How ML can change for rare events The post Using Transformers to Forecast Incredibly Rare Solar Flares appeared first on Towards Data Science.

Five-year old European military drone startup Helsing is close to raising another monster round.

This story originally appeared in The Algorithm, our weekly newsletter on AI. To get stories like this in your inbox first, sign up here. A few months before he was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics in 2024, Daron Acemoglu published a paper that earned him few fans in Silicon Valley. Contrary to what Big Tech…

Chance Miller / 9to5Mac: Apple releases iOS 26.5, introducing end-to-end encryption for RCS messaging in beta with supported carriers; the setting is enabled by default  —  iOS 26.5 is now available to everyone after six weeks of beta testing.  The update adds fresh wallpapers, new features to Apple Maps, and more.

New York City was known as New Amsterdam when it was a Dutch settlement. Marcio.Duarte/Shutterstock US cities like New York and Los Angeles have long and storied histories. Major cities once had names such as Flagler, Jernigan, and Yerba Buena. A coin toss determined the name of Portland, Oregon, while Boston was named after a British town. New York City wasn't always a densely packed metropolis of subways and skyscrapers, just as Los Angeles wasn't always a sprawling concrete city. Throughout their histories, US cities have undergone massive changes, from their residents and leaders to their size, shape, and infrastructure. Native Americans inhabited the regions around most cities before being driven out by European settlers, and the new cities often saw changes in rulers afterward. But among some cities' biggest changes are their names themselves. The area that eventually became Jacksonville, Florida, was at different points controlled by the Native Americans, French, Spanish, and British, leading to several name changes before being named after Andrew Jackson. Other cities' early names reflected their geographic importance or environmental factors. Atlanta was originally named for its place at the end of a railroad line, while San Francisco's name was inspired by the abundance of a certain herb in the area. See the original names of 16 US cities. Miami was almost incorporated under the name Flagler. Historical photo of Miami. Hulton Deutsch/Getty Images The Southeast Florida area was previously inhabited by the Tequesta Native Americans, who settled along the Miami River. Seminole Native Americans and other peoples also migrated south in the late 18th century. After wars and conquest, the Village of Miami was chartered by William English in the 1840s, according to the city. At the end of the 19th century, the oil tycoon Henry Flagler transformed the surrounding countryside with luxury resort hotels and a railway service. When the town was incorporated in 1896, the citizens wanted to name the city after him, per the Daytona Beach News-Journal. The city was eventually named after the area's Tequesta name. Miami, Florida. Joe Raedle/Getty Images Flagler declined the citizens' offer to have the city named in his honor. Instead, he suggested they use the Tequesta name for the area, Mayaimi, meaning "big water." Another Native American people called the Mayaimi also lived further north on Lake Okeechobee, which they called Lake Mayaimi. Charleston, South Carolina, was previously known as Charles Town. Historical drawing of Charleston, then known as Charles Town. Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images In 1670, the settlement was founded by English colonists who wanted to honor King Charles II by naming the town in his honor, according to the city. The name change occurred in 1783 when the city was incorporated in the state legislature. Charleston, South Carolina. f11photo/Shutterstock Other spellings, like "Charlestowne" were also used before "Charleston" became the consistent spelling. The exact reasons for the name change aren't known, according to the Charleston County Public Library. New York, a former Dutch settlement, was founded as New Amsterdam. New York, New York, circa 1895. The New York Historical Society/Getty Images The Dutch settled on the southern tip of Manhattan in 1624, and New Amsterdam served as a seat of government for the New Netherlands colony. According to legend, the land was purchased from Lenape Native Americans for $24 (roughly $1,000 in today's dollars). However, many Native Americans continued to live alongside the Dutch, and the purported deal likely took on a different meaning than a simple land exchange, according to Live Science. In 1664, it was renamed New York. New York, New York. mouseontherun/Shutterstock In 1664, the British conquered the settlement, and New Amsterdam was ceded by the Dutch. King Charles II gave his brother, the Duke of York, ownership of New York, which was named after him. The name "New Amsterdam" still lives on in current-day New York City in various places. The New Amsterdam Theatre sits on Broadway, and the New York Public Library has a New Amsterdam branch. In Spanish, Los Angeles was likely known in full as "the town of the Queen of Angels." Los