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  • Tennis star Alexander Zverev calls out automated line judging system

    Zverev received a warning for taking a photo of the mark the ball left on the clay court. | Photo by Alberto Gardin/Eurasia Sport Images/Getty Images<br>

    It’s clay court season in tennis, and instead of questioning the judgments of chair umpires, some players are now questioning the decisions of complex software — specifically electronic line-calling (ELS) systems, which are increasingly tasked with determining whether a ball is in or out.

    German tennis star Alexander Zverev became the latest to dispute the technology after it called his opponent’s ball “in” during a Madrid Open match against Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, as reported earlier by The Athletic. Zverev pointed to the discrepancy between the ELS call and the ball’s mark, which appeared just outside the court’s white line.

    Whereas on hard and grass courts, the other surfaces tennis players compete on, clay is unique because it is composed of loose particles of brick and stone. It also means that when a ball strikes a clay court, it leaves a mark of where it bounced. This is often used as clear and indisputable evidence of whether a ball was in or out. So what happens when the automated line-calling software disagrees with the visible mark left by a ball on clay?

    “The machine is not working,” Zverev said to the chair umpire. “Look at this mark… please come down.” He pulled out his phone to snap a photo of the mark and post on Instagram, resulting in a warning for unsportsmanlike conduct. Other players have snapped photos of disputed shots during the tournament, too, including Victoria Azarenka and Eva Lys.

    Though ELS is generally popular with players, we’ll likely see more disputes this year, as the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) continues replacing human line judges with ELS across major tournaments (with the French Open, the sole clay Grand Slam, being the only exception).

    Hawk-Eye, one of the companies behind this technology, uses a set of cameras to predict where a ball is headed by analyzing its speed, spin, and skid with a three-millimeter accuracy. “The system assumes where a ball will bounce before it arrives, a prophecy of the future made with the confidence of the combined might of physics, surveillance technology, and an algorithm trained on billions of data points,” my colleague Kevin Nguyen writes in a deep dive on the system.

    Hawk-Eye announced last year that its live line-calling system is ready for clay courts, where line judges and umpires have long used physical ball marks to make calls. But the look of the ball’s mark may change based on whether the clay is wet or dry, as well as if there is more or less clay on a court, as detailed in this video from the ATP Tour. That could make some of these marks deceiving to the human eye. 

    “Clay is a very different surface — probably the most difficult surface to work on,” ATP supervisor Cedric Mourier, said in an interview last year. “Interpreting a mark is subjective, the reading of the mark very complicated. And this will be obviously, taken away by the ELS live.” How the player reacts to the system’s determination will just add to the clay court drama.

  • Wii Homebrew Channel development shuts down over ‘stolen’ code

    The GitHub repository for The Homebrew Channel (HBC), a popular piece of software used on hacked Nintendo Wiis, has been archived. Its maintainers are accusing the creators of “libogc,” a software toolkit HBC relies on, of stealing both Nintendo-made and open-source code and presenting it as their own, according to a ReadMe posted to the repository yesterday by hacking group fail0verflow. (Hat tip to X user OatmealDome.)

    HBC is a central piece of the Wii homebrew community, serving as a launcher for non-Nintendo-approved software without needing to re-run an exploit. Through it, you can do things like load GameCube and Wii game files, run older console emulators, and more from a USB-connected hard drive or the Wii’s SD card slot. HBC is also one of the cleanest ways to back up your own Wii or GameCube collection, as you can copy files from game discs using Nintendo’s own hardware.

    In its ReadMe, fail0verflow, which owns the HBC repository, writes that although they knew early on that libogc used some stolen Nintendo code, they thought much of the rest of it was original code and decided to “reluctantly” continue using it. However, they say that after another developer claimed the code was actually lifted from the open-source RTEMS without attribution, they filed an issue that libogc’s developers closed and replied to with “verbal abuse” to before deleting it. HBC’s developers say they now “consider it impossible to legally and legitimately compile this software at this point, and cannot encourage any further development.”

    WiiHacks, one of the most well-made guides for hacking a Wii, still seems to offer all of the file downloads needed to hack a Wii. But as GameRant notes, that could change, particularly with the HBC developers admitting that some Nintendo code was used in the tooling it relies on. Nintendo has been known to go after emulation projects in the past, after all. If you’ve already hacked a Wii, none of this will matter much. HBC itself hasn’t had any major updates for years — just don’t count on any persistent bugs going away anytime soon, if ever.

