John Lister

Human brain cells could power computers of the future, according to a new study. Researchers say they've already seen a bunch of brain cells in a petri dish learn to play the old video game Pong. The bizarre-sounding concept already has a name: ... organoid intelligence, or OI for short. It's already prompted questions about the ethics involved. While the concept sounds pretty disturbing, the reality wouldn't be quite as unsettling as it might seem. There's no suggestion we'll be sticking human skulls inside the desktop computer in our living room. Instead, the idea is that brain cells, generated ... (view more)

A bizarre court ruling means that emojis can legally count as financial advice. It's a side effect of the latest case involving regulation of digital assets. The case centers on non fungible tokens, also known as NFTs. In short, an NFT is something ... that only exists digitally, can be bought and sold, and the ownership of which is recorded on a public ledger called a blockchain - similar to how bitcoin operates. In this case, the NFTs were a limited edition collection of digital clips of famous basketball moments. The effect was much the same as owning a rare trading basketball card except ... (view more)

Nokia has launched an Android phone specifically designed to be repairable by the user. The G22 handset was made in cooperation with spare parts and repair site iFixit. Being unable to easily repair a handset (or even to get a third party expert to ... do it) has been one of the biggest frustrations for many phone owners. It often means having to replace an entire handset because a single component has failed, causing both financial and environmental damage. While some manufacturers have made phones with easily replaceable components, they tend to be less well-known brands and carry a premium ... (view more)

Microsoft has experimented with one of its most audacious attempts yet to persuade users to prefer the Edge browser over Google Chrome. It appears the plan, which effectively involved full-size banner "ads" on the Chrome website, will not proceed ... after the tests. Technically speaking, the Microsoft Edge browser is built using "Chromium" code (which is open source), which is the exact same code that Google's Chrome browser uses. The only difference between Edge and Chrome is that Edge has been customized with its own set of unique features and is branded as being Microsoft Edge. That ... (view more)

Chrome users will soon have two new modes that could significantly increase performance and battery life. The Energy Saver and Energy Saver modes are the first major changes since users of Windows 8 and earlier editions lost access to Chrome ... updates. While Google probably won't acknowledge things quite so bluntly, the new modes are an attempt to solve one of the most frequent complaints about the widely used browser. Many users find having too many tabs open at once means Chrome quickly starts using a lot of system memory. This can slow performance and even increase battery use on laptops. ( ... (view more)

Samsung's flagship phone is getting special protection against a particularly nasty form of mobile malware. It combats zero-click attacks, which can steal data or compromise a handset without needing any action by the user. The hacking technique ... hasn't been widely seen in real-world attacks on Android phones, though Samsung claims it has worked on Apple devices. Samsung clearly believes it's just a matter of time before attackers find a vulnerability that would make such an attack almost irresistible. The company explains that a zero-click attack would exploit such a vulnerability by sending ... (view more)

The Windows 11 taskbar will soon have a quick option to kill a task or process. It's something users currently need to do by opening Task Manager. The precise terminology of stopping Windows doing something has changed over the years, with terms ... including programs, applications, tasks and processes. The actual distinctions don't really matter that much to the average user, but they include whether the issue is with Windows itself or an application. They also depend on whether the user is trying to stop an entire application or simply one of multiple things it is doing, such as running ... (view more)

Microsoft and Google have both put plenty of effort into artificial intelligence in recent months. After an initial wow factor, they've been plagued with a host of problems. Interest in AI-text shot up with the public release of ChatGPT, a tool that ... can not only simulate conversations with the user and answer questions, but also write articles and other text in a variety of styles. While it appears extremely clever, it's effectively an extremely souped-up version of the auto-predict feature many phones offer when sending text messages. ChatGPT is produced by an independent developer called ... (view more)

Internet providers have been accused of misleading claims as to where they offer service. The apparently false information could affect which areas benefit from a $42 billion government fund to get more homes online. Internet service providers have ... supplied data to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for coverage maps as part of the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment Program. That will help fund broadband networks in areas that don't currently have access, usually because they are too remote or sparsely populated to make it commercially worthwhile for companies to install new ... (view more)

The average US broadband subscriber uses almost 600GB a month according to new estimates. The figures also show people on an affordable connection program are making the most of it. The figures come from OpenVault, a company that provides technology ... for "optimizing networks," which naturally means it has an interest in showing broadband networks are under strain. According to the report, the average use was 586.7GB a month, up almost 10 percent last year. That includes both uploads and downloads, which remain in roughly the same proportion as last year. The averages are certainly being driven ... (view more)