Lead Hacker

Drums on film. | Image: Decap I don't think I'm going to hurt anyone's feelings by pointing out that Decap doesn't have the name recognition of Kendrick Lamar, Olivia Rodrigo, or Charli XCX. But his fingerprints are all over tracks from them, as well as many other artists , including Freddie Gibbs, Bad Bunny, Mac Miller, BTS, and even Ludwig Göransson's score for Oppenheimer . Nicholas Piantedosi, better known as Decap, is a record producer, but perhaps more importantly, he's the man behind Drums That Knock , a series of sample packs that have found their way onto countless records across genres. The line is so successful that, after debuting in 2016, it's now on its 11th … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/report/1000994/decap-drums-that-knock-interview

Middle schoolers, likely blocked from other apps and social networks, apparently turned the Spotify comment section under an episode of NPR's Wild Card into an impromptu group chat. In a new episode of This American Life , host Ira Glass digs into how the kids landed there and why. But it mostly boils down to kids getting creative to work around the restrictions placed on them. When Glass asked one of the kids why they picked this particular podcast, they said, "We just, like, looked for podcasts that didn't have many comments." Which, obviously, hurt Glass's feelings a bit. Initially, showrunner Dave Blanchard thought the comments were a … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/entertainment/1001056/this-american-life-npr-kids-group-chat-comment-section

As reports of OpenAI's models breaking containment , hacking sites, and generally getting out of control pile up, the company has made the decision to pause training of its most powerful models. The decision was made after a model being tested within a sandbox exploited a loophole to gain internet access . The incident happened on September 20th, and "All training, evaluation, and inference with tool-use" remains paused as of Saturday evening, September 25th. In addition, OpenAI revealed on Friday that its agents had inappropriately uploaded 53nimages from ChatGPT users to image-hosting sites. The company has not stated if the images were AI- … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1001049/openai-training-pause

Yesterday, with a little prodding, it was discovered that Meta's Muse would expose its filesystem to curious users. The files offered a fascinating peek under the hood of an AI chatbot, and appeared to expose details we weren't meant to see, not least because Muse itself told people, including us, it wasn't supposed to reveal them. But today Muse will eagerly offer up the contents of its file system when you ask for it. That appears to be because, as Meta's Nat Friedman later said, this is the " intended behavior. " In a post on X, Meta Superintelligence Labs' David Singleton elaborated: This was a very deliberate choice - your Muse Secur … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1000784/meta-muse-filesystem

Apple is expected to announce more hardware before the end of the year following the debut of the iPhone 18 Pro and folding iPhone Duo earlier this month. The updated products will include a new version of the HomePod mini, the iPad mini 8, and the Apple TV 4K, according to details and images discovered in Apple's own code by MacRumors contributor Aaron Perris. Details from the leaks are sparse, but the HomePod Mini 2 will carry forward a similar design to the original model that debuted in late 2020 . While the current model is available in bright color options including orange, yellow, and blue, the leaked images of the HomePod Mini 2 reve … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/tech/1000772/apple-code-leak-homepod-mini-2-ipad-mini-8-apple-tv-4k

It feels like Xbox has been in a permanent state of turmoil for at least two years now, and this week is no different. Microsoft cut 268 jobs across its gaming division this week, shuffled major studios and franchises around, and continued its Xbox "reset." Layoffs have become a way of life for Xbox employees, after Microsoft started cutting thousands in early 2024 and hasn't slowed down. The turmoil was particularly apparent when Microsoft started shutting down game studios , and the painful layoffs have had a lasting impact on morale, according to current and former Xbox employees I've been speaking to this week. At the same time, Xbox h … Read the full story at The Verge. source https://www.theverge.com/tech/999919/microsoft-xbox-reorganization-activision-notepad