solving the problem tbc

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Solving the Problem

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• 1 Objectives
• 2 Description
• 4 Completion
• 6 External links

Objectives [ ]

Poli'lukluk the Wiser at Telaar in Nagrand wants you to kill 20 Murkblood Scavengers and 10 Murkblood Raiders.

• Murkblood Raider slain (10)
• Murkblood Scavenger slain (20)

Description [ ]

The appearance of the Murkblood in Nagrand has had a profound negative impact on our environment. The elementals are all in flux which has, in turn, greatly disturbed the wildlife. Worse yet, the razing of Sunspring Post has reignited the hatred that the orcs held for our people.

While the Kurenai are a different tribe than the Murkblood, all an orc sees is Broken.

We must make an effort to solve this dilemma. Travel to Sunspring Post, northwest of here, and resolve the Murkblood problem.

Completion [ ]

It is doubtful that the orcs will understand or appreciate what you just did but Nagrand is better off for the deed. Thank you, problem solver...

Upon completion of this quest you will gain:

• 500 reputation with Kurenai

External links [ ]

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Solving the Problem

• 1 Objectives
• 2 Description
• 4 Completion
• 6 External links

Poli'lukluk the Wiser at Telaar in Nagrand wants you to kill 20 Murkblood Scavengers and 10 Murkblood Raiders.

• Murkblood Raider slain (10)
• Murkblood Scavenger slain (20)

Description

The appearance of the Murkblood in Nagrand has had a profound negative impact on our environment. The elementals are all in flux which has, in turn, greatly disturbed the wildlife. Worse yet, the razing of Sunspring Post has reignited the hatred that the orcs held for our people.

While the Kurenai are a different tribe than the Murkblood, all an orc sees is Broken.

We must make an effort to solve this dilemma. Travel to Sunspring Post, northwest of here, and resolve the Murkblood problem.

It is doubtful that the orcs will understand or appreciate what you just did but Nagrand is better off for the deed. Thank you, problem solver...

Upon completion of this quest you will gain:

• 500 reputation with Kurenai

External links

• Nagrand quests
• Alliance quests
• Quests at 15-30
• Kurenai quests
• Pages using deprecated templates

This wiki contains inaccurate and out-of-date information. Please head over to https://wowpedia.fandom.com for more accurate and up-to-date game information.

• Quests at 67
• Solo quests
• Kurenai quests

Quest : Solving the Problem

• View history
• 1 Objectives
• 2 Description
• 4 Completion
• 6 External links

Objectives [ ]

Poli'lukluk the Wiser at Telaar in Nagrand wants you to kill 20 Murkblood Scavengers and 10 Murkblood Raiders.

Description [ ]

The appearance of the Murkblood in Nagrand has had a profound negative impact on our environment. The elementals are all in flux which has, in turn, greatly disturbed the wildlife. Worse yet, the razing of Sunspring Post has reignited the hatred that the orcs held for our people. While the Kurenai are a different tribe than the Murkblood, all an orc sees is Broken. We must make an effort to solve this dilemma. Travel to Sunspring Post, northwest of here, and resolve the Murkblood problem.

Completion [ ]

It is doubtful that the orcs will understand or appreciate what you just did but Nagrand is better off for the deed. Thank you, problem solver...

Upon completion of this quest you will gain:

• 500 reputation with Kurenai

External links [ ]

• World of Warcraft
• 1 Useful macros for warriors
• 2 Sayge's Fortunes

Den of Geek

World of Warcraft Burning Crusade Classic: How to Fix Server Issues

Can't log in to World of Warcraft Burning Crusade Classic? Here's what you need to know about some common server issues.

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World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic is finally here, and unless Blizzard has figured out something about server overload that the rest of the video game industry hasn’t, the return of one of WoW ‘s most popular expansions ever will likely also mean the return of server issues that prevent some from playing the game.

Server problems are essentially the cost of doing business for those who love to play online games, but knowing that doesn’t make it any less frustrating to learn that you can’t actually play your favorite game because the servers that run it just aren’t working. Staring at a log-in screen for hours is sometimes enough to make even loyal fans walk away from a game entirely.

While there’s rarely a quick fix for the majority of video game server issues, here are a few things you need to know about Burning Crusade Classic ‘s most likely server issues and what you can at least try to do about them.

World of Warcraft Burning Crusade Classic: How to Check Server Status

It’s incredibly likely that Burning Crusade Classic ‘s servers are going to go down at some point during the game’s first few days of availability (and possibly longer than that). When that happens, you’re going to want to check on the game’s server status.

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The very good news is that it’s relatively easy to see the current status of TBC Classic ‘s servers. You just need to go to this website , find your realm, and check what its current server status is. While it’s entirely possible that every TBC Classic server will go down at once, the more likely scenario is that different realms will be active at different times.

It’s obviously not possible to connect to a server that’s listed as “down” or “in maintenance” on that website, so you can save yourself a lot of frustration by checking that site before you start repeatedly trying to log in to a server that’s not even working.

Choose Your World of Warcraft Burning Crusade Classic Realm Carefully to Avoid Long Queue Times

If WoW Classic ‘s launch was any indication, your ability to play Burning Crusade Classi c at any given time may be less about a realm’s server status and more about which realm you’ve chosen to play on.

At the moment, the following Burning Crusade Classic realms are listed as “Full,” and therefore will likely be the most difficult to join at the time of TBC Classic’s launch:

• Benediction

Even if a server isn’t on that shortlist, you have to remember that a lot of people are going to be trying to play TBC Classic during those first few days. That means that even lower population servers could quickly fill up.

The important thing to remember is that you can’t skip queue times, so you’ll just have to wait them out whenever a realm’s server fills up. More importantly, you have to remember that Classic characters are listed as “AFK” after 5 minutes of inactivity and are sent back to the character select screen after 30 minutes of AFK status. If you’re on the character select screen for 30 minutes without activity, you’ll be removed from the server.

For the servers listed above, you may want to consider transferring your character to a different realm if you’re not willing to deal with longer queue times for at least the first month of Burning Crusade Classic . You can also pay to “boost” an alternate character on a lower popular server if you’re desperate to play the game when your main realm is full, but that’s obviously not an ideal option for many players.

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World of Warcraft: Burning Crusade Horde Queues Will Probably Be Longer Than Alliance Queues

This will probably only really affect you if you’re trying to play TBC Classic Battlegrounds while you’re already logged in to the game, but it’s worth noting that Horde players will probably have to wait longer than Alliance players during at least the early days of TBC Classic .

Why? Well, Horde will most likely be the more popular faction at the start of the expansion due to the power level/popularity of the Blood Elf race. While that disparity may not impact overall server wait times (at least in many cases) it does mean that Alliance players may have shorter overall wait times than their Horde friends when it comes to certain in-game activities. Then again, a lot of that is going to depend on how Blizzard chooses to handle PvP queues this time around.

World of Warcraft Burning Crusade Classic Dark Portal Server Problems

From the moment that TBC Classic was confirmed, fans assumed that the hardest part of the expansion’s earliest days would be entering the Dark Portal and properly starting their TBC adventure . After all, if WoW Classic ‘s AQ40 event was any indication, anything in WoW that requires players to gather in one place at a set time will likely lead to server crashes.

