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Mozilla has rolled out an emergency Firefox 139.0.1 update after the Tuesday release caused graphical artifacts on PCs with NVIDIA GPUs. Firefox 139 shipped on May 27 with features like Full-Page Translations, but it also caused graphical artifacts when browsing the web in Firefox. In a Reddit thread, several Firefox users complained that videos would flicker or flash. This issue also affects webpages, including sites like Instagram. Mozilla has quickly identified the root cause and has shipped a hotfix with v139.0.1. In a post on Bugzilla, Mozilla confirmed that Firefox 139 re-enabled a specific DirectComposition path behavior, which caused these issues. In previous releases, Firefox kept a block list that stopped Firefox from using DirectComposition on mixed-refresh NVIDIA setup. Unfortunately, the block list was removed with Firefox 139, and it allowed the browser to use DirectComposition in a way that exposed a graphics driver bug on NVIDIA cards under Windows 10. When you play a 60 FPS video on the 60 Hz monitor and then scroll or hover over the content on the high-refresh monitor, parts of the video buffer leak into the other window. That shows up as flashing artifacts or corruption wherever the page repaints. The issue doesn't happen with 30 FPS content because the frame timing lines up with both refresh rates. Single-monitor or AMD/Intel setups weren't affected by these issues. It is also worth noting that DirectComposition isn't the problem, but Mozilla's implementation clashes with certain GPUs. "Currently the only thing that makes Firefox special in this respect is that it uses Windows DirectComposition in a certain way (Surfaces rather than Swapchains) for the majority of web content..." a Firefox developer noted in a post on Bugzilla. "We have a new code path (the Layer Compositor as it is called) which should become available for testing in Firefox Nightly in the coming weeks if all goes well, we will have an interest in testing that on the same computers when it is ready, to verify if any of this flickering occurs with that approach which is much more similar to other browsers." Mozilla fixed artifacts in Firefox 139 As per the release notes, a new update (139.0.1) is now rolling out, and it restores the blocklist, which means you should no longer run into artifacts. "Fixed graphics corruption with certain NVIDIA graphics adapters and multiple monitors running at mixed refresh rates after updating to Firefox 139," Mozilla noted on the release notes page. To install Firefox 139.0.1, open Settings and check for updates. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

In November 2024, Microsoft announced Edge Game Assist, a special browser built into Windows 11's Game Bar. The goal was to give gamers a more convenient way to browse the internet when playing games and eliminate the need to Alt + Tab just to check something on the internet. Now, Microsoft Edge Game Assist is out of beta and publicly available. With Microsoft Edge Game Assist, you can forget about alt-tabbing out of your game, which, in some cases, takes a lot of time and even causes issues with your game. Instead, hit Win + G to bring up the Game Bar, a gaming overlay with various useful features, and open Edge Game Assist while keeping the game running as usual. Microsoft Edge Game Assist is part of the Edge browser, so it is fully compatible with the modern internet and offers some of its existing features, plus some gaming-focused stuff like tips and guides (it can detect what game you are playing and suggest relevant content) and quick access to Discord, Spotify, or Twitch. Game Assist also lets you have separate tabs from the main browser, keeping gaming-related tabs away from work and personal browsing. During the testing period, Microsoft added support for over 80 various games (Game Assist works with any game, but it offers extra features for optimized and supported titles), keyboard shortcut support, a new Paste Game Title feature (the browser automatically pastes the name of the game when you open it), access to favorites, history, and extensions. However, there are still some limitations. At the moment, Game Assist is optimized for mouse and keyboard users, but Microsoft says it is working on "refining" controller support in future updates. You can read more about Microsoft Edge Game Assist here. The full list of supported games is available here. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

An experimental Edge feature lets you enable or disable all extensions when on a specific site with a single click. Microsoft Edge could soon gain the option to disable all extensions with a single click. The option is in testing within Edge Canary, so it could be a while before it ships to everyone. That is, of course, if it ships at all. As highlighted by Leo Varela (X user @Leopeva64), Microsoft tested similar functionality a few years ago but chose not to release it. The new version of the feature differs slightly from the earlier test, but the functionality remains largely the same. When browsing any website, you can use the extensions menu to disable all extensions on that specific site. Some extensions already support being paused. For example, uBlock Origin has a large on/off button in case you want to view ads on a specific site or if the adblocker prevents desired content from appearing on a page. The new Edge feature would give users a quick and easy way to pause all extensions, which could ensure a clean experience on certain sites when needed. Google Chrome has a similar option already and Microsoft has explored this functionality before, so the extension feature would be a welcome addition to Edge. Microsoft has several features in development for Edge. Recently, the tech giant started testing a new tab page for Edge that centers around Copilot. That page used to require a hidden flag, but it is now rolling out to everyone. Microsoft also revamped the Edge Add-ons site earlier this year. Edge supports installing extensions from the Chrome Web Store, so some people use that rather than the Edge Add-ons site. Microsoft's update to the Add-ons page makes it easier to find the best extensions and has a reorganized themes section. We'll have to wait to see if Microsoft releases the new extension feature or if the company scraps the option again. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

