Citigroup credited a client's account with $81 trillion when it meant to send only $280, an error that could hinder the bank's attempt to persuade regulators that it has fixed long-standing operational issues. Financial Times: The erroneous internal transfer, which occurred last April and has not been previously reported, was missed by both a payments employee and a second official assigned to check the transaction before it was approved to be processed at the start of business the following day.

A third employee detected a problem with the bank's account balances, catching the payment 90 minutes after it was posted. The payment was reversed several hours later, according to an internal account of the event seen by the Financial Times and two people familiar with the event. No funds left Citi, which disclosed the "near miss" to the Federal Reserve and Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, according to another person with knowledge of the matter.

Blue Origin on Thursday announced the crew for its next mission. "The crew most notably includes popstar Katy Perry and broadcast journalist Gayle King. They will be joined by two scientists -- Aisha Bowe and Amanda Nguyen -- as well as Jeff Bezos' fiancee, TV personality Lauren Sanchez and film producer Kerianne Flynn," reports TechCrunch. From the report: Blue Origin says this marks the first all-female space crew since Soviet astronaut Valentina Tereshkova's 1963 solo mission, which made her the first woman ever to go to space. For the company's New Shepard rocket, this is its 31st trip to space, and its 11th with a crew. This journey is expected to last around 10 to 12 minutes; and if you're willing to drop a $150,000 deposit, you too can reserve a future spot on a short space jaunt.

The JavaScript package world is heating up as startups attempt to challenge npm's long-standing dominance. While npm remains the backbone of JavaScript dependency management, Deno's JSR and vlt's vsr have entered the scene with impressive backing and even more impressive leadership -- JSR comes from Node.js creator Ryan Dahl, while npm's own creator Isaac Schlueter is behind vsr. Neither aims to completely replace npm, instead building compatible layers that promise better developer experiences.

Many developers feel GitHub has left npm to stagnate since its 2020 acquisition, doing just enough to keep it running while neglecting innovations. Security problems and package spam have only intensified these frustrations. Yet these newcomers face the same harsh reality that pushed npm into GitHub's arms: running a package registry costs serious money -- not just for servers, but for lawyers handling trademark fights and content moderation.

The Guardian: For some, the adverts that precede the start of a film are the bane of a trip to the cinema; for others, they are a useful buffer as you stand in the popcorn queue. But for one man in India, the lengthy marathon of cinema advertising was so infuriating that he took the matter to the courts -- and won. Abhishek MR, a 30-year-old man from the southern city of Bangalore, had booked a trip to the cinema with friends in December last year to watch wartime drama Sam Bahadur.

But while the scheduled time he had booked the ticket for was 4.05pm, he had to sit through 25 minutes of adverts for upcoming features and commercial items such as homewares, mobile phones and cars before the film actually began. Having planned to return to work straight after the film, Abhishek MR was angered by what he felt was a costly disruption to his life. He filed a lawsuit against PVR Inox, India's largest cinema multiplex chain, stating that: "The complainant could not attend other arrangements and appointments which were scheduled for the day and has faced losses that cannot be calculated in terms of money as compensation." Bruce66423 adds: Great outcome -- and only 25 minutes of garbage punished. Note that Indian cinemas also make patrons sit through 15 minutes of adverts in the middle of the film.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Meta Platforms is in discussions to construct a new data center campus for its artificial intelligence projects, with potential costs exceeding $200 billion, The Information reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter. Meta executives have informed data center developers that the company is considering building the campus in states including Louisiana, Wyoming or Texas, with senior leaders having visited potential sites this month, the report said.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: As part of a settlement announced by the state of New York's Attorney General, Letitia James, DoorDash has agreed to pay $16.75 million to more than 60,000 Dashers who were supposed to receive that money in the form of tips but instead, the company used it to cover base pay and pocketed the rest. New York's lawsuit alleged that between May 2017 and September 2019, tens of thousands of Dashers were misled by DoorDash's pay model. At the time, the company offered a guaranteed wage to drivers -- the minimum amount that they could expect to make from a job. But instead of paying that guarantee and letting drivers keep their tips, DoorDash counted the tip toward their base pay and kept what was left. [...]

