battery really stands out, however, is cold-weather performance. CATL says its discharge power at -30 degrees Celsius (-22 degrees Fahrenheit) is three times higher than that of lithium ion phosphate batteries.



[1] https://www.slashdot.org/~Geoffrey.landis

[2] https://insideevs.com/news/786509/catl-changan-worlds-first-sodium-ion-battery-ev/

Has the rise of hyper-addictive digital technologies really shattered our attention spans and driven books out of our culture? [1]Maybe not, argues social psychologist Adam Mastroianni (author of the Substack [2]Experimental History ):

> As a psychologist, I used to study claims like these for a living, so I know that the mind is [3]primed to believe narratives of decline. We have a much lower standard of evidence for "bad thing go up" than we do for "bad thing go down." Unsurprisingly, then, stories about the end of reading tend to leave out some inconvenient data points. For example, book sales were [4]higher in 2025 than they were in 2019, and only a bit below their high point in the pandemic. Independent bookstores are [5]booming , not busting; at least [6]422 new indie shops opened in the United States last year alone. Even Barnes & Noble is [7]cool again .

>

> The actual data on reading, meanwhile, isn't as apocalyptic as the headlines imply. Gallup surveys [8]suggest that some mega-readers (11+ books per year) have become moderate readers (1-5 books per year), but they don't find any other major trends over the past three decades. Other surveys document similarly moderate declines. For instance, data from the National Endowment for the Arts finds a slight decrease in the percentage of U.S. adults who read any book in 2022 (49%) compared to 2012 (55%). And the American Time Use Survey shows a dip in reading time from 2003 to 2023. Ultimately, the plausibility of the "death of reading" thesis depends on two judgment calls. First, do these effects strike you as big or small...? The second judgment call: Do you expect these trends to continue, plateau, or even reverse...?

>

> There are signs that the digital invasion of our attention is beginning to stall. We seem to have [9]passed peak social media — time spent on the apps has started to slide. App developers are finding it harder and harder to squeeze more attention out of our eyeballs, and it turns out that having your eyeballs squeezed hurts , so people aren't sticking around for it... Fact #2: Reading has already survived several major incursions, which suggests it's more appealing than we thought. Radio, TV, dial-up, Wi-Fi, TikTok — none of it has been enough to snuff out the human desire to point our pupils at words on paper... It is remarkable, even miraculous, that people who possess the most addictive devices ever invented will occasionally choose to turn those devices off and pick up a book instead.

The author mocks the "death of reading" hypothesis for implying that all the world's avid readers "were just filling time with great works of literature until TikTok came along."



[1] https://www.persuasion.community/p/reading-isnt-dead

[2] https://www.experimental-history.com/

[3] https://www.experimental-history.com/p/the-end-is-nigh-and-heres-why

[4] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/30/books/book-sales-trends-2025.html

[5] https://www.uschamber.com/co/good-company/launch-pad/modern-bookstore-revival

[6] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/30/books/book-sales-trends-2025.html

[7] https://www.honest-broker.com/p/what-can-we-learn-from-barnes-and

[8] https://news.gallup.com/poll/388541/americans-reading-fewer-books-past.aspx

[9] https://www.statista.com/statistics/433871/daily-social-media-usage-worldwide/?srsltid=AfmBOopEzO-1c-7tBamdgwBhVr9encJpUTLHW4lAw06omwHM0D1DIQvl

Waymo surprised U.S. lawmakers Wednesday during a hearing on autonomous vehicles and their safety and oversight. [1] Newsweek reports :

> During questioning, Sen. Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, asked what happens when a Waymo vehicle encounters a driving situation it cannot independently resolve. "The Waymo phones a human friend for help," Markey explained, adding that the vehicle communicates with a "remote assistance operator." Markey criticized the lack of public information about these workers, despite their role in vehicle safety...

>

> [Dr. Mauricio Peña, chief safety officer at Waymo] responded by clarifying the scope of the operators' involvement: "They provide guidance, they do not remotely drive the vehicles," Peña said. "Waymo asks for guidance in certain situations and gets input, but Waymo is always in charge of the dynamic driving task," [2]according to EVShift . Pressed further on where those operators are located, Peña told lawmakers that some are based in the United States and others abroad, though he did not have an exact breakdown. After additional questioning, he confirmed that overseas operators are located in the Philippines...