An ARM CPU and integrated NVIDIA graphics on the same chip? It looks like it could indeed happen. NVIDIA didn't unveil a new processor built for consumer laptops at Computex 2025 as many surmised, but that doesn't mean the project isn't underway. A new leak from YouTube's Moore's Law is Dead channel shows off a rough image of a purported NVIDIA APU designed for use in gaming laptops. The limited information now available suggests it will run between 80W and 120W. MLID's source expects NVIDIA to target a Q4 2025 or Q1 2026 release. The leak is said to come from an NVIDIA insider who tests APUs, so there's certainly some credibility to the information. A look at the leaked NVIDIA APU from the Moore's Law Is Dead YouTube channel. (Image credit: Moore's Law Is Dead (YouTube)) The "Eng Sample," as it's clearly branded, has eight modules surrounding the main chip. These are likely LPDDR5x memory modules akin to what AMD is doing with its Strix Halo APUs, where the chip relies on the speedy attached memory to boost performance. But where AMD's processors have an x86 architecture, NVIDIA's leaked APU is likely using an ARM CPU developed by MediaTek alongside an entirely new integrated GPU. That integrated GPU could hit the same performance as a discrete RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, at least according to a prior leak also provided by Moore's Law is Dead. Considering the discrete card runs at up to 115W alone, this could be a massive breakthrough for gaming laptops. No extra heat created by a discrete GPU, and less space needed for the extra cooling. Battery life would also no doubt improve, an area where even the best gaming laptops continue to underwhelm in 2025. NVIDIA isn't the first company to do something like this, but it could do it best. Its GPU technology, including DLSS 4, is only a step away from sheer magic already. An efficient ARM CPU paired with an integrated NVIDIA GPU and all of its AI upscaling and frame generation would certainly be a big deal. I'm eager to see what its new APU can do. What is an APU, and why is NVIDIA suddenly so interested? Will chunky gaming laptops like the Legion Pro 7i (Gen 10) disappear once NVIDIA's new APU enters the market? (Image credit: Windows Central | Zachary Boddy) Let's take a step back and cover some of these terms. Most importantly, an Accelerated Processing Unit (APU) is a term created by AMD to advertise a CPU and GPU built into the same chip. That might sound similar to a System-on-Chip (SoC), and you're not wrong for thinking so. However, an SoC incorporates more than just the CPU and GPU, adding controllers, networking, etc. More recently, it's come to include a Neural Processing Unit (NPU) for local AI tasks. Qualcomm's Snapdragon X chips found in Copilot+ PCs are a perfect example of an SoC. The news that NVIDIA is working on an APU didn't come out of nowhere. Rumors began in 2023 when Reuters broke the story about NVIDIA and AMD both working on ARM processors for Windows PCs. At the time, it was believed that they'd make a debut sometime in 2025, and the news caused Intel stock to drop. We also know that NVIDIA is powering the upcoming Nintendo Switch 2 with its Tegra T239, an APU using an ARM processor and an Ampere GPU. NVIDIA has also been focusing on DGX Spark, an AI supercomputer platform powered by its GB10 Grace Blackwell chip. MSI revealed a new EdgeXpert MS-C931 desktop PC based on the DGX Spark platform at Computex 2025. It's clear that Team Green is ready to step out of its GPU shoes and into a more dominant role in the Windows laptop world. We'll have to wait until NVIDIA officially reveals the chip, but I expect it will change gaming laptops in a major way when it does. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

NVIDIA has announced its financial results for the first quarter of fiscal 2026, which ended April 27, 2025, and the revenue figures are massive, though not without some serious headwinds. The company raked in $44.1 billion, a 69% increase from the same quarter a year ago and a 12% jump from the previous quarter. The last time we reported on NVIDIA's fiscal quarter earnings, the company was smashing expectations for its second fiscal quarter of 2024, posting what many called a blowout financial quarter with $30 billion in revenue and a massive 122% year-over-year jump. This time, aside from the revenue, the big headline grabber is a $4.5 billion hit NVIDIA took. This charge is tied to its H20 products for the Chinese market, thanks to the U.S. government deciding on April 9, 2025, that new licenses are needed for export. Before these new rules, H20 products actually sold $4.6 billion in this same quarter, and NVIDIA was unable to ship an additional $2.5 billion worth. This charge dragged GAAP earnings per diluted share down to $0.76 and non-GAAP to $0.81; without it, NVIDIA notes, non-GAAP earnings per share would have been a healthier $0.96. Despite these challenges, CEO Jensen Huang remains bullish, stating, "Global demand for NVIDIA’s AI infrastructure is incredibly strong." Huang pointed to the Blackwell NVL72 AI supercomputer, now in full-scale production, and a tenfold surge in AI inference token generation in just one year. Data Center revenue certainly reflects this, hitting $39.1 billion, up 73% year-over-year. Gaming also had a record quarter with $3.8 billion in revenue, boosted by new cards like the GeForce RTX 5070 and the upcoming Nintendo Switch 2, which will feature an NVIDIA processor and AI-powered DLSS. Looking ahead to the second quarter of fiscal 2026, NVIDIA expects revenue around $45.0 billion. Crucially, this forecast already accounts for an estimated $8.0 billion loss in H20 revenue due to those export controls. The company is also working to get its gross margins back into the mid-70% range later in the year, after the H20 charge pushed the Q1 non-GAAP gross margin to 61.0% (it would have been 71.3% without the charge). NVIDIA also announced its next quarterly cash dividend of $0.01 per share, payable on July 3, 2025. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

We weren't even sure if Paranthropus remains come from a single species. The ability to study ancient DNA has revolutionized our ability to understand our own species' past. It has clarified our relationship with Neanderthals and revealed the existence of Denisovans. But even in the most favorable environments, DNA degrades over time, setting a limit on how far back we can hope to resolve questions about our ancestors. And most of the species we've had trouble understanding lived in Africa, where the conditions are far less favorable for DNA's survival. But a large international team has now found another way to get some information about the genetics out of far older remains. They've extracted fragments of enamel proteins from the teeth of fossils of the species Paranthropus robustus and used them to test whether the remains truly belonged to one species, despite dramatic differences in size. Because one of the proteins is male-specific, they also found the size of the individual wasn't necessarily related to its sex. A complicated species Remains that have been classified as Paranthropus show up in the fossil record nearly 3 million years ago and persist for roughly a million years. That means it overlapped both with australopithecines and early members of the Homo genus. Four different species have been assigned to this genus, but the situation is complicated. It shares a lot of similarities with some species of Australopithecus, raising the possibility of interbreeding. There's also a lot of variation within remains identified as Paranthropus, notably in the size of individuals. Some have suggested that this might be due to male/female differences in this species (termed "sexual dimorphism"), but that has been difficult to test. Unfortunately, no remains have been found outside of Africa, and no DNA older than 20,000 years has been recovered from that continent—well after Paranthropus went extinct. So, for Paranthropus remains that date from roughly 2 million years ago, the team turned to proteins found in teeth. These inevitably get damaged over time—broken down into smaller fragments, with some amino acids chemically altered. But the robust nature of tooth enamel should prevent their wholesale destruction. And the technique known as mass spectrometry is sensitive enough to identify individual isotopes of atoms incorporated into larger molecules. Using this, the researchers could identify the likely composition of individual fragments of proteins and match those to known tooth enamel proteins. After testing their techniques on animal remains found with the hominins, the researchers turned to samples from the Paranthropus teeth, all found at the same site within South Africa’s Cradle of Humankind World Heri­tage Site. While the proteins identified varied from sample to sample, they found six different proteins that were present in all four of the teeth studied, though again, only as fragments. Collectively, those fragments covered 425 amino acids of the six proteins. To confirm that the results, generated in a lab in Copenhagen, were real, they repeated the process at a lab in Cape Town. The successful replication was bolstered by the fact that some of the amino acids showed signs of chemical damage, indicating that they really were pieces of 2 million-year-old proteins. Reading amino acids So, what could small bits of ancient proteins tell us? In this case, more than you might expect. That's because one of the enamel proteins, AMELY, comes from a gene that's located on the Y chromosome (there's also an AMELX gene on the X chromosome). And some of the protein fragments identified in a subset of the four remain clearly included pieces of AMELY, indicating that the tooth had come from a male individual. That turns out to be critical to testing the idea that body size is an indication of sex differences in Paranthropus. One of the samples was a small tooth that had been suggested to be from a female individual, but the presence of AMELY unambiguously identifies it as male. That's an important result because, as the researchers put it, "it enables us to exclude sexual dimorphism as one of the multiple variables affecting the range of anatomical variation," in this species. The absence of AMELY suggests that a sample is female, but it isn't definitive. That's both because it's impossible to rule out some problem with identifying the protein in samples this old, and in part because some rare males (including at least one Neanderthal) carry deletions that eliminate the gene entirely. Another key aspect is that some of the 425 amino acid locations differ between hominin species, and even individual members of Paranthropus. Thus, they can potentially serve as a diagnostic of the relationships between and within species and help address some of the confusion about how many species of Paranthropus there were and their relationship with other hominins. While it's difficult to say