Per the AG's lawsuit, DoorDash showed a message to customers that said "Dashers will always receive 100 percent of the tip" -- a statement that is technically true but does not clarify that "tip" is actually the delivery drivers' wage. New York argued that disclosures explaining how tips worked were buried in online documents and "customers had no way of knowing that DoorDash was using tips to reduce its own costs." DoorDash did eventually change its payment model to ensure "earnings will increase by the exact amount a customer tips on every order," but New York's case represents drivers finally getting those tips they earned during the period when the company was less transparent about who was actually pocketing that extra cash. Dashers eligible for the settlement will be contacted by the settlement administrator so they can get their piece of the pie that was rightfully theirs in the first place.

Oracle founder Larry Ellison's agricultural technology venture Sensei Ag has largely failed to deliver on its ambitious goals despite costing more than half a billion dollars, more than he spent to purchase Hawaii's Lanai island itself. Eight years after its founding, little of the revolutionary technology Sensei promised - including AI crop breeding, robotic harvesting, and advanced sensors - is being utilized in its six greenhouses on Lanai, according to WSJ.

The company has faced numerous setbacks, including greenhouses that weren't built to withstand Lanai's strong winds, solar panels that malfunctioned, and executives with limited agricultural experience. Far from its original mission to "feed the world," Sensei currently grows lettuce and cherry tomatoes primarily for Hawaii's local market, while its Canadian operations supply some East Coast supermarkets. The company has pivoted to focus on developing software and robotics at test centers in Southern California, aiming to eventually license technology packages to other indoor farms.

Long-time Slashdot reader schwit1 shared this observation from space/science news blogger Robert Zimmerman: Having now reached lunar orbit in preparation for its landing on March 2, 2025, an engineering test instrument on Firefly's Blue Ghost lunar lander has now proven that even from that distance spacecraft can use the multiple GPS-type satellites in Earth orbit to track their position.

[From NASA.gov]: The Lunar GNSS Receiver Experiment (LuGRE) acquired and tracked Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals for the first time in lunar orbit – a new record! This achievement, peaking at 246,000 miles, suggests that Earth-based Global Navigation Satellite System constellations can be used for navigation in transit to, around, and potentially on the Moon. It also demonstrates the power of using multiple GNSS constellations together, such as GPS and Galileo, to perform navigation.

After lunar landing, LuGRE will operate for 14 days and attempt to break another record – first reception of GNSS signals on the lunar surface.

This test is a very big deal. It tells us that operations on the Moon, at least those on the near side, will likely not require a GPS-type infrastructure in lunar orbit, thus allowing a lot of difficult missions to proceed sooner while saving a lot of money and time.

New power plants burning natural gas are being built all across America, reports the Washington Post, calling it a gas boom "driven in large part by AI."

They blame tech companies like Microsoft and Meta — which "looked to gas amid a shortage of adequate new clean energy" — while noting that those companies "say they plan to offset their development of natural gas capacity with equal investments in clean energy like solar and wind." [E]ven coal is making a comeback. But the biggest push is for gas, with more than 220 plants in various stages of development nationwide. They are often pitched as a bridge until more clean power is available, sometimes with promises the plants will eventually be equipped with nascent technology that traps greenhouse gas emissions. But the timeline for installing such "carbon capture" is vague. "These companies are building these massive new gas plants that are going to be there for 30 to 50 years," said Bill Weihl, a former director of sustainability at Facebook and founder of the nonprofit ClimateVoice. "That's not a bridge. It is a giant bomb in our carbon budget...."

