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What if your most important health numbers aren’t your weight, BMI, or even your cholesterol? Two people can step on a scale and see the same number, yet one may have the muscle mass of an avid hiker and the bone density of a 30-year-old, while the other is quietly losing both. That’s why a […]

Train services are resuming across Germany this morning, after rail operator Deutsche Bahn (DB) last night shut down operations after its wireless network failed. At 10:30 PM local time on Tuesday night, DB advised that its GSM-R network was down, meaning all trains had to be held at stations. We understand that even suburban trains ground to a halt. GSM-R is a version of the 2G GSM standard tuned to the needs of rail operators, who use it to power private networks that carry information necessary to keep their services rolling. The tech is considered obsolete and DB knows it because the company has already signed with Nokia for a 5G replacement that will use the Future Railway Mobile Communication System (FRMCS) – a move also under consideration in the UK. For now, however, DB needs its GSM-R to connect drivers with signalling services – so three minutes after midnight on Wednesday morning the carrier promised to issue taxi and hotel vouchers to passengers. At that time, DB also said it had found the cause of the outage and was working to fix it. The company’s techies moved quickly as the network came back online at 00:50. As of 6:30 AM, however, DB warned “some isolated disruptions may still occur” and advised passengers they’ll need to check that their connections will run on time. There’s no indication the incident was the result of a cyberattack and The Register can find no reference to cut cables or other physical layer incidents that could have caused a nationwide outage. Whatever went wrong isn’t a good look as any network powering critical infrastructure is supposed to have layers of redundancy to ensure resilience. At least the org made heroes of its tech team. "Our IT experts worked tirelessly to resolve the issue – successfully,” reads a company statement. ®

Japanese telco KDDI has messed up by allowing an attacker to access systems powering an email service it manages for itself and other local ISPs, and which stores info on up to 14.2 million users. The company yesterday posted a confession [PDF] that it detected unauthorized access to the email system it offers to third-party customers on June 17th. Machine translation of the confession suggests that KDDI investigated the situation and found attackers exploited a vulnerability in third-party software used on the email service, without claiming that vuln was a zero-day it had no chance of defending or an explanation of why it was running vulnerable software. There’s some good news because KDDI was able to prevent further intrusion on the same day it noticed the attack, and says it has bolstered its defences to prevent future intrusions. But the carrier also fears that up to 14.2 million email addresses and passwords may have leaked and therefore warned that third parties may have obtained personal data. Thankfully, the company had hashed and encrypted the passwords – so users only have to fear phishing and identity theft, instead of something nastier. However, some of the data KDDI thinks may have leaked pertains to dormant accounts or others that users cancelled, meaning some potential victims will be hard to contact if the attackers have indeed stolen data. KDDI is one user of the hacked platform, and also provides it to Japanese ISPs STNet, JCOM, Chubu Telecommunications Co., Nifty Corporation, and BIGLOBE. Those companies now get to explain KDDI’s failure to their own customers, and perhaps also have the chance to revisit any other outsourcing deals with the carrier. Others who rely on KDDI to provide them with various services also get to ask the company some stern questions about whether its other platforms are secure. The carrier, meanwhile, says it’s informed the relevant authorities of the situation, but is yet to complete an investigation so remains unaware of the full extent of the mess. ®

