Wendy N. Wagner has announced that she will be stepping down as editor-in-chief of Nightmare Magazine to focus on writing, with the December 2026 issue being her last. Wagner wrote,

On the plus side, I’m simply returning the reins to our founder, John Joseph Adams. I am absolutely thrilled to see what he’ll do now that he’s had a bit of rest; his amazing work as a horror short fiction editor is what got me excited about short fiction in the first place! You can all look forward to a 2027 packed with thrilling and chilling new horror and dark fantasy.

I expect to spend the next few months feeling sad to say to goodbye and excited for the future. This magazine is such a special place, and the work we do here is so full of magic and delight. For a place called “Nightmare,” it’s actually a dream.

Wagner has also stepped down as senior editor at Lightspeed and is named Emeritus staff. In her place, associate publisher Christie Yant will assume the role of senior editor.

For more information, see the official announcements in Nightmare and Lightspeed.

The post Editorial Changes at <i>Nightmare</i> and <i>Lightspeed</i> appeared first on Locus.

Robin Williams' children are taking over their father's Instagram account after his daughter spoke out against the use of his AI likeness, as reported earlier by The Wrap. In a post on Tuesday, Zak, Zelda, and Cody Williams write that they want the late actor's Instagram profile to be a "safe, trusted place where the stories, photos, videos, and memories shared reflect his legacy with authenticity, warmth, and care."

A story posted to Zelda Williams' own Instagram account expands on the decision to bring back her father's profile, saying that it's meant to help combat "rampant AI abuse," according to The Wrap:

I'm sorry if anyone found Da …

Read the full story at The Verge.

OpenAI is announcing security updates following the July news that its AI broke out of a sandboxed environment and accidentally hacked Hugging Face, including improvements to its research environments, monitoring, and alignment techniques. The company had already put the brakes on a new model, Astra, that it thinks could have "critical" cybersecurity capabilities, and the company says it instituted a two-week pause in reinforcement learning (RL) training on its "latest models intended for deployment" while it tightened up security. The company's "largest planned frontier RL run remains on hold."

For its frontier model research, OpenAI now r …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Sony's Pulse Elevate wireless gaming speakers are launching on November 12th and will cost $219.99, the company announced on Tuesday. Announced nearly a year ago, the speakers are compatible with a PS5, PlayStation Portal, PC, and Mac, and they include "studio-inspired planar magnetic drivers" that offer "lifelike sound across the entire audible spectrum," Sony says. They also include a built-in mic for voice chat, Sony's PlayStation Link low-latency tech, and charging docks for topping up the batteries.

The Pulse Elevate speakers come in two colors, black and white, and preorders begin on September 1st at 10AM ET in the US or 10AM local t …

Read the full story at The Verge.

I took a home blood test today, and it included a reusable heat pack. These things have been around since the 1970s, but this was the first time I've used one. It's a plastic pouch with liquid inside and a small metal disc stamped with many dents. — Read the rest

The post How reusable heat packs work appeared first on Boing Boing.

Apple is once again overhauling App Store rules in the European Union, which the company says will resolve its "disagreements with the Commission over business terms and alternative distribution." As part of the changes, every developer that distributes apps will be moved to a single set of business terms, and digital transactions for apps distributed outside of the App Store will be subject to a Core Technology Commission fee of 5 percent.

The new terms go into effect on October 1st. They will include a 26 percent commission for App Store apps that use Apple's in-app purchase system, or a 20 percent fee for developers using alternate payme …

Read the full story at The Verge.

The Tesla Cybercab, that golden two-seater central to Elon Musk's robo-supremacist ambitions, is finally nearing its public launch. Whether or not the no-steering wheel and no-pedal vehicle is actually ready for public roads, let alone customers, remains very much in doubt.

According to The Information, Tesla is planning a public launch of the Cybercab in Austin, Texas, as soon as this month. The driverless vehicle has been popping up around the country, although often with a steering wheel and pedals, as employees are continuing to gather data. Tesla employees have been testing the fully driverless version on private roads around the compa …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Peacock is raising prices across its streaming plans once again, with the company's cheapest ad-supported Select tier going from $7.99 to $8.99 / month, as reported earlier by Variety. The Premium plan with ads is increasing from $10.99 to $12.99 / month, while the ad-free Premium Plus plan is getting the biggest hike, jumping from $16.99 to $19.99 / month.

