The long-running [1]Advent of Code site just entered its 10th year, with 162,809 people completing both of its Day One puzzles (which involve a hunt for the missing historian of the North Pole). But its not the only site offering Christmas-themed programming puzzles:

Hundreds of SQL lovers are trying the daily challenges from the " [2]Advent of SQL" site .

You can sign up for daily emails with webdev challenges from the [3]Advent of JavaScript and [4]Advent of CSS sites.

The " [5]Advent of No-Code" site challenges you to build something new every day using no-code tools like AI-powered dev environments or the social coding site Val Town.

[6]TryHackMe.com is publishing "beginner-friendly, daily gamified cyber security challenges" in an event they're calling the "Advent of Cyber."

And Norway's biggest chess club (founded by world champion Magnus Carlsen) has even launched a site with daily chess puzzles called — what else? — [7]Advent of Chess . (It promises at the end of the event someone will win a chessboard signed by Magnus Carlsen).



[1] https://adventofcode.com/

[2] https://adventofsql.com/

[3] https://www.adventofjs.com/

[4] https://www.adventofcss.com/

[5] https://www.adventofnocode.io/

[6] https://tryhackme.com/r/christmas

[7] https://adventofchess.com/

A handful of countries should be held legally responsible for the ongoing impacts of climate change, [1]representatives of vulnerable states have told judges at the international court of justice (ICJ). From a report:

> During a hearing at the Peace Palace in The Hague, which began on Monday, Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu's special envoy for climate change and environment, said responsibility for the climate crisis lay squarely with "a handful of readily identifiable states" that had produced the vast majority of greenhouse gas emissions but stood to lose the least from the impacts.

>

> The court heard how Pacific island states such as Vanuatu were bearing the brunt of rising sea levels and increasingly frequent and severe disasters. "We find ourselves on the frontlines of a crisis we did not create," Regenvanu said. The hearing is the culmination of years of campaigning by a group of Pacific island law students and diplomacy spearheaded by Vanuatu. In March last year the UN general assembly unanimously approved a resolution calling on the ICJ to provide an advisory opinion on what obligations states have to tackle climate change and what the legal consequences could be if they fail to do so.

>

> Over the next two weeks, the court will hear statements from 98 countries, including wealthy developed states with the greatest historical responsibility for the climate emergency, such as the UK and Russia, and states that have contributed very little to global greenhouse gas emissions but stand to bear the brunt of their impact, including Bangladesh and Sudan as well as Pacific island countries.



[1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/dec/02/handful-of-countries-responsible-for-climate-crisis-icj-court-told

A ransomware attack on the multinational Stoli Group in August helped [1]push two of the vodka-maker's U.S. subsidiaries into bankruptcy , according to the company's CEO. From a report:

> In a Texas bankruptcy court filing on November 29, CEO Chris Caldwell attributed a range of external factors to the financial woes of Stoli Group USA and Kentucky Owl (KO) -- which are facing $84 million in debt. But one of the most prominent was a ransomware attack this year that damaged the parent company's IT system.

>

> "In August 2024, the Stoli Group's IT infrastructure suffered severe disruption in the wake of a data breach and ransomware attack," Caldwell said in the filing. "The attack caused substantial operational issues throughout all companies within the Stoli Group, including Stoli USA and KO, due to the Stoli Group's enterprise resource planning (ERP) system being disabled and most of the Stoli Group's internal processes (including accounting functions) being forced into a manual entry mode." Caldwell said the systems will be restored âoeno earlier than in the first quarter of 2025.â



[1] https://therecord.media/stoli-group-usa-bankruptcy-filing-ransomware

Meta is [1]using OpenAI's GPT-4 alongside its own Llama AI model in Metamate, an internal coding assistance tool, Fortune reported Tuesday. The dual-model approach has been in place since early 2024, despite CEO Mark Zuckerberg's public promotion of Llama as a leading AI model.

Metamate, previously known as Code Compose, serves Meta's developers and employees with coding support. The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Zuckerberg's philanthropic organization, is separately developing an educational AI tool using OpenAI's technology, with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman joining CZI's AI advisory board.



