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New Law Would Demand ‘Firearm Blocking’ Tech In Every 3D Printer

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As 3D printers from a number of brands get better and less expensive, there’s always the question of 3D-printed guns. After all, 3D printers are showing up in combat roles. To counter this, at least in California, Assembly member Rebecca Bauer-Kahan introduced a bill that would mandate that every 3D printer sold in California be coded with “firearm blocking features designed to prevent the printing of dangerous gun parts and ghost guns.” 

The bill, AB 2047, states: “all 3D printers sold in California will be required to include firearm detection algorithms and software controls that identify files designed to produce guns and illegal gun parts, then block those printing requests.”

The definition of “ghost gun” varies, but it usually refers to firearms without serial numbers or easily traceable markings. 

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According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, it’s federally legal to make your own firearms and does not require a serial number as long as the firearm in question is not being sold for a profit and is “detectable” by metal detectors and X-rays. 

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You mostly can’t print an entire gun

Speaking from personal experience from well over a decade of participating in shooting sports and gun-smithing, you cannot just find a file online and print a functioning gun like something out of a Tom Clancy novel. You can only print accessories and non-stressed parts of a gun, like the receiver of the popular Glock series of handguns or the lower receiver of an AR-15-style rifle. 

In order to make a firearm that functions without exploding from the pressure of a fired bullet, you still need a lot of conventional gun parts like barrels, slides, and trigger mechanisms. While each gun is different, receivers are often the only part of a firearm that requires a background check and cannot be purchased online without violating federal law. Still, printing a receiver without a background check is a valid concern.

3D printer bills like the one introduced in California are obviously well-meaning in their intent. No lawmaker wants to see their constituents hurt by potentially dangerous technology. But without knowledge of the problem with 3D-printed firearm components and concrete ways to actually program 3D printers to detect gun parts, the bill might not go very far.

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I’m thrilled by Wednesday’s star-studded third year, here’s everything we know about season 3

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Netflix’s mystery series Wednesday reinvigorated the Addams Family for the modern age, becoming one of the streaming giant’s most-watched shows. It’s only natural that Netflix keep the hype running with Wednesday‘s upcoming third season.

There’s a lot we can expect to see from Wednesday after season 2. It’s unclear what Wednesday and her peers will encounter in the next season, but what makes the show so fun is watching the mystery unfold. In all fairness, we don’t like waiting years for more episodes. Don’t fret. We’ve got you covered with everything you need to know about Wednesday season 3.

What’s the story of Wednesday season 3?

Netflix Tudum wrote that in season 3, “a new wave of insidious interlopers will be darkening the doors of Nevermore Academy.” Wednesday showrunners Al Gough and Miles Millar said to Tudum that the third season will also “excavate some long-rotting Addams Family secrets.”

“Our goal for Season 3 is the same as it is for every season: to make it the best season of Wednesday we possibly can,” said Gough. “We want to continue digging deeper into our characters while expanding the world of Nevermore and Wednesday.”

These statements fit with what we saw as Wednesday left Nevermore with Uncle Fester and Thing in search of her alpha werewolf bestie, Enid. In this ending to season 2, Wednesday had a vision of her Aunt Ophelia, imprisoned by Grandmama Frump and writing in blood, “Wednesday Must Die,” suggesting some of the Addams family’s skeletons will come out of the closet.

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When will Wednesday season 3 come out?

Since Wednesday season 3 is so early into production, there is no release date set at this time. We can’t see into the future like Wednesday Addams, but it is likely she will return in 2027. Though the second season premiered three years after the first, the 2023 writers’ and actors’ strike stalled production for several months. Barring any future delays, the wait for season 3 should last a total of two years rather than three.

When and where is Wednesday season 3 filming?

Production for Wednesday season 3 started in February 2026, according to Netflix Tudum. Like with season 2, filming will take place near Dublin.

Who will return in Wednesday season 3?

