DiscussionThis is the #threadcast for 29/10/2024 for 28/10/2024. It's time for some meal inspirations and food conversation. Don't forget to use #foodtalk in your comments.
Be part of the Food Talk Show On Leo. Here is Day 125 that leads you to the previous threadcasts.
Share your meals.
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs.
Share your food experiences.
Share other food-related content and ask questions about food.
More about food with tips and tricks will be dropped in the threadcast. Upvote the comments you find interesting & connect with others. Let's have fun. #foodie
Despite fearmongering anti-carb sentiments in the weight-loss world, carbs are actually essential to maintaining a balanced and steady diet—you just have to pick the right ones!
Get more delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs in the comments. 👇
Grains are a plant food that provides us with important vitamins, minerals, carbs, fiber, and protein, which fuel our muscles and brain and keep our bodies working like well-oiled machines. With so many grains out there, however, it can be hard to know what to get, and from there it's hard to know what to make with them. That's where we come in! Click through to see which grains offer the biggest nutritional bang for your buck, and what delicious meals and goodies you should make them into.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #deliciousfoods #food
There are many kinds of millet—a group of related grasses with small seeds—but generally, millet is gluten-free and contains fiber, minerals, and amino acids. It’s also loaded with manganese, which is a mineral that supports bone and brain health.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #millet #food
This gluten-free Asian grain is often used in porridge, to make congee, as well as stir-fried dishes. It’s also ground and used to make flatbreads in India. Since it’s gluten-free, it’s increasingly found in pancakes, muffins, and other sweets as well.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #millet
Though technically a seed, this superfood plant-based protein has every essential amino acid as well as iron, manganese, phosphorus, magnesium, folate, vitamin B1, and fiber. Quinoa is also a slow digesting carbohydrate, so it creates sustained energy.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Quinoa #food
This pseudo-grain is very versatile, as it can work in salads, soups, as a rice substitute, mixed with milk as a porridge, worked into burger patties, and so much more.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Quinoa
Oats contain highly-soluble fiber that helps improve digestion, lower cholesterol, and keep your blood sugar in balance, and reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease. Plus, they’re rich in iron and calcium, and keep you feeling full.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Oats #food
For breakfast, try a hot bowl of oatmeal with all the sweet fixings of fruits, jams, nut butters, or even chocolate. You can also bake them into a breakfast muffin, or make overnight oats by soaking them—the options are endless!
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Oats
This whole grain is not only low-glycemic, it also has four times the fiber per serving that brown rice has, and it keeps you feeling fuller for longer. It’s made from young wheat and roasted to give it a signature smoky flavor. It also has tons of protein, fiber, and vitamins.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Freekeh #food
This chewy, nutty grain is relatively unknown in American cuisine, but has been a staple in the Middle East for centuries. A Lebanese way of preparing it, which often involves first browning onions then cooking the freekeh with the onions and water, often pairs with chicken. The grain makes a great substitute for rice in dishes, it cooks quickly, and works well as a porridge, too.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Freekeh
Though not technically a grain (it’s actually a cousin of the rhubarb plant), buckwheat earns an honorary place on this list because it’s used like one. Plus, it has all nine essential amino acids, which makes it a whole protein, and is packed with B vitamins, magnesium, and soluble fiber.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Buckwheat #food
This gluten-free whole grain is best known as an ingredient in soba noodles, or as cereal (known as kasha), or in healthy pancakes. You can also toast buckwheat for a wonderfully crunchy addition to salads or granola.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Buckwheat #food
One of the oldest grains in humanity, going way back to ancient Egypt, barley has the most fiber of all the whole grains, including a soluble fiber called beta-glucans that keeps cholesterol low and supports your immune system. Whole grain barley packs more antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals than the pearled version.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Barley #wholegrains #food
Barley works great as a base for grain bowls or salads, as well as in soups. You can try barley flakes as a breakfast porridge instead of oats, or use barley flour with wheat flour in baked goods to get a kick of fiber in your sweet treats.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Barley #wholegrains #food
Also known as cracked wheat, bulgur has more fiber than quinoa, oats, and millet, which helps keep your digestive system happy. It’s also low in fat and packed with minerals like magnesium, manganese, and iron.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Bulgur #wholegrains #food
Bulgur is most famously found in tabbouleh, the Mediterranean salad, but it helps bulk up any salad. Its nutty flavor and chewy texture are also useful in soups and when stuffing vegetables. All you have to do is boil it like pasta to prepare it.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Bulgur #wholegrains #food
I won't just stop eating food that I like. It's not sustainable for me. I LOVE pasta, potatoes and rice. But I also like some veggies and grains. It's all about balance and moderation, IMO.