The TOP500 list of Earth’s mightiest supercomputers has a new leader: the 2.198 Exaflop/s LineShine machine housed at the National Supercomputer Center (NSC) in Shenzhen, which took the top spot without using any kit from Nvidia, Intel, or AMD. Which is not to say that LineShine is an entirely Chinese creation. As explained in a pre-press paper, the machine’s LX2 processors are a local effort but use Armv9 designs – so chalk up a win for Blighty, the home of Arm. The machine also runs KylinOS – a Linux distribution that features contributions from around the world. The paper reveals that LineShine comprises 20,480 computing nodes, and that each LX2 processor “integrates two compute dies (304 cores total) and eight on-package HBM stacks (32 GB, 4 TB/s aggregate bandwidth).” “Each compute die contains 152 cores and 128 GB of off-package DDR memory organized into four NUMA domains,” the paper adds. “A dedicated SDMA engine handles data movement between DDR and HBM. The LX2 supports FP64/FP32/FP16/INT8 via SME and SVE units, delivering up to 60.3/120.6 TFLOPS in FP64/FP32. Nodes are interconnected via the LingQi high-speed network with a dual-plane multi-rail fat-tree topology, offering 1.6 Tb/s bandwidth per node.” That network is also a Chinese creation, from the minds at Hangzhou LingQi Technology Co. LineShine became the first system on the TOP500 to exceed two exaflops of sustained double-precision performance using CPUs only and the curators of the list think it could do better in future tests, because this time around it reached about 80 percent of its 2.736 Exaflop/s theoretical peak in tests conducted in preparation for this iteration of the TOP500 list. News that LineShine topped the supercomputing charts comes as China’s government increasingly steers local organizations towards buying made-in-China tech. Beijing wants to decrease dependency on foreign products, because China has gone all-in on AI and other technologies to boost economic growth and enhance the capabilities of its military. China’s Communist Party understands that reliance on imports can stymie those ambitions, with the USA’s ban on GPU sales to the Middle Kingdom offering ample evidence of the need to control tech supply chains. And now Beijing can point to its policies producing the most powerful single computer on the planet. It’s conceivable that China could do even better in the future, as its GPU industry is nascent and currently producing products whose performance trails Nvidia and AMD by four or five years. Those two paragons of US computing power, along with Intel, dominate this version of the TOP500 list – as has been the case for years. China is therefore on the march, but is a long way from global dominance. Our sibling site The Next Platform has extensive analysis of the TOP500 list here. ®

Walmart-backed Flipkart has crossed 1,000 micro-fulfillment centers as Amazon accelerates its own quick-commerce push in India.

⚡ Quick Take

• Actors Millie Brady and Pilou Asbaek will join the Lee Shaw Monsterverse spinoff.
• Director J.D. Dillard will direct the pilot.
• The Apple TV Monarch prequel will star Wyatt Russell and take place in the 1980s

We’ve said it before, but Thunderbolts star Wyatt Russell is one of the best things in Monarch: Legacy of Monsters. Although in Monarch, he has to share screen time with an older version of his character, played by his real-life dad, Kurt Russell. Well, very soon, Wyatt Russell will get to lead a Monsterverse series all his own, with an upcoming spin-off for Apple TV+, set during the 1980s. And according to a report in Deadline, Millie Brady (The Last Kingdom) and Pilou Asbaek (Foundation) have joined the as-yet untitled series. Also announced as directing the pilot episode is J.D. Dillard, director of the sci-fi film Sleight.

Alex Cameron/Christian Staehr

According to series showrunner Joby Harold, the new addition to the Monsterverse franchise will follow the story of Colonel Lee Shaw (Russell), during his time as an American operative in 1984. During this era, he went on a secret mission behind enemy lines. This is an attempt to stop the Soviets from unleashing a new Titan big enough to destroy the U.S. One that can even turn the tide of the Cold War. Based on what we know from the existing Monsterverse projects, the big American vs. Russian kaiju battle didn’t happen. Or at least, didn’t happen in a way the public at large ever found out about. Maybe it was like Rocky IV, only with giant monsters, and no cameras.

Legendary/Apple TV

According to the original report, showrunner Joby Harold is developing several different series set within the existing Monsterverse. These new projects will showcase old Titans, presumably Kong and Godzilla. But it will showcase several new monsters created just for this series as well. So what will this series be called? We’re not sure, but we imagine the word “Monarch” will be in the title somewhere. We expect production to get underway for this new Monsterverse series sometime within the next year.

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The post New MONARCH Spinoff Series Adds New Cast, Director appeared first on Nerdist.

