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The Silicon Valley AV startup has not started driverless testing yet.

SAP plans to buy German AI startup Prior Labs and invest heavily in it. It is also prohibiting customers' agents use to a select few like Nvidia's NemoClaw.

It’s that time of year again, as May has become the official Star Wars month on the calendar. May the Fourth, Revenge of the Fifth, the actual anniversary month of all of George Lucas’ Star Wars films. So you’re probably inclined to buy some cool merch right now, celebrating the galaxy far, far away. Well, the folks at the LEGO group have just revealed one of their coolest Star Wars products of the year, and this is one you will want to snatch up right away. Especially all of you dark-sided Sith devotees. LEGO has revealed its new Up-Scaled Darth Vader minifigure, who at 11 inches tall, is not quite so mini a figure. You can check out several images of the most adorable Sith Lord ever, along with the product description, down below:LEGO Star Wars Darth Vader Up-Scaled Minifigure Click To View Gallery Lucasfilm/LEGO Group LEGO Group/Lucasfilm Lucasfilm/LEGO Group LEGO Group/Lucasfilm LEGO Group/Lucasfilm Lucasfilm/LEGO Group LEGO Group/Lucasfilm Lucasfilm/LEGO Group

This deluxe 1,028-piece collectible comes in the same proportions as a regular Darth Vader LEGO minifigure. And it stands over 11 in. (28 cm) tall. So, six times the size of the standard LEGO minifigure. Fans can enjoy building this posable Dark Lord in many different configurations. You can attach his right arm in one of two fixed positions to hold his red lightsaber at different angles. He also comes with a black fabric cape. You can turn the head, move the left arm and hand, along with both legs, to display Vader in different poses. All of this to add a cinematic touch to any room.

The LEGO Group

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This Darth Vader collectible is perfect for any Star Wars fan aged 10 years old and up. Hopefully, he’s the first of many up-scaled LEGO Star Wars minifigures to come. We’d love to see him posed next to a minifigure Emperor, or Darth Maul, or even a minifigure Luke Skywalker to fight. The new Darth Vader Up-Scaled minifigure is up for pre-orders now for the price of $99.99, and starts shipping around June 1.

The post Up-Scaled Darth Vader LEGO Minifigure Is Dark Sided Yet Cute appeared first on Nerdist.

The company is making a big bet that the swiping model is outdated and most matches never turn into actual dates. The company wants to fix that by redesigning profiles, changing how people interact, and focusing a lot more on getting users to meet in real life.

Altara’s AI aims to diagnose failures and help speed up R&D by unifying data siloed across spreadsheets and legacy systems.

New Leaf Energy will bypass Santa Cruz County’s permitting process and instead seek state approval for its proposed battery energy storage system near Watsonville, a move county officials long anticipated as local regulations tightened.

In a May 1 letter to County Executive Officer Nicole Coburn, the company said it will withdraw its application for the Seahawk project at 90 Minto Road and pursue the California Energy Commission’s “opt-in” permitting process under Assembly Bill 205.

The decision follows months of friction between the company and county leaders over a proposed ordinance regulating large-scale battery energy storage systems (BESS) in unincorporated areas.

New Leaf had previously supported a draft version of the ordinance, calling it among the strongest in the nation. But amendments added by the Board of Supervisors in January created “significant commercial risks” and uncertainty that made the local process “unviable,” according to Max Christian, a senior project developer for the company.

In particular, a requirement that future ownership transfers receive additional approval from the Board of Supervisors would complicate financing and delay procurement timelines needed to meet deadlines set by the California Independent System Operator, Christian wrote.

“Those amendments … created too much timing and commercial risk for Seahawk to be able to meet the CAISO’s March 2027 commercial viability deadline,” he said.

Instead, New Leaf will apply to the CEC in early summer, citing a more predictable review process with defined timelines that would allow the company to move forward with engineering and equipment procurement.

The move was foreshadowed in April, when the company submitted a pre-application to the CEC while continuing to work with the county on a local ordinance.

County officials said the shift was not a surprise.

“Given that New Leaf has been meeting with the state, this development is not unexpected,” county spokesperson Tiffany Martinez said in a statement. “While the project may move forward under state jurisdiction, the County’s expectations remain unchanged.”

The county emphasized that environmental review will still be required under the state process and said it expects local priorities—including protections for agricultural land, safety setbacks, emergency response planning and long-term site restoration—to be incorporated.