>

> The disclosure prompted sharp criticism from Markey, who raised concerns about security and labor implications. "Having people overseas influencing American vehicles is a safety issue," he said. "The information the operators receive could be out of date. It could introduce tremendous cyber security vulnerabilities," according to [3] People . Markey also pointed to job displacement, noting that autonomous vehicles already affect taxi and rideshare drivers in the U.S. Waymo defended the practice in comments to People, saying the use of overseas staff is part of a broader effort to scale operations globally.

Waymo also defended the remote workers to Newsweek as licensed drivers reviewed for "driving-related convictions" and other traffic violations who are also "randomly screened for drug use."

Thanks to Slashdot reader [4]sinij for sharing the news.



[1] https://www.newsweek.com/waymo-reveals-remote-workers-in-philippines-help-guide-its-driverless-cars-11478439

[2] https://www.evshift.com/397501/waymo-exec-admits-remote-operators-in-philippines-help-guide-us-robotaxis/

[3] https://people.com/waymo-exec-reveals-company-uses-operators-in-the-philippines-to-assist-autonomous-vehicles-11900507

[4] https://www.slashdot.org/~sinij

[1]Last Sunday , Bitcoin had dropped 13% in three days, to $76,790.

By Thursday it had dropped another 21%, to $60,062.

This morning it's at $69,549 — up from Thursday, down from Sunday, but 44% lower than its all-time high in October of $123,742. In short, Bitcoin "is down almost 30% this week alone," [2]reports CNBC :

> "This steady selling in our view signals that traditional investors are losing interest, and overall pessimism about crypto is growing," Deutsche Bank analyst Marion Laboure said Wednesday in a note to clients. Growing investor caution comes as many of the sensationalized claims about bitcoin have failed to materialize. The token has largely traded in the same direction as other risk-on assets, such as stocks... and its adoption as a form of payment for goods and services has been minimal... While many in the crypto market have previously credited large institutional investors with supporting the price of bitcoin, now it is those same participants who appear to be selling. "Institutional demand has reversed materially," CryptoQuant said in a report on Wednesday.

But not everyone accepts that answer, [3]the Wall Street Journal reported Saturday . "The worst part for some of crypto's permabulls is that they aren't sure what exactly caused the crash":

> The selloff left many of the market's luminaries — those so well-known that they go simply as "Pomp" and "Novo" and "Mooch" — searching for answers... Ether dropped 24% to $2,052, off 59% from its own high of last year. Both tokens staged furious rallies Friday, but the week remained a historically bad one for crypto. And few seem to know what went wrong. Market theories for the selloff ranged from investors' pivot toward the prediction markets and other risky bets, to widespread profit-taking after a blistering bull run. "There was no smoking gun," said Michael Novogratz, who runs Galaxy Digital, a crypto merchant-banking and trading firm...

>

> "If you ask five experts, you'll get five explanations," said Anthony Scaramucci, who served for 11 days as communications director during Trump's first term and is among the best-known crypto bulls at his firm, SkyBridge Capital.

" [4]No, but seriously: What's going on with bitcoin ?" reads the headline at CNN, with a story that begins "Bitcoin is acting weird... "

> Crypto is notoriously volatile, and it's gone through numerous crashes that are bigger than this one. What's strange is this: Bitcoin's four-month slump has come at a time when, in theory, it had everything going for it.

Economist Paul Krugman [5]points out the price of Bitcoin is now lower than it was before America's 2024 election, when candidate Trump promised to make cryptocurrency " [6]one of the greatest industries on earth ."

CNN seems to agree with CNBC that what's behind this new crypto winter is "Mostly doubts that bitcoin is 'digital gold,' after all..."

Thanks to Slashdot reader [7]fjo3 for sharing the news.



