Kalakshar US

Meta’s Oversight Board announced today it has upheld the company’s decision to leave up two posts detailing a Thai woman’s fruit juice-only diet. However, the board recommended the company restrict the monetization of similar “extreme and harmful diet-related content” on Facebook as researchers continue to wrestle with the concerning relationship between social media and eating disorders.

The Oversight Board’s decision describes the videos, posted in late 2022 and 2023 by the same account — and flagged by users as harmful. The clips detailed “content on life, culture and food in Thailand.” In both problematic videos, a man interviews a woman in Italian about her experience with “a diet consisting only of fruit juice.”

The decision illustrates the videos’ concerning influence. “In the first video, the woman says she has experienced increased mental focus, improved skin and bowel movement, happiness and a ‘feeling of lightness’ since starting the diet, while she also shares that she previously suffered from skin problems and swollen legs,” the board’s summary reads. “She brings up the issue of anorexia but states her weight has normalized, after she initially lost more than 10 kilograms (22 pounds) due to her dietary changes.”

The second video, posted around five months later, follows up on the woman’s story, asking how she feels nearly a year into her dangerous diet. “She responds by saying she looks young for her age, that she has not lost any more weight except for ‘four kilos of impurities,’ and she encourages him to try the diet.” Making matters worse, she told the interviewer she planned to become a “fruitarian” after wrapping up the fast, adding that she may start a “pranic journey,” which she describes as “living ‘on energy’ in place of eating or drinking regularly.”

Meta’s oversight board

The videos have been viewed over two million times and have over 15,000 comments. The posts also shared details about the woman’s Facebook page, which received a significant uptick in engagement after the second post. “Based on research commissioned by the Board, the woman’s Facebook page has 17,000 followers and features content about the lifestyle of the woman, including her diet,” the board wrote. Both the content creator and the woman’s Facebook page were part of Meta’s Partner Monetization Program, allowing them to profit from the potentially harmful advice. 

After users reported the videos, Meta’s human reviewers determined the posts didn’t violate Facebook’s Suicide and Self-Injury Community Standard. They remained visible on Facebook. Separate users for each video then appealed the decision to Meta’s Oversight Board.

The board’s decision not to remove the videos was more about the lack of specific violations of the Suicide and Self-Injury Community Standard than a belief that the content was harmless. Specifically, the videos don’t provide “instructions for drastic and unhealthy weight loss when shared together with terms associated with eating disorders,” nor do they “promote, encourage, coordinate, or provide instructions for eating disorders.” Even the woman’s mention of an energy-only “pranic journey” was determined to be “descriptive in nature” without mention of weight loss.

The board recommended Meta adjust its monetization policies to “better meet its human rights responsibilities” related to “harmful diet-related content.” Most of the board considers the current authorization of this content “a conspicuous and concerning one.”  

“With health and communications experts noting the ability of influencers to use first-hand narration styles to secure high engagement with their content — coupled with the ubiquity of wellness influencers — it is important that Meta should not provide financial benefits to create this type of content,” the board wrote.

Some board members believed demonetization of this type of content was a bridge too far. “For a minority of the Board, since demonetization may negatively impact expression on these issues, Meta should explore whether demonetization is the least intrusive means of respecting the rights of vulnerable users,” the board wrote. Meanwhile, another minority believed demonetization doesn’t go far enough. “For a separate minority of Board Members, demonetization is necessary but not sufficient; they find that Meta should additionally restrict extreme and harmful diet-related content to adults over the age of 18, and explore other measures such as putting a label on the content, to include reliable information on the health risks of eating disorders.”

Meta says that because the board upheld Meta’s decision to leave up both posts, it “will take no further action related to this bundle or the content.” The company adds that it will review the demonetization recommendation. A Meta spokesperson told Engadget it will respond to “their full recommendations in our Transparency Center” within 60 days.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/metas-oversight-board-dangerous-diet-videos-can-remain-but-please-demonetize-them-175404574.html?src=rss 

I am fully encased in a bundle of spider’s silk, only my eyeballs still visible as I wait for my turn to be devoured. I’ve failed to save the city from the insatiable arachnidian Old God, and now myself and all the inhabitants of Shiokawa, Japan are caught in its web. I’d come so far this time, solved all of the mysteries tacked to my bulletin board, but in the end, I couldn’t escape the doom that had been closing in on me.

