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Disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes is hoping President Donald Trump will help her get out of prison early. Holmes, the founder of Theranos, which is the now defunct blood testing start-up asked President Trump to release her from prison. “Elizabeth Holmes has been auditioning for this for months because her social media posts have been very favorable to Trump and his administration and I think she’s doing that to curry favor to try to get this sentence commuted,” said Steven Clark, a legal analyst. She was convicted in 2022 of defrauding investors. A U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of the Pardon attorney said Holmes sought to commute her more than 11-year sentence last year, and her request remains pending. In an earlier post on the “x” account Wednesday, it read “We are continuing to fight for my innocence”, adding “The fight against weaponization of our justice system is just beginning.” “She is saying ‘I wasn’t treated fairly in my trial’, and that is something that resonates really well with the president because he feels he’s been victimized in many ways he the legal system and the department of justice,” Clark said. Legal analysts say if Holmes is granted a commutation, she would still owe the $452 million dollars in restitution. But if she was pardoned, that obligation wouldn’t apply. NBC News reached out to the white house and attorneys for Holmes but has not received an answer. Holmes otherwise is scheduled for release in December 2031.

And the 2026 Oscar nominees are…. Nominations for the 98th Academy Awards were announced live Thursday morning from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Science’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Los Angeles by actors Lewis Pullman and Danielle Brooks. While horror films have traditionally been left out of the Oscars, Ryan Coogler’s vampire tale “Sinners” made history with 16 nominations, including Directing, Best Picture and Best Actor for Michael B. Jordan, his first Oscar nomination. No movie has ever landed more than 14 nominations — something achieved only by “All About Eve,” “Titanic” and “La La Land.” Paul Thomas Anderson’s father-daughter revolutionary saga “One Battle After Another,” trailed in second with 13 nominations. This year, the Academy is recognizing casting directors for the first time, adding the new category last year. The last time a competitive category was added was in 2001, with best animated film. The Oscars will take place on March 15 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles and will be televised live on ABC and Hulu at 7 p.m. ET on ABC. Conan O’Brien is returning as host. See the full list below: Best Actor Timothée Chalamet, “Marty Supreme”Leonardo DiCaprio, “One Battle After Another”Ethan Hawke, “Blue Moon”Michael B. Jordan, “Sinners”Wagner Moura, “The Secret Agent” Best Actress Jessie Buckley, “Hamnet”Rose Byrne, “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You”Kate Hudson, “Song Sung Blue”Renate Reinsve, “Sentimental Value”Emma Stone, “Bugonia” Best Director Chloé Zhao, “Hamnet”Josh Safdie, “Marty Supreme”Paul Thomas Anderson, “One Battle After Another”Joachim Trier, “Sentimental Value”Ryan Coogler, “Sinners” Best Cinematography “Sinners”“One Battle After Another”“Train Dreams”“Frankenstein”“Marty Supreme” Best Picture “Bugonia”“F1”“Frankenstein”“Hamnet”“Marty Supreme”“One Battle After Another”“The Secret Agent”“Sentimental Value”“Sinners”“Train Dreams” Best Supporting Actress Elle Fanning, “Sentimental Value”Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, “Sentimental Value”Amy Madigan , “Weapons”Wunmi Mosaku, “Sinners”Teyana Taylor, “One Battle After Another” Best Supporting Actor Benicio Del Toro, “One Battle After Another”Jacob Elordi, “Frankenstein”Delroy Lindo, “Sinners”Sean Penn, “One Battle After Another”Stellan Skarsgård, “Sentimental Value” Best Makeup and Hairstyling “Frankenstein”“Kokuho”“Sinners”“The Smashing Machine”“The Ugly Stepsister” Best Original Score “Bugonia”“Frankenstein”“Hamnet”“One Battle After Another”“Sinners” Best Live Action Short Film “Butcher’s Stain”“A Friend of Dorothy”“Jane Austen’s Period Drama”“The Singers”“Two People Exchanging Saliva” Best Animated Short Film “Butterfly”“Forevergreen”“The Girl Who Cried Pearls”“Retirement Plan”“The Three Sisters” Best Adapted Screenplay “One Battle After Another”“Hamnet”“Bugonia”“Train Dreams”“Frankenstein” Best Original Screenplay “Blue Moon”“It Was Just an Accident”“Marty Supreme”“Sentimental Value”“Sinners” Best Casting Nina Gold, “Hamnet”Jennifer Venditti, “Marty Supreme”Casandra Kulukundis, “One Battle After Another”Gabriel Domingues, “The Secret Agent”Francine Maisler, “Sinners” Best Costume Design “Avatar: Fire and Ash”“Frankenstein”“Hamnet”“Marty Supreme”“Sinners” Best International Feature Film “It Was Just an Accident”“The Secret Agent”“Sentimental Value”“The Voice of Hind Rajab”“Sirat” Best Original Song “Dear Me” from “Diane Warren: Relentless”“Golden” from “KPop Demon Hunters”“I Lied to You” from “Sinners”“Sweet Dreams of Joy” from “Viva Verdi!”“Train Dreams” from “Train Dreams” Best Production Design “Frankenstein”“Hamnet”“Marty Supreme”“One Battle After Another”“Sinners” Best Documentary Feature Film “The Alabama Solution”“Come See Me in the Good Light”“Cutting Through Rocks”“Mr. Nobody Against Putin”“The Perfect Neighbor” Best Film Editing “F1”“Marty Supreme”“One Battle After Another”“Sentimental Value”“Sinners” Best Visual Effects…