Chat, is it good when 101 former federal and state judges file a bar complaint against you? Because that’s what just happened to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, right in the middle of his big push to be confirmed by the Senate. The complaint, filed with the New York State Bar, requests an investigation into Blanche’s staggering number of possible ethics violations. Racking up so much…

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A daily roundup of the best stories and cartoons by Daily Kos staff and contributors to keep you in the know. Trump pulls endorsement switcheroo to avoid looking like a loser When in doubt, endorse everyone! Trump set to make another historic celebration all about himself The president knows there’s no better way to bask in the spotlight than to steal it. Trump’s fall guy…

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Now more than ever, we modern-day court jesters need your support! Become a paid subscriber to any (or all!) of the platforms below to keep Keef gentleman-cartooning into the future and beyond! www.patreon.com/keefknight keithknight.substack.com ko-fi.com/… kchronicles.com/… Help Keef create his first animated short.

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The all-cash deal gives MoEngage access to technology that assigns AI agents to individual customers.

One party believes in science and doctors and thinks it’s bizarre that some people think horse paste is the solution to everything. The other one? “Public health disparities provide an important lens for understanding social and political change in the USA,” a recent study in the journal Nature concludes. “Using individual-level medical data and death records, this study shows that…

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The Pajaro Valley Health Care District is seeking community members to serve on the Measure N Citizens’ Oversight Committee, which monitors spending of bond funds approved by voters for improvements at Watsonville Community Hospital.

The district board will appoint up to three members to two-year terms beginning in August. Applications are due by July 31.

Measure N, a general obligation bond approved by district voters in 2024, provides funding for capital improvements at the hospital. The oversight committee is tasked with providing independent public accountability and ensuring bond proceeds are spent as intended.

Committee members review Measure N expenditures, inform the public about how bond funds are used and prepare the committee’s annual report.

Applicants must be at least 18 years old and live within the boundaries of the Pajaro Valley Health Care District.

District and Watsonville Community Hospital employees, officials, vendors, contractors and consultants are not eligible to serve.

The district board is expected to make appointments at its August meeting. Terms will run through August 2028.

Applications and additional information are available at pvhcd.org under the Governance section and Measure N page.

The Pajaro Valley Health Care District was formed in 2022 to help preserve and strengthen local hospital services. The public health care district oversees Watsonville Community Hospital and is governed by an elected five-member board.

Santa Cruz County supervisors are set to make final decisions Wednesday on a proposed $1.3 billion county budget that would restore more than $1 million to the Public Defender’s Office while cutting funding for local arts organizations, including a 50% reduction in county support for the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History.

The proposed 2026-27 budget comes after numerous hearings and revisions as county officials grappled with what they describe as one of the most challenging fiscal environments in more than a decade. The spending plan relies on approximately $43 million in one-time funding sources to remain balanced.

Among the most contentious last-minute changes is a proposal to redirect arts and cultural funding to restore parks and recreation services.

Under the plan, the county would cut its contract with the Museum of Art & History by 50%, saving $77,297, and eliminate a cultural services contract with Arts Council Santa Cruz County, saving $170,046. 

The money would help fund $590,000 in restorations for Parks, Open Space and Cultural Services, including seven-day operations at Simpkins Family Swim Center, portable restroom services and park maintenance.

In a message to supporters this week, MAH Executive Director Ginger Shulick Porcella warned that the reduction would bring county support to its lowest level in the museum’s 30-year history and force significant program cuts.

According to Porcella, the reduction would end MAH programming and events at Evergreen Cemetery, including Qingming and Día de los Muertos celebrations, historic tours and artist residency programs. 

It also would halt programming at Davenport Jail, including the upcoming Davenport Days celebration, and reduce museum outreach, school tours and planned upgrades to history exhibits.

“The MAH is a place that this community needs and is worth fighting for,” Porcella wrote, urging residents to contact their supervisors before the vote.

The museum cuts are part of a broader effort to preserve county services elsewhere in the budget.

Supervisors are also expected to approve a revised Public Defender budget that restores $1.06 million after concerns were raised about an earlier proposal that would have altered the county’s indigent defense system.

The revised plan maintains the current conflict-defense model, fully funds contracts with the county’s conflicts attorneys and avoids layoffs within the Public Defender’s Office. County officials say layoffs would be particularly damaging because the office handles about 85% of indigent defense cases in Santa Cruz County.

