Bags weighed down by a Microsoft license key

Weary travelers making their way through airports have enough to contend with these days without some Microsoft borkage popping up over departure information.

Spotted by an eagle-eyed Register reader identifying themselves as Ethel Grapefruit (Mrs), one of the information boards at Heathrow Terminal 5’s check-in area has decided that whatever is running behind the scenes does not meet with Microsoft’s approval, and requires activation.

The message is familiar to many Windows users, and appears as a watermark when something has made the knickers of the computer behind the scenes get a bit twisty. Perhaps there’s been a hardware replacement, and Windows needs to be reactivated. Or an update that sent the operating system into a tizzy. There are any number of reasons the watermark may appear, and any number of ways to remove it.

The good news is that, while annoying, the presence of the watermark is unlikely to have much adverse effect at a technical level. There’ll be nagging. There won’t be much in the way of customization to make the computer your own. And, of course, Microsoft won’t be offering much – if anything – in the way of support (other than security updates).

Not that any of that matters much for a sign showing where to go to check in for a flight and hand bags over to be weighed by a member of staff.

However, it might matter for a passenger already a little tense about being flung through the air in a metal tube at ludicrous speed after passing through multiple (and occasionally performative) security gates. If, after stepping through the airport doors, the first sight a person has is of an approach to IT that would have the head of their home tech team given a stern talking-to by The Boss, what hope is there for the rest of the journey?

Heathrow and British Airways are names that rarely feature in sentences that include the words “competent IT.” There was the 2024 British Airways luggage whoopsie or last year’s Heathrow fire-related closure. Digital signage indicating that some IT contractor has not done their work to the required standard is therefore the least of their worries.

And it’s not as if either entity couldn’t afford a Windows license. Let’s face it, the cost of some baggage tipping the scales would probably go a long way toward acquiring a license key (if that is indeed the issue).

However, for an already jumpy customer, a Windows activation message is unlikely to assuage nerves already jangling over EU passport queues and overly complicated airplanes doing some odd things on approach. Perhaps the moral of today’s bork is that it is better to forget all this traveling malarky. Instead, how about a nice sit-down, a beverage, and a delicious biscuit? ®

from the ctrl-alt-speech dept

Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s Ben Whitelaw.

Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Pocket Casts, YouTube, or your podcast app of choice — or go straight to the RSS feed. To get extended episodes with additional coverage, support us on Patreon.

In this week’s episode, Mike and Ben cover:

And in the extended episode for Patreon supporters, they cover:

Our fun links this week are a replica of Scooby Doo’s Mystery-Machine and the Saltburn cricket scandal because we need more satire right now.

If you’re already a Patreon supporter, you can get the extended episode on Patreon.

Filed Under: ai, artificial intelligence, content moderation, dma, elon musk, eu, trust and safety

Companies: anthropic, google, meta, openai, xai

The year 2026 has marked a huge course correction for Microsoft after years of frustrating users with plenty of confusing processes, unoptimized UI elements, and just the generous bloatware that can bring any Windows system to a crawl. Microsoft has finally shifted into a new phase. From fixing the right-click behavior to speeding up the Search system, the company has fixed plenty of papercuts.

The next major milestone is making Windows 11 run smoothly on Windows PCs with just 8GB of RAM. That directly means entry-level and budget laptops will at least get the basics right, even if that means sacrificing the on-device AI bells and whistles. Let’s face it. The increasingly AI-first approach to computing on a Windows 11 machine is a little too taxing on the hardware at hand.

At last

Running the full OS experience without any jitters on a desktop or laptop PC with just 8 GB of RAM is proving to be increasingly challenging. The situation is not too different for Apple’s famously well-optimized macOS. Running the latest AI-heavy wheels of macOS Golden Gate or macOS Sequoia on older MacBooks with 8 GB of RAM, or even the new MacBook Pro, is an exercise in frustration until you decide to switch off the AI processes completely.

Pavan Davuluri, EVP of the Windows and Devices portfolio at Microsoft, says the company’s next target is memory optimization for devices with 8GB of RAM. “Reducing Windows memory footprint to deliver a fast and responsive Windows experience across the PCs customers use every day,” he wrote in a blog post. Additionally, the out-of-the-box set-up experience will also get smoother, and parental controls will also be fixed.

The situation in the PC and laptop segment is pretty grim, thanks to AI, and the pricing storm it has stirred in the memory and storage supply chain. The cost of RAM has more than quadrupled in a year, and it’s only forecasted to go up. Just a day ago, Samsung, one of the biggest players in the memory supply, said the situation won’t ease up until 2028, at the earliest.