[1] https://fortune.com/2024/12/03/meta-openai-gpt-4-llama-coding-tool/

An anonymous reader shares a report:

> Meta is mistakenly [1]removing too much content across its apps , according to a top executive. Nick Clegg, Meta's president of global affairs, told reporters on Monday that the company's moderation "error rates are still too high" and pledged to "improve the precision and accuracy with which we act on our rules."

>

> "We know that when enforcing our policies, our error rates are still too high, which gets in the way of the free expression that we set out to enable," Clegg said during a press call I attended. "Too often, harmless content gets taken down, or restricted, and too many people get penalized unfairly." He said the company regrets aggressively removing posts about the covid-19 pandemic. CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently told the Republican-led House Judiciary Committee the decision was [2]influenced by pressure from the Biden administration .

>

> "We had very stringent rules removing very large volumes of content through the pandemic," Clegg said. "No one during the pandemic knew how the pandemic was going to unfold, so this really is wisdom in hindsight. But with that hindsight, we feel that we overdid it a bit. We're acutely aware because users quite rightly raised their voice and complained that we sometimes over-enforce and we make mistakes and we remove or restrict innocuous or innocent content."



[1] https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/3/24311513/meta-content-moderation-mistakes-nick-clegg

[2] https://yro.slashdot.org/story/24/08/27/0154207/zuckerberg-says-he-regrets-not-being-more-outspoken-about-government-pressure

Intel's board of directors [1]ousted CEO Pat Gelsinger after losing confidence in his ambitious turnaround strategy. The move comes as Intel posted significant losses, including $16.6 billion in Q3 2024, its worst quarterly result ever. Under Gelsinger's leadership, Intel struggled to compete in the AI chip market dominated by Nvidia, while facing manufacturing challenges and declining data center revenue.

Analysts suggest the board may be considering splitting off Intel's foundry business, though such [2]a move could face scrutiny from the U.S. Commerce Department due to $8 billion in CHIPS Act funding. The Verge [3]adds :

> But Moorhead and Creative Strategies analyst Ben Bajarin both believe Gelsinger's departure was so sudden, it can't simply have been the straw that broke the camel's back. "There must have been a decision the board made that he was not going to stick around for," Moorhead tells me.

>

> His hunch: Intel's board may want to split off its foundry business entirely, above and beyond the spinoff that Gelsinger already announced, turning Intel into a company that simply designs chips like its direct rivals.



[1] https://tech.slashdot.org/story/24/12/02/1427231/intel-ceo-gelsinger-exits-as-chip-pioneers-turnaround-falters

[2] https://news.slashdot.org/story/24/11/29/0529245/intel-required-to-keep-control-of-foundries-under-79-billion-chips-act-deal

[3] https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/3/24311594/intel-under-pat-gelsinger

An anonymous reader shares a report:

> A new report suggests South Korea is the first country to have [1]replaced 10% of its workforce with robots to tackle its shrinking population due to its low birth rate, reports Independent.

>

> For every 10,000 employees, South Korea now has 1,102 robots, making the country number one in the world in using technology instead of human labour to do tasks, according to the annual survey by World Robotics 2024.

>

> South Korea now has twice the number of robots working in its factories than any other country in the world. Only Singapore has been close to South Korea regarding robots, with 770 of such technology per 10,000 workers.



[1] https://www.tbsnews.net/world/south-korea-becomes-first-country-replace-10-its-workforce-robots-1005896

Walmart said Tuesday it had [1]completed its $2.3 billion all-cash acquisition of TV maker Vizio , a move by the retailing giant to expand its advertising business. From a report:

> The closing of the deal follows the expiration of the waiting period under federal regulations. Walmart [2]announced the deal to buy Vizio in February 2024. Walmart said the acquisition of Vizio will let it "bring to market new and differentiated ways for advertisers to meaningfully connect with customers at scale and boost product discovery" through Walmart Connect, the company's U.S. retail media business.