If World of Horror could be reduced to a single word, it’d be “dread.” It’s a point-and-click cosmic horror game created by Polish developer and dentist, Pawel Kozminski (also known as Panstasz). And after spending years in early access, Ysbryd Games finally released it to the public this month on Steam, PlayStation 4 and 5, and Nintendo Switch. It was well worth the wait.

World of Horror is heavily text-based, and plays like a choose your own adventure story — one in which most of your options are bad ones that will inevitably lead you to a gruesome death or irrevocable insanity. Players must solve five mysteries that are tormenting the townspeople, gathering information and fighting off the monstrous entities that attempt to get in your way. A slippery, boil-covered former teacher here, a woman with shards of broken ribs jammed into her gaping hole of a face, there.

All the while, you’ll be working to stave off whichever Old God has set its sights on Shiokawa for that run, and must keep an eye on the ever-ticking Doom meter to know how close you are to being overcome. Only after you’ve obtained five keys by solving each of the five mysteries can you unlock the town’s lighthouse, where you can banish the Old God. That is, if you’re able to make it through the trials on the way to the top. It’s a roguelite, too, so prepare to start from the beginning every time you make a fatal misstep.

The horror-manga-style RPG doesn’t hide its Junji Ito and HP Lovecraft influences. It’s so disquieting that you’ll find yourself jumpy and on edge even when nothing’s happening, which in some investigations is most of the time. The evil may not be coming for you right that moment, but there’s the sense that it could at any turn.

When those little jump scares do come — a particularly revolting attacker or a booming sound that cuts through the chiptune score — they’re made all the more jarring by the high-contrast 1- or 2-bit visuals (you can choose at the beginning) that were created, incredibly, in MS Paint. It nails the often hard to stomach Ito-esque gore, and there are a few scenes I had to force myself not to turn away from (a certain DIY eyeball operation comes to mind).

You’re given a few options for approaching the game, in terms of difficulty and complexity. Its short tutorial, “Spine-Chilling Story of School Scissors,” is a straightforward introduction. And in the beginner-level main story mode, “Extracurricular Activities,” you’ll start with one mystery already solved.

Players also have the choice of a “Quick Play” mode, in which elements like your character, Old God and backstory are randomly selected, or a fully customized playthrough where you choose your own character and story elements. That last one is the most challenging route. You can also choose from a slew of color palettes at the start of each game, if you want to mix it up.

While the turn-based combat is nothing revolutionary, I found it to be engaging enough. There’s no guarantee all of your hits will land, and relying on spiritual attacks when going up against a ghost-type foe is a stressful game of “guess the right combo.” It keeps things interesting, albeit a bit frustrating. Since the runs are relatively short — about an hour, give or take 30 minutes — it doesn’t feel soul crushing every time you die and have to start fresh. If anything, it becomes an addicting cycle.

Where World of Horror truly excels is in its attention to horrifying detail. A TV playing in your home runs grisly newscasts nonstop, including one about a dentist who replaced his human patients’ teeth with dogs’ teeth. (Remember, the developer is also a dentist). Look through the peephole of your apartment door and you might see a shadow man down the hall, or the quickly retreating face of someone lurking around the corner, or just an empty corridor. Twisted ghouls wait behind dead-end classroom doors.

Things are rarely the same when you come back to them. Each mystery has multiple endings and multiple ways to get you there, so you can’t quite predict what’s going to happen next even if you just played 10 runs in a row. Some stories are more involved than others, better thought through. But each has at least one ghastly element that justifies its place among the rest. If World of Horror is anything, it’s effective, and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/world-of-horror-is-a-skin-crawling-dread-machine-that-does-its-inspirations-proud-183000816.html?src=rss 

Sony has revealed when you’ll be able to snap up the only two wireless audio devices that will work with its PlayStation Portal handheld any time soon. The $200 Pulse Explore earbuds will hit markets including the US, UK, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Japan, Canada, Australia and New Zealand on December 6. The $150 Pulse Elite headset will arrive in most markets starting on February 21, Sony says.