too much with only four samples, the researchers found some suggestive evidence. For example, they tested whether you might see the sort of amino acid variation found among these samples if they all belonged to the same species. This was done by randomly choosing four human genomes and examining whether they had a similar level of variation. They concluded that it was "plausible" that you'd see this level of variation among any four individuals that were chosen at random, but the population of modern humans is likely to be larger than that of Paranthropus, so the test wasn't definitive. Among the 425 different amino acids were 16 that had species-specific variations among hominins. Somewhat surprisingly, Paranthropus robustus is the most closely related species to our own genus, Homo, based on a tree built from these variations. Again, however, they conclude that there simply isn't enough data available to feel confident in this conclusion. But that should really be an "isn't enough data yet." We heard about this paper from regular Ars reader Enrico Cappellini, who happens to be its senior author and faculty at the University of Copenhagen's Globe Institute. And a quick look over his faculty profile indicates that developing the techniques used here is his major research focus, so hopefully we'll be able to expand the data available on extinct hominin species with time. The challenge, as noted in the paper, is that the technique destroys a small part of the sample, and these samples are one-of-a-kind pieces of the collective history of all of humanity. Science, 2025. DOI: 10.1126/science.adt9539 (About DOIs). Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

Windows Update orchestration platform will deliver a unified experience for app and driver updates. Microsoft announced the "unified future for app updates on Windows" this week. The tech giant created the Windows Update orchestration platform to bring together app updates and other updates on your PC. At the moment, apps, drivers, and other components are updated separately using different methods. This fragmented approach creates more work for IT admins and anyone who manages devices. The current setup can also cause CPU usage spikes and other issues, which Microsoft outlines in a recent blog post. "Updates across the Windows ecosystem can feel like a fragmented experience for IT admins managing applications that have their own update orchestrators (e.g., line of business) and commercial management tools that handle their own download, install, restart, and notifications today," said Microsoft. "To solve this, we're building a vision for a unified, intelligent update orchestration platform capable of supporting any update (apps, drivers, etc.) to be orchestrated alongside Windows updates." The newly announced Windows Update orchestration platform makes it possible to have app updates run through Windows Update. The platform is now in private preview. Windows Update currently handles updates to Windows 11, some OEM updates, and certain drivers. The Windows Update orchestration platform will result in a more unified update experience for apps and drivers. The Windows Update orchestration platform also benefits developers by enabling change logs to appear directly within Windows Update. Microsoft detailed that the new setup also allows for eco-efficient scheduling, a simplified notification experience, and admin policy support for deadlines. Microsoft Store failings The Microsoft Store manages app updates and uses Windows Update on its back end. (Image credit: Future) A centralized method for app updates managed by Microsoft — hasn’t that been around for a while? The Windows Update orchestration platform looks like a genuinely useful tool for IT admins and businesses. It also highlights that Microsoft cannot convince developers to embrace the Microsoft Store. The Microsoft Store uses Windows Update on its back end and has been around for well over a decade. These facts were also pointed out by Legacy Update on Bluesky. Admittedly, using the Microsoft Store to manage updates has had limits, but even those have gotten looser over the years. Late in 2024, Microsoft started testing the option to have the Microsoft Store's update system work with apps that are not hosted on the Microsoft Store's servers. That change affected "provided and updated apps," which are listed in the Microsoft Store but sourced from the server of the app's developer. The update turned the Microsoft Store into a "one-stop shop for all app updates on your system," as explained by our Senior Editor Zac Bowden. But it still requires apps to be within the Microsoft Store. The Windows Update orchestration platform provides a unified experience and works with apps and components not available through the Microsoft Store. Between improvements to the Microsoft Store, the release of Windows Package Manager, and the upcoming Windows Update orchestration platform, there is a collection of tools to get apps onto PCs. That's great for IT admins and consumers. It just feels like some of Microsoft's efforts are only needed because the tech giant cannot convince developers to embrace the Microsoft Store. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

