Author: Reporter

The Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game franchise says it will not allow artists to use artificial intelligence technology to draw its cast of sorcerers, druids, fantasy characters, or scenery. D&D art is supposed to be fanciful. But at least one ax-wielding giant seemed too weird for some fans, leading them to take to social media to question if it was human-made. Hasbro-owned D&D Beyond, which makes online tools and other companion content for the franchise, said it did not know until August 5 that an illustrator it has worked with for nearly a decade used AI to create commissioned...

Hundreds of people gathered on August 27 at prayer vigils and in church, in frustration and exhaustion, to mourn yet another racist attack in America: this one the killing of three Black people in Florida at the hands of a White, 21-year-old man who authorities say left behind White Supremacist ramblings that read like “the diary of a madman.” Following services earlier in the day, about 200 people showed up at a August 27 vigil a block from the Dollar General store in Jacksonville where officials said Ryan Palmeter opened fire August 26 using guns he bought legally despite...

Georgia’s oldest city, steeped in history predating the American Revolution, made a historic break with its slavery-era past on August 24 when Savannah’s city council voted to rename a downtown square in honor of a Black woman who taught formerly enslaved people to read and write Susie King Taylor is the first person of color whose name will adorn one of Savannah’s 23 squares. It is the first time in 140 years that Savannah has approved a name change for one of the picturesque, park-like squares that are treasured features of the original plan for the city founded in...

The powerful algorithms used by Facebook and Instagram to deliver content to users have increasingly been blamed for amplifying misinformation and political polarization. But a series of groundbreaking studies published in July suggest addressing these challenges is not as simple as tweaking the platforms’ software. The four research papers, published in Science and Nature, also reveal the extent of political echo chambers on Facebook, where conservatives and liberals rely on divergent sources of information, interact with opposing groups and consume distinctly different amounts of misinformation. Algorithms are the automated systems that social media platforms use to suggest content for...