Public filings from some of the big tech companies driving this development show their greenhouse gas emissions are soaring... "The last few years have revealed that a global energy transition is more complex and less linear than anticipated," Microsoft's board wrote in urging rejection of a December shareholder resolution demanding the company confront the climate risks of AI. "While urgency builds for decarbonization, so does the demand for energy."

Shareholders rejected the resolution. Microsoft is battling with environmental groups over its plans to build a multibillion-dollar data center in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin, powered with electricity from natural gas. Their petition warns Microsoft's project "will push our state's climate goals out of reach, locking us into 30 more years of fossil fuels." The company said in a statement that it remains committed to erasing its emissions by adding substantial clean power to regional power grids. "By the end of 2025 we expect to meet our goal of adding new sources of carbon-free electricity to the grid equal to 100 percent of the electricity used by our datacenters," the statement said.

Meta says it is doing the same in Louisiana [where it's building a new 4-million-square-foot data center] and is "committed to matching our electricity use with 100 percent clean and renewable energy."
The article includes two revealing quotes:

• "It is like everyone just gave up," said Aaron Zubaty, CEO of Eolian, a large clean energy developer that works with data centers.

• American Petroleum Institute President Mike Sommers (who represents the oil and gas industry in Washington), said "The words that have replaced 'energy transition' are 'AI' and 'data centers'. We're transitioning from the energy transition to the energy reality ... We're going to need a lot more oil and gas."

An anonymous reader shared this report from the Telegraph: Workers with an axe to grind against their employer are using AI to bombard businesses with costly and inaccurate lawsuits, experts have warned.

Frustration is growing among employment lawyers who say they are seeing a trend of litigants using AI to help them run their claims, which they say is generating "inconsistent, lengthy, and often incorrect arguments" and causing a spike in legal fees... Ailie Murray, an employment partner at law firm Travers Smith, said AI submissions are produced so rapidly that they are "often excessively lengthy and full of inconsistencies", but employers must then spend vast amounts of money responding to them. She added: "In many cases, the AI-generated output is inaccurate, leading to claimants pleading invalid claims or arguments.

"It is not an option for an employer to simply ignore such submissions. This leads to a cycle of continuous and costly correspondence. Such dynamics could overburden already stretched tribunals with unfounded and poorly pleaded claims."
There's definitely been a "significant increase" in the number of clients using AI, James Hockin, an employment partner at Withers, told the Telegraph. The danger? "There is a risk that we see unrepresented individuals pursuing the wrong claims in the UK employment tribunal off the back of a duff result from an AI tool."

On Wednesday Mozilla president Mark Surman "announced plans to tackle what he says are 'major headwinds' facing the company's ability to grow, make money, and remain relevant," reports the blog OMG Ubuntu: "Mozilla's impact and survival depend on us simultaneously strengthening Firefox AND finding new sources of revenue AND manifesting our mission in fresh ways," says Surman... It will continue to invest in privacy-respecting advertising; fund, develop and push open-source AI features in order to retain 'product relevance'; and will go all-out on novel new fundraising initiatives to er, get us all to chip in and pay for it!

Mozilla is all-in on AI; Surman describes it as Mozilla's North Star for the work it will do over the next few years. I wrote about its new 'Orbit' AI add-on for Firefox recently...

Helping to co-ordinate, collaborate and come up with ways to keep the company fixed and focused on these fledgling effort is a brand new Mozilla Leadership Council.
The article argues that without Mozilla the web would be "a far poorer, much ickier, and notably less FOSS-ier place..." Or, as Mozilla's blog post put it Wednesday, "Mozilla is entering a new chapter — one where we need to both defend what is good about the web and steer the technology and business models of the AI era in a better direction.

"I believe that we have the people — indeed, we ARE the people — to do this, and that there are millions around the world ready to help us. I am driven and excited by what lies ahead."