The really bad news is that there will likely be no way to “avoid” this problem when it happens. The best thing you can hope for is that everyone on your server gets through the Dark Portal as quickly as possible, but even if you logged into TBC Classic early, there’s a very good chance you’ll be kicked out of your realm once the expansion properly launches if there is too much activity outside of the Dark Portal.

The other option is to “wait” for some of those issues to be resolved and try to sneak in when things settle down. However, that’s probably not going to be a great option for players in high population realms who will need to log in as early as possible to stand a chance to get into the game at all.

Will World of Warcraft Burning Crusade Classic Have Layers?

In the early days of WoW Classic , Blizzard utilized a “layering” system to handle player queues and the problems they result in. Basically, you could be in the same realm as another player, but if you weren’t on the same layer within that realm, you could stand right next to them and never see them.

While that system helped Blizzard control server crashes during Classic ‘s early days and helped players complete certain quests more efficiently, it also proved to be controversial among other players due to some who exploited the system for XP gain and those who wanted to simply embrace the chaos and truly play together.

So far, Blizzard has been somewhat non-committal in terms of whether or not TBC Classic will have layering. While it feels like there will almost have to be some level of layering in place in order to handle the massive influx of new and returning players during TBC Classic ‘s early days, the team has stated that they’ll only utilize layering if it’s the best possible solution to the game’s server problems.

Matthew Byrd | @SilverTuna014

Matthew Byrd is Games Editor at Den of Geek and an entertainment enthusiast living in Brooklyn. When he's not exploring the culture of video games, he's…

Solving the problems with BC - a compromise between Van+ and TBC

So, if we must have BC, I think there might be a way that we could give the “we want more raid content” people what they want without introducing some of the many problems that BC brought to the Vanilla experience.

I think most of us agree that Class balance was at its most interesting during Vanilla, and thereafter it was just a mess. Similarly, one of the most crushing disappointments of BC was the way all your work in Vanilla was irrelevant the second you step into Hellfire peninsula.

Why don’t we make it that going through the dark portal (for the first time) saps your energy in some way and drops everyone to level 50. (Might have to do some tinkering with Karazhan keying so people can’t just waltz in there before going to Outland at all).

This way we could keep the superior Vanilla builds (Does any hunter want to move to Chimera sting/shot, whatever, and that garbage?) and still be able to enjoy a levelling experience in Outland.

Similarly, Vanilla raids and gear would remain relevant.

If we made this simple change, Vanilla’s welcome but fairly flat follow-up could be turned into what it always should have been – an expansion to the original game rather than a replacement.

How in any way is this a simple change?

Narrator: We dont

Narrator: It isnt

Narrator: I’d like to tell you this isn’t one of the worst ideas I’ve seen on the forunms. I’d like to tell you you’re fighting the good fight. I’d like to tell you that… but life is no fairy tale

Go play Retial if you want to adjust things like that. That will probably be the system they use going forward whenever they make a new expansion. Drop to 50 make the old content 1-50 new content 10 levels.

Alliance must maintain superiority over the horde to allow for appropriate balance. Swap the Pali seals.

Please explain how you came to this conclusion.

Class balance in Vanilla is at its worst by my account.

Cite valid examples. But i disagree. TBC brought a lot of polish across the board but kept every class flavorful and unique.

Please do your research properly before posting. This Chimera ability is not part of Burning Crusade… It is from Wrath of Lich King. And The builds in classic are not superior to TBC. The Classic developers and TBC developers were still one and the same and TBC was their fine tuning of vanilla. Now Wrath and onward you have Activision-Bliz.

TBC class balance, at least in PvE, was amazing

why do they need to remain relevant?

If there’s anything I would want to change in bc, it would be stuff like adding the exhaustion debuff to drums, and giving alliance seal of the martyr (the analogous counterpart to seal of blood given to alliance in early wrath).

I think most of us agree that Class balance was at its most interesting during Vanilla, and thereafter it was just a mess.

Main class warrior: checks out.

In VANILLA it was perhaps a bit more balanced, because people sucked at the game. As people have learned how to min-max, it has become clear that some classes are basically playing with 10 extra talents and levels. Ask any other tank spec (apart from prot warriors) how they feel about class balance. Ask any warlock or hunter for that matter. Ask a druid (doesn’t matter what spec they play).

OP, druids, paladins, and shaman would like to have a word with you regarding the ‘superior’ vanilla class balance lol

STRONG DISAVOW

This is a troll thread. No one could actually believe that “drop people to level 50 on going through the Dark Portal” was a small change or a compromise.

This thread reeks

I feel the opposite. In vanilla, pvp is very fast so every class usually has a shot at winning. In other expansions, they intentionally slow pvp down and inevitably a few classes float above the others because of it.

And I dont give two licks about pve class balance. It doesn’t even factor into game enjoyment for me at all.

Your opinion of tbc issues is like the exact opposite of everyone elses.

You are mental lol. You think warrior is bad 1v1 class in vanilla? Good luck killing hunters in open world when you cannot fear or stun them in tbc.

My opinion of a compromise? Keep raid sizes to 40. Remove flying. Re-tune everything to it’s original experience. Keep the attunements, the grind, etc. Then I might actually play.

so says the Warrior

I’m on the opposite side of that coin. Couldn’t care less about PvP in WoW, and honestly wish they would just get rid of it. To each their own though.

I have no idea what you’re talking about.

No we don’t. You don’t speak for anyone but yourself. Get off your high horse.

Vanilla class balance was a mess. A God awful mess where half the specs were either ignored or not played at all due to not being viable in PvE content.

TBC brought a ton of fixes to the game that made WoW better. This is my opinion and also factual.

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The Tale of Two GPS Stories — How Quantum Tech Could Solve The Growing GPS-Jamming And Spoofing Problem

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Matt Swayne

May 13, 2024.

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Insider Brief

• The Financial Times showed that the reliability of GPS (Global Positioning System) has been increasingly compromised by intentional interference.
• Meanwhile, an academic-government-commercial partnership showed that recent advancements in quantum technology could lead to un-jammable communications.
• There are still challenges and work to do, but this recent quantum navigation demonstration shows that solutions may be nearing.

In a case of journalistic synchronicity, two stories appeared in the press today — and they were deeply, if coincidentally connected.

In an excellent piece in the Financial Times , the reporters offered evidence that in recent years, the reliability of GPS (Global Positioning System) has been increasingly compromised by intentional interference. The surge in GPS jamming and spoofing, particularly in regions with heightened military activity, has caused significant disruptions to civilian life and essential services.

Jamming is the deliberate disruption of GPS signals by overwhelming them with noise, while spoofing is the transmission of false GPS signals to mislead receivers about their true location.

However, recent advancements in quantum technology — such as the ones demonstrated in the UK detailed in this story — could lead to un-jammable communications, making it a promising solution to this growing problem.

The GPS Crisis

GPS has become an integral part of modern life, providing essential services for navigation and timing with use cases across fields and industries, including aviation, shipping, banking and emergency services, according to FT. However, a wave of deliberate signal interference examples have demonstrated the system’s vulnerabilities.

