Author: The Tech Guy

247th American Astronomical Society (AAS) Meeting SATURDAY, JANUARY 3 8:30AM – 6:0PM  NASA’s Exoplanet Exploration Program Analysis Group (ExoPAG) 301DJosh Pepper, Dawn Gelino, Karl Stapelfeldt, Nick Siegler, Jessie Christiansen SUNDAY, JANUARY 4 8:30AM – 12:15PM  NASA’s Exoplanet Exploration Program Analysis Group (ExoPAG) 301D9:00AM – 2:00PMNASA’s Cosmic Origins Program Analysis Group (COPAG)Peter Kurczynski7:30PM – 9:30PM  NASA’s Physics of the Cosmos Program Analysis Group (PhysPAG)Francesca CivanoNASA’s Joint Program Analysis GroupShawn Domagal-Goldman MONDAY, JANUARY 5 12:45 PM – 1:45 PM  NASA UpdateWest Building 301ABShawn Domagal-Goldman2:00 PM- 3:30 PM  Beyond the Mid-Decadal: Community Inputs for Space Mission Concepts Toward Astro 2030335B TUESDAY, JANUARY 6…

Why you can trust TechRadar We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test. KEF XIO soundbar: Two minute review The KEF XIO can be installed either on a tabletop (shown above) or flipped up for a flat wall-mount configuration (Image credit: Future / Simon Cohen)The KEF XIO Dolby Atmos soundbar brings a new level of power, elegance, and versatility to the normally utilitarian soundbar category. And though KEF asks a pretty penny as the price of admission, the XIO delivers a performance…

To ring in the New Year 2026, WhatsApp has rolled out new stickers, video call effects, animated reactions, and more festive features. WhatsApp has added a new 2026 sticker pack that includes party themed stickers to send to your friends and family. There are new animated effects that are available during video calls, including fireworks, stars, and confetti, which show up as an overlay. Users will also see special reactions when they react to a message with the confetti emoji. And finally, animated stickers are also available in Status updates. There’s also a special 2026 layout that can be used…

Large Language Models Are Improving ExponentiallyGlenn Zorpette | IEEE Spectrum”According to a metric [METR] devised, the capabilities of key LLMs are doubling every seven months. This realization leads to a second conclusion, equally stunning: By 2030, the most advanced LLMs should be able to complete, with 50 percent reliability, a software-based task that takes humans a full month of 40-hour workweeks. And the LLMs would likely be able to do many of these tasks much more quickly than humans, taking only days, or even just hours.”There Is Only One AI Company. Welcome to the BlobSteven Levy | Wired ($)”Even the…

What is going on with Siri? It’s been a year of AI powering forward, with both Amazon and Google launching advanced GenAI voice assistants, but Siri still lags far behind in voice interaction. It’s not that I’m saying AI is particularly good, when it clearly isn’t, but more that the direct competition has a direct focus on improving its voice assistants so that they understand more; Siri feels like it’s stuck in time. If I wanted to check my phone, I would I’ve got a few HomePod mini speakers spread around the house for good reason: I need them for…

You’re trying to take a photo on your phone, the preview looks perfect—natural light, accurate colors, genuine texture. You snap the photo, swipe to the gallery, and everything changes. The subject’s skin looks plasticky, the colors have changed entirely, and the photo barely resembles the real scene. What happened? Your phone’s AI happened. Specifically, the computational photography pipeline buried in your device’s ISP (Image Signal Processor) is automatically applying aggressive post-processing before you even see the result. Understanding what your phone camera’s settings do can help, but the real culprit is a system-level setting that’s working against you the entire…

We pay a lot of attention to high-end devices, but many more people use Samsung’s Galaxy A-series phones and tablets than the company’s more premium S and Z lines: the $200 Galaxy A16 5G was the best-selling Android phone last quarter. Today, Samsung announced the successor to that phone in the Galaxy A17 5G, along with a new budget-friendly tablet. Both will be available in January. The new Galaxy A17 5G looks like a minor refresh of the previous-gen A16 5G, carrying over several key specs: both phones come with Samsung’s Exynos 1330 (in the US); a 5,000 mAh battery with 25W wired…

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Beneath ChatGPT’s flattering persona lies a goldmine for advertisers: an AI chatbot that never gets tired of hawking clients’ wares. New reporting by The Information has revealed some recent topics of conversation between OpenAI employees as they work to supply advertisers with a teeming new audience to manipulate. The plans are far from final, though they give us a look at what soon may become the norm for ChatGPT. One conversation between OpenAI staffers, for example, involved giving sponsored chatbot results “preferential treatment” over non-sponsored results, anonymous employees told The Information. This could look like a user…

If you’ve been watching high-end gaming laptops and waiting for a discount that actually matters, this is one of the rare price cuts that changes the conversation. The Lenovo Legion Pro 7i configuration with a 16-inch WQXGA OLED 240Hz display, Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX, RTX 5090, 32GB RAM, and a 1TB SSD is down to $2,999.99 (from $3,999.99), saving you $1,000. That’s still a premium purchase, but it’s a much better entry point for a “no compromises” laptop that’s meant to push high frame rates in modern games while also looking great doing it. What you’re getting This is…

I’m usually writing articles on my laptop the whole day and I get bored with the standard Windows 11 white arrow cursor moving across my screen. Not only is it uninspiring, but it easily gets lost in the white backgrounds in apps like Microsoft Word and Google Docs. That’s why I prefer switching things up with customized cursors with characters from my favorite movies or video games. I also enjoy having holiday-themed cursors to get me in the mood for certain events and creating my own cursors in vibrant colors. Here’s why I use the Custom Cursor app to get…