According to Bloomberg, YouTube plans to introduce a lower-priced, ad-free version of its paid video service. From the report: The package, dubbed "premium lite," will be announced soon in the US, Australia, Germany and Thailand, according to a person familiar with the plans. The service will target viewers who primarily want to watch programs other than music videos. While YouTube may be best known for the free videos uploaded by users, the company also offers a variety of paid services. YouTube Premium is a $13.99-a-month package in the US that lets subscribers watch everything on the service, including music videos, without ads.

"As part of our commitment to provide our users with more choice and flexibility, we've been testing a new YouTube Premium offering with most videos ad-free in several of our markets," a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement. "We're hoping to expand this offering to even more users in the future with our partners' support."

Nikola, the hydrogen-truck maker that briefly sported a market value comparable to Ford Motor, has filed for bankruptcy with plans to wind down its business. From a report: Nikola on Wednesday said that it made the chapter 11 filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware and that it plans to conduct a court-supervised auction of its assets.

The Phoenix company said it worked for months with its financial and legal advisers to find a way to sustain its operations before determining that a structured sale process was the best way to maximize the value of its assets.

Meta's WhatsApp messaging service has surpassed 45 million users, earning the designation of a "Very Large Online Platform" under the EU's Digital Services Act. Bloomberg reports: WhatsApp's open channels, which are feeds affiliated with news outlets or public figures that under the DSA are comparable to a social network, averaged about 46.8 million monthly average users in the second half of 2024, Meta said in a filing on Feb. 14 that hasn't previously been reported. [...] The DSA content moderation rulebook imposes stricter requirements on very large online platforms, defined as those whose EU-based monthly active users exceed 45 million. Users of WhatsApp's core messaging feature do not count toward the designation under the DSA.

The commission would still need to rule that WhatsApp should be included in the more regulated tier. Under the DSA, very large online platforms must carry out risk assessments on the spread of illegal or harmful content, and put in place a mitigation strategy. Fines under the DSA can reach as much as 6% of a company's annual global sales. The DSA requires platforms to disclose user numbers every six months. Messaging service Telegram also published an update this week, saying that monthly EU users of its public channels are "significantly fewer than 45 million."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: HP will acquire assets from Humane, the maker of a wearable Ai Pin introduced in late 2023, for $116 million. The deal will include the majority of Humane's employees in addition to its software platform and intellectual property, the company said Tuesday. It will not include Humane's Ai pin device business, which will be wound down, an HP spokesperson said. Humane's team, including founders Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno, will form a new division at HP to help integrate artificial intelligence into the company's personal computers, printers and connected conference rooms, said Tuan Tran, who leads HP's AI initiatives. Chaudhri and Bongiorno were design and software engineers at Apple before founding the startup. [...]

Tran said he was particularly impressed with aspects of Humane's design, such as the ability to orchestrate AI models running both on-device and in the cloud. The deal is expected to close at the end of the month, HP said. "There will be a time and place for pure AI devices," Tran said. "But there is going to be AI in all our devices -- that's how we can help our business customers be more productive."

Apps offering lifetime subscriptions may pose risks despite potential cost savings, according to cybersecurity experts and analysts. While some lifetime plans can pay off quickly - like dating app Bumble's $300 premium subscription that breaks even in five months - others require years of use to justify hefty upfront costs. Meditation app Waking Up charges $1,500 for lifetime access, requiring over 11 years of use to recoup the investment.

Security researchers warn against lifetime subscriptions for services with high recurring costs like VPNs and cloud storage. Such providers may compromise user privacy or cut corners on infrastructure to offset losses, said Trevor Hilligoss, senior vice president at cybercrime research group SpyCloud Labs.

An anonymous reader shares a report: JPMorgan Chase Bank (Chase) will soon start blocking Zelle payments to social media contacts to combat a significant rise in online scams utilizing the service for fraud.