Deceiving in its name, wild rice is actually an aquatic grass seed. Though it has less iron and calcium than brown rice, it gives you twice the protein and fiber. It also has 30 times more antioxidant power than white rice.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #wildrice #food
As farro is nutty, chewy, and hearty, this fiber-rich grain can be prepared in salads, soups, or in place of rice. Try a Caprese farro salad or a Greek farro salad.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Farro #food
This tiny ancient grain is small but mighty. Coming from grass that grows mostly in Ethiopia and Eritrea, it has significantly more calcium than other grains, and it’s packed with protein, iron, fiber, magnesium, zinc, vitamin B6, and manganese—not to mention it’s gluten-free.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Teff #food
Rye is unique because it has fiber in both its endosperm and bran, which gives it a lower glycemic index than most other grains and helps keep your blood sugar stable. It’s also typically more nutritious than wheat and contains more minerals for less carbs.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Rye #food
This ancient whole wheat boasts a high protein and zinc content, and it’s popular among people who are allergic to wheat because it offers many of the same benefits without the allergic reaction.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Spelt #food
You can use spelt in place of rice or pasta, or use spelt flour in place of white or whole wheat. For vegans and vegetarians, sprouting, fermenting, or soaking the grains reduces its antinutrients (which can reduce the absorption of zinc and iron from your gut).
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Spelt #food
Brown rice is a slow-digesting carb that is high in B vitamins and fiber. It has three parts: bran, germ, and endosperm, with nothing removed during milling, so while it has more calories than white rice, it also has more protein and fiber.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Brownrice #food
Day 126. Join the conversation, share your food experiences and delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs. Welcome back to another episode of the #foodtalk show on Leo,
Hmm... my food experience, I have a lot to share but let me share this one:
I remember when I was much younger, I disliked eating salad because of the taste of the cabbage. My dad made sure I ate salad until I got used to it and stopped rejecting it, haha. Him and my mum explained to me that salad makes one look fresh and I have to eat it to look fresh too.
A proposed class action lawsuit accuses the sandwich chain of “grossly misleading” customers.
A new lawsuit accuses Subway of “grossly misleading” customers by advertising sandwiches that contain at least three times more meat than it delivers.
According to a proposed class action filed on Monday in federal court in Brooklyn, Subway ads for its Steak & Cheese sandwich show layers of meat piled high, reaching about as high as the surrounding hero bread.
In reality, according to several photos in the complaint, the fast-food chain’s sandwiches are far more bread than filling.
This is especially concerning, the complaint said, because of inflation and high food prices, and because many lower-income consumers are struggling financially.
Anna Tollison of the New York City borough of Queens said she paid $7.61 for a Steak & Cheese sandwich at a local Subway, not realizing Subway’s ads showed a sandwich containing at least 200% more meat than she and other consumers would receive.
Her lawsuit seeks unspecified damages for New Yorkers who bought the sandwiches in the last three years, for Subway’s alleged violations of the state’s consumer protection laws.
In October, Starbucks reported its preliminary fourth-quarter net revenue at $9.1 billion, marking a 3% year-over-year drop. It's also the third quarter in a row that the coffee giant has experienced a decrease in revenue. And that's something Brian Niccol, the company's new CEO, wants to address by streamlining operations — including the chain's complex menu.
"People love Starbucks, but I’ve heard from some customers that we've drifted from our core, that we’ve made it harder to be a customer than it should be, and that we’ve stopped communicating with them," Niccol shared in a prerecorded video uploaded to the Starbucks website. "To welcome all our customers back and return to growth, we need to fundamentally change our recent strategy." He added that the "Back to Starbucks" plan will be that "fundamental change."
According to Niccol, who came over from Chipotle, the company will work to get back to its "core identity" to ensure customers keep coming back. "To succeed, we need to address staffing in our stores, remove bottlenecks, and simplify things for our baristas," he said. "We will simplify our overly complex menu, fix our pricing architecture, and ensure that every customer feels Starbucks is worth it every single time they visit."