As usual, Wednesday will feature a vast, quirky cast of characters in season 3, including members of the Addams Family and Wednesday’s classmates at Nevermore Academy.

  • Jenna Ortega as Wednesday Addams
  • Catherine Zeta-Jones as Morticia Addams
  • Luis Guzman as Gomez Addams
  • Isaac Ordonez as Pugsley Addams
  • Joana Lumley as Grandmama Hester Frump
  • Joy Sunday as Bianca Barclay
  • Georgie Farmer as Ajax Tanaka
  • Moosa Mostafa as Eugene Ottinger
  • Evie Templeton as Agnes DeMille
  • Victor Dorobantu as Thing
  • Winona Ryder as Tabitha
  • Emma Myers as Enid Sinclair
  • Hunter Doohan as Tyler Galpin
  • Fred Armisen as Uncle Fester
  • Billie Piper as Isadora Capri
  • Luyanda Unati Lewis-Nyawo as Santiago
  • Oscar Morgan as Atticus
  • Kennedy Moyer as Daisy
  • Noah Taylor as Cyrus
  • Chris Sarandon as Balthazar
  • Eva Green as Ophelia Frump

Who’s new to Wednesday season 3?

Just like season 2, Wednesday‘s third season will welcome plenty of new characters to Nevermore Academy. Actors joining the cast next season include Winona Ryder (Stranger Things), Chris Sarandon (Dog Day Afternoon, The Princess Bride), Noah Taylor (Peaky Blinders, Game of Thrones), Oscar Morgan (A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms), and Kennedy Moyer (Task, Roofman).

In an interview with Netflix Tudum, Gough and Millar shared a statement praising Eva Green and her performance as Wednesday’s Aunt Ophelia:

“Eva Green has always brought an exhilarating, singular presence to the screen — elegant, haunting, and beautifully unpredictable. Those qualities make her the perfect choice for Aunt Ophelia. We’re excited to see how she transforms the role and expands Wednesday’s world.”

Green also said to Tudum, “I’m thrilled to join the woefully twisted world of Wednesday as Aunt Ophelia. This show is such a deliciously dark and witty world, I can’t wait to bring my own touch of cuckoo-ness to the Addams family.”

Winona Ryder’s casting is also particularly noteworthy. The actor has frequently starred as a main player in producer Tim Burton’s films. Most recently, she starred alongside Jenna Ortega in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. Whether or not Ryder’s new character will support Wednesday on her journey, it will be exciting to see the former reignite her on-screen chemistry with Ortega.

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Are there any trailers for Wednesday season 3?

On February 23, Netflix shared a fiendishly flamboyant video announcing that production for Wednesday season 3, all while revealing the cast. The trailer also featured a “?” to label one of the season’s cast members, suggesting this mystery character plays an important role that would spoil the story.

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Google and OpenAI employees sign open letter in ‘solidarity’ with Anthropic

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Hundreds of employees at Google and OpenAI have urging their companies to in its standoff with the Pentagon over military applications for AI tools like Claude.

The letter, titled “We Will Not Be Divided,” calls on the leadership of both companies to “put aside their differences and stand together to continue to refuse the Department of War’s current demands for permission to use our models for domestic mass surveillance and autonomously killing people without human oversight.” These are two lines that Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei should not be crossed by his or any other AI company.

As of publication, the letter has over 450 signatures, almost 400 of which come from Google employees and the rest from OpenAI. Currently, roughly 50 percent of all participants have chosen to attach their names to the cause, with the rest remaining anonymous. All are verified as current employees of these companies. The original organizers of the letter aren’t Google or OpenAI employees; they say are unaffiliated with any AI company, political party or advocacy group.

The open letter is the latest development in the saga between Anthropic and US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who to label the company a “supply chain risk” if it did not agree to withdraw certain guardrails for classified work. The Pentagon has also been in talks with Google and OpenAI about using their models for classified work, with earlier this week. The letter argues the government is “trying to divide each company with fear that the other will give in.”