  • Apple’s complicated plan to improve its AI while protecting privacy

    Apple says it’s found a way to make its AI models better without training on its users’ data or even copying it from their iPhones and Macs. In a blog post first reported on by Bloomberg, the company outlined its plans to have devices compare a synthetic dataset to samples of recent emails or messages from users who have opted into its Device Analytics program.

    Apple devices will be able to determine which synthetic inputs are closest to real samples, which they will relay to the company by sending “only a signal indicating which of the variants is closest to the sampled data.” That way, according to Apple, it doesn’t access user data, and the data never leaves the device. Apple will then use the most frequently picked fake samples to improve its AI text outputs, such as email summaries.

    Currently, Apple trains its AI models on synthetic data only, potentially resulting in less helpful responses, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman. Apple has struggled with the launch of its flagship Apple Intelligence features, as it pushed back the launch of some capabilities and replaced the head of its Siri team.

    But now, Apple is trying to turn things around by introducing its new AI training system in a beta version of iOS and iPadOS 18.5 and macOS 15.5, according to Gurman.

    Apple has been talking up its use of a method called differential privacy to keep user data private since at least 2016 with the launch of iOS 10 and has already used it to improve the AI-powered Genmoji feature. This also applies to the company’s new AI training plans as well, as Apple says that introducing randomized information into a broader dataset will help prevent it from linking data to any one person.

  • Katy Perry has launched to space with Blue Origin

    Katy Perry, Lauren Sánchez, and the four other women on Blue Origin’s NS-31 flight.

    Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin has launched pop singer / songwriter Katy Perry into space, along with five other women: former NASA scientists Aisha Bowe and Amanda Nguyễn, journalist Gayle King, journalist and Bezos fiancée Lauren Sánchez, and film producer Kerianne Flynn. Their flight, called NS-31, launched aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket as its launch window opened at  8:30AM CT / 9:30AM ET. It’s being livestreamed both on YouTube and Blue Origin’s website.

    Past New Shepard flights have taken passengers just to the edge of space, where they’re allowed to unbuckle and roam freely for a few minutes inside the capsule before buckling up again for re-entry. The capsule then deploys a parachute and touches back down in west Texas. During the flight, the New Shepard rocket itself returns to its landing pad.

    In a video posted to Instagram before the flight, Perry said she plans to make a “special reveal coming to you from zero gravity.” She posted an earlier video touring the capsule that she and the others will be aboard, and said she will probably sing in space.

    This is Blue Origin’s 31st New Shepard launch. The rocket’s last flight was in February, and previous tourists aboard New Shepard flights include William Shatner, and 90-year-old Ed Dwight, who was America’s first astronaut candidate, but who never made it to space. 

  • Katy Perry is going to space with Blue Origin in a few minutes

    Katy Perry, Lauren Sánchez, and the four other women on Blue Origin’s NS-31 flight.

    Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin is preparing to put pop singer / songwriter Katy Perry into space, along with five other women: former NASA scientists Aisha Bowe and Amanda Nguyen, journalist Gayle King, journalist and Bezos fiancée Lauren Sánchez, and film producer Kerianne Flynn. Their flight, called NS-31, will launch aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket, with a launch window opening at 8:30AM CT / 9:30AM ET. It’s being livestreamed both on YouTube and Blue Origin’s website.

    Past New Shepard flights have taken passengers just to the edge of space, where they’re allowed to unbuckle and roam freely for a few minutes inside the capsule before buckling up again for re-entry. The capsule then deploys a parachute and touches back down in west Texas. During the flight, the New Shepard rocket itself returns to its landing pad.

    In a video posted to Instagram before the flight, Perry said she plans to make a “special reveal coming to you from zero gravity.” She posted an earlier video touring the capsule that she and the others will be aboard, and said she will probably sing in space.

    This is Blue Origin’s 31st New Shepard launch. The rocket’s last flight was in February, and previous tourists aboard it include William Shatner, and 90-year-old Ed Dwight, who was America’s first astronaut candidate, but who never made it to space.

  • Lime will recycle bike and scooter batteries with Redwood Materials

    Lime, the largest bike- and scooter-sharing company in the world, announced that it has struck a deal with Redwood Materials to recycle its lithium-ion batteries. 

    Lime says its e-bike and e-scooter batteries typically last 500 charge cycles, or between five and seven years. Once those batteries reach their end of life, Lime will ship them to Redwood’s North Nevada recycling facility, where the first step will be to figure out how much of the battery is reusable, such as various connectors, wires, plastics, and other components.