The proposed Seahawk facility has drawn scrutiny since it was introduced in 2025, particularly in the wake of a high-profile fire at a Vistra battery storage facility in Moss Landing that burned for days and raised concerns about toxic emissions.

New Leaf has said its project would use newer technology that does not rely on the same materials implicated in that fire.

In his letter, Christian said the company expects the CEC to incorporate elements of the county’s draft ordinance into its review, providing a degree of local control through the state process. He also said New Leaf will continue working with the county, including negotiating a community benefits agreement.

The company began public outreach in late 2024, meeting with local fire agencies, civic groups and elected officials, and hosting community meetings in Watsonville.

Despite the shift to state oversight, New Leaf said it remains committed to what it described as a “safe and thoroughly vetted project” that would improve grid reliability, lower energy costs and support climate goals.

The CEC process will include a full environmental review, consultation with battery safety experts, coordination with local fire agencies and public input meetings, the company said.

For county leaders, the key question now is how much influence local officials will retain as the project moves into state hands.

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There’s gold in midmarket IT spend, and Anthropic - backed by private equity and banking heavyweights and tapping its Claude Partner Network - is coming for it.…

Lucid Motors pulled its guidance for the year, as it navigates swelling inventory and a companywide cost-cutting measure.

MAGA influencers are renewing President Donald Trump’s crusade to get comedian Jimmy Kimmel removed from his broadcast, this time referencing an out-of-context joke about Trump ally and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Giuliani is reportedly hospitalized in critical condition, which was first disclosed on May 3. More than five days before Giuliani’s status was known…

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Lisa Jo Chamberlin, who spoke to a Mississippi reporter in January about her experiences as the only woman on the state’s death row and her allegations of cruel and unusual punishment behind bars, now says that after speaking to the press, she faced targeted retaliation by prison officers for having gone public about her concerns, prompting new calls by civil rights advocates for investigations into her conditions.

In an interview last week from the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility after her phone access was restored, Chamberlin told me she had endured what she characterized as punitive restrictions for speaking to Mississippi Today, from prolonged cell confinement to blocks on her contacts, interaction, shower access, and some medication and mail, treatment that men on death row of comparable records are not equally subjected to. After the article appeared, Chamberlin went silent, unreachable for months by friends and family who later learned she had been stripped of the rights and privileges that death-row men continued to receive.

“I was blocked the whole month of February and the whole month of March,” Chamberlin said.

“She lost phone access” after the Mississippi Today article, said her goddaughter, Laykin Bordelon. The prison “blocked her pin number and she couldn’t make outgoing calls. I definitely think” the block and the broader alleged restrictions were “retaliation for speaking out” about the constitutionality of conditions.

Men on death row “walk in and out their front door,” Chamberlin said. “They have a garden. They have a pool table. They have a couch. They have their own kitchen in their building. Whereas me, I’m housed in long-term closed custody” without equal access, and the impact on her mental health is unbearable, she said.

“This is the worst treatment I have seen by far” of anyone on death row, said the Rev. Jeff Hood in January, before learning of Chamberlin’s new restrictions. Her treatment “is by far, by far, the worst. Not just in Mississippi” but throughout the United States. Hood, who has advised hundreds of incarcerated people, said this weekend that “Mississippi’s death row for men is one of the least restrictive in the country, so here you have the men getting a lot more freedom and space, and then you have Lisa and she’s completely locked down. The men have gardens, video calls, phone calls pretty consistently, day-room privileges, playing sports together.”

“This is the worst treatment I have seen by far” of anyone on death row. “Not just in Mississippi” but throughout the United States.

“The men are allowed out of their cells from 7 in the morning to 7 at night,” said Mitzi Magleby, an advocate in Mississippi. “They have their own kitchen, their own basketball court, their own yard. They’re allowed to play games, watch television, talk on tablets, video with their families, and associate with each other—glaringly different from what Lisa Jo gets. Lisa Jo gets to sit in a cell. She gets no access to video calls. Rarely gets to go outside. She doesn’t get to use the microwave. She gets literally no interaction. She is basically punished for being the only woman.”

“It’s not just a little gap,” Hood added. “It’s not just one gender has video calls and another doesn’t. It’s this whole other world of privileges,” a “stark difference” contributing to the “moral injury” of death sentences he described to my colleague Al Letson, host of More To The Story.

