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The article discusses the potential collapse of the AI bubble, suggesting it may already be occurring but remains unrecognized. It references The Register as the source and notes engagement metrics from Hacker News comments.

Sci-fi authors John Scalzi and Charles Stross criticize AI's impact on writing, with Stross accusing AI companies of stealing copyrighted material to train models and Scalzi highlighting challenges for new writers due to unreliable AI detection tools. Both authors express strong opposition to AI-generated content competing with human-authored works.

An IT manager left terminals logged in as root during a company event where children were present, leading to a nine-year-old daughter typing 'SHUTDOWN' and causing 36 hours of repair work. The incident occurred in the 1990s at a company using IBM RS/6000 Unix machines and legacy BASIC software.

A Windows activation error appeared on an information board at Heathrow Terminal 5's check-in area, spotted by a reader named Ethel Grapefruit. The error, which typically appears when Windows requires reactivation, is causing concern among travelers and highlights ongoing IT issues at Heathrow and British Airways.

A digital signage system at a Phoenix airport car rental building failed to boot, displaying an EFI Shell error instead of its normal content. Police officers were present at the scene, though the article humorously speculates whether their presence relates to the technical malfunction or another issue.

A college professor used a hidden prompt in an essay question to catch AI cheating, with 35 students falling into the trap by including the nonsensical word 'Madagascar.' The experiment revealed students often submitted AI-generated work without reviewing it, raising concerns about academic integrity and critical thinking.

A kiosk at Six Flags Fiesta Texas in San Antonio is malfunctioning, with a streaked screen and an error message requesting an invalid custom app installation. The article humorously highlights IT issues, referencing nearby attractions like the Iron Rattler roller coaster and the SUPERGIRL Sky Flight ride.

Clay, a junior manager on a Swedish construction site in the 1980s, accidentally deleted files using the DOS command 'DEL *.*' while using an engineer's computer. The engineer forgave him, allowing Clay to keep his job, but the incident serves as a cautionary tale about non-technical users handling computers.

Lionel, a new analyst at a company operating IBM computer centers in the 1990s, developed a pre-process program to automate overnight COBOL batch processing fixes, eliminating his need for all-night shifts. His solution angered a colleague who relied on overtime pay from the overnight support roster.

Raspberry Pi has released a 10.1-inch Touch Display 2 with a resolution of 1,200 x 1,920 pixels, 24-bit RGB color, and ten simultaneous touch points. The display is compatible with Raspberry Pi 5 and Compute Modules but requires a firmware update for full functionality. It is priced at $80 and features a 35 ms touch response time.

A breach of microtask platform Paidwork exposed data for 23 million users, including personal and financial information like bank account numbers, phone numbers, and bcrypt-hashed passwords. The leaked database, first advertised in April by a user named HACKFORMETOME, was added to Troy Hunt's Have I Been Pwned service on July 19. Paidwork has not publicly confirmed the breach or detailed steps to notify affected users.

A developer named Johnny wrote a C# project that later caused an intermittent glitch he couldn't resolve, only to find years later that his own comment in the code apologized to his future self for the problematic code. The incident resurfaced when a support team reported the same unresolved bug, leading Johnny to discover his past comment: 'Dear future Johnny, I am very, very sorry.'

Google is addressing a security flaw in Android 16 that allows unauthenticated users to send SMS or WhatsApp messages via Gemini from the lock screen without a PIN. The bug, reported to The Register, enables physical attackers to bypass device authentication using a specific multi-touch gesture, with Google confirming a fix will deploy this week.

A tech support specialist named Steve helped a customer who mistakenly replaced phone batteries instead of using the included charger. The customer discovered the charger was inside the original phone box after Steve guided her to check the packaging.

South Korea is developing a security-focused AI model to rival Anthropic's Mythos, aiming for sovereign bug-finding capabilities by 2026. This follows U.S. government actions blocking access to Mythos, prompting global interest in independent AI development. The model will be trained with security-related data, and the government also plans to create a free public chatbot and an agentic application for government services.

A hotel elevator in Paris displays an American Megatrends BIOS configuration screen instead of digital signage, featuring an Intel Core i5 CometLake CPU and 8GB RAM. The hardware, described as excessive for an elevator display, is part of a Novotel near the Eiffel Tower.

Irish data centers now consume 23% of the country's electricity, highlighting a significant increase in energy usage. The article references a report from The Register and Hacker News discussions on the topic.

A cross-department AI pitch session is relocated to a pub, making it more appealing despite initial complaints about its dull nature. The Boss insists on moving the event to the upstairs bar of a nearby pub, leading to a chaotic but more engaging atmosphere.

The article criticizes C programmers for writing code that sacrifices readability, labeling their practices as 'crimes against readability.' It is published in The Register's offbeat section and has minimal community engagement with zero comments.

A company vice president reported a hacker named 'General Failure' was accessing his files, but a sysadmin clarified the error message indicated a disk failure. The sysadmin, Lee, resolved the issue by diagnosing hardware problems instead of a security breach.

A Portuguese restaurant chain's kiosk software, WinRestKioskWPF.exe, is failing on Windows 10/8.x due to a missing digital signature, displaying a warning dialog that disrupts customer use. The software, part of the WinRest Point of Sale suite, is described as 'ultra-secure and affordable' but is causing operational issues.