Google is leveraging its artificial intelligence technology to open a new peephole for its dominant search engine to tailor answers that draw upon people’s interests, habits, travel itineraries and photo libraries. The new option rolling out Thursday will give millions of people the option of turning on a recently introduced tool called “Personal Intelligence” within the AI mode that has been available on Google’s search engine since last year. The technology will be first offered in the U.S. to Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers, as well as an option within its experimental Labs division for anyone with a personal Google account. If turned on, the new tool will plug Google’s AI Mode into Gmail and the Google Photos app so the technology can learn more about each user’s life and deliver more relevant answers tailored to personal tastes. For instance, someone might ask for suggestions for a weekend getaway and get a quick recommendation based on past trips and experiences. Or, when in AI mode, the search engine might automatically know a person’s favorite restaurants or recognize preferred clothing styles by reviewing old pictures stored in Google Photos. “Personal Intelligence transforms Search into an experience that feels uniquely yours by connecting the dots across your Google apps,” Robby Stein, a vice president in Google Search, wrote in a blog post. Stein also warned Personal Intelligence won’t always deliver the best answers, a pitfall that he said users can help correct by telling AI mode with words or a thumbs-down symbol. Turning on the option will require users to trust Google’s search engine to protect the details that it is fed about their lives. But millions of people already have been doing that implicitly for decades while entering sometimes intimate queries into the search engine or sharing personal information within Gmail and the Photos app. Bringing Personal Intelligence to Google search is the latest sign of the company’s ambitions to make its arsenal of digital services even more powerful with a boost from the latest AI model, Gemini 3i, that came out in November. Earlier this month, Google took its first steps toward turning Gmail into a personal assistant powered by AI and now it’s getting a chance to play a bigger role in a search engine that remains the foundation of its internet empire. Gemini’s tentacles will even be extending into the iPhone, iPad and Mac after Apple decided last week to team up with Google to bring more AI tools to those products. The partnership will focus on a long-delayed effort to turn Apple’s often-bumbling digital assistant, Siri, into a more conversational and versatile aide. Although Google’s search engine was condemned as an illegal monopoly in 2024 by a U.S. federal judge, it remains the internet’s main gateway while trying to fend off competitive threats from AI-powered answer engines offered by up-and-coming innovators such as ChatGPT and Perplexity. The potentially revolutionary changes being wrought by AI helped persuade the judge who branded Google a monopoly to reject a proposal by the U.S. Justice Department that would have forced the company to sell its Chrome web browser to curb future abuses in the market.

Alameda County is taking a head count of all the people who live on the streets or in shelters Thursday. The county is hoping to see a decrease in the number of unhoused people like they did two years ago. The federal government requires the headcounts every two years to determine how much funding the county will receive. At Hayward City Hall, county leaders, members of the health department and volunteers are meeting before they head out onto the streets and shelters. NBC Bay Area’s Bob Redell has the full report in the video above.

Benjamin and Chance get excited for the upcoming Siri roadmap, with Bloomberg reporting that the delayed features will arrive with 26.4 and a full chatbot experience is due before the end of the year. The Information says Apple is developing an AI pin, the iPhone 18 Pro cutout positioning situation is seemingly clarified, and Apple makes App Store ads even less noticeable. And in Happy Hour Plus, Chance talks about the best parts of his new Oura Ring, and how Apple can learn from its software experience. Join now and save 26% on annual plans with code HAPPY26. Sponsored by Shopify: In 2026, stop waiting and start selling with Shopify. Sign up for a $1 per month trial at shopify.com/happyhour. Sponsored by Gusto: The online payroll and benefits software built for small businesses. Get three months free when you run your first payroll at gusto.com/happyhour. Sponsored by Framer: The only free design tool that brings your ideas to the web. Visit framer.com/design and use code HAPPYHOUR for a free month. more…