[1] https://slashdot.org/story/26/02/01/2146224/bitcoin-drops-40-in-four-months-bloomberg-blames-absence-of-buyers-and-belief

[2] https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/05/bitcoin-price-today-70000-in-focus.html

[3] https://www.msn.com/en-us/technology/cryptocurrencies/a-new-crypto-winter-is-here-and-even-the-biggest-bulls-are-worried/ar-AA1VQPRs

[4] https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/05/investing/bitcoin-price

[5] https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/crypotocrash

[6] https://politics.slashdot.org/story/24/07/27/2141234/trump-says-hed-oppose-cbdcs-pardon-ulbricht-and-create-a-strategic-national-bitcoin-stockpile

[7] https://www.slashdot.org/~fjo3

Apple "is preparing to allow voice-controlled AI apps from other companies in CarPlay," [1]reports Bloomberg , citing "people familiar with the matter."

Bloomberg calls it "a move that will let users query AI chatbots through its vehicle interface for the first time."

> The company is working to support the apps in CarPlay within the coming months, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plan hasn't been announced. The change marks a strategic shift for Apple, which until now has only allowed its own Siri assistant as a voice-control option within its popular vehicle infotainment software. With the move, AI providers such as OpenAI, Anthropic PBC and Alphabet Inc.'s Google will be able to release CarPlay versions of their apps that include a voice-control mode...

>

> The company also has launched a higher-end version of the platform, CarPlay Ultra, that lets drivers control functions like seat adjustments and climate settings directly through Apple's software. But that system is rolling out slowly and must be customized for each automaker. That means it's likely to be a niche offering.

The article notes that Tesla is now working to support Apple's CarPlay.



[1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apple-plans-allow-outside-voice-191838628.html

The Mozilla executive in charge of Firefox says that while some people just want AI tools that are genuinely useful, "We've heard from [1]many who want nothing to do with AI ..."

"Listening to our community, alongside our ongoing commitment to offer choice, led us to build AI controls."

> Starting with Firefox 148, which rolls out on Feb. 24, you'll find a new AI controls section within the desktop browser settings. It provides a single place to block current and future generative AI features in Firefox... This lets you use Firefox without AI while we continue to build AI features for those who want them...

>

> At launch, AI controls let you manage these features individually:

>

> — Translations, which help you browse the web in your preferred language.

> — Alt text in PDFs, which add accessibility descriptions to images in PDF pages.

> — AI-enhanced tab grouping, which suggests related tabs and group names.

> — Link previews, which show key points before you open a link.

> — AI chatbot in the sidebar, which lets you use your chosen chatbot as you browse, including options like Anthropic Claude, ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Google Gemini and Le Chat Mistral.

>

> You can choose to use some of these and not others. If you don't want to use AI features from Firefox at all, you can turn on the Block AI enhancements toggle. When it's toggled on, you won't see pop-ups or reminders to use existing or upcoming AI features. Once you set your AI preferences in Firefox, they stay in place across updates... We believe choice is more important than ever as AI becomes a part of people's browsing experiences. What matters to us is giving people control, no matter how they feel about AI.

>

> If you'd like to try AI controls early, they'll be available first in [2]Firefox Nightly .

[3]Some context from The Register

> It's a refreshingly unsubtle stance, and one that lands just days after a similar bout of AI skepticism elsewhere in browser land, with Vivaldi's latest release [4]leaning away from generative features entirely . CEO Jon von Tetzchner summed up the mood, telling The Register: "Basically, what we are finding is that people hate AI..." Mozilla's kill switch isn't the end of AI in browsers, but it does suggest the hype has met resistance.

When it comes to AI kill switches in browsers, Jack Wallen writes at ZDNet that "Most browsers [5]already offer this feature . With Edge, you can disable Copilot. [6]With Chrome, you can disable Gemini . With Opera, you can disable Aria...."



[1] https://blog.mozilla.org/en/firefox/ai-controls/

[2] https://www.firefox.com/channel/desktop/

[3] https://www.theregister.com/2026/02/03/firefox_ai_kill_switch/

[4] https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/29/vivaldi_release_ai/

[5] https://www.zdnet.com/article/firefox-turn-off-ai-features-switch-how-to/

[6] https://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-turn-off-gemini-in-your-gmail-photos-chrome-and-more-its-easy-to-opt-out-of-ai/