Chamberlin “does take responsibility for the part she played in the crimes” she was convicted of, Bordelon says: the murder 22 years ago of two people in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, committed with her then-boyfriend, who, unlike Chamberlin, had his death sentence vacated; he was resentenced to life without parole.

“I have to do everything by myself because I’m the only woman on death row,” Chamberlin told Mississippi Today reporter Mina Corpuz before going unresponsive to contacts who had typically heard from Chamberlin frequently.

“I believe it was” retaliation for speaking publicly about gender inequality, Chamberlin said. “The superintendent and a lot of the guards did” make comments about the January article. “I should have known to be careful” about going public, but “I’m completely aware of the repercussions” and risks of speaking again, and “it’s definitely worth it to me” to draw public attention to death-row disparities “because it’s not for me, in the long run.”

Asked if she is comfortable with more articles appearing, Chamberlin emphatically said yes: “My [advisers] for the longest time told me to be quiet. Sit down, be quiet, don’t raise a fuss. But I did that for so many years, and it didn’t change anything…And that was enough. I said I’m not gonna do this no more. I’m gonna start fighting for myself” by speaking to the press.

Now, a letter seeking investigations into whether Chamberlin’s treatment constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, in violation of the Eighth Amendment, and gender discrimination, in violation of the 14th Amendment, has been submitted by her goddaughter to the state’s Department of Corrections and other agencies.

The letter—and audio of Chamberlin’s first public comments since January—was shared with me by J.R. Rainbolt, host of Criminology Chats, a powerful podcast, produced by A.M. Peters, that delves into the criminal justice system. Rainbolt had exclusively interviewed Chamberlin as part of his educational and investigative work to shine a light on prisons, the courts, forensic psychology, and survivors of violence.

Men on death row “walk in and out their front door. They have a garden, pool table, couch, their own kitchen in their building, whereas I’m housed in long-term closed custody” without equal rights or access.

About 2,100 people are on death row in America. Fewer than 50 are women. Prisons tend to have latitude in how disparately they can treat individuals, but Chamberlin’s conditions are “very, very prejudicial,” said Magleby.

In the letter seeking an investigation, Chamberlin’s goddaughter alleges six forms of violations: extreme isolation and 48‑hour lockdowns that confined Chamberlin without being allowed out for movement, exceeding what men on death‑row experience; denied access to showers during extended lockdown; less outdoor access and social interaction than men; punitive restrictions not applied equally to men, including lost access to items she previously could purchase such as tobacco products; degrading staff conduct and comments aimed at Chamberlin on the basis of gender; and severe mental health decline from prolonged isolation and lack of contact.

Katrina Reid, the prison’s superintendent, did not respond to a request for comment about Chamberlin’s conditions. Neither did Kate Head, a spokesperson for the Mississippi Department of Corrections.

“I don’t mind” journalists seeking comment from officials about conditions, Chamberlin told me. “I get along with [Superintendent Reid] real good. It’s just that she needs to address the issues when I bring them to her. I’m locked behind a door. I can’t” communicate with Reid easily, and “every time I address the issue with the superintendent,” conditions do not materially improve. “That’s part of the problem because what the superintendent says about me is what everyone has to do.”

“I care about Lisa Jo very, very deeply,” said Magelby, the Mississippi advocate. “I speak with a lot of inmates on a daily basis and the way they’re treating Lisa Jo” is unequal, “like a ‘lesser’ person because she’s the only woman.”

More than 95 percent of women on death row expe­ri­enced gen­der-based violence before incar­cer­a­tion, “yet this information is often not con­sid­ered at trial,” according to the Death Penalty Information Center. In an amicus brief to the Supreme Court of Mississippi filed by the MacArthur Justice Center on behalf of the Battered Women’s Justice Project, attorneys Jim Craig and Andrea Lewis Hartung raised that argument: “A full picture of the defendant’s history is critical in the case of a [gender-based violence] survivor like Ms. Chamberlin,” whose “death sentence provides a textbook illustration of the consequences of failing to educate the factfinder in a capital case on the mitigating nature of a [gender-based violence] survivor’s background.”

Attorneys petitioned the court to grant postconviction relief, vacate her death sentence, and sentence her to life imprisonment. But she still sits on death row.

The implications of inequality in sentencing and confinement are far-reaching, from failure-to-protect laws that incarcerate women all over the country—for other people’s violence—as my colleague Samantha Michaels has reported, to conditions behind bars.