Earlier this month, we wrote a news piece about Windows 11 KB5058411 installations failing with various error codes. The KB update was released for Windows 11 24H2 PCs and we noted how the company's support guide for such error codes proved helpless in such a situation. Microsoft has not released official word on the 24H2 issues. However, the tech giant confirmed today similar installation-related problems regarding Windows 11 22H2/23H2 KB5058405, which was released simultaneously with KB5058411 as part of the May 2025 Patch Tuesday. The company notes that affected users will find that they will run into a "0xc0000098" hex error code in Windows recovery after the update fails to install. The error also reveals that the issue is related to a corrupt Windows ACPI.sys system driver. The ACPI or Advanced Configuration and Power Interface is part of the processor power management that helps control various power states (P-states and C-states) on Windows, meant to run a CPU efficiently. Microsoft says that you may see the following error during recovery: Your PC/Device needs to be repaired The operating system couldn't be loaded because a required file is missing or contains errors. File: ACPI.sys Error code: 0xc0000098 Aside from the error confirmed by the Redmond giant itself, users online are running into other issues too, like one with "0x8007007e" code (via Reddit). Once again, Microsoft's guide does not help. About the documented 0xc0000098 failure issues, Microsoft adds that home users are unlikely to run into such issues. The company has added that the problem is seen "primarily on devices running in virtual environments" like Azure Virtual Machines, Azure Virtual Desktops, and On-premises virtual machines hosted on Citrix or Hyper-V. The issue is currently being investigated and thus no workaround as of such has been provided. You can find the issue here on Microsoft's official Windows health dashboard website. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

Windows Insiders with PCs enrolled in the Canary Channel of the Insider program can download build 27868. Today's update is not very big, but it still has some notable improvements and fixes, such as a reworked Voice Access in-product experience. Microsoft will use the latter to announce new features and enhancements, helping users to discover and learn about the latest changes for these important accessibility features. Microsoft also fixed a bug that caused pen input to stop responding on some PCs and another one that caused some apps like Spotify to fail at launch or when installing from the Microsoft Store (error 0xc80070032). Also, developers resolved system crashes with the SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED message and Group Policy Editor not rendering correctly on systems with certain languages like Chinese. That is pretty much everything that build 27868 has to offer. Before you update, mind the following known bugs: [General] [IMPORTANT NOTE FOR COPILOT+ PCs] If you are joining the Canary Channel on a new Copilot+ PC from the Dev Channel, Release Preview Channel or retail, you will lose Windows Hello pin and biometrics to sign into your PC with error 0xd0000225 and error message “Something went wrong, and your PIN isn’t available”. You should be able to re-create your PIN by clicking “Set up my PIN”. You may see an Administrative Templates error message when opening Group Policy Editor. If you click OK you should be able to proceed as normal. We’re investigating an issue where the taskbar is unexpectedly not showing acrylic material after upgrading to this build. We’re working on the fix for an issue where audio devices with high sampling (like 192Hz) and multiple channels aren’t producing sound after upgrading to this build. Thanks Insiders that provided detailed information in your feedback! [NEW] When Virtualization Based Security is enabled, applications dependent on virtualization, such as VMware Workstation, lose the ability to run unless the “Windows Hypervisor Platform” Windows optional component is installed on the system. Previously, installing the optional component was not required. [Task Manager] Search and other options, such as filtering in Task Manager, do not work. You can find the announcement post on the official Windows Blogs website. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

WhatsApp Status updates are getting beefed up, thanks to a new feature drop announced by the company. The Meta-owned instant messaging platform will soon roll out four new Status update features, which will be available to all users in the coming months. For starters, you can create a photo collage of up to six images using the Layout feature and arrange them in your preferred way. It's complemented by a new Photo Stickers feature that turns a photo into a custom sticker, which you can add to your status update. Again, you can edit, resize, or reposition a custom photo sticker directly from the Status post creation interface. Just like Layout, Instagram's Add Yours sticker format is also making its way to WhatsApp Status. You can choose an image, write a prompt, and invite your friends to respond by sharing it as their WhatsApp Status with their take on the topic. WhatsApp already lets you add music to status updates with photos or videos. Support for soundtracks, similar to Facebook and Instagram, was added to WhatsApp earlier this year. Now, it's building on the experience with a new tool to post Status updates focused entirely on a particular song. You can share a song as your status or turn that song into a sticker and add it to a separate status post. You can try out these new features when they arrive on your Android or iOS device. WhatsApp Status is like the Stories feature on Instagram; it disappears after 24 hours of posting. It's accessible via the Updates tab in the WhatsApp app. The new features have arrived just days after WhatsApp launched its native app for iPad. In recent updates, WhatsApp has also added a new Advanced Chat Privacy feature designed to keep conversations within the instant messaging app. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