Can you name 24 different types of wine? This advent calendar’s got ’em all.
Here’s a philosophical question for you: If November arrives without a breathless media announcement about Aldi’s advent calendars, is it really the holiday season at all? Not to worry — you don’t have to ponder that one at all this year. The 2024 advent calendars have arrived at America’s favorite discount grocery store, and they offer a little bit of everything (literally). There’s even a hot sauce calendar this year with 24 different styles and levels of heat.
Starting November 6, Aldi will be releasing its hotly anticipated lineup of advent calendars, and it’s best to scoop them up fast because they tend to sell out quickly. For the unfamiliar, advent calendars are an annual tradition counting down the 24 days of December before Christmas Day, full of two dozen compartments typically housing one tiny treat for each day of the Advent season.
At Aldi, you certainly have your pick of tiny treats: There will be as many as 20 different calendars offered this year, filled with either chocolate, wine, or other treasures. The press release notes that the chocolate, wine, and cheese calendars this year are designed to complement one another, and thus, “customers are encouraged to purchase all three calendars together for the ultimate pairing experience.” (Well played, Aldi.)
UK-based DS Smith undertook an extensive field analysis — here's what it found.
There's no doubt in anyone's mind that plastic pollution is a problem. As the United Nations noted, "46% of plastic waste is landfilled, while 22% is mismanaged and becomes litter. Unlike other materials, plastic does not biodegrade. It can take up to 1,000 years to break down, so when it is discarded, it builds up in the environment until it reaches a crisis point," it pointedly added, "This pollution chokes marine wildlife, damages soil and poisons groundwater, and can cause serious health impacts." It's critical to address this growing issue — and that could begin by illuminating useless plastic packaging.
A new research paper commissioned by paper packaging firm DS Smith found that more than half (51%) of packaging on grocery items in the United Kingdom could be reduced or replaced entirely.
To come to this conclusion, the researchers undertook a field analysis, which included an audit of plastic usage on 1,500 food and drink products across the top five food retailers by market share in six European countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland, and the UK).
Neal's Yard Dairy, an artisan cheese purveyor in the UK, shared that it was the victim of a massive cheese theft that saw more than 22 tons of cheddar stolen out from under them.
"We have some difficult news to share. Neal's Yard Dairy has been the victim of a theft resulting in the loss of over 22 tons of clothbound Cheddar," the shop shared on its Instagram page. As it further explained, the theft was carried out by a fraudulent buyer who posed as a "legitimate wholesale distributor for a major French retailer."
The shop delivered more than 950 wheels of Hafod, Westcombe, and Pitchfork Cheddar before they discovered it was all a ruse. However, it added that "despite the significant financial blow, we have honored our commitment to our small-scale suppliers and paid all three artisan cheesemakers in full."
According to the BBC, the shop usually sells the Hafod Welsh for £12.90 (about 16.72) for 300g, the Westcombe for £7.15 (about $9.27) for 250g, and the Pitchfork for £11 (about $14.26) for 250g.
In the 1970s, a community of food businesses focused on quality and simplicity cropped up in a formerly derelict corner of Covent Garden – the eponymous Neal’s Yard. In 1979, Randolph Hodgson joined their ranks and founded Neal’s Yard Dairy. What began as a small shop stocking Greek-style yoghurt, creme fraiche, and a couple of cheeses grew with Randolph’s immersion in the British cheesemaking community. He began visiting cheesemakers, learning about their work and bringing cheeses back to his shop. That is still the core of what Neal’s Yard Dairy does today.
We currently work with about 40 cheesemakers from Britain and Ireland. While varying significantly in their backgrounds and personalities, what all of them share is a commitment to a slow, hands-on approach to cheesemaking. It is a commitment we share. We are proud to have stocked Beenleigh Blue, Stichelton, and many more of our cheeses for decades. We hope they are part of our story for years to come.
C4 Energy, the Austin-based sports nutrition drink, and The Hershey Company partnered to make a candy treat that’s actually meant to be functional. The sugary sweet partnership brings three candy-inspired flavors of whey protein powders — Hershey’s Milk Chocolate, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and Vanilla Bean — to the market.
