Welcome back to the Abstract! Here are the studies this week that took a bite out of life, appealed to the death drive, gave a yellow light to the universe, and produced hitherto unknown levels of cute. First, it’s the most epic ocean battle: orcas versus sharks (pro tip: you don’t want to be sharks)….

This is Behind the Blog, where we share our behind-the-scenes thoughts about how a few of our top stories of the week came together. This week, we discuss archiving to get around paywalls, hating on smart glasses, and more. JASON: I was going to try to twist myself into knots attempting to explain the throughline…

Social media accounts on TikTok and X are posting AI-generated videos of women and girls being strangled, showing yet another example of generative AI companies failing to prevent users from creating media that violates their own policies against violent content.  One account on X has been posting dozens of AI-generated strangulation videos starting in mid-October….

🌘 Subscribe to 404 Media to get The Abstract, our newsletter about the most exciting and mind-boggling science news and studies of the week. After a decade-long excavation at a remote site in Kenya, scientists have unearthed evidence that our early human relatives continuously fashioned the same tools across thousands of generations, hinting that sophisticated…

Nancy Pelosi, one of Wall Street’s all time great investors, announced her retirement Thursday. Pelosi, so known for her ability to outpace the S&P 500 that dozens of websites and apps spawned to track her seeming preternatural ability to make smart stock trades, said she will retire after the 2024-2026 season. Pelosi’s trades over the…

This story was reported with support from the MuckRock Foundation. Last month, a company called the Children’s Literature Comprehensive Database announced a new version of a product called Class-Shelf Plus. The software, which is used by school libraries to keep track of which books are in their catalog, added several new features including “AI-driven automation and…

Automattic, the company that owns WordPress.com, is asking Automatic.CSS—a company that provides a CSS framework for WordPress page builders—to change its name amid public spats between Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg and Automatic.CSS creator Kevin Geary. Automattic has two T’s as a nod to Matt. “As you know, our client owns and operates a wide range…

The FBI is attempting to unmask the owner behind archive.today, a popular archiving site that is also regularly used to bypass paywalls on the internet and to avoid sending traffic to the original publishers of web content, according to a subpoena posted by the website. The FBI subpoena says it is part of a criminal…