Boing , March 01, 2025
All our posts from the past 24 hours
Here are today's Boing Boing stories. Thanks for your support!
AI killing some companies, others doing fine
Rob Beschizza / 6:32 am PT Sat Mar 1, 2025
Everyone can intuit professions vulnerable to AI. If you're a digital concept artist, data entry clerk or a certain kind of writer, you're thinking about the problem. But what businesses are verifiably being taken out back by the new tech? AI is killing some companies, write Elena Verna, while others seemingly in the crosshairs are doing well. Thriving!
WebMD: Where every symptom leads to cancer. They're crashing and burning and the timing aligns with major AI releases. … Quora: Once the go-to platform where user-generated questions got a mix of expert insights and absolute nonsense – is struggling. And it's no surprise. AI now delivers faster, (usually) more reliable answers. … Chegg: A popular platform for students – now getting schooled by AI. Weirdly, they're fighting back by suing Google over AI snippets. Not sure what they expect.
CNET, a web publishing giant, has lost most of its traffic. And so on. But look who is doing just fine…
Just look at Reddit. Many say they are impacted, but traffic says otherwise – they are CRUSHING it. Probably because people are gravitating toward authentic content and a sense of community.
Reddit is really the last general purpose place to find human opinions about things. Google's search AI never misses an opportunity to summarize a Reddit thread!
Asus's powerful new gaming tablet PC reviewed
Rob Beschizza / 6:06 am PT Sat Mar 1, 2025
Asus's Flow Z13 13-inch gaming tablets have been around for a few years at the segment's highest end, but the latest model is getting a lot of attention due to the integrated graphics offered by AMD's Ryzen AI Max 390. The result is a startlingly powerful device, benchmarking roughly along the lines of a desktop 3060, but in the 13-inch size of an ultraportable PC.
Games Radar loved it. Here's Tabitha Baker:
The 2025 Asus ROG Flow Z13 is a hybrid device that never quite feels at home amongst either laptops or tablets. It's still one of the best devices I've had the pleasure of testing, though, offering a true blend of power and portability that's unique to this form factor. It's the only Windows gaming tablet on the market doing what it does, but you'll need to be the right kind of player for it to make sense.
The Verge's Antonio G. Di Benedetto is impressed by the graphical grunt it offers: "hold up, integrated graphics are good now?"
The ROG Flow Z13 is a tablet that's also trying to be a hardcore gaming machine. It has a 13.4-inch, 180Hz IPS touchscreen with pen support, 32GB of unified memory (up to 128GB), a 1TB m.2 SSD, and ample port selection, starting at $2,099.99. The Ryzen AI Max Plus 395 APU in our $2,299.99 review unit offers surprisingly good gaming performance, especially for a tablet. And the detachable keyboard with larger keycaps and trackpad feels like it's pulled directly from the excellent ROG Zephyrus laptops. It makes for a potent portable gaming device — one you can even use on your lap without your legs burning up.
PC Gamer, however, finds it something of a talking dog. Even with faster integrated graphics, it's still a $2,300 tablet that isn't as powerful as a regular gaming laptop with a discrete GPU. Jacob Ridley:
This is not the dedicated GPU killer that it's made out to be, or was hoped to be in the lead-up to launch. It's maybe a step on that journey for AMD, a proof of concept that discrete GPU performance is possible for an iGPU, and I do really hope it leads to better things. But in this form factor, with this price and performance, there's little in the way of real-world benefit for a user. Just because other iGPUs are affordable doesn't mean this is. The performance-per-dollar value is horrible.
There's something very enticing about it, but the lack of keyboard really makes the portability (and at more than 3 pounds "portable" is firmly in quotes) less appealing. The Flow X13 is Asus's matching standard laptop, but an update with this new AMD chipset isn't expected in 2025—and last year's 4060 model is already comparable in benchmarks, notwithstanding the worse battery life.
Honda made a Pokemon motorcycle
Rob Beschizza / 5:26 am PT Sat Mar 1, 2025
Honda's Koraidon Project is a motorcycle designed to resemble the legendary Pokémon creature by that name. The item, shown off only dimly in a promotional photograph, will be exhibited at Honda Welcome Plaza Aoyama in Tokyo from Friday, March 7 to Sunday, March 9, 2025.
