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01 Apr 2026 9:00pm GMT

ZipNada writes: Two software researchers recently demonstrated how modern AI tools can reproduce entire open-source projects, creating proprietary versions that appear both functional and legally distinct. The partly-satirical demonstration shows how quickly artificial intelligence can blur long-standing boundaries between coding innovation, copyright law, and the open-source principles that underpin much of the modern internet. In their presentation, Dylan Ayrey, founder of Truffle Security, and Mike Nolan, a software architect with the UN Development Program, introduced a tool they call malus.sh. For a small fee, the service can "recreate any open-source project," generating what its website describes as "legally distinct code with corporate-friendly licensing. No attribution. No copyleft. No problems." It's a test case in how intellectual property law -- still rooted in 19th-century precedent -- collides with 21st-century automation. Since the US Supreme Court's Baker v. Selden ruling, copyright has been understood to guard expression, not ideas. That boundary gave rise to clean-room design, a method by which engineers reverse-engineer systems without accessing the original source code. Phoenix Technologies famously used the technique to build its version of the PC BIOS during the 1980s. Ayrey and Nolan's experiment shows how AI can perform a clean-room process in minutes rather than months. But faster doesn't necessarily mean fair. Traditional clean-room efforts required human teams to document and replicate functionality -- a process that demanded both legal oversight and significant labor. By contrast, an AI-mediated "clean room" can be invoked through a few prompts, raising questions about whether such replication still counts as fair use or independent creation.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

01 Apr 2026 9:00pm GMT

Microsoft, Intel are also working on their own solutions for the issue.

01 Apr 2026 8:46pm GMT

A persistent agent, stealth "Undercover" mode, and... a virtual assistant named Buddy?

01 Apr 2026 8:04pm GMT

In classic Cloudflare fashion, the CDN provider used April Fool's Day to unveil an actual, "not a joke" product. Today, the company announced EmDash -- an open-source "spiritual successor" to WordPress that aims to solve plugin security. Phoronix reports: With the help of AI coding agents, Cloudflare engineers have been rebuilding the WordPress open-source project "from the ground up." EmDash is written entirely in TypeScript and is a server-less design. Making plug-ins more secure than the WordPress architecture, EmDash plug-ins are sandboxed and run in their own isolate. EmDash builds upon the Astro web framework. EmDash doesn't rely on any WordPress code but is designed to be compatible with WordPress functionality. EmDash is open-source now under the MIT license. The EmDash code is available on GitHub.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

01 Apr 2026 8:00pm GMT

Sperm gets lost in space; raccoons solve puzzles; the physics of folding a crepe; and more.

01 Apr 2026 7:53pm GMT

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01 Apr 2026 7:52pm GMT

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01 Apr 2026 7:36pm GMT

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: In 2023, the Swedish government announced that the country's schools would be going back to basics, emphasizing skills such as reading and writing, particularly in early grades. After mostly being sidelined, physical books are now being reintroduced into classrooms, and students are learning to write the old-fashioned way: by hand, with a pencil or pen, on sheets of paper. The Swedish government also plans to make schools cellphone-free throughout the country. Educational authorities have been investing heavily. Last year alone, the education ministry allocated $83 million to purchase textbooks and teachers' guides. In a country with about 11 million people, the aim is for every student to have a physical textbook for each subject. The government also put $54 million towards the purchase of fiction and non-fiction books for students. These moves represent a dramatic pivot from previous decades, during which Sweden -- and many other nations -- moved away from physical books in favor of tablets and digital resources in an effort to prepare students for life in an online world. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Nordic country's efforts have sparked a debate on the role of digital technology in education, one that extends well beyond the country's borders. US parents in districts that have adopted digital technology to a great extent may be wondering if educators will reverse course, too. As for why Sweden is pivoting away from digital devices, researcher Linda Falth said the move was driven by several factors, including concerns over whether the digitization of classrooms had been evidence-based. "There was also a broader cultural reassessment," Falth said. "Sweden had positioned itself as a frontrunner in digital education, but over time concerns emerged about screen time, distraction, reduced deep reading, and the erosion of foundational skills such as sustained attention and handwriting." Falth noted that proponents of reform believe that "basic skills -- especially reading, writing, and numeracy -- must be firmly established first, and that physical textbooks are often better suited for that purpose." Further reading: Digital Platforms Correlate With Cognitive Decline in Young Users

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

01 Apr 2026 7:00pm GMT

Arch Linux April 2026 ISO includes Linux kernel 6.19, systemd 260, updated firmware, and refreshed core packages from March.

01 Apr 2026 4:05pm GMT

Komodo 2.0 adds Docker Swarm management, introduces PKI-based authentication, and updates its UI with improved terminal features.

01 Apr 2026 11:29am GMT

AerynOS March alpha ISO brings GNOME 50, KDE Plasma 6.6.3, Linux kernel 6.18, and tooling improvements across moss and boulder.

01 Apr 2026 7:11am GMT