As a result, the average selling price of laptops has kept climbing, and even the likes of Apple had to raise prices a few weeks ago. Analyst predictions are pretty disheartening, too. “The sub-$500 entry-level PC segment will disappear by 2028,” Ranjit Atwal, Senior Director Analyst at Gartner, said in a research note. “PC memory costs are expected to peak at 23% of the total bill-of-materials (BOM) up from 16% in 2025,” the report adds.

A huge step forward

This is where the situation gets tricky. The makers of operating systems are increasingly pushing AI into the workflow, whether it’s a desktop on your table or on a phone in your palm. Microsoft is no different, and over the past couple of years, it has tried to push the Copilot AI experience into every corner of the Windows experience and the apps that it ships.

The company even had to create a baseline hardware requirement (an NPU that goes over 40TOPS and 16GB of RAM) for a PC to qualify as a Copilot+ machine. But the company soon realized its mistake as well. Owing to the higher asking price of its latest Surface hardware and how increasingly inaccessible they are becoming, the company launched a watered-down version of its latest Surface laptops, packing just 8 GB of RAM and lacking the Copilot+ AI branding, because it’s just not feasible to serve all those on-device AI features on a laptop with just 8 gigs of memory.

But Copilot is not the only hurdle that makes budget laptops a testing experience on a foundation with just 8 GB of RAM. There are a whole bunch of background processes and redundancies that keep Windows running slower on the same amount of RAM, whereas macOS does a much better job. I have used Apple’s MacBook Air and Neo laptops with the same RAM allowance, and they perform far more reliably than a budget Windows laptop with a similar memory allowance.

I’m glad that Microsoft is finally realizing the mistake and trimming the bloatware that could allow laptops and PCs with 8GB of RAM to perform smoothly. Given the current state of the market, laptops with 8GB of RAM — and a more affordable price tag — are desperately needed. Intel is chasing that dream with Project Dragonwing. Let’s hope Microsoft can pull off some magic. I’m not too confident, but I am certainly hopeful!

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from the show-time dept

RFK Jr. has a lot on his plate at the moment as the head of HHS. America is currently dealing with a record breaking outbreak of the measles, for instance. His agency has had a very hard time getting people confirmed for key roles. There’s that whole cyclosporiasis thing going around, which you’ll know you’ve caught it by the simple fact that you won’t be able to stop shitting yourself. There’s a huge self-inflicted talent vacuum at HHS and its child agencies. Pertussis cases are on the rise. Court orders keep blocking Kennedy’s committees.

With all of these crises and chaos, Kennedy became very angry at news reports that he was mostly checked out of the HHS work he should be doing to address all of this. It’s hard to take that anger all that seriously, though, given that Kennedy also became the very first sitting cabinet secretary to host a podcast while in office. And I have to assume it is also a first time a sitting cabinet secretary will — checks notes — host a cooking show with celebrity chefs.

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has launched a show geared toward teaching Americans how to cook healthy, inexpensive meals.

“Thanks to President Trump, we flipped the food pyramid and put real food back where it belongs: at the center of the American plate,” Kennedy said in a video he posted Wednesday to YouTube touting “The Real Food Show.”  “I’m traveling across America, connecting with renowned chefs to show families how to cook delicious, nutritious meals with real ingredients, and all at affordable prices,” the HHS secretary added. “America, it’s time to eat real food. Let’s get cooking.”

Cute. How about instead you travel the country on a mass vaccination campaign for measles? Maybe some lower level member of HHS can rub elbows with celebrity chefs while you, oh, I don’t know, do literally anything concrete when it comes to cyclosporiasis. Maybe you could fill the open roles in your agencies with competent people you can get confirmed by Congress. Or maybe you could get your agencies running smoothly and with high morale.

It’s not that cooking isn’t important. It’s not even that all of Kennedy’s thoughts on food and health are wrong, because they certainly are not. But there is other, real, important work that needs to be done, leadership that needs to be demonstrated, and confidence building that needs to happen with the public. All of that is a better place for the Secretary of HHS to be spending their time, compared with cosplaying as a daytime cooking show host.

Kennedy told USA Today his new cooking show aims to convince Americans that eating healthier does not cost more.

The price of food at home and away from home both rose by 0.2 percent from May to June, according to the consumer price index, a popular measure of inflation. 

It’s actually worse than that and looking at the CPI for food on a monthly basis doesn’t tell the whole story. Year over year CPI for food is up by roughly 3%. All of that is to say that if Kennedy wants to focus on the affordability of fresh food, part of the solution would be for him to get his current boss to not play stupid games with tariffs and to stop starting the very foreign wars that he promised to keep us out of.

So, as you continue to see headlines for the very real health issues the country is currently facing, just remember that RFK Jr. is hard at work baking crab cakes and getting his plating skills just right.