    After that, Redwood will begin a chemical recycling process, in which it strips out and refines the relevant elements like nickel, cobalt, and copper. Most of that refined material can then be reintegrated into the battery-making process. The company takes the materials and transforms them into “high-quality” battery materials that can then be sold back to its many partners to make new EV batteries. Around 95–98 percent of these materials are eventually recovered and returned to the supply chain, Redwood claims.

    Lime says it was impressed by Redwood’s high recovery rates, which helped persuade the scooter sharing company to make a deal. The company plans on recycling its batteries from its shared bikes and scooters in just three countries: the US, Germany, and the Netherlands. Lime says it currently operates 270,000 shared vehicles in 30 countries.

    “We’re in shared micromobility. So part of what we do, in essence, is a circular play,” said Lime’s head of sustainability, Andrew Savage. “Circularity of downstream, end of life batteries is quite similar, where we want to ensure that if a battery is no longer available for moving people around that we can get it back into the supply chain for its highest and best use.”

    Redwood Materials was founded in 2017 by Jeffrey “JB” Straubel, a founder and former chief technology officer of Tesla. In addition to breaking down scrap from Tesla’s battery-making process with Panasonic, Redwood also recycles EV and e-bike batteries from Ford, Toyota, Nissan, BMW, GM, Rad Power Bikes, Specialized, Amazon, Lyft, and others.

    “We’re in shared micromobility. So part of what we do, in essence, is a circular play.”

    Redwood notes that each e-bike and scooter battery is around 0.5kWh, as compared to an EV battery, which is approximately 65kWh. Collecting around 130 so-called medium-format batteries provides enough recyclable material for one battery-electric vehicle. 

    Alexis Georgeson, VP for government relations at Redwood, called the effort to recycle medium-format batteries “a massive opportunity.”

    “We recycled 20 gigawatt-hours worth of material just in 2024,” she said. “That’s enough to produce another 250,000 EVs. And that was spread across production scrap from the gigafactories to small consumer electronic devices, medium formats like these bikes and scooters, and then large-form EV packs and stationary storage.”

    In terms of material production, Georgeson said Redwood’s focus is on cathode, which represents 60 percent of the cost of the battery. “We have produced anode copper foil and delivered it to partners like Panasonic already,” she said, “but are really turning our attention right now to just scaling and investing more in cathode.”

  • Chipolo’s colorful new trackers now work with Apple’s and Google’s networks

    The Pop is also compatible with Apple’s and Google’s tracking apps, but Chipolo’s app offers extra functionality for its new trackers. | Image: Chipolo

    Chipolo has announced a new Bluetooth tracker called the Pop, featuring the same bright color options as its Chipolo One but with support for both Apple’s Find My and Google’s Find My Device networks. The Chipolo Pop also has a much larger Bluetooth range than the company’s current lineup of trackers and features improved water and dust resistance, expanding where it can be used.

    Previously, Chipolo offered three versions of its disc-shaped AirTag-like trackers. The $25 Chipolo One worked with Chipolo’s own app and limited network, the $28 Chipolo One Spot worked with Apple’s Find My network, and the $28 Chipolo One Point supported Google’s Find My Device network. The new Chipolo Pop is compatible with both Apple’s and Google’s networks (but only one at a time), so you don’t have to worry about choosing the correct version that works with your devices — a convenience well worth the Pop’s small price bump to $29.

    Several of Chipolo’s Pop trackers attached to various items.

    The Pop tracker is 1.53 inches in diameter, making it about a half-inch larger than a quarter, and measures about a quarter of an inch thick. It’s available in blue, black, green, red, white, and yellow color options and is powered by a user-replaceable CR2032 coin cell battery that will keep it running for up to a year.

    It features the same 120dB alarm as Chipolo’s other trackers but boosts Bluetooth range from 200 feet to 300 feet, potentially making it easier to locate. The Pop also features an improved IP55 rating, meaning it’s both dust- and water-resistant, but not waterproof. You can clip one to your dog’s collar and not worry about them being out in the rain, but should your pup go for a long swim, the Pop won’t survive a complete dunking.

    Although the tracker is designed to work with Apple’s and Google’s tracking apps, it’s also compatible with Chipolo’s own app, which offers unique features. You can change the sound the Pop makes when pinged, get a notification when you accidentally leave something behind (only on Android), use the Pop as a remote camera shutter, and ring your misplaced phone by squeezing the tracker twice, even if it’s set on silent.