Canonical, the maker of Ubuntu Linux, has announced that it will be introducing monthly snapshot development builds in addition to the beta, release candidate, and final release. The company is beginning to use these snapshot releases starting today, May 29. There will be four snapshots in total during the Ubuntu 25.10 development cycle with snapshot 2 arriving on June 10, snapshot 3 arriving July 15, and snapshot 4 arriving on August 19. The reasons for the change are to do with the underlying release processes that go on behind the scenes. The company said that over the last 20 years, it has developed a release process with various safeguards, but it’s mostly a manual process that requires the input of seasoned Ubuntu veterans. Canonical has recently put together the Canonical Ubuntu Release Management Team which will work with the Ubuntu Release Team, composed of the veterans, to develop a new process for releasing Ubuntu versions. The snapshot releases are designed to give the new team a better understanding of the existing processes. The company said that these monthly snapshot releases for Ubuntu are not fully-fledged releases but curated, testable milestones from the development stream. It’s also important to clarify that Ubuntu is not moving to monthly releases or adopting a rolling release model. For the meantime, Canonical is committed to its six-monthly releases with a Long Term Support (LTS) release every two years. For anyone out there who likes to get their hands dirty trying the latest development versions of Ubuntu, these snapshots will give you more stuff to try out. For average Ubuntu users, snapshots allow more people to try out Ubuntu releases during development and this could lead to less buggy Ubuntu public releases if more issues are detected during development. You can get snapshot 1 now from Canonical. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

Developers at Push On reveal gameplay for Alkahest, an RPG with a stylish combat system that combines swordplay with alchemy. On May 22, 2025, IGN showed off a teaser trailer for a new upcoming Xbox title with a similarly upcoming PC port named Alkahest. This game, developed by Push On and published by HypeTrain Digital, is a first-person RPG set in a medieval, dark fantasy world where the player must wield an arsenal of weapons and dangerous alchemical potions to defeat hordes of vicious monsters. The teaser trailer released by IGN gives us a glimpse of what Aklahest's combat will look like, and so far, it looks insane. The teaser trailer (as well as its reveal trailer shown in June 2024) showcases the player character utilizing the environment, performing acrobatic swordplay, and conducting deadly potions in the middle of combat to slay their foes. As for what the story is about, Alkahest takes place in Kadanor, a kingdom embroiled in civil war between three powerful noble houses. You play as the youngest son of a petty lord destined to rot in obscurity. To defy your fate, you embark on a quest across the kingdom to make a name for yourself by exploring the land for long-lost treasure, taking on jobs for locals, and quelling an unusual rise of goblin raids on the county border. The developers state on the game's Steam page that Alkahest's combat system will feature advanced melee combos and a large focus on interacting with the environment, like cutting down trees or using nearby siege equipment to slay enemies. Additionally, another huge component of Alkahest's gameplay will be Alchemy. By locating various recipes on their travels, players will be able to create all kinds of alchemical items like flammable grenades, healing potions, and weapon oils. You can even sneak in some poison in an NPC's pocket to take out stealthily. Will Alkahest's gameplay at launch live up to the hype of these trailers? What's interesting is that, according to the developers, Alkahest is inspired by games like Kingdom Come: Deliverance and Dishonored. While I haven't played the former, I have played the latter, and I definitely see some of Dishonored's melee combat in Alkahest. Aside from that, the combat looks unbelievable, maybe too unbelievable. After all, for all we know, these trailers could be pre-rendered cutscenes, and the final game could look totally different. But then again, people have said the same thing about the combat trailers for Black Myth: Wukong when that game first revealed itself, and the final product lived up to the hype (despite some jarring level design choices we found in our review of Black Myth: Wukong). Will Alkahest's combat system be just as fun to play as it is to watch from the trailers? We'll have to wait to find out when Alkahest eventually launches on Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, and PC via Windows and Steam. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

A former employee of a disc manufacturing company in Memphis has signed a plea agreement, in which he admits stealing and distributing numerous DVD and Blu-ray discs. They include “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” which subsequently leaked online before its official release. As part of the agreement, the U.S. will recommend a relatively low sentence. Three years ago, pirated Blu-ray copies of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” began circulating on pirate sites, weeks before its official release. Such high-profile leaks are rare, and the source of the breach remained unknown until earlier this year. In February, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted 37-year-old Steven Hale from Tennessee, a former employee of a disc manufacturing and distribution company in Memphis. While working at the unnamed company between 2021 and 2022, Hale allegedly stole numerous “pre-release” DVD and Blu-ray discs from his employer. These stolen discs contained many high-profile movie titles including “Spider-Man: No Way Home”. Hale Pleads Guilty Hale initially pleaded not guilty to two criminal copyright infringement charges and an additional charge of interstate transportation of stolen goods. This week Hale changed his plea, admitting guilt to one of the charges, and signing a plea agreement with the prosecution. Hale entered his guilty plea to Count Two of the indictment. The charge relates to his distribution of ten or more copies of copyrighted works, including pre-release movies, for commercial advantage and private financial gain. This includes the pre-release ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ disc, which is likely the source of the leak. The other films covered by this count are ‘Jungle Cruise,’ ‘Venom: Let There Be Carnage,’ ‘Encanto,’ ‘Eternals,’ ‘The King’s Man,’ ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings,’ ‘Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City,’ ‘Marry Me,’ ‘Sing 2,’ and ‘The Matrix Resurrections.’ Plea Agreement Lower Sentence, Limited Damages As part of the agreement, the prosecution agreed to drop two other counts and the Justice Department will recommend that the court awards the maximum available sentence reduction because Hale accepted responsibility. It will also recommend that the defendant is sentenced at the low end of the guideline range. For the remaining count, Hale faces a potential maximum penalty of five years imprisonment, a $250,000 fine, and three years of supervised release. In addition, he has also agreed to pay restitution to all identifiable victims who suffered losses due to his criminal conduct. Interestingly, for sentencing guideline purposes, the plea agreement puts the “infringement amount” between $15,000 and $40,000. That’s lower than the tens of millions of dollars in estimated losses mentioned in the indictment related to ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home. The final damages amount has yet to be determined by the court. 1,160 Blu-rays and DVDs The plea agreement doesn’t add much detail to what is already publicly known. Importantly, however, it does reveal that law enforcement seized approximately 1,160 Blu-rays and DVDs from the defendant on or around March 14, 2022. This means that the authorities had tracked down Hale as a potential suspect just days after the ‘Spider-Man’ movie leaked online. After that, it took nearly three years before the defendant was indicted. Why the indictment took so long is unknown, but the case may have been part of a broader ongoing investigation. Speculation and Sentencing While one can only speculate beyond this point, it is worth pointing out that the early online leaks of “Spider-Man: No Way Home” were shared publicly by the infamous release group EVO. This group was known for distributing pre-release content. A few months after the authorities tracked down Hale, EVO was dismantled by the Portuguese authorities. There is no evidence to suggest that these two cases are connected, but it’s not impossible either. What we do know for sure is that Hale will be sentenced by the District Court of Tennessee later this year. This sentencing hearing is scheduled to take place at the end of August. — A copy of the Plea Agreement, signed by all parties and submitted to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee is available here (pdf). Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

The results of the latest consumer surveys, carried out by Mediavision in the Nordic countries, are a mixed bag of bad news, and slightly less bad news. On one hand, consumption of pirate IPTV services in Sweden has dropped two points, from 16% of all households in 2024 to 14% in 2025. On the other, 30% of over 15-year-olds consume content illegally every month, a figure that rises to over 50% among men under 35. Describing Sweden as a country with a serious pirate IPTV problem is technically accurate, but lacking in all-important context. As a member of the European Union, Sweden is among 27 member states experiencing broadly similar difficulties. The main drivers usually boil down to lots of content being accessible from one supplier, at a price people can afford or are willing to pay. There are variables across the bloc, from consumer demand for specific types of often expensive regional content, to rightsholders’ ability to take action, and/or convince local governments to commit scarce resources towards solving the problem. In broad terms, the problem today is worse than it was pre-2020. No combination of industry measures, legal amendments, or government investment, has delivered anything close to a solution, anywhere in the EU. Even when positive news does arrive, it’s often met with cautious suspicion. 60,000 Swedish Households Say “No” to IPTV Stockholm-based consulting firm Mediavision conducts regular surveys to assess consumption trends in the Nordic countries. Its report for Sweden covering several months in 2024 could hardly have been worse. In the period bridging spring and the fall of last year, pirate IPTV subscription rates increased by a record 25%, with an estimated 700,000 households (one subscription = one household) regularly consuming from illicit sources. On face value, however, the numbers in Mediavision’s latest report seem to indicate progress. “The use of illegal IPTV is still high and it is now estimated that 640,000 Swedish households pay for illegal IPTV services,” says anti-piracy group Rights Alliance (Rattighetsalliansen). When a 60,000-household reduction warrants such a frosty reception (Rights Alliance says it’s too early to celebrate), the rest of the figures may not be encouraging either. 