The FT reports that GPS jamming and spoofing, historically used by militaries to protect sensitive sites and mask activities, are now increasingly affecting civilian populations. For instance, since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s recent offensive against Hamas in Gaza, the manipulation of GPS signals has expanded dramatically. This has led to bizarre and potentially dangerous situations: ships appearing to sail over land, flights forced to turn around mid-air due to navigation failures and disruptions in essential services like ride-sharing and food delivery apps.

Data from Flightradar24 analyzed by the Financial Times revealed that almost 40 million people lived in areas with unreliable GPS signals for at least half of the past six months. Areas with the highest levels of interference include Turkey’s capital Ankara, stretches of the Black Sea coastline, Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, several major Iraqi cities and war-torn regions in Myanmar. In some cities with significant military facilities, such as St. Petersburg in Russia and Lahore in Pakistan, strong interference has become a common occurrence.

These disruptions are not just a nuisance; they pose serious risks, the FT reports. For example, the Pentagon’s “Harmonious Rook” project aims to create a comprehensive map of GPS interference, acknowledging it as a significant global concern. The increased frequency of jamming incidents over major cities has led to alarming situations where pilots, confused by their location, have to request turn-by-turn directions from air traffic control.

The Quantum Solution

Amid these challenges, quantum technology does offer solutions. In a related story, the UK successfully completed commercial flight trials of advanced quantum-based navigation systems that are immune to jamming and spoofing. These groundbreaking systems promise to revolutionize Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) by offering highly accurate and resilient alternatives to traditional satellite-based navigation.

Infleqtion, one of the leaders in this type of quantum technology, in collaboration with aerospace companies BAE Systems and QinetiQ, recently completed a series of test flights showcasing two innovative quantum technologies that could ease dependence on GPS: the compact Tiqker optical atomic clock and a confined ultra-cold-atom-based quantum system. Both technologies were tested aboard QinetiQ’s RJ100 Airborne Technology Demonstrator.

The heart of this new navigation system is the Quantum Inertial Navigation System (Q-INS), which leverages the exceptional accuracy of quantum accelerometers and gyroscopes. These devices use ultracold atoms—cooled to temperatures near absolute zero—to measure motion with unprecedented precision. Unlike GPS, which relies on satellite signals that can be jammed or spoofed, Q-INS operates independently, making it highly resilient to interference.

The UK government has heavily invested in this technology, contributing nearly £8 million to the project. This funding is part of the broader £2.5 billion National Quantum Strategy, aimed at establishing the UK as a leader in quantum-enabled technologies. Science Minister Andrew Griffith emphasized the potential impact of this research, stating that it could provide the resilience needed to protect critical navigation systems from disruption.

Obviously, this is just a first steps and challenges remain. For example, developing quantum navigation systems that are small, portable and affordable enough for commercial use will be a significant challenge. These technologies typically require precise conditions, such as extremely low temperatures, which can be difficult to maintain outside of a lab environment.

There is also cost — this equipment is expensive — and the very complexity of the devices would require advanced knowledge to build, maintain, and operate. Last — but certainly not least —  work will need to done to make quantum navigation both robust and reliable for real-world uses.

The good thing is, researchers are much farther along than many experts anticipated. Quantum navigation is still a relatively new field, and ongoing research can help address these challenges. This R and D could lead to more efficient quantum sensors, improving error correction methods, and finding ways to mass-produce these systems.

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The Architects of Hades Strive to Bewitch Gamers Again

Supergiant Games, a small independent studio, had always tackled new projects. Then its dungeon crawler featuring the Greek pantheon became an enormous success.

By Brian X. Chen

Brian X. Chen, The Times’s personal tech columnist, reported from San Francisco. His favorite weapon in Hades was the rail gun.

When Supergiant Games was wrapping up Hades, a mythologically rich hack-and-slash dungeon crawler it had spent more than three years developing, the studio concluded it was not quite done. The game’s premise of being trapped in hell, which particularly resonated during the pandemic , had opened paths to untold stories about Greek lore.

It needed a sequel.

This was a plot twist for the small independent studio, which had always pursued new ideas — even after its debut game, Bastion, was an immediate hit that ultimately sold millions of copies. Although Hades won numerous industry accolades and prestigious Hugo and Nebula Awards, the decision to make Hades II was a hard one.

“Making a sequel to us, as well, was unexpected,” Greg Kasavin, the creative director of Supergiant, said at the company’s chic studio space in San Francisco ahead of the early access release of Hades II this month.

“We think they’re really quite tough,” he added. “To be able to surprise and delight the audience in the same way is quite a challenge.”

For big-budget triumphs like Mass Effect and Red Dead Redemption, a new installment is an obvious step toward building a lucrative franchise. But although some popular indie games, like Spelunky and Slay the Spire , have pursued sequels, it is a much less frequent route for smaller game makers. Rather than making decisions for shareholders, they often prioritize artists and designers who are eager to express their creativity.

Indie hits also face distinct constraints. They often stand out because of a novel element — like the ability to rewind time in Braid — and that buzz does not always carry into a sequel, said Jesper Juul, an associate professor at the Royal Danish Academy of Architecture, Design and Conservation in Copenhagen.

“The first time people will tweet and post about it and say, ‘Wow, that’s amazing,’” said Juul, who wrote a book about independent games . “The second time it doesn’t have that novelty value.”

Supergiant was founded in 2009 by Amir Rao and Gavin Simon, who had worked on the real-time strategy Command & Conquer franchise at Electronic Arts, a giant corporation responsible for franchises such as The Sims and Madden.

Rao and Simon had noticed that several best-selling games, like Plants vs. Zombies and Castle Crashers, were coming from small studios. So they decided to form their own, initially setting up shop at a vacant house owned by Rao’s father in San Jose, Calif. Kasavin, a former video games journalist who also worked at Electronic Arts, joined them.

Kasavin said Supergiant had been tempted to create a sequel after the positive reception of Bastion (2011), in which a child collects powerful shards in a hostile environment that unfolds as a narrator provides commentary. But the team of seven at the time decided to explore other ideas, including science fiction, instead.

That led to Supergiant’s second game, Transistor (2014), about a famous singer who battles robots in a futuristic city. Its third project, the role-playing game Pyre (2017), features a band of exiles seeking freedom from purgatory.

By the time the studio, which now has 25 employees, released an early-access version of Hades in 2018, it had unintentionally created a perception that it was anti-sequel. Yet Supergiant is anything but: Among the games that employees list as their favorites are classic sequels, including Diablo II, Street Fighter II and Warcraft II.

Hades follows the journey of Zagreus, who in some versions of Greek mythology is considered the son of the god of the dead. As he ventures upward through the layers of hell with hopes of visiting his mother on the surface world, Zagreus fights monsters (including his father) with the help of other gods.

The idea of a sequel clicked when Supergiant realized that the god Hades also had daughters. Melinoë, a witch, created the opportunity to dive deep on the connection between Greek mythology and witchcraft.

Hades II has been in the works for more than three years, and not a single member of the team was against pursuing it, Kasavin said.

