Category Archives: Blog

If you took a big sip of coffee on Wednesday and tried to dive down a Wikipedia rabbit hole, you may now have a wet screen, because get this: Wikipedia looks different.

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Perhaps your brain rejected all the new white space, or the way the “sticky” new table of contents hovers while you scroll. But also maybe you just hate change.

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There’s no right way to react to a thing happening on the internet, so whining and nitpicking, along with inexplicable fear, are to be expected at a time like this.

However, according to Annie Rauwerda, the Wikipedia editor and superfan behind the Twitter account Depths of Wikipedia, the update, called “Vector 2022,” was in the works for a long time, and had been discussed nearly to death before the changes were rolled out. “Wikipedians have spilled more than 200,000 words on the page for Vector 2022 feedback,” Rauwerda wrote in Slate. That word count means, she notes, “There’s a corpus longer than Jane Eyre (and almost as long as Moby-Dick) about button positioning and table formatting.”

But nothing has fundamentally changed. The links you’re used to seeing in a long, exhaustive sidebar on the left — y’know, “Main page,” “Contents” “Current events” “Random article,” and the rest — are still there. You just have to click the little double carrot icon in the top left corner to bring them back.

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And once you get used to the new maximum line width, users of monitors with high resolutions might appreciate not having to read single lines of text as long as the entire Gettysburg Address.

But according to Rauwerda, the new design has already seen a substantial backlash, and it’s only been one day. Swahili-language Wikipedians held a unanimous vote, according to her Slate article, and officially requested that the changes be reverted. And in a wider vote about whether the new version should be the default, true democracy does not appear to be in evidence, since “the 165 people who voted to oppose the redesign outnumbered the 153 supporters.”

So if this gets you fired up, and you just need the old Wikipedia back, well, join one of the long, long, discussion threads about that. Or, since this is Wikipedia after all, just customize your experience, and leave the Wikipedians to their weirdly aggressive arguments about steam engines.

Popular, eerily-humanlike OpenAI chatbot ChatGPT was built on the backs of underpaid and psychologically exploited employees, according to a new investigation by TIME. 

A Kenya-based data labeling team, managed by San Francisco firm Sama, reportedly was not only paid shockingly low wages doing work for a company that may be on track to receive a $10 billion investment from Microsoft, but also was subjected to disturbingly graphic sexual content in order to clean ChatGPT of dangerous hate speech and violence. 

Beginning in November 2021, OpenAI sent tens of thousands of text samples to the employees, who were tasked with combing the passages for instances of child sexual abuse, bestiality, murder, suicide, torture, self-harm, and incest, TIME reported. Members of the team spoke of having to read hundreds of these types of entries a day; for hourly wages that raged from $1 to $2 an hour, or a $170 monthly salary, some employees felt that their jobs were “mentally scarring” and a certain kind of “torture.”

Sama employees reportedly were offered wellness sessions with counselors, as well as individual and group therapy, but several employees interviewed said the reality of mental healthcare at the company was disappointing and inaccessible. The firm responded that they took the mental health of their employees seriously. 

The TIME investigation also discovered that the same group of employees was given additional work to compile and label an immense set of graphic — and what seemed to be increasingly illegal — images for an undisclosed OpenAI project. Sama ended its contract with OpenAI in February 2022. By December, ChatGPT would sweep the internet and take over chat rooms as the next wave of innovative AI speak. 

At the time of its launch, ChatGPT was noted for having a surprisingly comprehensive avoidance system in place, which went far in preventing users from baiting the AI into saying racist, violent, or other inappropriate phrases. It also flagged text it deemed bigoted within the chat itself, turning it red and providing the user with a warning.   

The ethical complexity of AI

While the news of OpenAI’s hidden workforce is disconcerting, it’s not entirely surprising as the ethics of human-based content moderation isn’t a new debate, especially in social media spaces toying with the lines between free posting and protecting its user bases. In 2021, the New York Times reported on Facebook’s outsourcing of post moderation to an accounting and labeling company known as Accenture. The two companies outsourced moderation to employee populations around the world and later would deal with a massive fallout of a workforce psychologically unprepared for the work. Facebook paid a $52 million settlement to traumatized workers in 2020.  

Content moderation has even become the subject of psychological horror and post-apocalyptic tech media, such as Dutch author Hanna Bervoets’s 2022 thriller We Had to Remove This Post, which chronicles the mental breakdown and legal turmoil of a company quality assurance worker. To these characters, and the real people behind the work, the perversions of a tech- and internet-based future are lasting trauma. 

ChatGPT’s rapid takeover, and the successive wave of AI art generators, poses several questions to a general public more and more willing to hand over their data, social and romantic interactions, and even cultural creation to tech. Can we rely on artificial intelligence to provide actual information and services? What are the academic implications of text-based AI that can respond to feedback in real time? Is it unethical to use artists’ work to build new art in the computer world? 

The answers to these are both obvious and morally complex. Chats are not repositories of accurate knowledge or original ideas, but they do offer an interesting socratic exercise. They are quickly enlarging avenues for plagiarism, but many academics are intrigued by their potential as creative prompting tools. The exploitation of artists and their intellectual property is an escalating issue, but can it be circumvented for now, in the name of so-called innovation? How can creators build safety into these technological advancements without risking the health of real people behind the scenes?

One thing is clear: The rapid rise of AI as the next technological frontier continues to pose new ethical quandaries on the creation and application of tools replicating human interaction at a real human cost.

If you have experienced sexual abuse, call the free, confidential National Sexual Assault hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673), or access the 24-7 help online by visiting online.rainn.org.

Have you ever wanted to buy 68 Belkin power strips that once belonged to Twitter? Well, first, I’d say you have some pretty specific tastes, but guess what? You are in luck.

Twitter, under the sterling leadership of maverick/boygenius Elon Musk, is selling off assets from its San Francisco headquarters. It’s a wild collection of weird, mundane objects, including that large stack of power strips.

At the time of this writing, there were just a few hours left on the online auction from Heritage Global Partners, so peruse and get your bids in while you’re still able. The range of things to buy was pretty interesting, considering tech giants long made it a point to have offices well stocked with food, booze, coffee, and fancy furniture. There’s the neon Twitter bird with a current bid past $35,000. There’s six fake leather chairs somehow getting a $1,000 bid. An @ sculpture for $12,000. A single Eames chair for $1,400. Or, a personal favorite, the industrial food smoker for $700.

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The sale comes amid financial woes for Twitter, which has struggled under Musk’s unpredictable leadership. The company reportedly has a massive interest bill coming due, which might explain the slew of cost-cutting measures employed by Musk, including this garage sale of sorts, firing half the staff, and apparently straight-up refusing to pay rent.

The bids on these used Twitter items do seem pretty ridiculous thus far — in some cases, people are paying more for used items than they would cost new. So perhaps this is a big step forward for Musk in his bid to keep his new toy afloat. If you want to contribute, go ahead and bid. And if anyone wants to buy me a smoker… I’m all ears.

We put a man on the moon; now let’s make a home for him. Apple Originals’ latest dramedy, Hello Tomorrow!, stars Billy Crudup as Jack, a talented salesman selling everyone a one-way ticket to the moon. 

Set in a futuristic but retro world, Hello Tomorrow! follows a group of salesmen changing lives in their own way by selling people property on the moon. But there’s a dark secret looming, with things quickly spiraling out of control in the show’s trailer. Are people actually having potlucks and movie nights on the moon? Or is there something more sinister going on? With a gorgeous visual aesthetic and suspense to match, Hello Tomorrow! promises to be an exciting watch. 

The show’s ensemble cast also includes Hank Azaria, Haneefah Wood, Alison Pill, Nicholas Podany, Dewshane Williams, Matthew Maher, and Jacki Weaver. 

Hello Tomorrow! premieres on Apple TV+ on Feb. 17.

SAVE $250: As a daily deal, Amazon has the Shark AI Ultra 2-in-1 robot vacuum and mop on sale for $449.99 through the end of Jan. 18. You save 36% — marking a new all-time low price.

It’s not too early to plan for spring cleaning, and the best plan is to trust one of our favorite robot vacuum and mop combos to do all the work for you this year.

The Shark AI Ultra provides powerful suction to pick up all types of debris on carpets and floors. Using its Matrix Clean Navigation technology, it creates a grid to make multiple passes across your floor for precise vacuuming. It also utilizes 360-degree LiDAR imaging to map your home and avoid objects while adapting to any changes in your home’s layout. And when cleaning’s done, it empties itself in its charging base that holds up to 60 days of dirt before you need to empty it.

And for extra pristine floors, the Shark uses sonic mopping to scrub floors over 100 times per minute. For tougher stains, you can enable its Ultra Mop mode to increase cleaning by 50% in targeted zones. It’s great at cleaning hard-to-reach spots along floor corners and edges by blasting air to free up debris so it can easily suck it up.

UPDATE: Jan. 18, 2023, 1:30 p.m. EST This story has been updated with the latest 4K and 8K TV deals. Check out our favorites below:

• BEST 55-INCH TV DEAL: The Toshiba 55-inch C350 Series 4K Fire TV is the cheapest 55-inch on our list and operates on Amazon’s wicked easy-to-navigate Fire TV platform — $299.99 $469.99 (save $170)

• BEST 65-INCH TV DEAL: The Samsung 65-inch QN800B 8K QLED TV is Samsung’s more affordable 8K offering and is great for watching sports in bright rooms — $2,599.99 $3,499.99 (save $900)

• BEST 75-INCH TV DEAL: The LG 75-inch 83 Series QNED TV combines mini LED backlighting and NanoCell tech for juicy color and more precise contrast — $1,499.99 $2,499.99 (save $1,000)

Upgrading to a 4K TV — even a QLED or OLED — no longer has to be an intimidating financial setback. High-quality TVs featuring punchy colors, decipherable shadows, and smooth transitions have become increasingly affordable for regular consumers, made even more budget-friendly by frequent sales from retailers like Best Buy, Walmart, and Amazon.

TV deals are categorized by brand, then listed in order of size (smallest to largest) and price (lowest to highest).

Samsung TV deals

Why we love it

Enjoy the rest of the football season on a supersized Samsung QLED, now $200 below its price from Cyber Monday. The 2021 Q70A Series isn’t Samsung’s cheapest or most expensive QLED, but it checks all the right boxes for watching sports and gaming: direct backlighting with local dimming, crisp HDR, and bright quantum dot color even in sunlit rooms.

More Samsung TVs on sale

• Samsung 55-inch Q70A QLED TV — $899.99 $1,099.99 (save $200)

• Samsung 55-inch S95B OLED TV — $1,599.99 $2,099.99 (save $500)

• Samsung 60-inch TU7000 4K TV — $477.99 $598 (save $120.01)

• Samsung 65-inch TU8300 Curved 4K TV — $647.99 $799.99 (save $152)

• Samsung 65-inch Q90B QLED TV — $1,699.99 $2,599.99 (save $900)

• Samsung 65-inch S95B OLED TV — $1,999.99 $2,999.99 (save $1,000)

• Samsung 65-inch QN800B 8K QLED TV — $2,599.99 $3,499.99 (save $900)

• Samsung 65-inch QN900B 8K QLED TV — $3,799.99 $4,999.99 (save $1,200)

• Samsung 75-inch QN85B Neo QLED TV — $1,999.99 $2,399.99 (save $400)

• Samsung 75-inch QN90B Neo QLED TV — $2,599.99 $2,999.99 (save $400)

• Samsung 75-inch QN800B 8K QLED TV — $2,999.99 $4,699.99 (save $1,700)

• Samsung 85-inch Q70A QLED TV — $1,999.99 $3,299.99 (save $1,300)

• Samsung 85-inch Q80B QLED TV — $2,199.99 $3,299.99 (save $1,100)

• Samsung 85-inch QN900B 8K QLED TV — $5,499.99 $8,499.99 (save $3,000)

LG TV deals

Why we love it

One $1,000 discount left in the aftermath of Best Buy’s holiday sale brings a massive LG QNED TV below $1,500. QNED is a mashup of LG’s NanoCell technology and quantum dots (which amp up color depth using an extra light filter of nanoparticles) and the backlighting of mini LEDs (for more precise contrast through extra dimming zones).

More LG TVs on sale

• LG 50-inch NanoCell 75UQA 4K TV — $429.99 $549.99 (save $120)

• LG 55-inch B2 OLED TV — $1,099.99 $1,299.99 (save $200)

• LG 55-inch C2 OLED TV — $1,299.99 $1,599.99 (save $300)

• LG 65-inch 83 Series QNED TV — $999.99 $1,699.99 (save $700)

• LG 65-inch B2 OLED TV — $1,399.99 $1,899.99 (save $500)

• LG 70-inch NanoCell 75UQA 4K TV — $699.99 $899.99 (save $200)

• LG 75-inch UP7300 4K TV — $599.99 $799.99 (save $200)

• LG 77-inch B2 OLED TV — $2,299.99 $2,899.99 (save $600)

• LG 77-inch G2 Gallery OLED TV — $3,599.99 $3,799.99 (save $200)

• LG 83-inch C2 OLED TV — $4,499.99 $5,299.99 (save $800)

• LG 86-inch 80 QNED TV — $1,999.99 $2,199.99 (save $200)

• LG 86-inch 85 QNED TV — $2,699.99 $2,999.99 (save $300)

Sony TV deals

Why we love it

Sony debuted a handful of groundbreaking products at CES 2023. TVs weren’t one of them. But the absence of a new line isn’t stopping retailers from following the unspoken January rule of heavily discounting last year’s models. Arguably one of the internet’s favorite TVs right now, the A95K provides a dynamic watching experience through the Bravia QD-OLED panel, which combines the precise viewing angles of OLED and the color-boosting quantum dot layer of QLED.

More Sony TVs on sale

• Sony 43-inch X80K TV — $449.99 $549.99 (save $100)

• Sony 55-inch X90K 4K TV — $899.99 $1,199.99 (save $300)

• Sony 55-inch A80J OLED TV — $999.99 $1,899.99 (save $900)

• Sony 55-inch A90J OLED TV — $1,798 $2,999.99 (save $1,201.99)

• Sony 65-inch X75K TV — $579.99 $699.99 (save $120)

• Sony 65-inch X80K TV — $699.99 $899.99 (save $200)

• Sony 65-inch X90K TV — $999.99 $1,299.99 (save $300)

• Sony 65-inch X95K TV — $1,799.99 $2,299.99 (save $500)

• Sony 75-inch X95K TV — $2,499.99 $3,299.99 (save $800)

• Sony 85-inch X95K Mini LED TV — $3,999.99 $5,499.99 (save $1,500)

Other TV deals from TCL, Vizio, and more

Why we love it

Before you hit “Buy Now” on Amazon’s 75-inch Omni 4K TV, which is only about 18% off at $799.99, consider Toshiba’s 75-inch entry-level version of the Fire TV instead — it’s $230 less than the Omni. For a budget model, the C350 Series has good color and decent viewing angles, plus a responsive layout away from your streaming apps.

More TVs from TCL, Vizio, and more on sale

• Toshiba 43-inch C350 Series 4K Fire TV — $229.99 $329.99 (save $100)

• onn. 50-inch 4K TV — $198 $238 (save $40)

• Vizio 50-inch V-Series 4K TV — $298 $358 (save $60)

• Hisense 50-inch U6H 4K TV — $399.99 $599.99 (save $200)

• Toshiba 55-inch C350 Series 4K Fire TV — $299.99 $469.99 (save $170)

• Hisense 55-inch U6GR 4K TV — $429.99 $599.99 (save $170)

• Hisense 55-inch U8H Mini LED TV — $699.99 $1,149.99 (save $450)

• Insignia 58-inch F30 Series 4K Fire TV — $309.99 $479.99 (save $170)

• Toshiba 65-inch C350 Series 4K Fire TV — $399.99 $599.99 (save $200)

• Vizio 65-inch V Series 4K TV — $448 $629.99 (save $80)

• Hisense 65-inch U6GR ULED TV — $599.99 $799.99 (save $200)

• TCL 65-inch 6 Series QLED TV — $699.99 $999.99 (save $300)

• Hisense 75-inch U6H ULED TV — $799.99 $999.99 (save $200)

• TCL 75-inch 5 Series QLED TV — $799.99 $1,099.99 (save $300)

• Hisense 85-inch U7H ULED TV — $1,799.99 $2,499.99 (save $700)

Translating a beloved video game franchise to TV or film is a famously dicey move. But so far, HBO appears to have done the almost-impossible with its adaptation of Naughty Dog’s 2013 masterpiece The Last of Us, churning out an outstanding show with a stellar cast while staying true to the soul and mechanics of its source material. (Read Mashable entertainment reporter Belen Edwards’ review for the full scoop.)

If watching the first episode has you itching to boot up a PlayStation, you’re not alone: The acclaimed third-person survival horror game and its sequel are starting to sell out at major retailers in the wake of the show’s Sunday, Jan. 15 premiere. Here’s a quick rundown of all of your buying options (in order of release date) and their online availability at the time of publication.

The Last of Us (2013)

Meet Joel and Ellie.
Credit: Naughty Dog / Sony Computer Entertainment

A PS3 release, the original TLOU earned a slew of awards upon release and quickly solidified itself as one of the greatest PlayStation exclusives of all time. (Read our review from the Mashable archives.) It’s best as a collector’s item nowadays, since there are better-looking remasters and remakes available, but you can still play it if you’ve held onto an old console.

A few used copies were available on Amazon for about $26 when we last checked; you can also try your luck on eBay.

The Last of Us Remastered (2014)

*clicker squawks*
Credit: Naughty Dog / Sony Computer Entertainment

Naughty Dog gave the game a minor facelift for the PS4 a year after launching in the form of TLOU Remastered. This one includes the single-player campaign in full 1080p with improved visuals, higher-res character models, and several gameplay updates, plus an expansion pack called The Last of Us: Left Behind that adds several new chapters about Ellie and her friend Riley and two bonus maps for the game’s Factions multiplayer mode. (Reddit says it’s still alive and kicking, for what it’s worth.)

PlayStation Plus Premium subscribers can download TLOU Remastered for free. Otherwise, grab a new copy of the game from the PlayStation Store or Best Buy for $19.99, or save a few bucks with the pre-owned version at GameStop for $17.99. (Amazon and Target’s inventories were both wiped within the last few days.)

The Last of Us Part II (2020)

Stealth skills are essential for survival in “TLOU2.”
Credit: Naughty Dog / Sony Interactive Entertainment

Set five years after Joel and Ellie’s original post-apocalyptic journey out west, TLOU‘s grueling but gorgeous sequel lived up to players’ astronomically high expectations (and then some), nabbing over 300 Game of the Year awards to become the most-awarded game in history; it was only just dethroned by Elden Ring. Note that the first season of the HBO series only covers the events of the first game, but a second season that continues the story seems very likely.

There are two editions available for the PS4, with a free performance patch for PS5:

Standard Edition

The base game of TLOU2 retails for $39.99, but you can get it on sale at Walmart for $19.96 or on Amazon for $26.99. It’s currently stuck at full price at Best Buy, GameStop, and the PlayStation Store, and sold out at Target.