  • Apple’s picked a very fitnessy way to mark a decade of smartwatches

    April 24th, 2025 marks 10 years of Apple Watches.

    April 24th will be the 10th anniversary of the day the first Apple Watch shipped to customers. A decade is a major milestone in the gadget world, but you won’t see a lot of anniversary-themed fanfare to mark the occasion. Instead, Apple is dubbing the 24th as Global Close Your Rings Day — and it has some research from its studies to convince people why they should partake.

    Render of the limited-time badge for Global Close Your Rings Day

    Global Close Your Rings Day is exactly what it sounds like. If you close all three rings — move, exercise, and stand — you’ll get a limited edition badge and 10 animated stickers in the Messages app. You can also pick up a physical pin inspired by the award at Apple Stores while supplies last.

    Apple has often used these types of limited edition award badges to motivate users, especially tied to holidays or other events. But for folks who are less motivated by fitness gamification, Apple is also throwing its own research data into the mix. Based on its Apple Heart and Movement Study, the company says people who close their rings most of the time were 48 percent less likely to have poor sleep and 73 percent less likely to have elevated resting heart rate levels. They are also 57 percent less likely to feel elevated stress.

    All in all, this is a relatively low-key way to celebrate the Apple Watch’s 10th anniversary, especially since all Apple Watch owners know the device never takes a day off from poking you to close your rings.

  • WhatsApp gets a dozen new features inspired by others

    WhatsApp has rolled out a dozen new features across chats, calls, and channels that make it easier to manage group conversations, alongside other general quality-of-life improvements. One of the more notable additions is a new “Online” indicator for groups, which displays how many participants are currently using the app in real time.

    This is one of several new features that are similar to capabilities on competing communications platforms like Discord, which highlights the online status of server participants. WhatsApp hasn’t mentioned if users will be able to override their own status indicator to manually set themselves as online/offline, but it should make it easier to see how many users are actively reading the chat.

    Notifications in group chats will now be easier to manage and organize if you find them overwhelming. Users can select the new “Notify for” setting and tap “Highlight” to place specific limitations on notifications for replies, @mentions, and messages from saved contacts, or select “All” to receive every notification. Group chat participants can also tap on reactions that other users have left on messages to add the same reaction, much like Discord and Slack users can.

    A phone displaying some of WhatsApp’s new features, like online indicators and event channel pinning.

    Events have been updated to allow users to RSVP as “maybe,” invite a plus one, and specify an end date and time. Events can now also be created in direct messages, and pinned in group chats to make them easier to find.

    Two features that are exclusively for iPhone users include a built-in document reader that allows users to scan, crop, and save document files without opening a separate app, and the ability to set WhatsApp as the default app for calls and messages. iPhone users can make the switch by opening their device settings, tapping on “Default Apps,” and selecting WhatsApp.

    In the WhatsApp updates tab, users will now find transcriptions of voice messages that they’ve received, and a voice notes feature that allows channel admins to record videos of up to 60 seconds that can be instantly shared with followers. Channel admins can now also link people directly to their channels via a QR code.

    Finally, WhatsApp says that video calls have been upgraded to make them “more reliable and higher quality.” WhatsApp users can be added to an ongoing call directly within a chat thread by tapping the call icon, and call participants can now pinch to zoom in to get a closer look at the live video.

  • Digg will let you reserve your username (for a price)

    The new Digg might look a little like this.

    Digg’s return to the modern internet is one step closer with the launch of an “early access” group called Groundbreakers. For a one-off $5 fee you can claim your username before someone else does and get a behind the scenes look at the new Digg as it comes together. 

    Digg says that the $5 fee “keeps the bots at bay,” and that proceeds will go to a nonprofit to be chosen by the Groundbreakers community. It’s a one-off charge, not an ongoing subscription.

    In addition to locking down their username, members of Groundbreakers will get early access to mockups and previews of the new Digg, with the chance to give feedback directly to the development team. They’ll also get a permanent Groundbreakers badge on their profile once Digg goes live. It’s worth noting that this isn’t actually early access to Digg itself just yet, but a group on the Circle community platform.

    The rebooted Digg was announced last month, with original founder Kevin Rose returning alongside a group that includes Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian. It will still be centered around sharing and voting on links, but takes inspiration from the rise of Reddit and will incorporate AI to help user-led communities with moderation.

    Invites to join Groundbreakers were initially sent out to Digg’s mailing list, but you can now sign up without an invite. There’s apparently a limited number of spaces, though Digg hasn’t said how many.