“We’re too small for that to be an acceptable starting point,” he said. “It’s only going to get tougher from there if you don’t have the raw excitement at the beginning.”

The long development process of Hades underscores one way that games are trying to optimize their odds of success . An incomplete version of the role-playing game Baldur’s Gate 3 was available to players for nearly three years before it was officially released in August to universal acclaim.

The early access version of Hades was made available in December 2018 with the hopes of receiving player input; the game that was officially released in September 2020 was the result of revisions based on thousands of pieces of feedback.

Supergiant is repeating this approach for the sequel. Hades II was released in early access on Steam and the Epic Games Store last week, and the studio said it expected to keep refining it through at least the end of this year.

Rao, who works on the game’s design and mechanics, said player feedback was crucial to the success of Hades. “We will absolutely need that for Hades II,” he said.

In its current state, Hades II is much more polished than the original Hades was at the same point. (A year before Hades was released in early access, it was a game that involved exploring a minotaur’s labyrinth.) But the sequel will still benefit from crowdsourced feedback, Rao said, because it is much larger in scope.

Unlike Zagreus’s singular path in the first Hades, Melinoë will be able to explore two main routes, which essentially makes the sequel at least double the size. Option A is a path down into the underworld to fight Chronos, the god of time, who has usurped her father’s throne. Option B, which opens up later in the game, is a path upward to defend Mount Olympus, the home of the gods, which is under siege by Chronos.

Much of what made the original game addictive remains intact. Hades II is part of the roguelite genre, where players incrementally progress by starting out weak, failing, trying again and applying what they have learned or unlocked to eventually beat the main boss.

To get stronger, Melinoë picks up artifacts known as boons that contain powers shared by gods such as Aphrodite, Hermes and Zeus. The average player will probably die dozens of times before snowballing into an unstoppable force to defeat Chronos.

Sequels can have particular pitfalls. Sitara Shefta, the head of studio at No Brakes Games, said it had been a challenge to expand on Human Fall Flat — a physics-based puzzle game that involves controlling a character named Bob through a dreamy landscape — while preserving what people loved about it.

The original game, by a solo developer, sold 50 million copies. A team of about 35 is working on the sequel, focusing on adding levels and improving the graphics.

“What we don’t want to do is dilute it,” Shefta said. “It’s a physics game where so many people can express themselves in different ways.”

Juul, the video game scholar, said successful independent game makers often faced an innovator’s dilemma. As teams grow larger, he said, they can lose nimbleness and begin playing it safe in response to external demands.

Supergiant said it got no such pressure to make a sequel from partners, including Netflix, which recently published Hades as a mobile game . The studio declined to share sales numbers, saying only that Hades outperformed Bastion, which sold 3 million copies by 2015 .

Days before Supergiant released the early access version of Hades II, a small cluster of employees worked in its small studio space, which has an open floor design embellished with orange and crimson accents reminiscent of the original game’s color palette.

The team was eager to reveal how Melinoë’s role as a witch added new dimensions to the gameplay. Zagreus’s punches and sword swings were conducive to rapid button mashing, but Melinoë’s spell-casting staff and other magic weapons require careful timing and precision. With one of her combat moves, she projects a force field that traps surrounding enemies.

Rao said Supergiant would study player feedback through the studio’s Discord channel, web forums, livestreams and social media. The studio also logs some important data — if most players are not picking a certain weapon, for instance, that can serve as a suggestion for designers to make it more fun to use.

The iterative process of learning from mistakes to improve Hades and Hades II is essentially a rogue game in and of itself. Supergiant has been immersed in Greek mythology for nearly seven years, so it is easy for Kasavin to draw a comparison: Sisyphus pushing a boulder for eternity.

Brian X. Chen is the lead consumer technology writer for The Times. He reviews products and writes Tech Fix , a column about the social implications of the tech we use. More about Brian X. Chen

Tech Fix: Solving Your Tech Problems

Will A.I. Voice Assistants Take Off?: Meta, Google and others are driving a renaissance  for voice assistants, but people have found the technology uncool for more than a decade.

Switching From iPhone to Android: Even if you manage to ditch your iPhone, Apple’s hooks are still there .

Trying Meta’s Smart Glasses: What happens when a columnist and a reporter use A.I. Ray-Bans to scan groceries, monuments and zoo animals? Hilarity, wonder and lots of mistakes ensued .

Ditch Your Wallet: Using your phone as a digital wallet is attainable , but it requires preparation and some compromise.

Managing Subscriptions: The dream of streaming — watch what you want, whenever you want, for a sliver of the price of cable! — is coming to an end as prices go up. Here’s how to juggle all your subscriptions and even cancel them .

Apple’s Vision Pro: The new headset  teaches a valuable lesson about the cost of tech products: The upsells and add-ons will get you .  

Solving the Problem

Poli'lukluk the Wiser at Telaar in Nagrand wants you to kill 10 Murkblood Scavengers and 5 Murkblood Raiders.

The appearance of the Murkblood in Nagrand has had a profound negative impact on our environment. The elementals are all in flux which has, in turn, greatly disturbed the wildlife. Worse yet, the razing of Sunspring Post has reignited the hatred that the orcs held for our people. While the Kurenai are a different tribe than the Murkblood, all an orc sees is Broken. We must make an effort to solve this dilemma. Travel to Sunspring Post, northwest of here, and resolve the Murkblood problem.

Required Level

Recommended level.

Hearthing...

You will be able to choose one of these rewards:

Upon completion of this quest you will gain:

• 1150 experience
• 250 reputation with Kurenai

There's no data for this section.

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Teens and Video Games Today

85% of u.s. teens say they play video games, and about four-in-ten do so daily. teens see both positive and negative sides of video games – from problem-solving and making friends to harassment and sleep loss, table of contents.

• Who plays video games?
• How often do teens play video games?
• What devices do teens play video games on?
• Social media use among gamers
• Teen views on how much they play video games and efforts to cut back
• Are teens social with others through video games?
• Do teens think video games positively or negatively impact their lives?
• Why do teens play video games?
• Bullying and violence in video games
• Appendix A: Detailed charts
• Acknowledgments
• Methodology

Pew Research Center conducted this analysis to better understand teens’ use of and experiences with video games.

The Center conducted an online survey of 1,453 U.S. teens from Sept. 26 to Oct. 23, 2023, through Ipsos. Ipsos recruited the teens via their parents, who were part of its KnowledgePanel . The KnowledgePanel is a probability-based web panel recruited primarily through national, random sampling of residential addresses. The survey was weighted to be representative of U.S. teens ages 13 to 17 who live with their parents by age, gender, race and ethnicity, household income, and other categories.

This research was reviewed and approved by an external institutional review board (IRB), Advarra, an independent committee of experts specializing in helping to protect the rights of research participants.

Here are the questions used for this analysis , along with responses, and  its methodology .

There are long-standing debates about the impact of video games on youth. Some credit them for helping young people form friendships and teaching them about teamwork and problem-solving . Others say video games expose teenagers to violent content, negatively impact their sleep and can even lead to addiction.