Pre-orders for both products, as well as extra PlayStation Link USB adapters, will open on November 9. You can lock in an order for the earbuds, headset or adapter on PlayStation Direct or at other select retailers.

PlayStation Link, you may recall, is Sony’s own wireless audio tech. The company claims it will deliver low latency, lossless audio. Sony says it’ll be easy to switch between PlayStation Link devices, such as the PlayStation Portal and your PS5 (which can only connect to the Pulse Explore or Pulse Elite with the help of a USB adapter).

The earbuds and headset both include Bluetooth. Multipoint support means you can connect them to your PS5 or Portal and your phone at the same time, so you can answer a call while playing the likes of Marvel’s Spider-Man 2. However, there’s no Bluetooth option on the PlayStation Portal, Sony’s PS5 remote play handheld that’s arriving on November 15. As such, you’ll need to either use the device’s speakers, plug a wired headset into the 3.5mm jack or connect a Pulse Explore or Pulse Elite.

For the time being, those are the only two devices that will support PlayStation Link. According to IGN, Sony eventually plans to allow third-party makers of audio devices to use the standard in their products. 

Low-latency, lossless wireless audio is certainly nothing to sniff at. However, Sony’s decision to refrain from offering Bluetooth support in the Portal and instead nudge consumers toward an expensive headset and earbuds that use its proprietary tech is disappointing, if not surprising.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/sonys-200-pulse-explore-earbuds-will-be-available-on-december-6-165017764.html?src=rss 

I’ve always dreamed of revisiting classic RPGs with my kids — I wanted them to jump across time with me in Chrono Trigger, or pretend to be sky pirates in Skies of Arcadia. It’s not that tough to transform a well-told RPG into an interactive storybook for children (though I may have to shield their eyes from the more gruesome bits of Final Fantasy VII). I’ve been planning my “intro to RPGs” playlist for years, waiting for the moment my daughter Sophia began to look beyond the storytelling stylings of Peppa Pig.

But one night she saw me playing Sea of Stars, the recent Chrono-inspired retro RPG from Sabotage Studio, and she was hooked. I didn’t need to entice her like I originally thought. The game’s gorgeous 2D pixel art, catchy music (including some tunes from Chrono Trigger composer Yasunori Mitsuda) and epic story were more than enough to captivate her. While I held the Switch, she kept an eye out for enemies and treasure chests, and she stayed engaged with the story as I broke it down for her. She also clapped whenever I hit the action button at just the right time to deliver an extra hit, or to block an enemy’s blow (a nifty feature taken from Super Mario RPG).

Sophia loved the two leads — Valere and Zale, who she calls Moon Girl and Sun Boy — and their colorful companions. She teared up when a major character sacrificed themself to defeat the Big Bad (that was a long conversation). And she held tight as we took on the final boss, setting the two leads up for a larger adventure once we defeated them. Now, we’re mopping up additional side quests and working towards the “true” ending. Sophia doesn’t want to stop until we’ve seen everything the game has to offer, a sign that she’s going to be quite the completionist when she’s ready to play on her own.

Don’t judge me, but games have become an integral part of my daughter’s wind-down time at night. They help her to calm down and relax before bathtime, a sort of pre-storytime before we read some actual books before bed. We’re not playing anything fast-paced or loud, and the games offer plenty of teachable moments when it comes to spelling words, counting and complex moral choices. From what I can gather, watching a screen at night (which I keep distant from her and a bit dim) hasn’t affected her ability to fall asleep on schedule either. (Yes, I know it’s not recommended. I also waited until Sophia was over four years old before we started nightly gaming — I’m sure it would have been more troublesome if I started earlier.)