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OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told his employees on Friday that the ChatGPT maker will draw the same red lines as Anthropic, according to an internal memo seen by . He told on the same day that he doesn’t “personally think the Pentagon should be threatening DPA against these companies.”

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Smartphone Market To Decline 13% in 2026, Marking the Largest Drop Ever Due To the Memory Shortage Crisis

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Worldwide smartphone shipments are forecast to decline 12.9% year-on-year (YoY) in 2026 to 1.1 billion units, according to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker. This decline will bring the smartphone market to its lowest annual shipment volume in more than a decade. The current forecast represents a sharp decline from our November forecast amid the intensifying memory shortage crisis.

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Global smartphone shipments expected to fall 13% amid memory supply crunch

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According to a new report from market research firm International Data Corporation, global smartphone shipments are expected to total around 1.1 billion units this year, down from 1.26 billion in 2025. This marks a significant downward revision from the company’s November 2025 forecast, which projected a decline of between 0.9…
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Perplexity launches Computer, wants AI to run tasks for months, not minutes

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Rather than relying on a single model, Perplexity AI’s Computer system functions as an orchestrator across multiple models. Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.6 serves as the primary reasoning engine, while Gemini handles deep research tasks. Nano Banana generates images, Veo 3.1 produces video, Grok executes lightweight, speed-optimized tasks, and OpenAI’s ChatGPT…
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Loewe’s Vega TVs give you slick design in smaller sizes

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Loewe has announced the Vega, a new range of compact 4K Ultra HD smart TVs available in 32 and 43-inch sizes.

The Vega sits below Loewe’s flagship Stellar OLED line, which spans 42 to 97 inches and starts at £1,699, but uses VA LCD panels with full-array Direct LED backlighting rather than OLED, a technology choice that allows Loewe to hit higher peak brightness figures across a smaller and more affordable chassis.

The 43-inch model carries 390 LED dimming zones and reaches a peak luminance of 880 cd/m², while the 32-inch version uses 260 dimming zones and reaches 550 cd/m², both figures sitting above what most competing LCD televisions at this screen size typically deliver to living rooms in bright daylight conditions.

Both models support the full range of HDR formats, including Dolby Vision IQ, HDR10, and HLG, with the Vega marking the first time Loewe has offered a 4K Ultra HD panel in a 32-inch format, a size that most manufacturers continue to supply only in Full HD resolution.

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The integrated soundbar delivers 60 watts of Class-D amplification developed and tuned by Loewe’s in-house audio team, supporting Dolby Atmos and connecting to external sound systems through HDMI eARC, a configuration that competes more directly with premium soundbar bundles than with the basic speakers typically built into televisions at this screen size.

Smart features and connectivity

Loewe’s os9 smart platform, built on the VIDAA operating system, handles streaming access across Netflix, YouTube, Disney+, and Apple TV, with Apple AirPlay, Miracast, DLNA, and Matter connectivity expanding the Vega’s integration with both Apple and broader smart home ecosystems.

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The 43-inch model carries two HDMI 2.1 ports supporting 4K at up to 120Hz alongside VRR and ALLM for low-latency gaming, while the 32-inch version supports 4K at up to 60Hz through its HDMI 2.1 ports, with both models also offering cloud gaming access through Blacknut and Boosteroid via the VIDAA platform.

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A brushed aluminium frame, rotatable metal table stand with chrome finish, and integrated cable management with magnetic rear covers reflect the same design discipline Loewe applies across its higher-end OLED TV range, placing the Vega closer in aesthetic approach to Bang and Olufsen than to mass-market LCD televisions at comparable screen sizes.

The Loewe Vega 32-inch is priced at £1650 and the 43-inch at £1900, with both models available through selected Loewe retail partners from March 2026.

For a closer look at how the Vega’s LCD panel compares against the best screens on the market, our guide to the best OLED TVs rounds up the top picks from every major brand.

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Videos: Farming Robots, Humanoid Robots, and More

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Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us your events for inclusion.

