Punjab Times

NLRB accuses Grindr of using a return-to-office mandate to upend a unionization drive

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has filed a complaint against Grindr. According to Bloomberg, the agency alleges that a return-to-office (RTO) mandate that limited remote work and effectively meant a relocation requirement for many workers was an attempt to fend off a unionization drive. Around 80 of Grindr’s 178 employees quit as a result of last year’s RTO demand, according to the Communications Workers of America (CWA).

The NLRB’s general counsel office has accused Grindr of violating labor law by retaliating against workers who were attempting to organize. Per Bloomberg, the agency additionally claims the company refused to recognize the union or to negotiate with it in good faith, which would also be a violation of labor law.

A Grindr spokesperson told the publication that the claims were “meritless.” They added that some employees started signing union cards “only after it was known that the transition back to in-office work was underway.”

According to the CWA, the company announced on August 4 last year that workers would have to attend its offices at least two days a week. A supermajority of workers announced their unionization in July. The union claims that, by the end …read more

GM says it has become the No. 2 seller of EVs in the US

Front 7/8 view of the 2024 Chevrolet Blazer EV RS in Galaxy Gray Metallic driving down the road.
Image: GM

GM is claiming the number two spot in EV sales in the US for the third quarter of this year, selling 32,000 electric vehicles. The automaker produces EVs across multiple brands running on the same platform, like Chevy’s Silverado, Blazer, and Equinox EVs, as well as the GMC Hummer EV and the Cadillac Lyriq.

GM says it has sold a total of 370,000 EVs in North America since 2016, including 300,000 in the US specifically. Tesla is still the undisputed leader, with more than 5 million vehicles sold since 2008.

In an email with The Verge, GM’s executive director of finance and sales communications James Cain wrote that sales have accelerated since the company built a dedicated EV platform (formerly known as Ultium) and began producing battery…

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Apple will let you share lost AirTag info with an airline

An Apple AirTag in a holder clipped to a metal suitcase.
Finding lost luggage might soon be a little easier. | Image: Apple

Apple will be introducing a new feature to its Find My app that allows you to temporarily share the location of a lost AirTag with “an airline or a trusted person,” according to MacRumors, which is testing the second developer beta release of iOS 18.2. The feature could make it easier for airport staff to locate a missing piece of luggage if Find My indicates it’s nearby.

In iOS 18.2 the Find My app now has a “Share Item Location” option that creates a link that can be sent to anyone, not just your trusted contacts. On Apple devices, the link will open the Find My app, allowing someone else to see the location of the AirTagged item. On non-Apple devices, the link will instead open a web page with a map showing the item’s last known…

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AI for real-time, patient-focused insight

BiomedGPT is a new a new type of artificial intelligence (AI) designed to support a wide range of medical and scientific tasks. This new study is described in the article as ‘the first open-source and lightweight vision — language foundation model, designed as a generalist capable of performing various biomedical tasks.’ …read more

New trigger proposed for record-smashing 2022 Tonga eruption

Fifteen minutes before the massive January 2022 eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano, a seismic wave was recorded by two distant seismic stations. The researchers propose that the seismic wave was caused by a fracture in a weak area of oceanic crust beneath the volcano’s caldera wall. That fracture allowed seawater and magma to pour into and mix together in the space above the volcano’s subsurface magma chamber, explosively kickstarting the eruption. …read more

Amazon will now use AI to recap what you’re watching

Have you ever started a show, stopped mid-season and then struggled to get back into it because you have no idea exactly where you stopped watching or what was going on? Amazon just might have you covered. The company just launched a new tool for Prime Video that uses AI to generate personalized recaps.

X-Ray Recaps uses generative AI to create “brief, easy-to-digest summaries” of entire TV seasons, single episodes or even portions of episodes. All of this is personalized, so the recap will go up to the “exact minute of where you are watching.” The company promises “short textual snippets of key cliffhangers, character-driven plot points” and other details.

Adam Gray, vice president of product at Prime Video, says that this tool will help customers “quickly jump back into what they were watching or rediscover why they fell in love with a series in the first place.” It’s powered by Amazon Bedrock, the company’s proprietary AWS service for building and scaling AI applications. For those worrying about spoilers, the AI has been trained to avoid them at all costs.

Amazon

This is an extension of the pre-existing X-Ray feature, which offers trivia and cast information during …read more