The budget package also includes a proposal to transfer $20.3 million in federal disaster-recovery funds into the county’s General Fund disaster reserve and authorize an internal $5 million loan intended to improve county cash flow.

County officials say the budget protects the county’s workforce and maintains essential services despite growing fiscal pressures and uncertainty surrounding future federal funding. The final adopted budget is expected to return to the board for formal adoption in September.

•••

If you go

The Board of Supervisors will meet at 9am Wednesday in the supervisors chambers in Room 525 on the fifth floor of the County Government Center, 701 Ocean St., Santa Cruz.

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The Supreme Court’s decision in Landor v. Louisiana is a perfect example of how conservatives strip rights from people by abstracting them away. The court’s conservative majority didn’t really want to talk about Damon Landor and how Louisiana corrections officials openly and flagrantly violated his religious liberty rights. So, they buried that simple story in a sprawling monstrosity of a…

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Superhuman, which also has an AI detection tool as part of Grammarly, has snapped up GPTZero.

Santa Cruz County Supervisor Monica Martinez has been selected as state Sen. John Laird’s 2026 Pride Month honoree and was recognized Tuesday at the California State Capitol during the California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus’s annual Pride Month celebration.

Martinez, who represents Santa Cruz County’s Fifth District and serves as chair of the Board of Supervisors, was among 15 Californians honored during the caucus’s Pride Month Floor Ceremony for contributions to the LGBTQ+ community and for serving as role models.

Laird said Martinez has dedicated her career to public service and expanding opportunities for residents.

“Supervisor Martinez has dedicated her career to expanding opportunity, strengthening communities, and serving those most in need,” Laird said in a statement. “As the first openly LGBTQ+ person elected to the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors, she has helped break barriers while remaining deeply committed to public service.”

Martinez made history in 2024 when she became the first openly LGBTQ+ person elected to the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors and the first woman elected to represent the county’s Fifth District.

Before joining the board, Martinez served for more than a decade as chief executive officer of Encompass Community Services, a Santa Cruz County nonprofit that provides behavioral health, housing and family support services. During her tenure, she oversaw programs serving vulnerable populations throughout the region.

As a county supervisor, Martinez has focused on healthcare access, youth and family services, disaster preparedness and public safety, according to Laird’s office. She has also advocated for LGBTQ+ youth, inclusive healthcare and policies aimed at expanding opportunity for residents.

Martinez said the recognition was especially meaningful because of her experiences growing up without many openly LGBTQ+ public figures.

“Growing up in a conservative family in Bakersfield, I did not see many openly LGBTQ+ leaders in public life, and I understand how powerful representation can be, especially for young people who are still learning who they are and where they belong,” Martinez said.

She said she hopes her election and leadership demonstrate that LGBTQ+ people “belong in every space where decisions are being made” and that their perspectives strengthen communities.”

The California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus, made up of openly LGBTQ+ members of the state Senate and Assembly, hosts the annual ceremony to recognize Californians who have advanced representation, equality and inclusion across the state.

The Trump administration wants to give white South African “refugees” an arrival gift bag with an American flag, an Android tablet, the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and hagiographic literature from PragerU minimizing the history of slavery and apartheid in the country and falsely accusing the South African government of “favoring the Black population.”

This is the latest effort to woo the Afrikaner population, descended from 17th-century Dutch, German, and French Huguenot settlers in South Africa, since the Trump administration began allowing thousands of white South Africans into the country based on debunked claims that they’re victims of “white genocide” pushed by Elon Musk, while maintaining Trump’s ban on people who legitimately need asylum.

“Farmers are being killed,” Trump said last May, calling Afrikaners a “long-persecuted minority group.”

The gift bags have yet to be finalized, according to The New York Times.

One of the books from PragerU, titled Lwazi’s Hard Lesson, details a Black South African rugby player who protects his white teammate from an angry Black mob, and describes South African freedom fighter and first post-apartheid President Nelson Mandela as a “South African lawyer and activist who sought to end apartheid with acts of sabotage.”

