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AI is the wild card in Hollywood’s strikes. Here’s an explanation of its unsettling role

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Artificial intelligence has surged to the forefront of Hollywood’s labor fights. Standing alongside more traditional disputes over pay models, benefits and job protections, AI technology is the wild card in the contract breakdowns that have led actors and writers unions to go on strike. The technology has pushed negotiations into unknown territory, and the language used can sound utopian or dystopian depending on the side of the table. Here’s a look at what the unions and their employers each say they want.WHY IS ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE SUCH A HOT-BUTTON ISSUE?As the technology to create without creators emerges, star actors fear they will lose control of their lucrative likenesses. Unknown actors fear they’ll be replaced altogether. Writers fear they’ll have to share credit or lose credit to machines. The proposed contracts that led to both strikes last only three years. Even at the seeming breakneck pace at which AI is moving, it’s very unlikely there woul...

FBI wrongly searched for US senator and state senator in Section 702 spy data, court says

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — FBI employees wrongly searched foreign surveillance data for the last names of a U.S. senator and a state senator, according to a court opinion released Friday. The disclosure could further complicate Biden administration efforts to renew a major spy program that already faces bipartisan opposition in Congress. Another FBI employee improperly queried the Social Security number of a state judge who alleged civil rights violations by a municipal chief of police, according to the opinion by the chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.News of the latest violations comes as the Biden administration faces a difficult battle in persuading Congress to renew Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which allows spy agencies to collect swaths of emails and other communications. Already this year, U.S. spy officials have disclosed that the FBI improperly searched Section 702 databases for information related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at th...

Thousands of Muslims took to the streets to express outrage over Quran desecration in Sweden

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

BEIRUT (AP) — Thousands of people took to the streets in a handful of Muslim-majority countries Friday to express their outrage at the desecration of a copy of the Quran in Sweden, a day after protesters stormed the country’s embassy in Iraq.The protests in Iraq, Lebanon and Iran that followed weekly prayers were controlled and peaceful, in contrast to scenes in Baghdad on Thursday, when demonstrators occupied the Swedish Embassy compound for several hours and set a small fire.The embassy staff had been evacuated before the storming, and Swedish news agency TT reported that they were relocated to Stockholm for security reasons.For Muslims, any desecration of the Quran, their holy text, is abhorrent. Under scorching heat Friday, thousands gathered in Baghdad’s Sadr City, a stronghold of influential Iraqi Shiite cleric and political leader Muqtada al-Sadr, some of whose followers took part in the attack on the Swedish Embassy. They brandished Qurans, burned the Swedish flag and ...

Rapper Quando Rondo crashes car while awaiting trial. Prosecutors want him back in jail

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — Prosecutors want the rapper Quando Rondo sent back to jail after he crashed a car while free on bond pending trial on gang and drug charges. The 24-year-old rapper, whose given name Tyquian Terrel Bowman, was indicted last month in his hometown of Savannah. He was released from jail June 26 on a $100,000 bond. Now prosecutors are asking a judge to revoke his bond.Their filing in Chatham County Superior Court says Bowman crashed a car while driving at high speed Wednesday, and that emergency responders “administered Narcan as he was exhibiting signs of an overdose.”Narcan is a drug used to treat opioid overdoses. Bowman was ordered to refrain from using illegal drugs as a condition of his bond, according to court records.Bowman’s attorney, Kimberly Copeland, had no comment on the case, said a woman answering the phone at Copeland’s law office Friday.A judge scheduled a Thursday hearing on Bowman’s bond. Prosecutors obtained a subpoena for toxico...

CPD seeks to ID man who sexually assaulted woman in Lincoln Park

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

CHICAGO —  Chicago police issued a community alert Friday, hoping for leads on the identity of a man who the department says sexually assaulted a woman inside a residence vestibule in Lincoln Park. The alleged assault occurred just before 3:30 a.m. in the 1900 block of N. Sheffield Ave. on July 8.SEE ALSO: Suburban elementary school employee accused of distributing child pornographyAccording to police, the sexual assault occurred after the suspect followed the victim entering the vestibule.Police described the suspect as 5'9"-6', with a thin build and weight ranging from 165-175 pounds. The suspect may also be 25-35 years of age with short, black, receding hair. At the time of the incident, the suspect was wearing a black t-shirt and multi-colored drawstring pants, police added. Anyone with information may leave an anonymous tip at cpdtip.com.Tipsters may also call police at (312) 744-8261