With this in mind, Pew Research Center surveyed 1,423 U.S. teens ages 13 to 17 about their own video game habits – from how often they play to the friends they’ve made and whether it gets in the way of them doing well in school or getting a good night’s sleep. 1

Key findings from the survey

• Video games as a part of daily teen life: 85% of U.S. teens report playing video games, and 41% say they play them at least once a day. Four-in-ten identify as a gamer.
• Gaming as a social experience: 72% of teens who play video games say that a reason why they play them is to spend time with others. And some have even made a friend online from playing them – 47% of teen video game players say they’ve done this.
• Helpful with problem-solving, less so for sleep: Over half of teens who play video games say it has helped their problem-solving skills, but 41% also say it has hurt their sleep.
• Bullying is a problem: 80% of all teens think harassment over video games is a problem for people their age. And 41% of those who play them say they’ve been called an offensive name when playing.
• Boys’ and girls’ experiences differ: Most teen boys and girls play video games, but larger shares of boys identify as gamers (62% vs. 17%) and play every day (61% vs. 22%). Boys who play them are also more likely to experience positive things from it, like making friends, and more troubling things like harassment.

Jump to read about: Who plays video games | Socializing over video games | Views about video games’ impact | Harassment and violence in video games      

Playing video games is widespread among teens. The vast majority of U.S. teens (85%) say they play them. Just 15% say they never do, according to the survey conducted Sept. 26-Oct. 23, 2023.

In addition to asking whether teens play video games, we also wanted to learn whether they consider themselves gamers. Overall, four-in-ten U.S. teens think of themselves as gamers. Just under half of teens (45%) play video games but do not think of themselves as gamers.

Nearly all boys (97%) say they play video games, compared with about three-quarters of teen girls. There is a substantial gap by gender in whether teens identify as gamers: 62% of teen boys do, compared with 17% of girls. 2

By gender and age

Younger teen girls are more likely than older girls to say they play video games: 81% of girls ages 13 to 14 compared with 67% of those ages 15 to 17. But among boys, nearly all play video games regardless of age. 

Similar shares of teens play video games across different racial and ethnic groups and among those who live in households with different annual incomes. Go to Appendix A for more detail on which teens play video games and which teens identify as gamers.

We also asked teens how often they play video games. About four-in-ten U.S. teens say they play video games daily, including 23% who do so several times a day.

Another 22% say they play several times a week, while 21% play them about once a week or less.

Teen boys are far more likely than girls to say they play video games daily (61% vs. 22%). They are also much more likely to say they play them several times a day (36% vs. 11%).

By whether someone identifies as a gamer

About seven-in-ten teens who identify as gamers (71%) say they play video games daily. This drops to 30% among those who play them but aren’t gamers.

By household income

Roughly half of teens living in households with an annual income of less than $30,000 (53%) say they play video games at least daily. This is higher than those in households with an annual income of $30,000 to $74,999 (42%) and $75,000 or more (39%).

Go to Appendix A to see more details about who plays video games and identifies as a gamer by gender, age, race and ethnicity, and household income.

Most teens play video games on a gaming console or a smartphone. When asked about five devices, most teens report playing video games on a gaming console (73%), such as PlayStation, Switch or Xbox. And 70% do so on a smartphone. Fewer – though still sizable shares – play them on each of the following:

• 49% say they play them on a desktop or laptop computer
• 33% do so on a tablet  
• 24% play them on a virtual reality (VR) headset such as Oculus, Meta Quest or PlayStation VR

Many teens play video games on multiple devices. About a quarter of teens (27%) do so on at least four of the five devices asked about, and about half (49%) play on two or three of them. Just 8% play video games on one device.

Teen boys are more likely than girls to play video games on four of the five devices asked about – all expect tablets. For instance, roughly nine-in-ten teen boys say they ever play video games on a gaming console, compared with 57% of girls. Equal shares of teen boys and girls play them on tablets.  

Teens who consider themselves gamers are more likely than those who play video games but aren’t gamers to play on a gaming console (95% vs. 78%), desktop or laptop computer (72% vs. 45%) or a virtual reality (VR) headset (39% vs. 19%). Similar shares of both groups play them on smartphones and tablets.

One way that teens engage with others about video games is through online platforms. And our survey findings show that teen gamers stand out for their use of two online platforms that are known for their gaming communities – Discord and Twitch :

• 44% of teen gamers say they use Discord, far higher than video game players who don’t identify as gamers or those who use the platform but do not play video games at all. About three-in-ten teens overall (28%) use Discord.
• 30% of teens gamers say they use Twitch. About one-in-ten other teens or fewer say the same; 17% of teens overall use the platform.

Previous Center research shows that U.S. teens use online platforms at high rates .

Teens largely say they spend the right amount of time playing video games. When asked about how much time they spend playing them, the largest share of teens (58%) say they spend the right amount of time. Far fewer feel they spend too much (14%) or too little (13%) time playing them.

Teen boys are more likely than girls to say they spend too much time playing video games (22% vs. 6%).

By race and ethnicity

Black (17%) and Hispanic (18%) teens are about twice as likely than White teens (8%) to say they spend too little time playing video games. 3

A quarter of teens who consider themselves gamers say they spend too much time playing video games, compared with 9% of those who play video games but don’t identify as gamers. Teen gamers are also less likely to think they spend too little time playing them (19% vs. 10%).

Fewer than half of teens have reduced how much they play video games. About four-in-ten (38%) say they have ever chosen to cut back on the amount of time they spend playing them. A majority (61%) report that they have not cut back at all.

This share is on par with findings about whether teenagers have cut back with their screen time – on social media or their smartphone.

Although boys are more likely to say they play video games too much, boys and girls are on par for whether they have ever cut back. About four-in-ten teen boys (39%) and girls (38%) say that they have ever cut back.

And gamers are as likely to say they have cut back as those who play video games but don’t identify as gamers (39% and 41%).

A main goal of our survey was to ask teens about their own experiences playing video games. For this section of the report, we focus on teens who say they play video games.

Socializing with others is a key part of the video game experience. Most teens who play video games do so with others, and some have developed friendships through them.

About nine-in-ten teen video game players (89%) say they play them with other people, in person or online. Far fewer (11%) play them only on their own.

Additionally, about half (47%) report that they have ever made a friend online because of a video game they both play. This equals 40% of all U.S. teens who have made a friend online because of a video game.

These experiences vary by:  

• Gender: Most teen boy and girl video game players play them with others, though it’s more common among boys (94% vs. 82%). Boys who play video games are much more likely to say they have made a friend online because of a video game (56% vs. 35%).
• Race and ethnicity: Black (55%) and Hispanic (53%) teen video game players are more likely than White teen video game players (43%) to say they have made a friend online because of them.
• Whether someone identifies as a gamer: Nearly all teen gamers report playing video games with others (98%). Fewer – though still most – of those who play video games but aren’t gamers (81%) also play them with others. And about seven-in-ten (68%) say they have made a friend online because of a video game, compared with 29% of those who play them but don’t identify as gamers.

Teens who play video games are particularly likely to say video games help their problem-solving skills. More than half of teens who play video games (56%) say this.