“Unlike South Africa’s Black population, the white population is declining in number,” the literature included in the package reads. “As an easy scapegoat for a failing government, more and more white South Africans are choosing to leave the country each year.”

Brown University historian Nancy Jacobs described that account to the Times as “selective in the extreme, and even inaccurate.”

As of 2025, white South Africans own nearly 75 percent of all farmland in the country despite making up just 7 percent of the population.

Three are dead following a solo crash on Highway 9 in the Santa Cruz Mountains on Monday night.

At 9:36 p.m. on Monday, officers from the California Highway Patrol’s San Jose-area division responded to a report of a vehicle crash on Highway 9 west of Redwood Gulch Road. Once at the scene, officers quickly confirmed that the crash involved fatal injuries, according to a media release.

Although the accident was still under investigation Tuesday, initial information suggested that a 2024 BMW M3 was heading eastbound when the driver lost control of the vehicle and veered off the road down a steep embankment.

The driver, a 21-year-old man from Yuba City, and two passengers, a 27-year-old man from Salem, Oregon, and a 17-year-old male from San Jose, died in the accident.

San Jose CHP Officer Ross Lee told Lookout on Tuesday that the cause of the crash has not yet been determined. Witnesses or anyone with information can call the San Jose CHP office at 408-961-0900.

Have news that should be in Lookout Briefs? Send your news releases, including contact information, to news@lookoutlocal.com.

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⚡ Quick Take

• The Vampire Lestat’s Damien Atkins spoke to Nerdist about Magnus, his ‘love sick’ feelings, and why he turned Lestat into a vampire.
• Atkins thinks Magnus was imagining a vampire revolution when he turned Lestat.
• He also teases that Magnus might be a real-life ghost, like he is in the Anne Rice books.

In The Vampire Lestat episode three, we got to meet the vampire who made Lestat. Some parts campy, some parts monstrous, all parts incredibly acted by Damien Atkins, Magnus brought a new level of intensity to the story. And Lestat’s song about his maker, “Your Biggest Fans,” is widely regarded as one of the best The Vampire Lestat songs of all. In the wake of Magnus’ harrowing appearance on The Vampire Lestat, Nerdist spoke to Damien Atkins about bringing the love-sick vampire to life, his designs for Lestat, and whether or not he has any agency as a ghost. You can check out our full interview with Magnus below.

AMC

Nerdist: In The Vampire Lestat song,”Your Biggest Fan,” we get Lestat’s interpretation of what he believes Magnus felt when he turned him into a vampire. How much of that do you think is accurate to Magnus himself?

That’s such a great question because I actually think it’s very accurate. I think for Lestat to have written this song, it’s like an act of rebellion, but it’s also actually it made me feel seen. I think it’s actually kind of a weirdly compassionate thing for Lestat to have done.

And even though Magnus is a monster, particularly to Lestat, it’s just another excellent example of how the show is just a very mature show that can have both those things at the same time, right? You are a monster to me, and I also have some insight into your heart, right?

AMC Networks

Yeah, that’s beautiful. So Magnus is quite antagonistic to Lestat when he appears to haunt him in the present day. Lestat tells him, “You’ve got your song, go away,” and he kind of just laughs. What do you think kind of Magnus’s apparition wants from his fledgling or vice versa?

Damien Atkins: That’s fascinating. I mean, because the question is, does Lestat summon him or does he have his own free will, right? I mean, I have to sort of play it like I’m doing it, but it’s a show about perspectives. So the question was, what does he want?

Well, Sam [Reid] would know best why he thinks he summons me, but it feels like it has something to do with exorcising me. I saw an interview that Sam did where he was talking about Lestat as an optimist, someone who is a fighter who wants to push through things, and get over things, and improve things. And so yeah, maybe you summon the original abuser to kind of punish or forgive or get past them. I think Magnus has his own reasons for haunting Lestat, and, for me, I chose him for a reason. It’s a pretty dark ethos and philosophy, and I think there is some impatience, some disapproval that he hasn’t lived up to what I know he can live up to. I think the story kind of proves me right. I think he’s the chosen one, and I keep saying, “Why aren’t you doing what you know you can do?