ICRA 2026: 1–5 June 2026, VIENNA

Enjoy today’s videos!

Our robots Lynx M20 help transport harvested crops in mountainous farmland—tackling the rural “last mile” logistics challenge.

[ DEEP Robotics ]

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Once again, I would point out that now that we are reaching peak humanoid robots doing humanoid things, we are inevitably about to see humanoid robots doing non-humanoid things.

[ Unitree ]

In a study, a team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, the University of Michigan, and Cornell University show that groups of magnetic microrobots can generate fluidic forces strong enough to rotate objects in different directions without touching them. These microrobot swarms can turn gear systems, rotate objects much larger than the robots themselves, assemble structures on their own, and even pull in or push away many small objects.

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[ Science ] via [ Max Planck Institute ]

Bipedal—or two-legged—autonomous robots can be quite agile. This makes them useful for performing tasks on uneven terrain, such as carrying equipment through outdoor environments or performing maintenance on an ocean-going ship. However, unstable or unpredictable conditions also increase the possibility of a robot wipeout. Until now, there’s been a significant lack of research into how a robot recovers when its direction shifts—for example, a robot losing balance when a truck makes a quick turn. The team aims to fix this research gap.

[ Georgia Tech ]

Robotics is about controlling energy, motion, and uncertainty in the real world.

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[ Carnegie Mellon University ]

Delicious dinner cooked by our robot Robody. We’ve asked our investors to speak about why they’re along for the ride.

[ Devanthro ]

Tilt-rotor aerial robots enable omnidirectional maneuvering through thrust vectoring, but introduce significant control challenges due to the strong coupling between joint and rotor dynamics. This work investigates reinforcement learning for omnidirectional aerial motion control on over-actuated tiltable quadrotors that prioritizes robustness and agility.

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[ DRAGON Lab ]

At the CMU Robotic Innovation Center’s 75,000-gallon water tank, members of the TartanAUV student group worked to further develop their autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) called Osprey. The team, which takes part in the annual RoboSub competition sponsored by the U.S. Office of Naval Research, is comprised primarily of undergraduate engineering and robotics students.

[ Carnegie Mellon University ]

Sure seems like the only person who would want a robot dog is a person who does not in fact want a dog.

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Compact size, industrial capability. Maximum torque of 90N·m, over 4 hours of no-load runtime, IP54 rainproof design. With a 15 kg payload, range exceeds 13 km. Open secondary development, empowering industry applications.

[ Unitree ]

If your robot video includes tasty baked goods it WILL be included in Video Friday.

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[ QB Robotics ]

Astorino is a 6-axis educational robot created for practical and affordable teaching of robotics in schools and beyond. It has been created with 3D printing, so it allows for experimentation and the possible addition of parts. With its design and programming, it replicates the actions of industrial robots giving students the necessary skills for future work.

[ Astorino by Kawasaki ]

We need more autonomous driving datasets that accurately reflect how sucky driving can be a lot of the time.

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[ ASRL ]

This Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute Seminar is by CMU’s own Victoria Webster-Wood, on “Robots as Models for Biology and Biology and Materials for Robots.”

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In the last century, it was common to envision robots as shining metal structures with rigid and halting motion. This imagery is in contrast to the fluid and organic motion of living organisms that inhabit our natural world. The adaptability, complex control, and advanced learning capabilities observed in animals are not yet fully understood, and therefore have not been fully captured by current robotic systems. Furthermore, many of the mechanical properties and control capabilities seen in animals have yet to be achieved in robotic platforms. In this talk, I will share an interdisciplinary research vision for robots as models for neuroscience and biology as materials for robots.

