Hacker NewsTuesday, March 4

Independent Latvian film "Flow" won the Best Animated Feature Oscar at the 97th Academy Awards, making history as Latvia's first Oscar win. The dialogue-free film, directed by Gints Zilbalodis, tells the story of a cat finding refuge with other animals on a boat after a flood destroys their homes.

A robotic lunar lander called Blue Ghost, built by Texas-based Firefly, successfully landed on the moon's surface, becoming only the second private company to achieve this feat. The mission, part of NASA's CLPS and Artemis programs, carries 10 scientific instruments to study the moon's surface and will conduct various experiments over a two-week period before lunar nightfall.

A creative alternative to traditional scrollbars featuring an animated stick figure that walks up and down the page as users scroll. The prototype is the first version, with plans to develop more characters like skateboarders, rock climbers, and squirrels. A warning is included for users with vestibular motion sensitivity.

Solarpunk is a literary and artistic movement focused on envisioning a sustainable future where humanity successfully addresses climate change and environmental challenges. It emphasizes community, renewable energy, and positive social change while rejecting dystopian outlooks. The aesthetic combines technology with nature, drawing inspiration from Art Nouveau and emphasizing DIY ethics.

<p>The article explores a specialized circuit in Intel's 1993 Pentium processor designed to multiply numbers by three. This circuit, part of the floating-point multiplier, was complex and crucial for the processor's base-8 multiplication system. The article details how this seemingly simple multiplication required sophisticated engineering techniques to achieve high performance.</p>

The author argues that hallucinated methods in LLM-generated code are less problematic than other types of hallucinations, as they're immediately detectable through testing. They emphasize the importance of manual code testing and review, offering tips to reduce hallucinations including using different models, leveraging context, and choosing established technologies.

Video game speedrunners who discover glitches and exploit game mechanics are unknowingly practicing skills similar to cybersecurity vulnerability researchers. Their expertise in reverse engineering games, analyzing code, and finding exploits could translate well into professional cybersecurity careers.

The wealth gap in the US continues to widen, with the top 10% owning most stocks, businesses, and real estate. Their consumer spending has increased significantly, now accounting for 50% of all spending compared to 36% three decades ago. This concentration of wealth shows no signs of slowing down.

Mozilla updated Firefox's Terms of Use, initially causing controversy over data ownership claims which were later removed. The company also revised its privacy commitments, removing explicit promises not to sell user data, explaining this change was due to varying legal definitions of "selling data" across jurisdictions, though maintaining they don't actually sell user information.

A comprehensive MIT course covering the mathematical foundations of diffusion and flow-based models in generative AI. The course includes lectures on flow matching, training targets, model building, and guest lectures on robotics and protein design, complemented by hands-on labs for practical implementation experience.