Tech Topics
Test your CPU in a fun way—warm it up by simulating the galaxy (galaxym.ovh). Controls are in French, but you can use the sliders to change aspects of the simulation and stretch the power of your computer’s processor and graphics system.
As embarrassing as it might feel to fall for an internet scam, it needs to be reported to help track such criminal behavior, as that drives government responses. Go to usa.gov/where-report-scams to figure out where to report almost any scam.
Dresden’s Art Courtyards has five themed courtyards, one of which uses rain drains to make music. View that space and others, with themes like animals, light and mythical creatures, at tinyurl.com/53puznd8.
The FCC has released updated maps of ISPs (broadbandmap.fcc.gov/home), which means you can look up alternatives to your current provider for your street address. The FCC also runs the Affordable Connectivity Program (fcc.gov/acp) to help low-income households cover up to the first $30 per month of internet costs.
Security can sometimes be too much and get in the way of recycling Apple’s Macs. Simply put, if you don’t turn off Find My before erasing or handing it off, it can make it impossible to resell it on the used market. Find My is part of Apple’s security system to make it harder to steal and repurpose a Mac, so help out and turn off Find My in System Preferences or System Settings before getting rid of that Mac.
In other recycling news, Best Buy will now sell you a box to fill with old laptops, smartphones and all those power chargers and then ship to them for recycling. This is better than just pitching them into your WastePro bin. Start out at bestbuy.com/site/recycling/mail-in-service. As always, you can bring such devices into Best Buy for free.
If you use Microsoft 365, get excited if you want AI to automate your tasks. Microsoft is pitching Copilot as an assistant to summarize meetings, process email, analyze data, make PowerPoint slides and more. The challenge will be to know when it is right and when it is “usefully wrong”—a wonderful term for something that could be plain wrong.
Facebook will be giving more control over how much spam you see in your feed. It had been trying to demote obvious spam and violent posts, but to avoid seeming too controlling, they are giving users more control to override those policies. This is currently only in place in the US. Facebook users will also be able to decide if they want to see less or more content that was fact- checked by one of the company’s third-party fact-checking partners.