Additionally, more think that video games help, rather than hurt, three other parts of their lives that the survey asked about. Among teens who play video games:

• Roughly half (47%) say it has helped their friendships
• 41% say it has helped how they work with others
• 32% say it has helped their mental health

No more than 7% say playing video games has hurt any of these.

More teens who play video games say it hurts, rather than helps, their sleep. Among these teens, 41% say it has hurt how much sleep they get, while just 5% say it helps. And small shares say playing video games has impacted how well they do in school in either a positive or a negative way.

Still, many teens who play video games think playing them doesn’t have much an impact in any of these areas. For instance, at least six-in-ten teens who play video games say it has neither a positive nor a negative impact on their mental health (60%) or their school performance (72%). Fewer (41%) say this of their problem-solving skills.

Teen boys who play video games are more likely than girls to think playing them has helped their problem-solving skills, friendships and ability to work with others. For instance, 55% of teen boys who play video games say this has helped their friendships, compared with 35% of teen girls.

As for ways that it may hurt their lives, boys who play them are more likely than girls to say that it has hurt the amount of sleep they get (45% vs. 37%) and how well they do in school (21% vs. 11%). 

Teens who consider themselves gamers are more likely than those who aren’t gamers but play video games to say video games have helped their friendships (60% vs. 35%), ability to work with others (52% vs. 32%), problem-solving skills (66% vs. 47%) and mental health (41% vs. 24%).

Gamers, though, are somewhat more likely to say playing them hurt their sleep (48% vs. 36%) and how well they do in school (20% vs. 14%).

By whether teens play too much, too little or the right amount

Teens who report playing video games too much stand out for thinking video games have hurt their sleep and school performance. Two-thirds of these teens say it has hurt the amount of sleep they get, and 39% say it hurt their schoolwork. Far fewer of those who say they play the right amount (38%) or too little (32%) say it has hurt their sleep, or say it hurt their schoolwork (12% and 16%).

Teens who play video games say they largely do so to be entertained. And many also play them to be social with and interact with others. Teens who play video games were asked about four reasons why they play video games. Among those who play video games:

• Nearly all say fun or entertainment is a major or minor reason why they play video games – with a large majority (87%) saying it’s a major reason.
• Roughly three-quarters say spending time with others is a reason, and two-thirds say this of competing with others. Roughly three-in-ten say each is a major reason.
• Fewer – 50% – see learning something as a reason, with just 13% saying it’s a major reason.

While entertainment is by far the most common reason given by teens who play video games, differences emerge across groups in why they play video games.

Teens who identify as gamers are particularly likely to say each is major reason, especially when it comes to competing against others. About four-in-ten gamers (43%) say this is a major reason, compared with 13% of those who play video games but aren’t gamers.

Teen boys who play video games are more likely than girls to say competing (36% vs. 15%), spending time with others (36% vs. 27%) and entertainment (90% vs. 83%) are major reasons they play video games.

Black and Hispanic teens who play video games are more likely than White teens to say that learning new things and competing against others are major reasons they play them. For instance, 29% of Black teen video game players say learning something new is a major reason, higher than 17% of Hispanic teen video game players. Both are higher than the 7% of White teen video game players who say the same.

Teens who play video games and live in lower-income households are especially likely to say competing against others and learning new things are major reasons. For instance, four-in-ten teen video game players who live in households with an annual income of less than $30,000 say competing against others is a major reason they play. This is higher than among those in households with annual incomes of $30,000 to $74,999 (29%) and $75,000 or more (23%).

Cyberbullying can happen in many online environments, but many teens encounter this in the video game world.

Our survey finds that name-calling is a relatively common feature of video game life – especially for boys. Roughly four-in-ten teen video game players (43%) say they have been harassed or bullied while playing a video game in one of three ways: 

• 41% have been called an offensive name
• 12% have been physically threatened
• 8% have been sent unwanted sexually explicit things

Teen boys are particularly likely to say they have been called an offensive name. About half of teen boys who play video games (48%) say this has happened while playing them, compared with about a third of girls (32%). And they are somewhat more likely than girls to have been physically threatened (15% vs. 9%).

Teen gamers are more likely than those who play video games but aren’t gamers to say they been called and offensive name (53% vs. 30%), been physically threatened (17% vs. 8%) and sent unwanted sexually explicit things (10% vs. 6%).

Teens – regardless of whether they’ve had these experiences – think bullying is a problem in gaming. Eight-in-ten U.S. teens say that when it comes to video games, harassment and bullying is a problem for people their age. This includes 29% who say it is a major problem.

It’s common for teens to think harassment while playing video games is a problem, but girls are somewhat more likely than boys to say it’s a major problem (33% vs. 25%).

There have also been decades-long debates about how violent video games can influence youth behavior , if at all – such as by encouraging or desensitizing them to violence. We wanted to get a sense of how commonly violence shows up in the video games teens are playing.

Just over half of teens who play video games (56%) say at least some of the games they play contain violence. This includes 16% who say it’s in all or most of the games they play.

Teen boys who play video games are far more likely than girls to say that at least some of the games they play contain violence (69% vs. 37%).

About three-quarters of teen gamers (73%) say that at least some of the games they play contain violence, compared with 40% among video game players who aren’t gamers.   

• Throughout this report, “teens” refers to those ages 13 to 17. ↩
• Previous Center research of U.S. adults shows that men are more likely than women to identify as gamers – especially the youngest adults. ↩
• There were not enough Asian American respondents in the sample to be broken out into a separate analysis. As always, their responses are incorporated into the general population figures throughout the report. ↩

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Watch CBS News

Teens come up with trigonometry proof for Pythagorean Theorem, a problem that stumped math world for centuries

By Bill Whitaker

May 5, 2024 / 7:00 PM EDT / CBS News

As the school year ends, many students will be only too happy to see math classes in their rearview mirrors. It may seem to some of us non-mathematicians that geometry and trigonometry were created by the Greeks as a form of torture, so imagine our amazement when we heard two high school seniors had proved a mathematical puzzle that was thought to be impossible for 2,000 years. 

We met Calcea Johnson and Ne'Kiya Jackson at their all-girls Catholic high school in New Orleans. We expected to find two mathematical prodigies.

Instead, we found at St. Mary's Academy , all students are told their possibilities are boundless.

Come Mardi Gras season, New Orleans is alive with colorful parades, replete with floats, and beads, and high school marching bands.

In a city where uniqueness is celebrated, St. Mary's stands out – with young African American women playing trombones and tubas, twirling batons and dancing - doing it all, which defines St. Mary's, students told us.

Junior Christina Blazio says the school instills in them they have the ability to accomplish anything. 

Christina Blazio: That is kinda a standard here. So we aim very high - like, our aim is excellence for all students. 

The private Catholic elementary and high school sits behind the Sisters of the Holy Family Convent in New Orleans East. The academy was started by an African American nun for young Black women just after the Civil War. The church still supports the school with the help of alumni.

In December 2022, seniors Ne'Kiya Jackson and Calcea Johnson were working on a school-wide math contest that came with a cash prize.

Ne'Kiya Jackson: I was motivated because there was a monetary incentive.