>

> Walmart and Vizio will continue to operate separately "for the foreseeable future," according to the announcement. William Wang will continue to lead Vizio as CEO, reporting to Seth Dallaire, executive VP and chief growth officer of Walmart U.S. Vizio, founded in 2002, is a leading vendor of value-priced HDTVs. Its device ecosystem and its smart TV operating system, SmartCast, provide free, ad-supported access to streaming content.



[1] https://variety.com/2024/digital/news/walmart-closes-vizio-acquisition-1236233418/

[2] https://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/24/02/20/1218207/walmart-to-buy-tv-maker-vizio-for-23-billion

China-linked spies are still [1]lurking inside U.S. telecommunications networks roughly six months after American officials started investigating the intrusions, senior officials told reporters Tuesday. From a report:

> This is the first time U.S. officials have confirmed reports that Salt Typhoon hackers still have access to critical infrastructure -- and they're proving difficult to kick out. Officials added that they don't yet know the full scope of the intrusions, despite starting the investigation in late spring.

>

> The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and FBI released guidance Tuesday for the communications sector to harden their networks against Chinese state-sponsored hackers. The guide includes basic steps like maintaining logs of activity on the network, keeping an inventory of all devices in the telecom's environment and changing any default equipment passwords. The hack has given Salt Typhoon unprecedented access to records from U.S. telecommunications networks about who Americans are communicating with, a senior FBI official told reporters during a briefing.



[1] https://www.axios.com/2024/12/03/salt-typhoon-china-phone-hacks

More Americans are looking to switch jobs [1]than at any point in the past decade . In a cooling job market, that's a lot easier said than done. From a report:

> White-collar hiring continues to slow, but workers' restlessness to find new work is intensifying, new Gallup data show. More than half of 20,000 U.S. workers surveyed in November said they were watching for or actively seeking a new job. That's the largest share since 2015, eclipsing the so-called Great Resignation of 2021 and 2022, when millions of people quit jobs for better ones.

>

> The result? Job satisfaction has fallen to its lowest level in recent years as employees feel more stuck -- and frustrated -- where they are, according to Gallup, whose quarterly surveys are widely viewed as a bellwether of workplace sentiment. Smaller raises and fewer promotions are spurring some of the discontent, workers say. So are cost-cutting moves and stepped-up requirements to be working in offices more often.



[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/careersandeducation/more-workers-feel-stuck-on-the-job/ar-AA1vbpNz

Nature:

> Millions of research articles are [1]absent from major digital archives . This worrying finding, which Nature [2]reported on earlier this year , was laid bare in a study by Martin Eve, who studies technology and publishing at Birkbeck, University of London. Eve sampled more than seven million articles with unique digital object identifiers (DOIs), a string of characters used to identify and link to specific publications, such as scholarly articles and official reports. Of these, he found that more than two million were 'missing' from archives -- that is, they were not preserved in major archives that ensure literature can be found in the future.

>

> Eve, who is also a research developer at Crossref, an organization that registers DOIs, carried out the study in an effort to better understand a problem librarians and archivists already knew about -- that although researchers are generating knowledge at an unprecedented rate, it is not necessarily being stored safely for the future. One contributing factor is that not all journals or scholarly societies survive in perpetuity. For example, a 2021 study found that a lack of comprehensive and open archiving meant that 174 open-access journals, covering all major research topics and geographical regions, vanished from the web in the first two decades of this millennium.

>

> A lack of long-term archiving particularly affects institutions in low- and middle-income countries, less-affluent institutions in rich countries and smaller, under-resourced journals worldwide. Yet it's not clear whether researchers, institutions and governments have fully taken the problem on board. [...] At the heart of the problem is a lack of money, infrastructure and expertise to archive digital resources. [...] For institutions that can afford it, one solution is to pay a preservation archive to safeguard content. Examples include Portico, based in New York City, and CLOCKSS, based in Stanford, California, both of which count a raft of publishers and libraries as customers.