While Chamberlin waits for intervention, she is determined to self-advocate for treatment that is more humane.

“Lisa Jo needs to be afforded the right to associate with other people,” said Magleby. “As long as her behavior is on par with other inmates, there is no reason she should be locked away and isolated.” The prison could “create a designated plot for her to walk in and out of her room like the men on death row. Even if they have to house her with other closed-custody offenders, they can still give her the type of treatment the men on death row have.”

Uhoh. What was supposed to be an exciting moment for the Magic: The Gathering community has become scandalous in an unfortunate turn of events. At MagicCon 2026, Wizards of the Coast revealed a brand new collection that fans everywhere were truly excited about, Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit. Of course, as a centerpiece of the new The Hobbit collection, the company revealed a special The One Ring Magic card. But things quickly turned sour as fans realized that there truly was only One Ring. The new The Hobbit One Ring card looked suspiciously similar to The One Ring released in Magic: The Gathering‘s earlier The Lord of the Rings collection. But what exactly happened? According to Wizards of the Coast, it was an unfortunate case of inadvertent plagiarism. And most likely, that’s all we’ll ever know, but that hasn’t stopped the internet from speculating.

A message from Dan Frazier and Wizards of the Coast: pic.twitter.com/4VCM8avcay

— Magic: The Gathering (@wizards_magic) May 2, 2026

In full, Wizards of the Coast had this to say about the One Ring Magic: The Gathering plagiarism issue. They noted:

A message from Dan Frazier and Wizards of the Coast:

Recently, fans noted the similarities between The One Ring by Marta Nael, and the newly released image of The One Ring by Dan Frazier. Those similarities are not coincidental, unfortunately.

—

From Dan,

I made a mistake, and I feel awful. I especially feel for Marta, whose work I adore. In trying to create an iconic version of The One Ring, while looking at references online, I ended up using Marta’s Ring as a reference and painted over it to try to depict the item fans hold dear to their hearts. In doing so, I didn’t make it my own. I’m reaching out to Marta privately to apologize artist to artist. I love creating art for Magic, I’ve loved being a part of this artist community for more than 30 years, and I’m sorry I’ve let my fans down.

Sincerely,

Dan Frazier

—

From Wizards of the Coast,

Dan Frazier is a titan of the art industry and of Magic: The Gathering. He has created so many iconic pieces of art for the game that he will forever be a part of our game, and we value his contributions tremendously. With that in mind, we’re disappointed our review process didn’t catch the issue. Like Dan, we have already reached out to apologize to Marta Nael for not catching the use of her art in this piece.

None of this was intentional, but we’re going to make it right as much as we can.

On digital versions of the card, we will credit both Dan Frazier and Marta Nael.

We will also make sure Marta is compensated for her work here.

This is a good moment to recognize that we are all humans who make mistakes.

Dan made a mistake. We made mistakes in our process to not catch the error.

We don’t condone or accept either, but we still value Dan and his contributions and are grateful for his place in the game.

Thank you to the eagle-eyed fans who noticed this, and for all of you for being strong advocates for amazing art and artists.

Sincerely,

All of us at Wizards of the Coast

Ultimately, it feels like Wizards of the Coast is portraying that this One Ring Magic card mishap was an honest mistake, born of wanting to do right by fans’ expectations. But, in practice, it does seem like somewhere a purposeful act of plagiarism was committed. We feel glad that Marta Nael will be compensated for her work, but disappointed that Dan Frazier, who is a long-time Magic: The Gathering artist, and Wizards of the Coast, who surely must have considered looking at the original One Ring Card, did not catch this error and handle it before it became public. You can take a look at both One Ring Magic cards below.

Wizards of the Coast

We won’t deal in the various conspiracies flying around the internet, but will say that it’s hard enough to be an artist already! In fact, other artists from the community have chimed in on their opinions about the One Ring issue and what may have spurred it.

pic.twitter.com/yrd70UJyhE

— Alexis Haro (@SadPoor) May 3, 2026

Suffice to say, we support artists and original creators. We hope that everyone else does too. There is a modicum of irony that the One Ring, of all Magic: The Gathering cards, has created this plagiarism disarray. But we cannot let Sauron win!

This post has affiliate links, which means we may earn advertising money if you buy something. This doesn’t cost you anything extra, we just have to give you the heads up for legal reasons. Click away!

The post One Ring HOBBIT Card Is Tearing the MAGIC: THE GATHERING Community Apart appeared first on Nerdist.