Calcea Johnson: 'Cause I was like, "$500 is a lot of money. So I-- I would like to at least try."

Both were staring down the thorny bonus question.

Bill Whitaker: So tell me, what was this bonus question?

Calcea Johnson: It was to create a new proof of the Pythagorean Theorem. And it kind of gave you a few guidelines on how would you start a proof.

The seniors were familiar with the Pythagorean Theorem, a fundamental principle of geometry. You may remember it from high school: a² + b² = c². In plain English, when you know the length of two sides of a right triangle, you can figure out the length of the third.

Both had studied geometry and some trigonometry, and both told us math was not easy. What no one told  them  was there had been more than 300 documented proofs of the Pythagorean Theorem using algebra and geometry, but for 2,000 years a proof using trigonometry was thought to be impossible, … and that was the bonus question facing them.

Bill Whitaker: When you looked at the question did you think, "Boy, this is hard"?

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Yeah. 

Bill Whitaker: What motivated you to say, "Well, I'm going to try this"?

Calcea Johnson: I think I was like, "I started something. I need to finish it." 

Bill Whitaker: So you just kept on going.

Calcea Johnson: Yeah.

For two months that winter, they spent almost all their free time working on the proof.

CeCe Johnson: She was like, "Mom, this is a little bit too much."

CeCe and Cal Johnson are Calcea's parents.

CeCe Johnson:   So then I started looking at what she really was doing. And it was pages and pages and pages of, like, over 20 or 30 pages for this one problem.

Cal Johnson: Yeah, the garbage can was full of papers, which she would, you know, work out the problems and-- if that didn't work she would ball it up, throw it in the trash. 

Bill Whitaker: Did you look at the problem? 

Neliska Jackson is Ne'Kiya's mother.

Neliska Jackson: Personally I did not. 'Cause most of the time I don't understand what she's doing (laughter).

Michelle Blouin Williams: What if we did this, what if I write this? Does this help? ax² plus ….

Their math teacher, Michelle Blouin Williams, initiated the math contest.

Bill Whitaker: And did you think anyone would solve it?

Michelle Blouin Williams: Well, I wasn't necessarily looking for a solve. So, no, I didn't—

Bill Whitaker: What were you looking for?

Michelle Blouin Williams: I was just looking for some ingenuity, you know—

Calcea and Ne'Kiya delivered on that! They tried to explain their groundbreaking work to 60 Minutes. Calcea's proof is appropriately titled the Waffle Cone.

Calcea Johnson: So to start the proof, we start with just a regular right triangle where the angle in the corner is 90°. And the two angles are alpha and beta.

Bill Whitaker: Uh-huh

Calcea Johnson: So then what we do next is we draw a second congruent, which means they're equal in size. But then we start creating similar but smaller right triangles going in a pattern like this. And then it continues for infinity. And eventually it creates this larger waffle cone shape.

Calcea Johnson: Am I going a little too—

Bill Whitaker: You've been beyond me since the beginning. (laughter) 

Bill Whitaker: So how did you figure out the proof?

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Okay. So you have a right triangle, 90° angle, alpha and beta.

Bill Whitaker: Then what did you do?

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Okay, I have a right triangle inside of the circle. And I have a perpendicular bisector at OP to divide the triangle to make that small right triangle. And that's basically what I used for the proof. That's the proof.

Bill Whitaker: That's what I call amazing.

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Well, thank you.

There had been one other documented proof of the theorem using trigonometry by mathematician Jason Zimba in 2009 – one in 2,000 years. Now it seems Ne'Kiya and Calcea have joined perhaps the most exclusive club in mathematics. 

Bill Whitaker: So you both independently came up with proof that only used trigonometry.

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Yes.

Bill Whitaker: So are you math geniuses?

Calcea Johnson: I think that's a stretch. 

Bill Whitaker: If not genius, you're really smart at math.

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Not at all. (laugh) 

To document Calcea and Ne'Kiya's work, math teachers at St. Mary's submitted their proofs to an American Mathematical Society conference in Atlanta in March 2023.

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Well, our teacher approached us and was like, "Hey, you might be able to actually present this," I was like, "Are you joking?" But she wasn't. So we went. I got up there. We presented and it went well, and it blew up.

Bill Whitaker: It blew up.

Calcea Johnson: Yeah. 

Ne'Kiya Jackson: It blew up.

Bill Whitaker: Yeah. What was the blowup like?

Calcea Johnson: Insane, unexpected, crazy, honestly.

It took millenia to prove, but just a minute for word of their accomplishment to go around the world. They got a write-up in South Korea and a shout-out from former first lady Michelle Obama, a commendation from the governor and keys to the city of New Orleans. 

Bill Whitaker: Why do you think so many people found what you did to be so impressive?

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Probably because we're African American, one. And we're also women. So I think-- oh, and our age. Of course our ages probably played a big part.

Bill Whitaker: So you think people were surprised that young African American women, could do such a thing?

Calcea Johnson: Yeah, definitely.

Ne'Kiya Jackson: I'd like to actually be celebrated for what it is. Like, it's a great mathematical achievement.

Achievement, that's a word you hear often around St. Mary's academy. Calcea and Ne'Kiya follow a long line of barrier-breaking graduates. 

The late queen of Creole cooking, Leah Chase , was an alum. so was the first African-American female New Orleans police chief, Michelle Woodfork …

And judge for the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Dana Douglas. Math teacher Michelle Blouin Williams told us Calcea and Ne'Kiya are typical St. Mary's students.  

Bill Whitaker: They're not unicorns.

Michelle Blouin Williams: Oh, no no. If they are unicorns, then every single lady that has matriculated through this school is a beautiful, Black unicorn.

Pamela Rogers: You're good?

Pamela Rogers, St. Mary's president and interim principal, told us the students hear that message from the moment they walk in the door.

Pamela Rogers: We believe all students can succeed, all students can learn. It does not matter the environment that you live in. 

Bill Whitaker: So when word went out that two of your students had solved this almost impossible math problem, were they universally applauded?

Pamela Rogers: In this community, they were greatly applauded. Across the country, there were many naysayers.

Bill Whitaker: What were they saying?

Pamela Rogers: They were saying, "Oh, they could not have done it. African Americans don't have the brains to do it." Of course, we sheltered our girls from that. But we absolutely did not expect it to come in the volume that it came.  

Bill Whitaker: And after such a wonderful achievement.

Pamela Rogers: People-- have a vision of who can be successful. And-- to some people, it is not always an African American female. And to us, it's always an African American female.

Gloria Ladson-Billings: What we know is when teachers lay out some expectations that say, "You can do this," kids will work as hard as they can to do it.

Gloria Ladson-Billings, professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin, has studied how best to teach African American students. She told us an encouraging teacher can change a life.

Bill Whitaker: And what's the difference, say, between having a teacher like that and a whole school dedicated to the excellence of these students?

Gloria Ladson-Billings: So a whole school is almost like being in Heaven. 

Bill Whitaker: What do you mean by that?