Angeles, California, in the 1930s. American Stock/ClassicStock / Getty Images According to WorldAtlas, the first European land expedition in California was led by Fernando Rivera y Moncada in 1769. A priest who accompanied Moncada, Juan Crespi, named what would come to be known as the Los Angeles River "Our Lady of the Angels of the Portiuncula" in English. Historians debate what the original settlement was called. Los Angeles, California. Chones/Shutterstock The Spanish founded a settlement in 1781 next to the river, though historians are unsure if the town's naming was a direct result of the river's name. Boston was known to colonists as Trimountaine. Boston, Massachusetts, in the 1960s. Boston Globe/Getty Images Before being incorporated as Boston, settlers referred to the area as Trimountaine, after the three peaks of what is now known as Beacon Hill. Per the Boston Public Library, the peaks were later removed during the 18th century to use as landfill for development projects. Trimountaine was renamed Boston after a British town. Boston, Massachusetts. Steve Marsel/Getty Images The Puritan settlers officially named the city Boston after the town of the same name in Lincolnshire, England. Cincinnati was called Losantiville in the 18th century. Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1915. Universal History Archive/Getty Images A combination of Greek, Latin, and French, Losantiville received its name due to its position opposite the mouth of the Licking River, The New York Times reported. The name Cincinnati was given by the governor of the Northwest Territory. Cincinnati, Ohio. Raymond Boyd/Getty Images Cincinnati was named by the territorial governor Arthur St. Clair in 1790. He wanted to honor the Society of Cincinnati, a group of Revolutionary War veterans with which he was involved. Per the Times, the governor was reported to have said, "What an awful name, damn it. Call it Cincinnati!" The word "Cincinnati" itself is a reference to the Roman leader Lucius Cincinnatus, who is best known for receiving absolute power during a time of war, then renouncing it and retiring as soon as the war ended. Atlanta was once known as Terminus, and then later as Marthasville. Atlanta, Georgia, in 1953. H. Armstrong Roberts/ClassicStock via Getty Images Marking the end of the Western and Atlantic Railroad line, Atlanta was originally named Terminus, meaning "end of the line," according to Georgia Public Broadcasting. In 1843, the city was renamed Marthasville after Governor Wilson Lumpkin's daughter Martha, who was just 16 at the time, per Atlanta Magazine. Marthasville quickly became Atlanta. Atlanta, Georgia. Sean Pavone/Shutterstock The city continued to hold significance in the railroad industry, and in 1845, it was named "Atlanta" by railroad engineer J. Edgar Thompson. The name is thought to be a shortened, feminine homage to the Western and Atlantic Railroad line. New Orleans, Louisiana, formed around the neighborhood called Vieux Carré in the 18th century. An 18th century depiction of New Orleans, Louisiana. DEA/J. L. CHARMET/Getty Images Before European settlers arrived, the New Orleans area was known as Bulbancha among the Choctaw Native Americans. The modern city was founded around the neighborhood of Vieux Carré, or "Old Square" in English, according to the US Department of Transportation. Today, the neighborhood is known as the French Quarter. Founded by Jean Baptiste Le Moyne in 1718, the original town consisted of an outpost for soldiers, merchants, slaves, and rivermen. The city soon became known as a cultural center.  The city was then named New Orleans. The Washington Post/Getty Images The city was named Nouvelle-Orléans, or New Orleans, in honor of the Duke of Orleans, Philippe II.  Orlando was originally known as Jernigan. Farmland in Orlando shown in a 1904 postcard. Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images During the Second Seminole War, the United States established Fort Gatlin to defend against attacks from Native Americans, according to the city. By 1840, a community had grown around the fort called Jernigan, named after the family who were the first permanent settlers in the area.  The origins of the name Orlando is subject to dispute. Orlando, Florida. Jeff Greenberg/Getty Images Despite the city's clear origins, its name isn't as clear-cut, with at least four different stories possibly accounting for it. One involved the town being named after a character from Shakespeare's "As You Like It." Another theory involved a settler named Orlando who fell ill on his way to Tampa and died where the future city would be built, causing passersby to remark, "There lies Orlando." Phoenix was once known as Swilling's Mill. Phoenix, Arizona, in the 1960s. ClassicStock/Getty Images The area was originally populated by the Hohokam for more than 1,500 years, but environmental factors, such as droughts, are thought to have driven them from the land. "Hohokam" translates to "the people who have gone," per the South Phoenix Oral History Project. In 1867, Confederate veteran Jack Swilling found the area and saw its farming potential. The area became known as "Swilling's Mill" after its