A UPS strike could be just around the corner. Here's what you need to know

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — The clock is ticking. As the deadline to reach a new contract nears, a potential UPS strike feels closer than ever.Negotiations broke down earlier this month and unionized workers have been holding rallies and practice pickets across the country. The Teamsters, which represent more than half of the company's workforce, will resume talks with UPS on Tuesday. That leaves less than a week to come to an agreement before the current contract expires on Monday, July 31. The union has authorized a strike and Sean M. O'Brien, a fiery leader elected last year to lead the union, has vowed to do so if their demands aren't met. “We’re sending a message... all 340,000 of our members are united and ready to fight,” O’Brien told The Associated Press at a practice picket Friday in Atlanta, where UPS is based. UPS's unionized workers still seethe about a contract they feel was forced on them in 2018, and say that the company delivers millions more packages every day than it did just ...

Biden names CIA Director William Burns to his Cabinet

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden elevated CIA Director William Burns to his Cabinet on Friday, a symbolic move that underscores the intelligence chief's influence and his work in U.S. support for Ukraine. In a statement, Biden said Burns had “harnessed intelligence to give our country a critical strategic advantage" and credited his “clear, straightforward analysis that prioritizes the safety and security of the American people.”Burns has been a central figure in the Biden administration, particularly in the White House strategy to declassify intelligence findings that Russia was intending to launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. A career diplomat and former ambassador to Russia, Burns was sent to Moscow months before the war to warn Russian President Vladimir Putin of Washington's analysis.In the nearly 18 months since Putin invaded, the U.S. has provided intelligence support to Ukraine along with weapons and ammunition. Burns has gone to Kyiv repeatedly to meet with Ukrain...

House bill raises retirement age to quell pilot shortage

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

WASHINGTON (Nexstar) – Lawmakers in Washington say they've found a solution for the pilot shortage by increasing the retirement age, a move that major pilot associations oppose out of safety concerns.Lawmakers are celebrating a bipartisan agreement to fund the Federal Aviation Administration for the next five years, which they say will also tackle major issues like “addressing workforce shortages in the aviation sector,” according to Rep. Don Davis (D-NC).The legislation cleared the House on Thursday and now heads to the Senate. It includes a provision to raise the pilot retirement age from 65 to 67, a move that Senator Lindsey Graham says will "allow thousands of experienced and well-trained pilots to stay on the job."However, Captain Dennis Tajer says while the idea sounds good, the reality is different.“Issues that may not keep someone from working as an attorney or as a doctor, keep you out of the flight deck,” Tajer said.Tajer has been a pilot for over 30 years and is the spoke...

Rite Aid customers' personal information accessed in data breach

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

DAYTON, Ohio (WDTN) – If you are a customer of Rite Aid, an "unknown third party" may have accessed your personal information in a recent data breach, the company says.In a release obtained by Nexstar's WDTN, Rite Aid said the company learned on May 31 that a "vulnerability" in a vendor partner's software had been exploited. ‘This is not American’: Sheryl Crow responds to Jason Aldean’s controversial song Rite Aid said that once it was told about the exploit, it installed and updated its systems as well as the provider's software. In the process, Rite Aid discovered that, on May 27, the "third party" managed to access files containing personal customer information.Customer information in the files included:Patient First and Last NameDate of BirthAddressPrescription InformationLimited Insurance InformationCardholder IDPlan NameSocial Security numbers and credit card numbers were not accessed in the breach, according to Rite Aid."We regret that this incident occurred," Rite Aid says...

Republicans rush to defend Jason Aldean and 'Try That in a Small Town'

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:10:36 GMT

Republicans are mounting up to defend Jason Aldean's song "Try That in a Small Town" and its music video against accusations of racist imagery and threats of violence.Aldean’s video, which went up on YouTube last week and quickly drew attention on social media, features clips of Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests interspersed with footage of crimes — including an apparent convenience store robbery, a carjacking and depictions of people setting American flags on fire.“Stomp on the flag and light it up. Yeah, you think you’re tough,” he sings. “Well, try that in a small town — See how far ya make it down the road.”But perhaps what’s raised the most eyebrows is the location where the video was the shot: the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tenn. In 1927, 18-year-old Henry Choate was famously lynched at the courthouse, his body hanged off the balcony after he was accused of assaulting a white girl who never identified him. The building also played a part in the “Columbia race riot” o...