Filed Under: cooking show, rfk jr.

Does It matter?: Intel is providing a startup with significant access to its chip design schematics as part of a rare licensing deal involving the x86 instruction set architecture. RosaicLabs could now theoretically build its own x86 CPU, although speculation points to more cutting-edge applications such as robotics and AI.

Reuters sources claim that Intel is entering into a secret agreement with RosaicLabs Inc., a company incorporated in Delaware just a couple of months ago. The agreement covers the register-transfer level (RTL) code for Intel’s Atom CPUs, although we don’t have any specific clues about which generation of Atom chips – or which computing core technology – is involved.

Atom chip technology is based on the x86 ISA, although it is designed to operate within significant power and form-factor constraints. In circuit design, RTL code provides a design abstraction that models data transfers between hardware registers and logical operators. In theory, RosaicLabs could use Intel’s RTL IP to develop a brand-new x86 CPU or even design something more complex based on the ISA that has powered most PCs since the IBM PC era.

A few significant hints about RosaicLabs’ business prospects come from the people actually involved in the deal. Reuters reports that the company’s CEO is Amarjit Gill, a longtime business partner of Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan. Gill and Tan previously worked at Rivos, a chip company that was later acquired by Meta. Amit Parikh, Rivos’ former top financial officer, is also part of the new Rosaic venture.

Besides a long-standing cross-licensing agreement with AMD, Intel is not known for freely sharing official design documents for x86 CPUs with third-party organizations. Incorporation documents filed in Delaware state that RosaicLabs is seeking an initial funding round of $10 million, with executives free to invest up to $5 million without seeking approval from investors or the board.

It’s safe to say that one potential outcome for RosaicLabs is adapting Atom’s peculiar low-profile “skills” to this brand-new world of chip scarcity and data center overprovisioning. The “lesser” x86 processor could find a new role in edge-computing infrastructure, robotic AI, or other emerging applications. In the worst-case scenario, Lip-Bu Tan’s Intel could simply swoop in and acquire whatever RosaicLabs develops a few years down the line. Although, then again, there would be nothing particularly revolutionary about that.

The funds raised will enable CoreMap to develop more precise data-driven tools to assist atrial fibrillation ablation.

CoreMap, a US-based medtech, has announced the closure of an oversubscribed Series C funding round, which was led by Medtronic and included participation from existing and new investors.

The organisation, which was established in 2016 and is headquartered in Burlington, Massachusetts, focuses on advancing the diagnosis and treatment of atrial fibrillation. This is a common heart rhythm disorder in which the beat is irregular. 

CoreMap will put some of the funds raised towards further developing its electrophysiology mapping system, which is designed to provide physicians with atrial fibrillation (AF) ablation guidance, based on large datasets of highly accurate electrical activation data.

Ablation is a technique that targets tissue in the heart, creating tiny scars via radiofrequency or pulsed field energy; this works to block the faulty signals that result in the irregular heartbeat.

Commenting on the funding announcement Sarah Kalil, the CEO and co-founder of CoreMap, said: “The successful completion of this financing is a significant milestone for CoreMap. 

“AF remains one of the most significant unsolved challenges in electrophysiology and physicians need better data to guide treatment decisions and improve patient outcomes. This investment provides the resources to accelerate CoreMap’s next-generation AF mapping platform’s time to market.”

Chris Eso, the global head of corporate and business development, M&A and ventures at Medtronic, said: “CoreMap is addressing one of the critical unmet needs in AF treatment with a differentiated technology platform and strong clinical support. We are excited to support Sarah and the CoreMap team as they advance the company through its next stage of growth.”

SiliconRepublic.com previously spoke with Ronan Rogers, the senior R&D director for cardiac ablation solutions at Medtronic. Alongside his colleague Ruth Callanan, who is Medtronic’s director of site quality, Rogers discussed how the Ireland’s west is building real depth not just in medtech, but across key areas such as pharmaceutical science, advanced analytics and digital technology. 

Don’t miss out on the knowledge you need to succeed. Sign up for the Daily Brief, Silicon Republic’s digest of need-to-know sci-tech news.

To confirm that the observed signal was indeed caused by a moon, the research team also examined other possible factors. These included apparent periods resulting from errors in corrections for Earth’s orbital motion, seasonal variations in atmospheric conditions, and the effects of the brown dwarf’s own rotation.

Furthermore, calculations of the Roche limit—the boundary beyond which a satellite would be torn apart by the brown dwarf’s tidal forces—and the Hill radius—the radius of the brown dwarf’s gravitational influence—confirmed that the satellite’s orbit falls within a range where it can exist in a physically stable manner.