namesake, according to the city. It was later called Helling Mill and Mill City. The city later took on the mythical name of Phoenix. Phoenix, Arizona. Joe Sohm/Visions of America /Getty Images The name Phoenix was suggested by a man named Phillip Darrell Duppa, who spoke of a phoenix-like city springing up from the ruins of a former civilization. The name stuck, and Phoenix officially became recognized on May 4, 1868. Portland, Oregon, formed from a small settlement referred to as The Clearing. Portland, Oregon, in the 1930s. Three Lions/Getty Images The original name came from a 640-acre piece of land, which is now downtown Portland. The founders of the city, Asa Lovejoy and Francis Pettygrove, both owned a stake in the land, according to Portland's KGW8. Later, the two settlers attended a dinner party in Oregon City, about 10 miles south of Portland. Lovejoy and Pettygrove couldn't see eye-to-eye on the name for their shared land, so they flipped an 1835 minted copper penny to decide. A coin toss led to Portland, Oregon. Portland, Oregon. Education Images/Getty Images Pettygrove, who was from Portland, Maine, wanted to name the new settlement after his home city, while Lovejoy wanted to do the same for Boston. Of course, Pettygrove won the toss, but there was a 50/50 chance Oregon's famous city might have been called Boston instead.  San Francisco originally went by the name Yerba Buena. San Francisco, circa 1868. Carleton E. Watkins/Getty Images The area was originally named for a plant abundant in the area. Yerba Buena translates to "good herb," meaning spearmint in Spanish, according to Celebrate California. The name was officially changed under American rule. San Francisco, California. Brookgardener/Shutterstock In 1846, American troops claimed Yerba Buena during the Mexican-American War. The next year, Navy lieutenant Washington Allon Bartlett issued a proclamation stating, "It is hereby ordained, that the name of San Francisco shall hereafter be used in all official communications and public documents, or records appertaining to the town." The new name came from Francis of Assisi, an important Catholic figure. In the coming years, the gold rush would draw an influx of settlers from across the country to the area.  San Diego originally went by the name San Miguel. San Diego, California, in the 1950s. American Stock/ClassicStock/Getty Images In 1542, the area was visited by explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo, per the San Diego History Center. Cabrillo bestowed it with the name San Miguel, likely for the Christian figure Michael. It would take 60 years before the name change. San Diego, California. ullstein bild/Getty Images Then, in 1602, the explorer Sebastián Vizcaíno renamed the harbor San Diego, after Saint Didacus of Alcalá, known in Spanish as San Diego de Alcalá. Austin originated as the riverside village of Waterloo. Austin, Texas in the 1950s. FPG/Getty Images The area was originally inhabited by the Tonkawa and Comanche tribes, which hunted buffalo.  Settlers lived on the north bank of the Colorado River, and the area was named Waterloo by a commission of surveyors looking for a spot to designate as Texas' capital city, per the Texas State Historical Association. The exact reasoning behind the name is unknown. The city was soon named after the "Father of Texas." Austin, Texas. Steve Heap/Shutterstock In 1839, the area became the capital of the Republic of Texas and was renamed after Stephen F. Austin, who was known as the "Father of Texas," according to Britannica. Like New Amsterdam in New York City, references to Austin's original name can be found throughout the city, such as Waterloo Park or the music store Waterloo Records. Jacksonville, Florida, developed from a settlement called Cowford. 1920s painting of the Jacksonvile, Florida, skyline. Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images The area called Cowford was previously inhabited by the Timucua tribe. In 1562, French settlers built a fort in the area called Fort Caroline, but were invaded by the Spanish six years later, who renamed it San Matteo, according to the National Park Service. Britain then seized control of the region in the 18th century and named it Cowford. The name Jacksonville came from Andrew Jackson. Jacksonville, Florida. Jeff Greenberg/Getty Images In 1822, Jacksonville was named after the soon-to-be president, who had just served as the military governor of Florida. There's no record of Jackson ever visiting his namesake city, per the Florida Times-Union. Seattle was once known as New York-Alki. Seattle, Washington, in 1962. Bettmann Archive via Getty Images Pioneers in 1851 named the settlement "New York-Alki" in honor of New York City. "Alki" comes from the Chinook Native American language, meaning "by-and-by," according to the city. The name Seattle also came from Native American roots. Seattle, Washington. Carl Larson/Getty Images This time, the name was derived from the Duwamish Native Americans, another people of the region. Seattle was the anglicized form of the name of the people's chief, who was referred to as Sealth in English. Read the original article on Business Insider