[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-03842-z

[2] https://science.slashdot.org/story/24/03/07/0614207/millions-of-research-papers-at-risk-of-disappearing-from-the-internet

Amazon's data centers could soon [1]double as carbon capture machines , offsetting the harmful effects of the massive amounts of energy required to run them. From a report:

> Amazon Web Services is partnering with startup Orbital Materials, which used artificial intelligence to create a new material specifically designed for separating carbon from hot air exhaust in data centers, the companies announced Monday.

>

> Orbital Materials CEO Jonathan Godwin said he expects AWS to capture enough carbon to exceed the fossil fuel consumption used to power its AI data centers, giving them a net negative impact on climate change. The process will cost less than purchasing captured carbon to offset its climate impact, according to Godwin. The system, part of a pilot program at a to-be-determined data center location, works when outside air is sucked in and used to cool extremely hot semiconductors designed to run or train powerful AI models, such as Anthropic's Claude chatbot.



[1] https://www.semafor.com/article/12/01/2024/amazon-ai-data-centers-to-double-as-carbon-capture-machines

The Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday [1]announced sweeping action against some of the most important companies in the location data industry, including those that power surveillance tools used by a wide spread of U.S. law enforcement agencies and demanding they delete data related to certain sensitive areas like health clinics and places of worship. From a report:

> Venntel, through its parent company Gravy Analytics, takes location data from smartphones, either through ordinary apps installed on them or through the advertising ecosystem, and then provides that data feed to other companies who sell location tracking technology to the government or sells the data directly itself.

>

> Venntel is the company that provides the underlying data for a variety of other government contractors and surveillance tools, including Locate X. 404 Media and a group of other journalists recently revealed Locate X could be used to pinpoint phones that visited abortion clinics. The FTC says in a proposed order that Gravy and Venntel will be banned from selling, disclosing, or using sensitive location data, except in "limited circumstances" involving national security or law enforcement.



[1] https://www.404media.co/ftc-bans-location-data-company-that-powers-the-surveillance-ecosystem/

[1]MojoKid writes:

> Intel officially revealed its next generation discrete graphics cards, code named Battlemage, this morning. There are two midrange cards in the series so far, [2]branded Arc B580 and Arc B570 , though future higher-end B700 series cards are unknown currently. The graphics architecture for Battlemage is Xe2, and it debuted in the iGPU on Lunar Lake Core Ultra 200V mobile processors earlier this year.

>

> Arc B580 is paired to 12GB of GDDR6 memory operating at an effective data rate of 19Gbps over a 192-bit interface, and its average GPU clock should hover around 2,670MHz. The Arc B570 is based on the same slice of silicon, but scales things down with 10GB of GDDR6 memory operating at the same speed as the B580, but connected over a narrower 160-bit interface. The B570's average GPU clock will also be lower, in the 2,500MHz range. Performance-wise, Intel is projecting that Arc B580 will be about 10% faster than an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 on average but will be priced at $249 USD, undercutting GeForce RTX 4060 substantially while offering 4GB more onboard graphics memory. Arc B580 cards are due to arrive in market this month, with Arc B570 arriving in January 2025 at $219 USD.



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

[2] https://hothardware.com/reviews/intel-arc-b580-debut-battlemage-discrete-gpus-arrive

Major U.S. corporations have [1]eliminated thousands of middle management positions over the past two years in a widespread restructuring trend, with no signs of rehiring, according to workforce data from Revelio Labs.

Job postings for middle management roles remained 42% below April 2022 levels in October, even as hiring rebounded for other positions. Meta, Citigroup, UPS, and Amazon have all reduced management layers or increased worker-to-supervisor ratios, citing efficiency goals. Middle managers accounted for 32% of layoffs in 2023, up from 20% in 2019, Live Data Technologies reports.

Displaced supervisors, typically in their late 40s to 50s, face limited job prospects as companies permanently eliminate these positions rather than temporarily freezing hiring, Business Insider reports.



[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/middle-manager-hiring-white-collar-recession-layoffs-jobs-efficiency-2024-12

The cyber risks facing the United Kingdom are being " [1]widely underestimated ," the country's new cyber chief will warn on Tuesday as he launches the National Cyber Security Centre's (NCSC) annual review. From a report:

> In his first major speech since joining the NCSC -- part of the signals and cyber intelligence agency GCHQ -- Richard Horne will drive a shift in tone in how the cybersecurity agency communicates these risks. Despite some evidence showing cyberattacks growing year-on-year for half a decade, the NCSC has not previously confirmed the trend nor expressed alarm about it.