This is the first-ever protein powder released by either company. For C4, known for its energy drinks and pre-workout powders, this is just the start, says Robert Zajac, the CMO of Nutrabolt, C4’s parent company. “This is just the beginning of our entry into this space,” Zajac told Food & Wine exclusively. “We’re already developing the next phase of protein — from ingredients to flavors to formats; the opportunities are endless.”
The brand plans to roll out more protein-focused products because it is “crucial for muscle repair and growth,” making it appealing to fitness enthusiasts, pro and amateur athletes, plus the newly health-conscious, says Zajac. And science backs that all up. Studies show that consuming protein is responsible for multiple benefits: it helps strengthen and expand muscles, is good for bone health, and lowers blood pressure. The new candy-flavored proteins are an easy entry point for anyone looking to reap these benefits.
We have had the pleasure of hosting Ellen who is the 2024 Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund (ASLF) apprentice.
We have had the pleasure of hosting Ellen who is the 2024 Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund (ASLF) apprentice. The ASLF is an American organisation which honours the great, late cheese pioneer Anne Saxelby by providing opportunities for young people to live on sustainable farms across the US. Neal's Yard Dairy is currently the only ASLF partner in the UK and we offer an experience across our London-based business instead of on farms. Read on to find out what Ellen has been up to.
Stilton
Maturation experiment
tasting at
8am on a Thursday morning?
I knew
I’d
made the right c
hoice
when I saw this on the agenda
for my Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund (ASLF) apprenticeship with Neal’s Yard Dairy.
Coming from a Cornish farming family and having worked in people-facing roles within the Arts & Cultural sector for over two years now, this opportunity felt like a calling (and a collision of my two worlds!) that I couldn’t ignore. I have always believed both art and creatives have the power to facilitate learning and engagement amongst communities from all walks of life, so it has been really rewarding to discover that it is no different when it comes to the (somewhat overlooked) art forms of Cheesemaking and Cheesemongering.
For instance, it cannot be overstated how much everybody loves cheese here, and how contagious that love is. Seriously. The passion people have for the product and the process underpins every decision each department makes, plus the relationships with producers and customers alike are treated with such respect and dedication.
Hot sauce, chicken wings, and Stichelton: three things that taste great, combined. This easy and flavourful recipe comes courtesy of Emma Young, cheesemonger and author of The Cheese Wheel.
This recipe comes courtesy of Emma Young, cheesemonger and author of The Cheese Wheel: How to Choose and Pair Cheese Like an Expert.
There’s nothing more satisfying than a recipe that involves minimal preparation and full, impactful flavour. These hot wings with Stichelton are essentially a combination of things which already taste excellent, a combination which can be recreated at any time of the year… or day for that matter.
In The Cheese Wheel, you’ll find me mentioning the yeasty, savoury, and fruity goodness of Stichelton working well with strong alcohol like Islay whisky, and part of the reason this works so well is the spicy nature of the alcohol cutting through the cheese.
The creamy, fudgy paste of Stichelton is also cut extremely well by hot sauces. I purposefully haven’t specified which, as there are so many out there. I am partial to a buffalo sauce or fermented hot sauce for a fruity, umami, and fermented explosion to coat your chicken wings, enhanced by the salty, savoury Stichelton.
(Serves one hungry person or two people with sides)
Ingredients:
750g chicken wings (highest welfare possible please, I’m a hen mum!)
2-4 tablespoons of hot sauce (I recommend the Buffalo Hot Sauce from The Sauce Shop or making your own fermented sauce at home.)
150g Stichelton
I’m not cool enough to own an air fryer but this would make for an even easier cooking method than it is already.
Alternatively, bake or fry.
To bake: preheat your oven to 200°C (392°F, gas mark 6). Place your wings on a baking tray or dish. Spread them for even cooking & place the tray onto the middle shelf of your oven for approximately 35-40 minutes.
To fry: deep fry the chicken wings at 180°C (350°F) for 10-12 minutes or until cooked through and crispy. If you have a deep fat frier, fabulous, if not, make sure your pan is deep enough to accommodate chicken plus oil without spillage. Once cooked, place the wings straight onto paper towel to remove excess oil.
Crumble or roughly chop your Stichelton before sprinkling all over the wings. I like a mixture of crumble sizes: large pieces for a cheeky bite and small pieces to fully integrate into the sauce like a veritable cheesy seasoning.