Zelle is a highly popular digital payments network that allows users to transfer money quickly and securely between bank accounts. It is also integrated into the mobile apps of many banks in the United States, allowing for almost instant transfers without requiring cash or checks but lacking one crucial feature: purchase protection.

gwolf (Slashdot reader #26,339) writes: On Friday, February 14, Libertarian Argentinian president, Javier Milei, promoted the just-created $LIBRA cryptocoin, created by the Viva la libertad project, strongly aligned with his political party, La Libertad Avanza. Milei tweeted, "This private project will be devoted to promote growth of the Argentinian economy, funding small startups and enterprises. The world wants to invest in Argentina!"

It is worth noting that the project's website was registered a mere three minutes before Milei tweeted his endorsement. The cryptocoin quickly reached a $4.6 billion market cap... Only to instantaneously lose 89% of its value, with nine core investers pulling the rug from under the enthusiast investors. More details from the blog Web3 Is Going Just Great: [W]ithin hours of the launch, insiders began selling off their holdings of the token. The token had been highly concentrated among insiders, with around 82% of the token held in a small cluster of apparently insider addresses. Those insiders cashed out around $107 million, crashing the token price by around 95%. After the crash, Milei deleted his tweet promoting the project. He later claimed he was "not aware of the details of the project."
UPDATE: CNN reports that Argentine President Milei is now facing calls for impeachment. The presidency on Saturday announced an investigation into the matter, saying: "President Javier Milei has decided to immediately involve the Anti-Corruption Office to determine whether there was improper conduct on the part of any member of the national government, including the president himself."

A hedge fund startup that uses AI to do work typically handled by analysts has outperformed the global stock market in its first six months while slashing research costs. From a report: The Sydney-based firm, Minotaur Capital, was founded by Armina Rosenberg and Thomas Rice. Rosenberg previously managed a global equities portfolio for tech billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes and ran Australian small-company research for JPMorgan Chase & Co. when she was 25. Rice is a former portfolio manager at Perpetual. The duo's bets on global stocks returned 13.7% in the six months ending January, versus 6.7% for the MSCI All-Country World Index. Minotaur has no analysts on staff, with Rosenberg saying AI models are far quicker and cheaper.

"We're looking at about half the price" in terms of cost of AI versus a junior analyst salary, Rosenberg, 37, said of the firm's program. Minotaur is among a growing number of hedge funds experimenting with ways to improve returns and cut expenses with AI as the technology becomes increasingly sophisticated. Still, the jury is still out on the ability of AI-driven models to deliver superior returns over the long run.

Reddit's recent earnings report revealed that AI licensing deals with Google and OpenAI account for about 10% of its $1.3 billion revenue, totaling approximately $130 million. With Google paying $60 million, OpenAI is estimated to be paying Reddit around $70 million annually for content licensing. Adweek reports: "It's a small part of our revenue -- I'll call it 10%. For a business of our size, that's material, because it's valuable revenue," [said the company's COO Jen Wong]. The social platform -- which on Wednesday reported a 71% year-over-year lift in fourth-quarter revenue -- has been "very thoughtful" about the AI developers it chooses to work with, Wong said. To date, the company has inked two content licensing deals: one with Google for a reported $60 million, and one with ChatGPT parent OpenAI.

Reddit has elected to work only with partners who can agree to "specific terms ... that are really important to us." These terms include user privacy protections and conditions regarding "how [Reddit is] represented," Wong said. While licensing agreements with AI firms offer a valuable business opportunity for Reddit, advertising remains the company's core revenue driver. Much of Reddit's $427.7 million Q4 revenues were generated by the ongoing expansion of its advertising business. And its ad revenue as a whole grew 60% YoY, underscoring the platform's growing appeal to brands. [...]

Helping to accelerate ad revenue growth is Reddit's rising traffic. While Reddit's Q4 user growth came in under Wall Street projections, causing shares to dip, its weekly active uniques grew 42% YoY to over 379 million visitors. Average revenue per unique visitor was $4.21 during the quarter, up 23% from the prior year. While Google is "nicely reinforcing" Reddit's growth in traffic, Wong said, she added that the site's logged-in users, which have grown 27% year-over-year, are "the bedrock of our business."