In 2024, the Toyota Engineering Society created the "Toyota Miraidon" with their project message," Adults' Devotion Make Children's Dreams Come True." The Honda Koraidon Project started with the idea that Honda could create a Koraidon that is uniquely Honda, based on the commitment to monozukuri (the art of manufacturing) passed on by the Toyota Miraidon. The project consists of approximately 40 engineers who were recruited from the Motorcycle and Power Products Businesses and the Innovative Research Excellence who have shown interest in this project. Under the slogan "Honda's Devotion Make Children's Dreams Come True," the team applied the design philosophy and simulation technology cultivated by Honda's motorcycle business over the years. Innovative Research Excellence's advanced self-balancing technology will also be incorporated to the Honda Koraidon to express game world Koraidon as much as possible in a form Honda's vision of mobility -.
Various bits of enticing media were posted online:
Here's what Koraidon, the Pokémon, looks like. Just what I always wanted in a bike!
These caterpillars build log-cabin cocoons to wear on their backs
Gail Sherman / 5:00 am PT Sat Mar 1, 2025
Bagworm moth caterpillars build their cocoons out of sand, dirt, and plant material. They look even more amazing than they sound, like something out of a Studio Ghibli film — the cocoons the bagworms build look so improbable that there is a Snopes page dedicated to them.
The bagworms stay in their little homes throughout the larval stage, expanding them as they grow by adding more material. They are mobile until the pupal stage when they affix the cocoon to a surface like a branch or a fence. Because their cocoons are constructed of plant material, they serve as excellent camouflage from predators.
The over 1300 species of bagworm moths are considered mostly harmless, but in some areas, they are troublesome pests, damaging trees in Florida orange groves and acacia trees in South Africa.
Zelensky ordered out of White House after Trump tantrum
Rob Beschizza / 2:20 pm PT Fri Feb 28, 2025
Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and J.D. Vance bickered during a news conference at the White House on Friday, with president Trump launching into a rant thereafter that dimmed hopes for a peace deal with Russia. Trump ordered Zelensky to be "thankful," warned him that he was "gambling with World War Three" by not making more concessions, and demanded that he "sign the deal." Zelensky was ordered to leave thereafter. "A scene like this was simply unimaginable in the White House," the BBC quoted someone present at the chaotic scene.
Here's the video; jump to 3m in for where it goes off the rails—initially with J.D. Vance jumping in with some unasked-for stirring. The exchange soon had Trump losing his temper and ranting for several minutes about Ukraine, Zelensky, "the deal" and the poor treatment received by Vladimir Putin.
A number of Ukraine's key European allies were quick to confirm their continued support for the country. French President Emmanuel Macron said: "Russia is the aggressor, and Ukraine is the aggressed people. I think we were all right to help Ukraine… and to continue to do so."
Meanwhile, in a post on X directed towards Zelensky, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said: "You are never alone dear president… we will continue working with you for a just and lasting peace".
Trump, however was praised by the deputy head of the Russian security council, Dmitry Medvedev, who said Zelensky "finally got a proper slap down in the Oval Office".
Very clear sides, for once—and no minerals for Trump, of course.
West Virginia lawmakers want declare Bible "inerrant" and "accurate historical record"
Rob Beschizza / 1:40 pm PT Fri Feb 28, 2025
The West Virginia House of Delegates will consider resolution 3020, which would recognize the Holy Bible as 'the divinely inspired, inerrant foundational document for our society and government,' 'an accurate historical record of human and natural history' and 'the utmost authority for human moral behavior.'
[the bill] is co-sponsored by Delegates Dillon, Coop-Gonzalez, White, Anders, Butler, Mazzocchi, T. Howell, T. Clark, and Moore. This resolution is a proposal that seeks to amend the state's constitution. If two thirds of the House of Delegates agree to the amendment, the ratification of the amendment would then be on the ballot in 2026 for West Virginian citizens to vote on.
If it's inerrant and infallible, why does anyone need to vote on it?
This and other news items link to the bill on the W. Va. legislature's website, but all I see is a message saying "Please email us and let us know that the text for House Bill 3020 is not available." I did find a resolution with the same number in North Dokota, however, declaring that Jesus Christ is King.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF
NORTH DAKOTA, THE SENATE CONCURRING THEREIN:
That North Dakota acknowledge the Kingship of Jesus Christ over all the world so that this
great state may at last receive the great blessings of real liberty, well-ordered discipline, peace,
and harmony
Amendment shmendment!