Serve the wings as they are, or perhaps add a homemade coleslaw for some added crunch.
One thing that I love for starting my own threadcast yesterday was I can write a longer form post about the questions that's been asked and answered by other users.
By this, I am hitting many birds at one stone.
Increase my engagement with InLeo.
Build a community
Share my ideas and thoughts in a short-form content.
Make a blog from the topics
Making new friends
Become a real "owner" and build a "business" on Hive.
I will continue doing this threadcast twice a week. I don't really have a specific day in mind, but I hope more users will join soon 😄
I hope more users will have the same mindset as you. My only goal right now is just to enjoy the platform. I'm really enjoying having the premium experience and using this instead of X.
I get more engagement here than X, which makes it meaningful and thoughtful. I feel seen here.
In the past 48 hours, I have managed to move from number 35 to number 22 on the Kaichi airdrop leaderboard. Heading for the Top 5! I will be stoked if I am one of the largest airdrop recipients! I can then stake the KAI tokens I receive from the airdrop to boost profitability! #cent #sapphirecrypto
Russian President Vladimir Putin is hosting the annual summit of BRICS, a high-prestige stage that offers him an opportunity to showcase his defiance of U.S.-led efforts to isolate his regime and punish the Kremlin for its decision to invade Ukraine more than two years ago.
Mr. Putin’s posturing is clearly meant to send a reassuring signal to average Russians that even though powerful and prosperous democracies in North America, Europe and East Asia have turned the diplomatic and economic screws on Russia since the Ukraine invasion, their nation is neither contained nor ostracized.
The 2024 BRICS summit, the sixteenth gathering of a group that originally included just Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, runs from October 22-24 in the Russian city of Kazan, the capital of Tatarstan. Mr. Putin will welcome both Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, leaders of the world’s most populous countries and, respectively, the world’s second- and fifth-largest economies.
The grouping has grown markedly in recent years: The leaders of Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Turkey, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates are coming to Kazan, though Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, citing health concerns, will attend via video conference.
In all, up to 32 foreign delegations, including those from rising economies such as Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam, are anticipated. There is even speculation that North Korea, whose relations with Russia have been warming rapidly, may send a delegation.
Another question is whether the body will, in the wake of the summit, expedite the membership of NATO member Turkey, which has announced its desire to join.
Brazil Reaches $23 Billion Settlement with Mining Firms over 2015 Environmental Disaster
Brazil's federal government on Friday reached a multibillion-dollar settlement with the mining companies responsible for a 2015 dam collapse that the government said was the country's worst-ever environmental disaster.
Under the agreement, Samarco — a joint venture of Brazilian mining giant Vale and Anglo-Australian firm BHP — will pay 132 billion reais ($23 billion) over 20 years to compensate for human, environmental and infrastructure damage caused by the release of an immense amount of toxic mining waste into a major river in southeastern Minas Gerais state, killing 19 people and ravaging entire villages.
“We are fixing a disaster that could have been avoided, but wasn’t,” President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said in a hall of the presidential palace, surrounded by governors of the affected states, members of his administration, reporters and victims.
Lula's speech, filled with criticism of what he called the mining companies’ irresponsibility in chasing profit over safety, was met with applause from the audience.
The toxic sludge — enough to fill 13,000 Olympic-size swimming pools — flowed down the Doce River for 420 miles to the Atlantic Ocean, contaminating waterways and coastal areas in two neighboring states.
Slight Progress in Global Biodiversity Protection Efforts but Some Species Decline, New Reports Find
Global efforts to protect the world's plants and animals have made slight progress and some species remain in serious decline, according to two reports released Monday at a major United Nations biodiversity summit in Colombia.
A report from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) evaluated global progress since its biodiversity report in 2020. Two years ago, 196 countries signed a historic treaty to protect biodiversity on 30% of the planet by 2030.
The biodiversity summit underway in Cali, Colombia is a follow-up to the 2022 accord in Montreal, which includes 23 measures to halt and reverse nature loss. One calls for putting 30% of the planet and 30% of degraded ecosystems under protection by 2030.