Hank, a sysadmin, accidentally dropped an expensive 750MB SCSI drive, lied to his boss about it malfunctioning, and successfully replaced it with a new drive. The incident led to him learning to handle hardware carefully.

A digital sign at Banco CTT in Lisbon displays a 'S.M.A.R.T. Status Bad' error, indicating potential storage failure. The sign, showing 4GB of installed memory, has sparked humor about its value amid rising RAM prices. The article notes Lisbon's attractions while urging the bank to address the hardware issue.

Terry, a municipal IT worker in the 1980s, faced reprimands for both clocking irregular hours and attempting to fix a data-loss issue caused by a flawed MOVE command on an IBM mainframe. His efforts to prevent data loss by rewriting the script were dismissed as overstepping his job responsibilities, leading to his eventual departure.

A company's use of an outdated MS Word document for recording orders led to confusion when a new employee, Mitch, panicked over red underlines caused by Word's spell checker. Cooper, a staff member, explained that the red lines flagged SKUs as non-dictionary words and suggested disabling the spell checker or ignoring the warnings.

Qualcomm is reportedly in talks to acquire AI chip company Tenstorrent, a RISC-V-based firm, in a deal valued at $8 billion to $10 billion. The potential acquisition aligns with Qualcomm's datacenter ambitions and efforts to expand its RISC-V ecosystem, following its earlier purchase of Ventana Micro Systems. Tenstorrent's CEO, Jim Keller, is known for his work at AMD, Apple, and DEC.

A university IT technician named Jackson encountered a PC that rebooted and played a Chinese voice message during a Power-On Self-Test (POST). The issue stemmed from a 'talking error BIOS' feature on the motherboard, which defaulted to Chinese after a dead CMOS battery reset settings. Jackson resolved it by changing the BIOS language to English, revealing the error was related to a missing floppy drive.

A Paris Metro screen on Line 11 displayed a directory browser instead of transit information, spotted at the Chatêlet terminus in June. The incident, humorously compared to France's can-can dance, may stem from technical issues, heatwave stress, or fan enthusiasm following PSG's Champions League victory. Line 11, known for its rubber-tired trains and historical ties to the Belleville funicular, was recently extended.

A test automation consultant accidentally deleted data using a script, reported it as a bug, and the client's support team restored it, taking responsibility for the incident. The consultant avoided blame as the client attributed the error to a faulty SaaS script.

The Register's systems editor Tobias Mann reported from Computex 2026 in Taipei, highlighting how AI is driving chipmakers to prioritize demand for AI hardware over other products. Key announcements included Nvidia's N1X high-end notebook SOC for Windows and Intel's updates, though the article questions whether rising hardware costs will stabilize.

Cisco's SD-WAN management software is under attack due to a high-severity zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2026-20245), which allows authenticated attackers to escalate privileges and execute commands. Cisco has not yet released a patch, and this is the sixth SD-WAN vulnerability exploited since the year began.

A tech support worker named Solomon was unexpectedly called to assist a sheriff's office raid, where he encountered a high-stakes situation involving a SWAT team. Despite initial fears, he was later informed the operation didn't require his IT skills, and he celebrated with a meal afterward.

AI-enabled cybercriminals are using advanced tools to destroy virtual machines and hypervisors, leaving infrastructure in a 'dark, dead' state. Commvault's CTO emphasizes the need for organizations to adopt strategies beyond backups, including air-gapping and pressure-testing recovery plans, to counter evolving AI-driven threats.

Claude, a chatbot and coding tool developed by Anthropic, experienced an outage following the company's IPO filing. Anthropic, valued at $965 billion, faces challenges as users reported disruptions, while competitors like OpenAI and SpaceX also anticipate major IPOs.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) warned the public about scammers spoofing its switchboard number to impersonate police and solicit gift cards and bank details. A separate case involved an elderly woman defrauded of over £250,000 through a cryptocurrency scam involving malware.

Password manager Dashlane suspended customer accounts following brute-force attacks, which began on Sunday and led to unauthorized login attempts from Korea and Russia. The company restored accounts after investigating the incident but later changed the status to 'monitoring.' Dashlane confirmed no internal systems were compromised, though users criticized the lack of public communication and faced issues with two-factor authentication.

The article argues that Large Language Models (LLMs) share similarities with religion, cautioning against those who prefer this analogy. It highlights a discussion around the implications of framing AI in religious terms.

A reader named Kirk worked at a government building swapping out computers. His colleague expensed a bag of oranges and threw them from a window, causing a security response. The incident led to a lesson about perception but no consequences for Kirk or his colleague.

ShinyHunters leaked 4.9 million Charter Communications customer records, including names, email addresses, phone numbers, and physical addresses, after the company allegedly refused their extortion demands. Charter confirmed an investigation but claimed no sensitive data was exfiltrated, while the breach is part of a broader pattern of ShinyHunters targeting organizations, including a recent Carnival Corporation data theft.

ReactOS, an open-source project recreating Windows NT, has achieved a milestone by booting on ARM64 hardware, including the Raspberry Pi 5. The build is experimental, with limited functionality, but marks a significant technical feat after eight months of work. The project aims for Windows Server 2003 compatibility and celebrates its 30th anniversary.