Probably the last big updates we'll see before the next versions appear at WWDC.

Lipa says her picture contributed to Samsung's "enormous revenue."

As microdrama apps like ReelShort and DramaBox quietly rake in billions, Peacock announced on Monday that it is launching two unscripted Bravo microdramas, which will stream in the Peacock app.

In an email to beta testers, the company said the site's goal is to "track the most influential voices in a space" and to surface the news that's actually worth "paying attention to."

Jonathan Stempel / Reuters: Texas AG Ken Paxton sues Netflix for allegedly spying on consumers by collecting their data without consent, and designing its platform to be addictive  —  Netflix (NFLX.O) was sued on Monday by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who accused the streaming company of spying on consumers …

Financial Times: Sources: German defense tech startup Helsing is set to raise $1.2B led by Dragoneer and Lightspeed at a valuation of about $18B, up from $14B in June 2025  —  German company backed by Spotify's Daniel Ek set to raise $1.2bn in latest funding round  —  Helsing, the German defence technology group backed …

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Enterprise leaders have spent two years and hundreds of billions of dollars on AI. The results have been uneven. According to McKinsey’s 2024 global survey, fewer than one in three […] The post Why Enterprise AI Keeps Failing, and It’s Not the Model’s Fault appeared first on BigDATAwire.

Google’s new Gmail AI personalization features are raising privacy concerns. Here’s what users should know and how to review smart settings. The post 1.8 Billion Gmail Users May Want to Check This AI Privacy Setting appeared first on TechRepublic.

Millions of people around the world now use AI companions — for friendship, emotional support, mental health counselling and romantic interactions. This includes 72 per cent of adolescents, according to one study from the United States. Meanwhile, human-caused climate change has already led to widespread impacts and rising risks, some of them irreversible. Yet emissions remain high. As a professor of finance, I see these phenomena as different expressions of the same underlying bias: we apply too high a discount rate to the future. The idea of a discount rate is straightforward. A dollar today is worth more than a dollar tomorrow. The discount rate tells us by how much. Set that rate too high, and you systematically undervalue what lies ahead. Set it too low, and you over-invest in distant outcomes. In many parts of life, we set this rate too high. Behavioural economist David Laibson showed that people place disproportionate weight on immediate rewards, even when this leads to worse outcomes over time. In finance, we understand that valuation depends critically on the discount rate applied to future cash flows. In life, we continue to apply a discount rate that is too high, marking down the future to the point where it no longer meaningfully constrains the present. What feels good now Psychologist Hal Hershfield’s research on the future self helps explain why. People often perceive their future selves more as another person than as a continuation of who they are now. This makes it easier for the self that benefits today to shift costs onto the self that must bear them tomorrow. Looking at this through a finance lens, it resembles a “principal-agent problem,” where managers may prioritize short-term incentives over the long-term interests of shareholders. In both cases, the person making the decision does not fully bear the long-term cost. But the future does not disappear. It simply becomes easier to ignore. Investment in relationships This logic becomes easier to see if we look at how we build relationships. Strong relationships require time and a willingness to tolerate discomfort. Trust and intimacy involve immediate effort but the benefits accumulate gradually. By contrast, autonomy and flexibility offer immediate rewards. They preserve options and reduce constraints, making it easy to defer relational investment. But relationships, like other forms of capital, depend on sustained investment, and delayed investment is often hard to recover later. The same logic can also be seen in family structures and broader social connections. Strong ties in families, friendships and communities depend on time and repeated interaction. Without it, those ties weaken. As those ties weaken, loneliness becomes more likely. Research shows that loneliness and social isolation are associated with significant health risks. In this sense, loneliness can be understood as the long-term consequence of insufficient investment in connection when it was easier to build. How loneliness is killing us, according to Harvard professor Robert Waldinger. These patterns are not only individual. They also reflect the way modern life is increasingly organized around immediacy and convenience. Technology makes interaction faster, easier and more responsive, but many of the things that matter most in the long run still require time, patience and discomfort. The result is a social environment that increasingly rewards responsiveness over endurance. Immediate benefits Seen in this light, AI companions are not an anomaly. They are emerging in an era of widespread loneliness, where many people are seeking connection that feels reliable and low in emotional cost. Back in 2002, pioneering research by Clifford Nass and Youngme Moon showed that people apply social rules to computers even when they know they’re not human. Almost 25 years later, research now suggests AI can provide emotional support and a real sense of companionship in the short term. From today’s perspective, this is an efficient solution: the benefits are immediate and reliable. The concern is not that AI companionship fails. It’s that it succeeds too well in the present. By reducing effort, uncertainty and emotional risk, AI companions make connection easier to access but may also shift expectations in ways that are harder to sustain over time in human relationships. In that sense, they reflect the same trade-off: immediate comfort at the expense of longer-term relational depth. The same logic extends beyond individual life and helps explain how societies respond to long-term problems. Climate change is perhaps the clearest example. The impacts of our warming planet are already very evident and yet we’re slow to act. This is, in part, because the economic benefits of extraction and consumption are immediate, while many of the costs are delayed and dispersed across time. A voiceless future Across many human domains, from AI and personal relationships to climate change, the structure is the same: The present is immediate and rewarded; the future is abstract, distant and silent. So, decisions skew toward today. This is not simply a matter of awareness or intention. It is structural. The future has no meaningful representation in present decision-making. It has no voice, no urgency and no direct claim. And so it’s discounted. This is what Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney called the “tragedy of the horizon.” Whether in the climate crisis or the loneliness epidemic, the catastrophic impacts will be felt beyond the traditional horizons of investment cycles and political terms. Because the future has no seat at the board table, it is treated as an externality — a cost we don’t have to account for today, but one that is compounding at an unsustainable rate. Until we find ways to give the future a real stake in present decisions, we will continue to choose what is easier now and pay for it later. The tendency to discount the future is deeply human. But in a world increasingly shaped by AI systems, weakening social ties and accelerating climate risk, the costs of doing so are becoming harder to ignore. Rahul Ravi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