Brazil's Federal Police requested the extradition of dozens of people who had fled the country after being accused of storming top government offices last year,
RIO DE JANEIRO — Brazil’s Federal Police requested the extradition of dozens of people who had fled the country after being accused of storming top government offices last year, in an alleged bid to forcefully restore former President Jair Bolsonaro to office, two sources familiar with the police request told the Associated Press on Wednesday.
The police sent their request to the Supreme Court’s Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who remitted it to the Justice Ministry, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. One of them said the request targets 63 people, most believed to be in neighboring Argentina.
De Moraes oversees the extensive investigation into the Jan. 8 rampage in the capital, Brasilia, and has prohibited suspects and those convicted from leaving the country.
Bolsonaro - who is a target of the investigation himself - and his allies deny wrongdoing and say they are victims of political persecution, echoing former U.S. President Donald J. Trump’s characterization of his legal woes. He repeatedly sowed doubt about the reliability of Brazil’s voting system, never conceded defeat in the October 2022 presidential election and declined to attend President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s swearing-in.
Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Sunday canceled his trip to Russia for a BRICS summit after an accident at home that left him with a cut in the neck, his office said.
SAO PAULO — Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Sunday canceled his trip to Russia for a BRICS summit after an accident at home that left him with a cut in the neck, his office said.
The 78-year-old leader was scheduled to attend a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies in the city of Kazan from Tuesday to Thursday this week.
Hospital Sirio Libanês in Sao Paulo said in a statement that the leftist leader was instructed not to take long distance trips, but can keep his other activities. Doctors Roberto Kalil and Ana Heleno Germoglio said they will regularly check on Lula’s recovery.
Brazil’s presidency said in a separate statement that Lula will take part in the summit by videoconference and will continue his work in capital Brasilia this week. It did not disclose details about what caused the president’s injury.
Voters in Brazil’s biggest city, Sao Paulo, started going to the polls Sunday in a mayoral race pitting incumbent Mayor Ricardo Nunes against leftist lawmaker Guilherme Boulos.
Nunes has lukewarm support from former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro while Boulos is an ally of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Different polls published Saturday showed Nunes, who inherited the mayorship after Bruno Covas died of cancer in 2021, is the favorite to win. His advantage against Boulos is greater than the margin of error of the Datafolha and Quaest polls.
Boulos, in a last-ditch effort for exposure, on Friday accepted an invitation to debate self-help guru turned far-right politician Pablo Marçal, who finished third in the first round of voting on Oct. 7. At the end of the debate, Marçal urged his voters not to vote Sunday. Lower turnout could work against Nunes.
Most of the attention in this year’s round of municipal elections in Brazil has been on Sao Paulo, where the race was marred by episodes of violence involving Marçal in the first round of voting. Boulos, a longtime housing advocate for the poor, has been campaigning nonstop to avoid his second consecutive defeat in the race.
Other Brazilian cities with more than 200,000 registered voters are also holding mayoral elections.
In Rio de Janeiro, incumbent Mayor Eduardo Paes was reelected in the first round of voting for his fourth, non-consecutive term. Paes, an enthusiastic fan of Carnival, had Lula’s support but focused his campaign on local issues against Bolsonaro’s candidate, Alexandre Ramagem.
Brazilians will be also watching closely for results in Belo Horizonte, one of the country’s biggest cities, where polls suggest Mayor Fuad Noman faces a close race with pro-Bolsonaro candidate Bruno Engler.
Brazil’s environmental agency has levied $64 million in fines against 23 meatpacking companies and their suppliers for buying and selling cattle raised illegally on deforested land in the Amazon.
The operation, dubbed Cold Meat 2, launched last week. It tracked 18,000 head of cattle raised in 100 square miles of pasture that has been banned for commercial use due to illegal deforestation. The agents also apprehended 8,854 head of cattle found inside the restricted areas. News of the fines began emerging over the weekend.
Cattle raising is the main driver of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, with 90% of the area cleared between 1985 and 2023 converted to pasture. That represents 227,800 square miles, slightly larger than France. As a result, 14% of the Amazon is covered by grazing land, according to MapBiomas, a network of nongovernmental organizations that monitor land use.
“We are inspecting the production chain to hold offenders accountable for acquiring products from deforestation and to ensure that crime does not pay,” Jair Schmitt, chief of environmental protection at Brazil’s federal environmental agency, known as Ibama, told The Associated Press.