According to the researchers, this is the first evidence of a satellite orbiting a brown dwarf companion obtained using this method. A few months earlier, another team had gathered clues suggesting the presence of a satellite during observations of the HD 206893 star system using the VLT Interferometer but had not yet achieved a definitive detection.

The object discovered in this study occupies a unique position that cannot be fully understood using the conventional framework for moons in our solar system. “We have a clear delineation between the planets and the Sun in the Solar System, so defining things like moons is simple,” says Alice Zurlo, an astrophysicist at Diego Portales University, in a news release. “In the CD-35 2722 system, where we are blurring the lines between stars, planets, and moons, the whole thing becomes more complicated to describe.”

It remains unclear whether this object should be called a moon. ESO also notes that there is no officially recognized definition for exomoons and the researchers use the term “exosatellite.” The paper itself acknowledges that it is uncertain whether this object will meet future criteria to be considered a moon, but that the discovery is a step toward creating a definitive detection.

Researchers believe this discovery will serve as a catalyst for identifying new directions in future theories of planet formation and celestial mechanics. Furthermore, if there are smaller, rocky moons like the one in the new paper, they could be subjected to tidal heating from brown dwarfs, potentially creating environments suitable for life even at greater distances from their stars—a development that might also have implications for the search for extraterrestrial life.

It’s also possible that once the next-generation Extremely Large Telescope equipped with a 39-meter primary mirror is completed, it will be possible to detect even smaller exomoons.

This story originally appeared on WIRED Japan and has been translated from Japanese.

For years, India was the world’s largest app download market but one of its toughest places to make money. That is beginning to change as Indian consumers spend more on AI, entertainment, and other premium apps.

India’s mobile app market generated a record $345 million in consumer spending during the second quarter of this year, up 35% from a year earlier, according to a new report by Sensor Tower. The app-market intelligence firm said the gains were increasingly driven by generative AI, streaming, and productivity apps rather than gaming, as Indian consumers became more willing to pay for digital subscriptions.

The record quarter builds on a broader trend of rising app monetization. India’s revenue per download has more than doubled over the past three and a half years, while quarterly app downloads have remained at around 6.3 billion since 2023.

“We would describe India today as a rapidly evolving mobile market with a large user base and growing willingness to pay for digital services,” Eve Chen, an insights analyst at Sensor Tower, told TechCrunch.

Chen attributed the change to the wider adoption of digital payments, including India’s Unified Payments Interface (a system that lets people pay directly from their bank accounts) and digital wallets, which have reduced friction for in-app purchases, alongside growing acceptance of app-based subscriptions and premium digital services.

The trend also stands out globally. India’s app revenue saw its fastest growth in Q2 among major app markets, generating more than $200 million in quarterly consumer spending, per Sensor Tower’s data shared with TechCrunch. In contrast, Mexico grew 30% and Turkey 25%, while U.S. app revenue actually declined 3% over the same period.

“These figures suggest that India is no longer just the world’s largest market by downloads, but is also emerging as one of the fastest-growing markets for app monetization,” Chen told TechCrunch.

India still trails more mature app markets by a wide margin. Revenue per download stands at about $4.60 in the U.S., $3.90 in South Korea, and $6.10 in Japan, compared with a small fraction of that in India. Nonetheless, Chen said the trajectory matters more than the absolute level, with India’s steadily improving monetization suggesting significant room for long-term growth.

Generative AI has emerged as one of the fastest-growing segments, with OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude together accounting for nearly 83% of India’s AI app revenue in Q2, according to Sensor Tower’s data shared with TechCrunch.

Much of India’s app revenue growth is also being driven by non-gaming apps. Non-gaming categories, Sensor Tower said, accounted for 68% of India’s mobile app revenue in the first half of 2026, up from 58% three years earlier.

The latest data also suggests global subscription apps continue to be among the biggest beneficiaries of rising app spending in India, with Google One becoming India’s highest-grossing mobile app during the quarter. Streaming platforms such as Amazon Prime Video, Crunchyroll, Sony LIV, and JioHotstar also saw growing consumer spending. Gaming also bucked the global trend, with revenue rising 3.7% from the previous quarter despite a worldwide decline, per Sensor Tower.

App intelligence firm Appfigures also sees India’s app subscription market continuing to grow, although it says the pace has slowed after an AI-fueled surge over the past two years. Subscription revenue is still rising, but much of the initial excitement around AI has abated, Ariel Michaeli, the company’s founder and CEO, told TechCrunch.

“The numbers are still staggering,” Michaeli added. Appfigures estimates that ChatGPT generates about $60,000 a day in India and attracted around 1.8 million downloads over the past month, although that’s down from roughly $80,000 a day last October.