2.3 Million Swedes Use Illegal Source Every Month The new Mediavision survey estimates that 2.3 million Swedes aged 15 to 74-years-old, consume movies, TV shows, or live sports, from illegal sources, at least every month. Sweden is a relatively small country where 2.3 million people represent 30% of the population. Studies regularly show that infringement rates are higher among younger people; Sweden continues the long-standing trend here. Among citizens aged 15 to 34, over half say they regularly use content from illegal sources. As expected, piracy rates are highest among younger men and when every other person is already a subscriber or regular viewer, word tends to spread especially fast. Organized Crime The Rights Alliance graphic below shows that another large number is also causing concern. In 2019, the European Union Intellectual Property Office estimated that pirate IPTV services were generating close to a billion euros in annual revenue, in the EU alone (pdf). At the time, the Netherlands and Sweden had the highest percentage of IPTV users in the bloc, with 8.9% and 8.5% respectively. To put Sweden’s pirate IPTV growth into perspective, today’s 640,000 households can be placed alongside 616,700 individuals in the six-year-old EU report. In 2018, revenue generated by pirate providers from Swedish sales was an estimated 490,000 euros. The 1.4 billion figure above is in Swedish Krona; at today’s exchange rate that’s €137.6 million (US$154.8 million) “1.4 billion SEK directly from Swedish households into the criminal economy is unacceptable. Organized crime is fueled, and the damages to rights holders are much bigger than this,” Rights Alliance says. An investigation launched in Sweden a year ago is still ongoing. Alongside an assessment of financial damage to the film and TV industries, advice on whether action against IPTV subscribers is required (including a ‘ban’ on IPTV itself) is expected in the final report. Rights Alliance believes that more can be done immediately. “There is a need for increased resources and enhanced expertise among police and prosecutors,” says Rights Alliance lawyer and former police IP crime investigator, Alma Shawwaf. “Several actors can also do more to make it harder for criminals, not least payment providers and search engines such as Google.” Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend

Discord moves further away from being ad-free. Discord is further distancing itself from its ad-free beginnings by offering users a new virtual currency for clicking on in-platform advertisements. Acoording to a blog post this week by Peter Sellis, Discord’s SVP of product, a “small group” of Discord users around the globe can now earn "Orbs" through Play Quests, which Discord announced in March 2024 and let users earn in-game rewards by getting people to watch a stream of them playing a sponsored game. With enough Orbs, Discord users can purchase items in Discord's shop, including customization options for their profiles and credits for Nitro, a subscription add-on that offers features like 500MB uploads and HD resolution streaming. The goal is to fuel Discord’s advertising business by making clicking on ads more appealing. Advertisers also benefit by associating their ads with the ability to get desirable rewards. “This means that users will have the flexibility to use Orbs on many different rewards, making Quests even more relevant,” Sellis wrote. "This is particularly great for users who want to try Nitro without a current subscription." Sellis said that Orbs will be available to “many more” Discord users “soon” but didn’t specify when. “We will continue to add new ways for users to claim rewards using Orbs in the future and for Nitro subscribers to continue to receive better rewards and deals across our ecosystem,” Sellis wrote. Sellis also announced that Discord is working with brand measurement firm Kantar to help advertisers track ad success. With Kantar technology, advertisers can measure things like “awareness, recall, and intent,” Sellis said. The partnership further underscores Discord's growing reliance on advertising revenue. “Our partnership with Discord is helping marketers better understand Discord as an advertising platform for new generations,” Nicole Jones, Kantar’s chief commercial lead, said on Discord’s blog. Rethinking ads Discord also announced this week that it will soon sell Play Quests to more advertisers. The announcement follows the company's introduction of video ads to the Discord mobile app in June. Video Quests, as they’re called, allow advertisers to show trailers, announcements, and other types of content. Overall, Discord’s new ad-friendly approach to business is very different than its previous strategy, which kept Discord ad-free from its 2015 launch until last year. Because the company is expected to go public soon, its leaders have determined that it’s no longer sufficient to rely completely on premium add-ons and subscriptions. Discord isn’t profitable, forcing the firm to reconsider its use of ads, which cofounder and CEO Jason Citron felt were too intrusive as recently as 2021. Currently, Discord’s ads are limited to clickable sidebars within the platform and offer direct benefits to users. Introducing ads can be a slippery slope, though, especially for social media companies that prioritize ad revenue to please investors. On the other hand, another social media company, Reddit, has seen success by boosting its ad business. Reddit went public in March 2024 and became profitable in October 2024 after reporting a 60 percent year-over-year increase in ad revenue. Reddit has hinted at plans to introduce new and more types of ads, and we can expect Discord to consider the same after its IPO, which a March Bloomberg report suggested could happen as soon as this year. Advance Publications, which owns Ars Technica parent Condé Nast, is the largest shareholder in Reddit. Source Hope you enjoyed this news post. Thank you for appreciating my time and effort posting news every day for many years. News posts... 2023: 5,800+ | 2024: 5,700+ | 2025 (till end of April): 1,811 RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend