Category: News and Views

Mark Carney: Canada’s next PM vows to win trade war with Trump

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Mark Carney has won the race to succeed Justin Trudeau as Canada’s next prime minister, vowing to win the trade war against US President Donald Trump.

The former governor of Canada and the UK’s central banks beat three rivals in the Liberal leadership contest in a landslide.

In much of his victory speech, Carney, 59, attacked Trump, who has imposed tariffs on Canada and said he wants to make the country the 51st US state. “Americans should make no mistake,” he said. “In trade, as in hockey, Canada will win.”

Carney is expected to be sworn in as PM in the coming days and will lead the Liberals in the next general election, which is expected to be called in the coming weeks.

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ChatGPT doubled its weekly active users in under 6 months, thanks to new releases | TechCrunch

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OpenAI’s flagship AI chatbot, ChatGPT, returned to solid growth in the latter half of 2024, according to a new report published on Thursday by VC firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). While it took ChatGPT nine months to grow from 100 million weekly active users in November 2023 to 200 million in August 2024, it’s now taken less than six months for the app to double those numbers yet again, the report found.

Shortly after its November 2022 release as a research preview, ChatGPT became the fastest app ever to reach 100 million monthly active users — a milestone it hit in only two months’ time.

By November 2023, ChatGPT had reached another milestone of 100 million weekly active users, which grew to 300 million by December 2024, then 400 million in February 2025.

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Scale AI is being investigated by the US Department of Labor | TechCrunch

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The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) is investigating the data-labeling startup Scale AI for compliance with the Fair Labor Standards Act, TechCrunch has learned.

That’s a federal law that regulates unpaid wages, misclassification of employees as contractors, and illegal retaliation against workers.

The investigation has been active since at least August 2024, a document seen by TechCrunch shows. And it’s ongoing, according to a person directly familiar with the matter.

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Reddit Rival Digg Is Making a Comeback, Using AI to Moderate | Entrepreneur

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Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, 41, has joined forces with former rival Kevin Rose, 48, to revive Digg, a social and link-sharing website Rose founded in 2004 — it was divided up and sold for parts to Betaworks, LinkedIn, and The Washington Post in 2012. The two intend to infuse the new Digg with AI content moderators, a move not yet implemented by Reddit.

The Digg of 2004 allowed users to share links that others could “digg” and upvote or “bury” and downvote, creating a place for trending news. Users could comment on links too, with the most popular content ending up on the homepage.

In its heyday, Digg attracted 40 million monthly unique users, but after a 2010 update removed the “bury” button, users revolted and left the site in droves, leading to its demise.

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Apple announces the M3 iPad Air with Apple Intelligence | Mashable

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Apple just dropped a new iPad Air with an M3 chip, and yes, it has Apple Intelligence.

The M3 iPad Air is twice as fast as the M1 iPad Air which was released in 2022, according to the announcement. The M3 chip also gives the iPad Air faster graphics performance and the same dynamic caching support that comes in other M3 models, which boosts performance and response time.

The M3 iPad Air comes with iPadOS 18, which supports Apple Intelligence features, including Writing Tools with ChatGPT integration, type to Siri, Image Playground, and Genmoji creation. Apple Intelligence for iPad also has photo and graphics editing tools like the Clean Up tool in Photos and Image Wand in the Notes app that works with the Apple Pencil.

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Dow tumbles 650 points as Trump confirms tariffs on Mexico and Canada will start Tuesday | CNN Business

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US stocks slid Monday as investors braced for President Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs on Canada and Mexico to go into effect by the midnight deadline. The Dow tumbled 650 points, or 1.48%, to close at 43,191.

The Dow fell almost 900 points in afternoon trading before pulling back slightly. The broader S&P 500 fell 1.76% and the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.64%.

The S&P 500 posted its biggest one-day decline of the year. The Nasdaq is down about 6.5% since since Trump took office on January 20.

“Tomorrow, tariffs — 25% on Canada and 25% on Mexico,” Trump said during a press conference at the White House. “And that’ll start. … What they have to do is build their car plants, frankly, and other things in the United States, in which case they have no tariffs.”

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This year’s flu shot was up to 78% effective at preventing hospitalization in kids, early data finds | Live Science

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This year’s flu shots have dramatically reduced hospitalizations for seasonal influenza, early data suggest.

For kids and teens, the shots were at least 63% effective against flu hospitalizations and up to 78% in some regions. That’s according to data pulled from two networks of health care centers that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) monitors to assess flu shot effectiveness.

“Vaccine effectiveness” reflects how much a shot lowers the chances of a particular health outcome in the real world, and it’s calculated by comparing how often that outcome occurs in vaccinated versus unvaccinated people. So in this case, vaccinated kids had a 63% to 78% lower chance of being hospitalized for flu.

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Meta Announces Changes to Facebook Live Video Storage Policy | Small Biz Trends

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Meta is updating its Facebook Live video storage policy, limiting the availability of live broadcasts to 30 days before automatic deletion. The change, which takes effect on February 19, will align Facebook’s storage policies with industry standards and streamline how live video content is managed on the platform.

New 30-Day Limit for Live Videos

Under the updated policy, new live broadcast videos can be replayed, downloaded, or shared for 30 days before they are automatically removed from Facebook. Previously, live videos were stored indefinitely.

Additionally, all live videos older than 30 days will be deleted in phases over the coming months. Meta will notify users before deletion, giving them 90 days to download, transfer, or repurpose their content. Users will receive these notifications via email and in the app.

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IRS Warns Taxpayers to Choose Tax Preparers Carefully to Avoid Fraud and Identity Theft | Small Biz Trends

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The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is urging taxpayers to exercise caution when selecting tax professionals, warning that while most preparers are reputable, some engage in fraud, identity theft, and other scams. The agency emphasizes that taxpayers remain legally responsible for their tax returns, even if prepared by someone else.

IRS Resources for Selecting a Tax Professional

To help taxpayers make informed choices, the IRS offers several tools, including:

  • The Directory of Federal Tax Return Preparers with Credentials and Select Qualifications, which lists preparers who meet high professional standards.
  • A dedicated page on IRS.gov with guidance on choosing a reputable preparer, avoiding unethical ones, and understanding different preparer qualifications

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SpaceX just achieved another first with its Falcon 9 rocket | Digital Trends

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SpaceX undertook a Falcon 9 mission with a difference on Tuesday night, landing the booster in a different country from which it was launched. The spaceflight company shared footage of the feat on social media site X.

Up to now, SpaceX has always landed the returning Falcon 9 booster back at the launch site in Florida or California, or on a droneship off the East or West Coast, but this time it touched down on a droneship off the coast of The Bahamas, some 420 miles southeast of the launch site at Cape Canaveral, Florida — completing its first-ever international voyage.

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