Before Sea of Stars, we also played around 20 hours of Dave the Diver, another recent release with a glorious pixel art aesthetic. Recently, we’ve also spent some time with the delightful Super Mario Bros. Wonder. But after playing a few levels of that, Sophia almost always wants to play Sea of Stars instead. Now she can tell the difference between a platformer like Mario, a game with a variety of experiences like Dave the Diver and an RPG (she calls them “adventure games,” officially settling that debate). I’m sure she’ll appreciate the mechanics of other genres more once she learns how to both run and jump at the same time in Mario. For now, she leans towards story.

Once it was clear that Sophia was truly into RPGs as a concept, I introduced her to Chrono Trigger. For whatever reason, Square Enix hasn’t re-released it yet on the Switch, and I wanted to play it on a more portable system than the Steam Deck. That left me with the iPhone port of the game, which looks pretty great on my iPhone 15 Pro Max. While there’s no option to use the game’s original graphics — a perk of the Steam release — the iOS version of Chrono Trigger still has all of the charm and whimsy that made me fall in love with the SNES version. (And as a nice bonus, there’s an auto button to speed through minor fights!)

Sophia immediately noticed the many (many!) similarities between Sea of Stars and Chrono Trigger. The overworld map is framed similarly, they both feature some of the best pixel art of their time and they both ultimately weave an epic story. Playing both games back-to-back reveals some of Sea of Star’s weaker elements — it takes a while to truly get going and the writing is a bit more simplistic. But it also makes me really want to play a proper Chrono sequel with Sea of Stars’ battle system.

Within 15 minutes of starting Chrono Trigger, Sophia and I were thrown back 400 years into the past. We were looking for Marle, the princess-in-hiding, who vanished soon after we found her. Then I had to explain the potential consequences of timeline interference to a 5 year old. And Sophia immediately understood what was happening: We had to save Marle’s ancestor before Marle ceased to exist! Just try competing with that, Peppa!

To be clear, this isn’t really Sophia’s first rodeo with complex storytelling. She’s devoured almost all of Miyazaki’s films (we’re holding off on Princess Mononoke because it may be too scary, and she’s probably not ready for the mature exploration of death and art in The Wind Rises), and I’ve guided her through Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. So I shouldn’t be surprised that she’s fully embracing the power of RPGs. After envisioning this moment for years, I’m going to enjoy it while it lasts.

It won’t be too long before she’ll be regaling me with stories of her own RPG adventures. And when she’s ready, I’m going to blow her mind with a one-two punch of Xenogears and Neon Genesis Evangelion. She’ll thank me later.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/i-taught-my-daughter-to-love-rpgs-by-playing-sea-of-stars-170038097.html?src=rss 

After 30 minutes or so with Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, I was fully invested. A broad grin crept across my mug as my Na’vi bounded from platform to platform up a mountain in the sky. The rousing music, lush vegetation and minimal user interface pulled me into Ubisoft’s take on Pandora. Having ikran, the distant moon’s answer to dragons, swooping around during my ascent helped me feel like I was actually exploring this alien environment.

The journey up to the ikran rookery was the highlight of my two hours or so with the game, closely followed by having the chance to explore Pandora from the skies after bonding with my new companion. Calling your new irkan flying friend to swoop in and rescue you in mid-air is thrilling, and your sidekick can land pretty much anywhere.

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora is an open-world adventure game from Ubisoft studio Massive Entertainment. It’s a canonical part of James Cameron’s fictional universe and it’s set shortly before the events of Avatar: The Way of Water, the sequel to the original 2009 film. Frontiers of Pandora was initially supposed to arrive at around the same time as The Way of Water, but Ubisoft pushed it back to this year.

As massively successful as the Avatar movies have been at the box office, they’ve hardly made much of a lasting cultural impact. I saw Avatar three times in theaters because of its absorbing spectacle, but had forgotten almost everything within a year and had to rewatch it before checking out the long-delayed sequel. I appreciate the technical wizardry and astonishing visuals of the films, as well as their salient points about environmentalism and colonialism, but the plots are largely rudimentary.

With more time and scope, the game has a chance to tell a richer narrative. Your character and some other Na’vi were kidnapped at a young age and were trained to serve under the RDA, a human military operation that’s harvesting resources from Pandora. Something goes wrong and the protagonist is put into emergency cryosleep. After waking up 15 years later, you’re effectively an outsider and need to relearn the ways of the Na’vi.