Digital Deluxe Edition

For $10 more, you can upgrade to the Deluxe Edition through the PlayStation Store for a digital soundtrack, a mini digital art book, a dynamic theme for your console, and a set of six exclusive PSN avatars.

The Last of Us Part I (2022)

Re-meet Joel and Ellie.
Credit: Naughty Dog / Sony Interactive Entertainment

Naughty Dog re-revisited the first TLOU last year for a PS5 remake that features a complete visual overhaul and modernized gameplay with new controls, new enemy AI, enhanced combat, haptic feedback, better audio, and more accessibility options. (Psst: It’ll be coming to PC in March 2023.) Like TLOU Remastered, it also includes the Left Behind single-player DLC. Choose from two editions:

Standard Edition

You can score a free two-hour trial of the base game with a PS Plus Premium subscription, or buy it for $69.99 at Best Buy, GameStop, Target, and the PlayStation Store. It’s sold out on Amazon.

Digital Deluxe Edition

This edition sets the player up for success with early unlocks of skill upgrades, weapon upgrades, weapon skins, a gameplay filter, and a speedrun mode. It’s up for grabs in the PlayStation Store for $79.99.

People have been fighting to #FreeTheNipple on Instagram and Facebook for years. Now, Meta’s Oversight Board – a group of academics, lawyers, and rights experts – have recommended that the company update its rules around adult nudity to “respect international human rights standards”.

In a statement on Jan. 17, the board recommended an overhaul of Meta’s Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity Community Standard, advising that the company put forth “clear, objective, rights-respecting criteria” regarding its policies in this area, “without discrimination on the basis of sex or gender”. The decision comes after the board examined two posts from an account belonging to an American couple who are non-binary and transgender.

The posts – one shared in 2021 and the other in 2022 – displayed the couple topless but with their nipples covered. The captions featured a discussion about transgender healthcare and gender-affirming surgery. These posts were flagged by users and later removed for violating “the Sexual Solicitation Community Standard,” seemingly due to a fundraising link for said surgery.

Instagram restored the posts after the couple appealed and after investigating, the board overturned Meta’s original decision, stating that both cases “highlight fundamental issues with Meta’s policies”.

The Oversight Board operates independently from Meta but is funded by the company, advising them on content moderation. In the group’s statement, it said, “The restrictions and exceptions to the rules on female nipples are extensive and confusing,” and even more so when it comes to transgender and non-binary people. Examples cited include posts about breast cancer awareness, top surgery, childbirth, and protests.

“…the Board finds that Meta’s policies on adult nudity result in greater barriers to expression for women, trans, and gender non-binary people on its platforms,” reads the post.

Instagram and Facebook’s rules have seemed more arbitrary over the years, with exceptions made in some instances and less reinforcement in others. Female nudity has always been more staunchly censored on the platform, and continues to be.

Back in 2020, Instagram altered its nudity policy after backlash against its censorship of plus-size Black women on the platform. After a sweeping campaign from activist Nyome Nicholas-Williams, the policy change allowed for breast hugging, cupping, and holding to be shown in posts. In 2021, the Oversight Board updated nudity policies on Facebook, allowing for some nuance and permitting “health-related nudity”. This wasn’t exactly a win but a step forward.

This new guidance could mean the ban on nipples and bare breasts may soon be a thing of the past. And it’s been a long time coming.

It’s Wednesday, and with it comes a new Wordle puzzle for you to solve. As always, we’re here with some tips and hints to help you find the solution.

If you just want to find out today’s answer, you can jump to the end of this article for January 18’s Wordle solution revealed. If you’d prefer to solve it yourself, keep reading for a few tips, tricks, and hints to guide you along the way.

Where did Wordle come from?

While engineer Josh Wardle originally created Wordle for his partner, the word guessing game has since become a daily habit for thousands of players across the globe. In fact, Wordle became so popular that it was eventually purchased by the New York Times. 

Wordle has also inspired numerous fanmade clones and alternate iterations, such as battle royale Squabble, music identification game Heardle, and variations like Dordle and Quordle that have you trying to guess multiple words at once. It has also provided ample content for TikTok creators, because sometimes it’s nice to just watch someone solve a problem rather than do it yourself.

Not the day you’re after? Here’s the Wordle answer for January 17.

What’s the best Wordle starting word?

Like determining People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, determining the best Wordle starting word is an entirely subjective matter. However, if you enjoy being ruthlessly strategic when taking on word puzzles, we have a few ideas to help you select your opening move. One hot tip is to choose a word that has at least two different vowels in it. It wouldn’t hurt to make sure it has a few common consonants as well, such as S, T, R, or N.

What happened to the Wordle archive?

The entire archive of past Wordles used to be available for you to access whenever you wished, like a giant wonderland of word puzzles. Unfortunately it has since been taken down, which was done at the request of the New York Times according to the website’s creator. Nothing good ever lasts.

Is Wordle getting harder?

No, Wordle isn’t getting harder, even though you may feel like it is! Though conversely, if you feel as though you haven’t been getting enough of a challenge, you can switch on Hard Mode.

Why are there two different Wordle answers some days?

Wordle solutions usually stand alone, with only one correct answer per day. However occasionally the puzzle game will break this rule and accept two different solutions as correct on the same day. This is because the New York Times made changes to Wordle after acquiring it, swapping out some answers for new ones.

The Times has since added its own updated word list, so this should happen even less frequently than before. To avoid any confusion, it’s a good idea to refresh your browser before getting stuck into a new puzzle.

Here’s a subtle hint for today’s Wordle answer:

The solution to today’s Wordle is a noun, and one that’s pretty good for you. It can be a bit bitter, though.

Does today’s Wordle answer have a double letter?

The answer to today’s Wordle doesn’t have any double letters for you to trip over, so no need to worry about that!

Today’s Wordle is a 5-letter word that starts with…

Today’s Wordle starts with the letter C, as in “Charmer” by Stray Kids.

What’s the answer to Wordle today?

Lock in your final answers, because it’s time to reveal the answer to today’s Wordle.

Are you ready?

The solution to Wordle #578 is…

CHARD.

Don’t be sad if you didn’t get it today. There will be a new Wordle puzzle for you to try tomorrow, and we’ll be back again with more tips and tricks to help you out.

Getty Images is suing the makers of an AI image generator tool for alleged copyright infringement.

On Tuesday, the stock image supplier announced it was starting legal proceedings in the UK against the Stability AI alleging the company “unlawfully copied and processed millions of images protected by copyright and the associated metadata owned or represented by Getty Images.” Essentially, Stability AI is accused of scraping images from the Getty digital library without paying for a license or compensating the image creators.

Apparently, Stability AI wasn’t informed directly of Getty’s legal action. “Please know that we take these matters seriously. It is unusual that we have been informed about this intended legal action via the press,” a spokesperson told Mashable in an email. “We are still awaiting the service of any documents. Should we receive them, we will comment appropriately.”

Stability AI makes Stable Diffusion, a popular tool for generating AI images. By entering a text prompt like “dog lying in the sun,” Stability Diffusion generates unique images based the text. The tool’s artificial intelligence learns what kind of imagery to create by consuming massive amounts of images found on the internet, which makes it smarter and more accurate over time.

Since image generating AI companies like Stability AI, DALL-E, and NightCafe rely on images and artistic styles created by humans, the issue of intellectual property is murky and uncharted territory. And the increasing popularity of these tools has brought copyright laws to the forefront of the conversation.

Regarding the copyright for using the tool’s generated images, Stable Diffusion’s site says, “The area of AI-generated images and copyright is complex and will vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.”

Stable Diffusion also says the images created are open source and protected by the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication. All in all, it’s an entirely new area in the realm of IP and copyright law that doesn’t have a straightforward answer.

Getty Images declined to provide further detail upon Mashable’s request.

UPDATE: Jan. 17, 2023, 5:45 p.m. EST This story was updated to include comment from a Stability AI spokesperson.