>

> "What has struck me more forcefully than anything else since taking the helm at the NCSC is the clearly widening gap between the exposure and threat we face, and the defences that are in place to protect us," Horne will say, according to an advance preview of his speech on Tuesday. Citing the intelligence that NCSC has access to as an agency within GCHQ, Horne will warn that "hostile activity in UK cyberspace has increased in frequency, sophistication and intensity," adding that despite growing activity from Russian and Chinese threat actors, the agency believes British society as a whole is failing to appreciate the severity of the risk. The annual review reveals that the agency's incident management team handled a record number of cyber incidents over the past 12 months -- 430 compared to 371 last year -- 89 of which were considered nationally significant incidents.



[1] https://therecord.media/uk-cyber-chief-warns-underestimate

India, the world's fifth-largest economy, is offering the heftiest electric vehicle subsidies globally -- [1]yet has achieved just 2% market penetration so far . From a report:

> India's total EV subsidies amount to 40-50% of vehicle prices when accounting for GST (goods and services tax), road tax benefits, state subsidies and production-linked incentives. For larger vehicles like the Grand Vitara, the effective subsidy reaches 61%.

>

> This dwarfs incentives in other major markets. China's subsidies represent about 10% of EV prices, while South Korea and Germany offer around 16-20%. The US provides roughly 26% through various federal and state programs.

>

> Yet India's EV penetration significantly lags these markets. China has reached 24% penetration, South Korea 18%, Germany 20%, and the US 8%. India's 2% looks particularly stark in comparison.



[1] https://indiadispatch.com/2024/12/03/india-ev-paradox-highest-subsidies-lowest-uptake/

China banned exports of minerals and metals used in semiconductor manufacturing and military applications to the United States on Tuesday, escalating tensions in the growing technology trade war between the world's two largest economies.

The commerce ministry [1]halted shipments of gallium, germanium, antimony and related compounds, citing national security concerns. These materials are crucial components in advanced electronics and military hardware, with China controlling 98% of global gallium production and 60% of germanium output, according to U.S. Geological Survey data. The move comes in direct response to Washington's new restrictions on semiconductor exports to China, including controls on high-bandwidth memory chips used in AI systems and limits on manufacturing equipment sales.



[1] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/china-bans-exports-gallium-other-102308172.html

Major cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has [1]integrated Apple Pay into its Onramp service , enabling third-party apps to offer direct cryptocurrency purchases through Apple's payment system.

The move significantly streamlines the traditionally complex process of converting traditional currencies to cryptocurrencies, eliminating multiple steps and extra fees previously required. It also marks a notable shift in Apple's historically cautious stance toward cryptocurrency, following years of restricting crypto-related features and removing major exchanges from its App Store in certain markets.



[1] https://techcrunch.com/2024/12/02/coinbase-now-lets-you-buy-crypto-with-apple-pay-in-third-party-apps/

[1]Mirnotoriety writes:

> Amid the growing warmth and increasingly volatile weather of an approaching summer, Australia passed a remarkable milestone this week. The number of homes and businesses with a solar installation clicked past 4 million -- barely 20 years since there was practically none anywhere in the country. It is a love affair that shows few signs of stopping.

>

> And it's a technology that is having ever greater effects, not just on the bills of its household users but on the very energy system itself. At no time of the year is that effect more obvious than spring, when solar output soars as the days grow longer and sunnier but demand remains subdued as mild temperatures mean people leave their air conditioners switched off.

>

> Such has been the extraordinary production of solar in Australia this spring, the entire state of South Australia has -- at various times -- [2]met all of its electricity needs from the technology .

>

> [...] [T]here is, at times, too much solar power in Australia's electricity systems to handle.



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

[2] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11-17/solar-flooded-australia-told-its-okay-to-waste-some/104606640