I think that’s probably where I’m coming from a little bit, where Magnus is coming from. Whether it’s fair, no. Is it healthy? Absolutely not.

AMC

Why do you feel is the reason that you mentioned? Why did Magnus choose Lestat?

Damien Atkins: There is something about, in the book, that he’s been through dozens of blonde men. It’s… like this weird… don’t know if Rice is consciously referencing a sort of Aryan philosophy or something. I don’t know. But there seems to be a combination of what Magnus would consider beautiful, but also brave. I mean, I say “Brave Little Wolf Killer.” So I think it has to be something about that bravery and charisma.

I think this is the guy we need. This is the guy who’s going to kick off the revolution. But this is Damien’s interpretation.

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What Is the Great Conversion in THE VAMPIRE LESTAT?

You think Magnus is thinking about a revolution when he turns Lestat?

Damien Atkins: Yeah. I mean, in the end, that was what was in my head. I wasn’t in Anne Rice’s head, and I don’t know if Rolin and Hannah would… I don’t know if that’s their intention. And in the end, that’s more important. Their intention is key, they are the drivers, but that was something I could play. That was a reason to be demanding of this of him, to go, “It’s not just about you.”

Like a vampire revolution?

Damien Atkins: Yeah, that was what was in my head.

AMC

In Anne Rice’s books, Magnus actually comes back as a real ghost down the line. Do you think that this Magnus in The Vampire Lestat series was just a figment of Lestat’s imagination or could he be a real ghost?

Damien Atkins: I think he could be a real ghost. We’ll have to wait. Yeah. Yeah. It’s that kind of universe, right? Both things are potent, right? Yeah. Because it’s so real inside his head, but yeah, it’s a crazy universe.

It definitely is. Magnus notoriously throws himself into the fire after making Lestat his air. Why do you think he just made him and then decided to die?

Damien Atkins: Oh yeah, that’s such a great question. It’s because it’s a bit of a mystery in the book, right? I mean, what I get from the book is that he’s tired, that he entered this life late, and he wants to leave a legacy, but he wants to do it right. Like he’s done years of work to find the right person. Maybe he wants to find that pure love moment, which does happen in the book. Lestat talks very tenderly about sort of holding him after he sort of sucked all of his blood out, that he feels real love for this ugly, sick old man.

So maybe what Magnus wants is to feel that, and then peace out before it gets ruined.

AMC

The fans are quite interested in knowing where Magnus got his fan art portrait of Lestat. What do you think?

Damien Atkins: Oh, that’s so great. I think I drew it myself. I think there’s a lot of discarded, terrible versions of it.

One perfect drawing.

Damien Atkins: Yeah. I took my time.

AMC Networks

Magnus is what I might call campy, but also terrifying all at once. How did you kind of find that balance between being really scary and dark but also somewhat comedic?

Damien Atkins: For me, it’s all in the same kind of tapestry of behaviors. Magnus is love-sick for Lestat, right? And human beings, when they are love-sick, can be pathetic, can be very sweet, can be ridiculous, can be scary. And a lot of people are campy in the privacy of their room or in front of the mirror with a brush, doing a lip sync. I think it is actually just a part of the spectrum of human experience. I don’t know. When you put a big love in your heart, you will act out in lots of different ways. That’s what I was thinking. So it all felt quite natural.

Like, “Of course, now I do a video.” You know what I mean? “Of course. Now I’m standing here with a thing of flowers crying, of course.” And you love somebody or you’re infatuated, let’s say, you are insane. That’s why they call it love-sick. We take that word for granted, but it’s sickening. It’s not necessarily a good feeling. It’s sickening. Your body has a reaction.

The Vampire Lestat airs on AMC and AMC+, Sundays at 9 pm ET/PT and midnight, respectively. You can snag The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice to read, if you’d like to know a little bit more about what’s going on.

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The post THE VAMPIRE LESTAT’s Damien Atkins on ‘Love-Sick’ Magnus and Being Seen By Lestat appeared first on Nerdist.