That’s a setup that effectively draws the player in as someone who needs to gradually understand how everything works. Naturally, as one of the Na’vi, you’ll square off against the RDA and try to drive them from Pandora.

My demo started with a modest fetch mission. I had to harvest some nectar needed for a ritual. After taking a few minutes to drink in the unusual flora and get my bearings, I made my way over to a mangrove hive. Harvesting the nectar involves a minigame that I’m sure will become annoying after having to do it a few times. You need to use a thumbstick to find the correct angle to pull an item from a plant or tree. Thankfully, Ubisoft offers the option to turn off this special interaction, much like you can skip the irritating pickpocketing minigame in Assassin’s Creed Mirage.

The publisher’s most recent open-world title is a blast. That was largely helped by Ubisoft showing restraint and avoiding much of the bloat for which it’s become notorious over the last several years. I was worried that Ubisoft would revert back to its old habits and stuff too many things into Frontiers of Pandora; it’s difficult to say whether that’s the case, based on a relatively brief look at an early section

Between side missions, looting, crafting and exploring, there’s certainly going to be lots to keep you busy outside of the main quests. You’ll be able to experiment with cooking by combining ingredients and seeing what happens (a familiar task to anyone who has played a recent Zelda game). This doesn’t seem too complex as you can only cook with two ingredients at once. Eating food can be helpful as meals can provide temporary boosts to things like base health and damage delivered while in stealth. It can also help you recover health. There are the expected multiple skill trees to juggle too, focused on survival, combat, hunting, crafting and ikran riding.

Most of these features seem additive rather than things that will pull you too far from the main story. On that note, it’s too early to say whether the narrative of the game will be much better than the humdrum narratives of either Avatar film (I’m still not over the rare mineral humans were mining from Pandora being called “unobtainium”).

After learning how to use your ikran, you’ll need to disable some aerial devices that are disrupting a Na’vi clan and then take out an enemy base. Destroying those floating beacons isn’t too difficult. You’ll need to use your hacking tools to disable the device before blowing it up. This section gave me a chance to try out aerial combat as RDA aircraft hover around the beacons to protect them. Playing on normal mode, I found that it was pretty easy to take down the flying machines with an automatic rifle (your Na’vi is pretty comfortable with guns after their RDA training).

Defeating mechs and human opponents is relatively straightforward too — unless you get overeager and rush headlong into an RDA base, only to get overwhelmed by enemies. I did just that a couple of times and died on each attempt. Taking a stealthy approach was both more successful and satisfying. Your Na’vi is powerful, so their bows are effective against humans and mechs alike. Taking out a soldier from a long distance with the longbow and thunking large arrows into mechs using the heavy bow helps to thin out the numbers without causing too much of a ruckus.

I deftly snuck between tunnels and pipes as I disabled drill towers and generators. When the enemies eventually discovered me, I made good use of my rifle as well as the staffsling to hurl explosives at them. Frontiers of Pandora affords you a lot of freedom when it comes to combat, and I enjoyed figuring out the best approach to various encounters.

The side missions I was able to try add some flavor too. One will see you taking out RDA installations and outposts to reduce pollution. Elsewhere, you’ll free animals that the military operation has captured.

Some aspects of the demo were unintuitive, however. I spent a few minutes figuring out how to ascend a steep cliff face before realizing I had to shoot a plant with my bow so it would drop a climbable vine. That was a little frustrating, as was not immediately knowing how to use the hacking tool — you need to apply just enough pressure to the controller’s trigger to line up two circles.

Overall, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora is showing a lot of promise. I went into the demo with low expectations after a gameplay showcase in June left me underwhelmed, much like the two Avatar movies did. But now I can’t wait to jump back in and once again soar through the skies on my own ikran.

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora will hit PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PC and Amazon Luna on December 7.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/avatar-frontiers-of-pandoras-adventurous-spirit-might-just-win-you-over-160024430.html?src=rss