In the Oval Office on Tuesday, President Donald Trump ruminated about vicious deaths in Iran—while surrounded by a group of children he was hosting. “They should do the smart thing, because we don’t want to go in and kill people,” Trump said about Iran, adding, “I have so many Iranian friends from New York and from other places over the years. They’re great people. I don’t wanna—I don’t want…

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As some of the biggest VCs in crypto start to consider funding AI startups, a16zcrypto's new fund will stay the course.

The US Department of Agriculture has spent the past week notifying people that the country is (allegedly) overrun by individuals who are fraudulently claiming SNAP benefits, while (allegedly) driving luxury vehicles. 

“In just ONE state, 14,000 individuals receiving SNAP benefits were driving LUXURY VEHICLES!” Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins posted on X last week. The official USDA account made similar claims, which were then amplified by figures like Senator Ted Cruz and Senator Rand Paul.

The numbers that Rollins used come from the Foundation for Government Accountability, a conservative think tank out of Florida that has been working to demolish the social safety net—programs like SNAP, Medicaid, and Social Security—since launching in 2011. The USDA, which administers the SNAP program, confirmed in an email to Mother Jones that FGA (and a New York Post article written by an FGA staffer) were the sole sources used for their data, but would not comment further on the record.

Those numbers are questionable at best. For one thing, the report they come from doesn’t name the state where thousands of people are allegedly buying Ferraris while using government money to buy food. For another, that report doesn’t include any explanation of its methodology. 

FGA has spent the past several years pushing for restrictions on SNAP benefits. Though SNAP fraud exists, it is far less prevalent than the foundation makes it out to be: SNAP trafficking rates—the illegal sale of benefits for dollars—have decreased countrywide from about 4 percent in the 1990s to around 1.5 percent today. When SNAP overpayments do occur, per the US Department of Agriculture, they’re more often than not the result of administrative error rather than intentional fraud.

Much of the Foundation for Government Accountability’s rhetoric hearkens back to the Reagan-era myth of the “welfare queen”—a racialized stereotype alleging that Black women exploit SNAP benefits to gain wealth, and that SNAP benefits encourage people not to get jobs. (Notably, the single largest racial group receiving SNAP benefits is white.) FGA, according to its website, advocates for dramatically cutting back SNAP benefits in order to “better serve the truly needy.” 

In July of 2025, FGA notched a major victory: in President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill, work requirements for SNAP benefits were expanded. In a rule that took effect at the start of February, all adults ages 18 to 64 without dependents under 14 are now required to work a minimum of 20 hours per week. Previously, this rule only applied to adults aged 18 to 54 without dependents under age 18. Beyond that, some groups that were previously exempted from the work rule — such as some veterans and people experiencing homelessness — must now find employment or risk losing their benefits. (Studies have shown such regulations are unlikely to address the root issue of underemployment, which is a lack of readily available jobs.) 

SNAP currently helps provide food to more than 38  million Americans each month—more than two–thirds of whom are elderly, disabled, or under 18. To qualify for SNAP, households must be at or below 130 percent of the poverty line—which, as of 2026, is $15,960 for a single person, $27,320 for a three-person household, and $38,680 for a five-person household.

But over the past year, more than four million Americans have dropped off the food aid rolls—which Rollins attributes to a crackdown on alleged fraudsters, like the luxury-vehicle-driving SNAP recipients she described in her posts. In this, she is once again echoing FGA’s language: on an American Family Radio broadcast in early January, FGA’s Hayden Dublois asserted that Trump is “cracking down” on “illegal aliens receiving food stamps.” Undocumented immigrants were never eligible for SNAP benefits in the first place.  The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, a progressive think tank, says that this precipitous change in food stamp enrollment can be blamed in part on new work requirements, new restrictions tied to immigration status, and cost-shifting onto states from the federal government. 

“A lot of that is fraud, and a lot of it is just a better economy,” Rollins said last week of the 8 percent drop in food stamp enrollment. That better economy, she added, means that “People don’t need food stamps.” The unemployment rate has remained around 4% since July of 2025, according to BLS records, making it unlikely that economic growth is causing people to stop using the program. 

And while politicians argue over who’s receiving SNAP and shouldn’t be, the bigger issue is overlooked: every year, thousands of people who are eligible for food aid end up going hungry instead, as evidenced by the USDA’s own data.

If the numbers are large enough, perhaps we won't question the math

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