Gloria Ladson-Billings: Many of our young people have their ceilings lowered, that somewhere around fourth or fifth grade, their thoughts are, "I'm not going to be anything special." What I think is probably happening at St. Mary's is young women come in as, perhaps, ninth graders and are told, "Here's what we expect to happen. And here's how we're going to help you get there."

At St. Mary's, half the students get scholarships, subsidized by fundraising to defray the $8,000 a year tuition. Here, there's no test to get in, but expectations are high and rules are strict: no cellphones, modest skirts, hair must be its natural color.

Students Rayah Siddiq, Summer Forde, Carissa Washington, Tatum Williams and Christina Blazio told us they appreciate the rules and rigor.

Rayah Siddiq: Especially the standards that they set for us. They're very high. And I don't think that's ever going to change.

Bill Whitaker: So is there a heart, a philosophy, an essence to St. Mary's?

Summer Forde: The sisterhood—

Carissa Washington: Sisterhood.

Tatum Williams: Sisterhood.

Bill Whitaker: The sisterhood?

Voices: Yes.

Bill Whitaker: And you don't mean the nuns. You mean-- (laughter)

Christina Blazio: I mean, yeah. The community—

Bill Whitaker: So when you're here, there's just no question that you're going to go on to college.

Rayah Siddiq: College is all they talk about. (laughter) 

Pamela Rogers: … and Arizona State University (Cheering)

Principal Rogers announces to her 615 students the colleges where every senior has been accepted.

Bill Whitaker: So for 17 years, you've had a 100% graduation rate—

Pamela Rogers: Yes.

Bill Whitaker: --and a 100% college acceptance rate?

Pamela Rogers: That's correct.

Last year when Ne'Kiya and Calcea graduated, all their classmates went to college and got scholarships. Ne'Kiya got a full ride to the pharmacy school at Xavier University in New Orleans. Calcea, the class valedictorian, is studying environmental engineering at Louisiana State University.

Bill Whitaker: So wait a minute. Neither one of you is going to pursue a career in math?

Both: No. (laugh)

Calcea Johnson: I may take up a minor in math. But I don't want that to be my job job.

Ne'Kiya Jackson: Yeah. People might expect too much out of me if (laugh) I become a mathematician. (laugh)

But math is not completely in their rear-view mirrors. This spring they submitted their high school proofs for final peer review and publication … and are still working on further proofs of the Pythagorean Theorem. Since their first two …

Calcea Johnson: We found five. And then we found a general format that could potentially produce at least five additional proofs.

Bill Whitaker: And you're not math geniuses?

Bill Whitaker: I'm not buying it. (laughs)

Produced by Sara Kuzmarov. Associate producer, Mariah B. Campbell. Edited by Daniel J. Glucksman.

Bill Whitaker is an award-winning journalist and 60 Minutes correspondent who has covered major news stories, domestically and across the globe, for more than four decades with CBS News.

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Why RAG won’t solve generative AI’s hallucination problem

Hallucinations — the lies generative AI models tell, basically — are a big problem for businesses looking to integrate the technology into their operations.

Because models have no real intelligence and are simply predicting words, images, speech, music and other data according to a private schema , they sometimes get it wrong. Very wrong. In a recent piece in The Wall Street Journal, a source recounts an instance where Microsoft’s generative AI invented meeting attendees and implied that conference calls were about subjects that weren’t actually discussed on the call.

As I wrote a while ago, hallucinations may be an unsolvable problem with today’s transformer-based model architectures. But a number of generative AI vendors suggest that they can be done away with, more or less, through a technical approach called retrieval augmented generation, or RAG.

Here’s how one vendor, Squirro, pitches it :

At the core of the offering is the concept of Retrieval Augmented LLMs or Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) embedded in the solution … [our generative AI] is unique in its promise of zero hallucinations. Every piece of information it generates is traceable to a source, ensuring credibility.

Here’s a similar pitch from SiftHub:

Using RAG technology and fine-tuned large language models with industry-specific knowledge training, SiftHub allows companies to generate personalized responses with zero hallucinations. This guarantees increased transparency and reduced risk and inspires absolute trust to use AI for all their needs.

RAG was pioneered by data scientist Patrick Lewis, researcher at Meta and University College London, and lead author of the 2020 paper that coined the term. Applied to a model, RAG retrieves documents possibly relevant to a question — for example, a Wikipedia page about the Super Bowl — using what’s essentially a keyword search and then asks the model to generate answers given this additional context.

“When you’re interacting with a generative AI model like ChatGPT or Llama and you ask a question, the default is for the model to answer from its ‘parametric memory’ — i.e., from the knowledge that’s stored in its parameters as a result of training on massive data from the web,” David Wadden, a research scientist at AI2, the AI-focused research division of the nonprofit Allen Institute, explained. “But, just like you’re likely to give more accurate answers if you have a reference [like a book or a file] in front of you, the same is true in some cases for models.”

RAG is undeniably useful — it allows one to attribute things a model generates to retrieved documents to verify their factuality (and, as an added benefit, avoid potentially copyright-infringing regurgitation ). RAG also lets enterprises that don’t want their documents used to train a model — say, companies in highly regulated industries like healthcare and law — to allow models to draw on those documents in a more secure and temporary way.

But RAG certainly  can’t stop a model from hallucinating. And it has limitations that many vendors gloss over.

Wadden says that RAG is most effective in “knowledge-intensive” scenarios where a user wants to use a model to address an “information need” — for example, to find out who won the Super Bowl last year. In these scenarios, the document that answers the question is likely to contain many of the same keywords as the question (e.g., “Super Bowl,” “last year”), making it relatively easy to find via keyword search.

Things get trickier with “reasoning-intensive” tasks such as coding and math, where it’s harder to specify in a keyword-based search query the concepts needed to answer a request — much less identify which documents might be relevant.

Even with basic questions, models can get “distracted” by irrelevant content in documents, particularly in long documents where the answer isn’t obvious. Or they can — for reasons as yet unknown — simply ignore the contents of retrieved documents, opting instead to rely on their parametric memory.

RAG is also expensive in terms of the hardware needed to apply it at scale.

That’s because retrieved documents, whether from the web, an internal database or somewhere else, have to be stored in memory — at least temporarily — so that the model can refer back to them. Another expenditure is compute for the increased context a model has to process before generating its response. For a technology already notorious for the amount of compute and electricity it requires even for basic operations, this amounts to a serious consideration.

That’s not to suggest RAG can’t be improved. Wadden noted many ongoing efforts to train models to make better use of RAG-retrieved documents.

Some of these efforts involve models that can “decide” when to make use of the documents, or models that can choose not to perform retrieval in the first place if they deem it unnecessary. Others focus on ways to more efficiently index massive datasets of documents, and on improving search through better representations of documents — representations that go beyond keywords.

“We’re pretty good at retrieving documents based on keywords, but not so good at retrieving documents based on more abstract concepts, like a proof technique needed to solve a math problem,” Wadden said. “Research is needed to build document representations and search techniques that can identify relevant documents for more abstract generation tasks. I think this is mostly an open question at this point.”

So RAG can help reduce a model’s hallucinations — but it’s not the answer to all of AI’s hallucinatory problems. Beware of any vendor that tries to claim otherwise.

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