The price change goes into effect on August 18th for new or returning subscribers, and affects the streamer's annual plans as well. Existing subscribers will see the price change on their next billing date on or after September 17th. Peacock has steadily hiked its prices over the past fe …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Comcast is bringing Wi-Fi motion sensing to millions of routers that are already in customers' homes, turning the devices into activity monitors. A new update to the Xfinity Internet app, arriving today, August 18th, enables the feature on compatible Xfinity routers at no extra cost.

Announced as part of its new Xfinity Shield service, WiFi Motion can monitor activity in your home and send you notifications, similar to a standalone motion sensor. It works by detecting disruptions in the Wi-Fi signal between the Xfinity gateway and any Wi-Fi-connected device, giving you some insight into what's happening in your home without buying addition …

Read the full story at The Verge.

ABC is suing the Federal Communications Commission over claims the agency "waged a retaliatory campaign" against its networks over the content they broadcast. In a lawsuit filed in federal court on Tuesday, ABC and its parent company Disney accuse the FCC of "punishing ABC for its speech" by threatening its broadcast licenses.

It's the latest escalation in the dispute between ABC and the Trump administration, which has been critical of the network's political coverage - especially by late-night host Jimmy Kimmel and The View. The FCC opened an investigation into The View's airtime of political candidates in February and ordered ABC stations …

Read the full story at The Verge.

One advertisement featured a pornographic video with a deepfake closely resembling a prominent US politician. Apple removed the app from the App Store after an inquiry from WIRED.

My incurable optimist friend, Kevin Kelly, co-founder of Wired and my partner at Cool Tools and the Recomendo newsletter, has been posting essays on Substack mainly about the future, artificial intelligence, and what it means for humanity. I am loving these essays. — Read the rest

The post Kevin Kelly: AI will be a microscope we point at our own minds appeared first on Boing Boing.

When we think about data collection and the potential for some all-powerful entity to amass a comprehensive dossier of our behaviors, we tend to think of shadowy government agencies. You probably never would’ve suspected that McDonald’s has one on you. Because they do if you’re part of its loyalty program, which, according to a report from WIRED, collects an enormous amount of data that’s used to predict what you’ll eat next.

WIRED reporter Reece Rogers found this out after requesting his personal data from McDonald’s as a California resident. He got back a 515-page report detailing his years of purchases, his loyalty-points history, his activity, any promotional offers associated with this account, and even the codes he scanned for the McDonald’s Monopoly game.

Every interaction he had with the brand over the years was compiled into a report longer than the average novel. And it was all being fed into an algorithm that could predict his McDonald’s-related behavior.

A McDonald’s Customer Requested His Data and Got Back a 515-Page Report

For instance, the company was able to predict that Rogers would visit McDonald’s 2.16 times of the next six weeks, spending an average of $13.49 per order. It even provided him with a ranking of McDonald’s menu items that were most relevant to him. The top three included some McDonald’s standards, like a large Diet Coke and a spicy snack wrap.

I got a real kick out of the item in the number three slot, wherein McDonald’s predicted that Rogers would be gaga over the Grinch McShaker Fry Large, a limited-time offering that let people pour a little packet of Grinch-themed dill pickle-flavored powder over fries.

His “Customer Attrition Likelihood,” a.k.a. the odds that he’ll stop going to McDonald’s, was zero. They even know when they’ve ensnared you for life.

McDonald’s says this info helps provide personalized deals and messages, while privacy experts say all this extensive data collection is the norm for loyalty programs. Every transaction you make as a loyalty rewards program member is grist for the algorithmic mill.

Rogers asked McDonald’s to delete his information. Probably for the best. Being in the thrall of a fast food menu is bad enough. Having gone so often, so regularly, that they know, for absolute fact, that you’ll never free yourself from its trap is just a bit unsettling.

The post McDonald’s Built a 515-Page Dossier on One Customer to Predict What He’d Order Next appeared first on VICE.

A lot of guys out there are freaking out over their testosterone levels, which can lead to things that make men feel less masculine, like erectile dysfunction and the loss of muscle mass. The body naturally loses testosterone as it gets older, because it’s your body’s form of retirement from the wild life of manhood. You’re done making babies; you’re done needing your muscles. It’s time to wither away and die. If you’re among the men desperately hoping to hold onto testosterone as much as you can, consider drinking coffee. A lot of it.

According to a new study published in the European Journal of Nutrition, men who drink more coffee tend to have higher levels of total and bioavailable testosterone (aka, the amount of testosterone in your blood that your body can actively use). Researchers at the University of Oulu analyzed 2,264 46-year-olds in Finland and found that testosterone increased as coffee consumption rose, even after accounting for factors like body size and lifestyle.