The battery-recycling and energy-storage company has hired former Tesla finance chief Deepak Ahuja, reuniting him with former Tesla CTO JB Straubel.

<p><strong><a href="https://twitter.com/tobi/status/2053121182044451016">Learning on the Shop floor</a></strong></p> Tobias Lütke describes Shopify's internal coding agent tool, River, which operates entirely in public on their Slack:</p> <blockquote> <p>River does not respond to direct messages. She politely declines and suggests to create a public channel for you and her to start working in. I myself work with river in <code>#tobi_river</code> channel and many followed this pattern. Every conversation is therefore searchable. Anyone at Shopify can jump in. In my own channel, there are over 100 people who, react to threads, add color and add context, pick up the torch, help with the reviews, remind me how rusty I am, and importantly, learn from watching. [...]</p> <p>As so often with German, there is a word for the kind of environment: <em>Lehrwerkstatt</em>. Literally: <strong>A teaching workshop</strong>. The whole shop floor is the classroom. You learn by being near the work. Being a constant learner is one of the core values of the firm.</p> <p>Shopify wants to be a Lehrwerkstatt at scale and River has now gotten us closer to this ideal than ever. It’s <em>osmosis learning</em>, because it does not require a curriculum, a training plan, or a manager. It just requires everyone's work to be visible to the maximum extent possible. Everyone learns from each other.</p> </blockquote> <p>I'm reminded of how Midjourney spent its first few years with the primary interface being public Discord channels, forcing users to share their prompts and learn from each other's experiments. I continue to believe that the early success of Midjourney was tied to this mechanism, helping to compensate for how weird and finicky text-to-image prompting is. <p>Tags: <a href="https://simonwillison.net/tags/ai">ai</a>, <a href="https://simonwillison.net/tags/slack">slack</a>, <a href="https://simonwillison.net/tags/generative-ai">generative-ai</a>, <a href="https://simonwillison.net/tags/llms">llms</a>, <a href="https://simonwillison.net/tags/midjourney">midjourney</a>, <a href="https://simonwillison.net/tags/coding-agents">coding-agents</a>, <a href="https://simonwillison.net/tags/tobias-lutke">tobias-lutke</a></p>

Crackers take advantage of unencrypted files that briefly appeared on Steam.

Rather than dig in, the sport is being proactive about fixing the problem.

Apple and Intel reportedly reached an early chip manufacturing agreement that could reduce Apple’s TSMC reliance and boost Intel’s foundry ambitions. The post Apple, Intel Reportedly Near Chip Deal That Could Reduce TSMC Reliance appeared first on TechRepublic.