[ CMU RI ]

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A Guide to Selecting Adhesives for Medical Device Applications

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This product guide from Master Bond presents a range of medical-grade adhesives designed for device manufacturing. It covers epoxies, silicones, cyanoacrylates, and UV/LED curable systems, each tested against biocompatibility standards including USP Class VI and ISO 10993-5. The guide highlights key selection criteria such as sterilization resistance (autoclaving, EtO, gamma radiation, chemical immersion), thermal performance, chemical resistance, and electrical properties. Case studies demonstrate real-world applications in prosthetics, implantable sensors, and diagnostic devices. The guide emphasizes that adhesive selection should be a systems-level decision made early in the design process to avoid performance and manufacturability trade-offs.

 

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Aventon Soltera 3 Electric Bike Review: A Fun Hybrid Single-Speed

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Belt-drive bikes offer some huge upsides. First, they usually require less maintenance, with many belts often lasting twice as long as a typical chain. Second, there’s no grease to speak of, and therefore, no black smudges on your work pants. Third, in the case of the Soltera 3, the belt comes from the Gates brand, whose drivetrain belts are as good as it gets. Belt-drive bikes are silent and often smoother than their chain-driven counterparts.

That said, the inclusion of a low-maintenance element such as a belt drive paired with hydraulic disc brakes, which require bleeding roughly every year, struck me as an odd choice. If Aventon wanted to make the Soltera 3 as hands-off as possible, cable-actuated brakes would have been a more intuitive choice.

The other thing that immediately jumps out about the Soltera 3 is its relatively light weight. At 37 pounds, the Soltera 3 is heavy for an analog bike. But it’s certainly not heavy for an ebike, and it’s nearly as stiff, nimble, and navigable as a conventional bicycle. One issue I’ve always had with ebikes is their heft. Given that they’re often made to replace a car, they’re built with load bearing in mind. Also, ebike batteries are heavy.

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Adding to that sense of “this is just like my other bikes,” the Soltera 3 simply looks cool, which is often not the case when it comes to ebikes. The matte black my tester bike arrived in looks cool because matte black almost never doesn’t look cool. (Additionally, the Soltera 3 is available in dark matte blue and a sleek silver.) But beyond the finish, the bike’s geometry; its wide, almost perfectly flat handlebars; and its narrow (by ebike standards) 700 x 36 tires make it feel closer in DNA to a road bike than a traditional ebike.

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Image may contain Electronics Screen Computer Hardware Hardware Monitor Body Part Finger Hand Person and Camera

Photograph: Michael Venutolo-Mantovani

I’m 6′4′′, and the extra large Soltera 3 that I tested was at a maximum saddle height. It was suitable for me, but I couldn’t recommend anyone bigger than me riding the Soltera 3. That said, with four sizes ranging from small to extra large, the line covers a wide swath of riders, ranging from my height all the way down to 5′ tall.

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Here’s your first look at Kratos and Atreus in Amazon’s upcoming God of War TV adaptation

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With the likes of  and  out of the way for a bit, Amazon has seized its opportunity to put the spotlight on the next big video game adaptation, its currently-in-production God of War show. Today we got our at Ryan Hurst and Callum Vinson as Kratos and Atreus.

The image released by Amazon shows the eponymous God of War standing next to a tree as he watches his son — who notably looks a bit younger than the video game version of 11-year-old Atreus we first met in 2018’s God of War — take aim with his bow. Exactly what they’re hunting is unclear, but we know that the developing relationship between father and son that was such a big part of the PS4 game is also going to be at the heart of the show.

Whether Sony Pictures Television and Amazon MGM Studios have nailed the looks of its central characters is a matter of opinion. Personally I think Hurst’s Kratos in particular looks a little bit off here, but there’s every chance it all comes together later in production. Or when we first hear him angrily exclaim “boy!”

The Sons of Anarchy star was as Kratos back in January, and earlier this week we learned that Deadpool’s will play Baldur in the Amazon show. The rest of the cast includes Mandy Patinkin as Odin, Max Parker and Heimfall, Ólafur Darri Ólafsson as Thor, as Sif, Alastair Duncan as Mimir, Jeff Gulka as Sindri and Danny Woodburn as Brok.

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No release date has been announced yet, but a second season of God of War has been confirmed.

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