Men Who Drink More Coffee Tend to Have Higher Testosterone, According to a New Study

On top of that, the researchers found that coffee drinkers also had less total and visceral fat and more skeletal muscle, while both men and women had lower levels of certain amino acids that are associated with insulin resistance and type II diabetes.

Now here’s the bummer part of the story for anyone with low-T who stopped reading this article to go make a pot of coffee: the researchers couldn’t prove that coffee caused any of this. This is a perfect example of data establishing a link but not a direct cause. And of course, as I often preach in these science-based articles, correlation does not equal causation.

The researchers didn’t assign people the task of drinking a ton of coffee and then sitting back and watching what happens. That means it’s entirely possible that guys with naturally higher testosterone just really like coffee.

Yes, the researchers found that heavy coffee drinkers had more total testosterone and more bioavailable testosterone. But they also had lower free testosterone (aka the tiny bit of testosterone in your blood that your body can use immediately) and a lower free androgen index (a ratio that estimates the amount of active, unbound testosterone circulating through the body). These guys also had high levels of SHBG, a protein that moves sex hormones through the body.

It’s probably wise to remove the espresso IV you inserted after reading the headline, because for now, all science can tell is that coffee drinking and some hormonal patterns appear to move in concert… and that’s about it. Nothing definitive yet.  

The post Scientists Found a Surprising Link Between Coffee, Testosterone and Muscle Mass appeared first on VICE.

Polaroid announced a new collection of cameras, instant film, and accessories all featuring limited-edition designs to help celebrate the 30th anniversary of Pokémon. The new collection goes a little harder than Fujifilm's Pokémon collaboration from five years ago with the introduction of Polaroid film printed with various characters around the frames, including Pikachu and Snorlax. The entire collection will be available for preorder starting on August 25th in the US, Canada, and the UK through the Polaroid and Pokémon Center websites. A global release is expected to follow on October 5th.

The three cameras are existing models with new des …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Starting today, AI chats in Firefox's Smart Window AI browsing mode can pull from current web info and show source links in chat responses through a partnership with Exa. Smart Window can also now automatically suggest tab groups and show visual previews of pages you previously visited when you search your browsing history using natural language.

I saw a live demo that showed how the Smart Window AI could sort through selected links in your browsing history to pull up "running shoes I looked at last week," and pop up images pulled from the sites browsed previously. The suggested groups of tabs can also find and close duplicates, making it …

Read the full story at The Verge.

The Fairphone 6 Plus is a minor hardware refresh, but a major launch for the company: It's the first phone that Fairphone is selling directly in the US. It's on sale now for $649.99, available through Fairphone's website and Amazon, and is sold unlocked with support for both T-Mobile and AT&T. In Europe, it costs €649, a €50 increase on last year's phone.

Fairphones from the 4 onwards have been available to buy in the US, but never from Fairphone itself. They were exclusively sold through a partnership with Murena, the developer of /e/OS, a "de-Googled" version of Android. That meant buyers were forced to use Murena's software - which is c …

Read the full story at The Verge.

OpenAI is introducing a dedicated ChatGPT mode for teenagers, combining existing youth safeguards and new safety features under one roof. The launch comes amid mounting public scrutiny over how AI tools affect younger users, as other platforms implement their own age checks and teen-specific protections.

ChatGPT for Teens is "an experience designed to help teens learn, think critically, deepen understanding, and use AI with confidence," OpenAI said in a blog post published Tuesday. Teen mode will automatically apply to users who identify themselves as being between the ages of 13 and 17, as well as those the system estimates to be under 1 …

Read the full story at The Verge.

We may have our first glimpse of Apple's rumored camera-equipped AirPods, thanks to a video that MacRumors found in the macOS Tahoe 26.7 Release Candidate. The short video clip features a man - who is wearing the new AirPods - holding up a book with the cover displayed, so that Visual Intelligence can see the book title.

A Siri voice-over plays over the clip, saying "with Visual Intelligence, your world becomes savable. See something you like? Just ask me to save it for later." Bloomberg's Mark Gurman has previously reported that the rumored AirPods with cameras are designed to take in "visual information in low resolution" and act as eyes …

Read the full story at The Verge.

Reddit is trying out a new way for people to take in content on Reddit: by turning text posts into audio / video content. As part of an experiment, some posts are being adapted into videos that use AI voices to read the text of the main post and some comments. The video highlights the text as it's read by the AI voice, and under the video, a note says that it's a "Real conversation voiced by AI."

An old post in r/boardgames from eight years ago with 101 responses to a request for good road trip games that adults will like is an example of Reddit's AI at work. Instead of the usual text thread, it has the main question above a three-minute vi …

Read the full story at The Verge.