Among those fined was JBS, the world’s largest meat-packing company. JBS has applied to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange, a move that has faced opposition from some U.S. lawmakers and environmental nonprofits. It’s not clear when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission may make a decision on JBS’ bid.
The JBS fine was $108,000 for purchasing 1,231 head of cattle, the fifth largest penalty among the fined companies.
Ainda tô me adapatando com o teclado do meu irmão... é completamente diferetente em algumas posições onde ficam algumas teclas essenciais como por exemplo o delete e o print screen... Mas vou sobreviver. Pelo menos o S funciona kkkk...
Ontem caiu uma chuva pesada aqui. Estava no trânsito, pois tive que buscar a patroa... Esse tipo de chuva eu até evito de sair de casa, mas como eu já estava no caminho, então tive que ir mesmo assim.
Felizmente deu tudo certo e na volta a chuva até amenizou.
Lembrete, galera: temos uma lista para brasileiros ativos nas Threads. Eu frequentemente passo por ela votando em todo mundo que interage aqui pelas threads. Caso queira fazer parte é só responder aqui
#feedback If at all possible, it would be awesome if the notifications counter auto-updated whenever there's a new notification, without having to refresh the page
It's been a bit on and off for the past month as far as I've been able to tell. I know several people have posted feedbacks about this and that the team is aware of the problem. I'm sure it will be resolved in due time
Even though I do not receive financial benefits from DeSo, I post there at least once a day to remain in the loop in case anything unexpected transpires. Just the other day a single Ravencoin post received 76 likes and 52 reposts. You never know what will happen! #cent #sapphirecrypto
I need to celebrate life because I'm in a good spot, I work hard, and I am happy with who I am and happy with what I do for a living, and sometimes I just focus and overwhelm myself so much with the fights and getting better, that I just need to slow it down and enjoy life and enjoy training. Dustin Poirier
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
In this dangerous world that we live in, where hatred and violence and natural disasters sometimes collide to almost overwhelm us, we each can help in some way. Marsha Blackburn
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
I don't think that you can let the storms of life overwhelm you. When you do that, you are no better than the craziness that caused you to be under attack. T. D. Jakes
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Too many choices can overwhelm us and cause us to not choose at all. For businesses, this means that if they offer us too many choices, we may not buy anything. Sheena Iyengar
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Challenge is the pathway to engagement and progress in our lives. But not all challenges are created equal. Some challenges make us feel alive, engaged, connected, and fulfilled. Others simply overwhelm us. Knowing the difference as you set bigger and bolder challenges for yourself is critical to your sanity, success, and satisfaction. Brendon Burchard
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Let's be honest; it's rather easy to be busy. We all can think up a list of tasks that will overwhelm our schedules. Some might even think that their self-worth depends on the length of their to-do list. They flood the open spaces in their time with lists of meetings and minutia - even during times of stress and fatigue. Dieter F. Uchtdorf
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Instead of being critical of people in authority over you and envious of their position, be happy you're not responsible for everything they have to do. Instead of piling on complaints, thank them for what they do. Overwhelm them with encouragement and appreciation! Joyce Meyer
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To be poor does not mean you lack the means to extend charity to another. You may lack money or food, but you have the gift of friendship to overwhelm the loneliness that grips the lives of so many. Stanley Hauerwas
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Fantasy is fantasy. It's fiction. It's not meant to be a textbook. I don't believe in letting research overwhelm the fiction. That's a danger of science fiction in particular, as opposed to fantasy. A lot of writers forget that what they're doing is supposed to be art. N. K. Jemisin
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There are times when external circumstances can overwhelm us, and we do things we never thought. If you're not aware that this can happen, you can be seduced by evil. We need inoculations against our own potential for evil. We have to acknowledge it. Then we can change it. Philip Zimbardo
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Chess: It's like alcohol. It's a drug. I have to control it, or it could overwhelm me. I have a regular Monday night game at my home, and I do play a little online. Charles Krauthammer
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The only thing that can blow away the Michael Jordan sad face meme, is the Floyd Mayweather knockout meme. If Floyd Mayweather got knocked out - knocked out to the point where he is ice cold on the ground - I think that's the one meme that can just overwhelm the whole Jordan issue. Jay Williams
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We can pretend that China is not there. But China is there, and unless we put our economy on the right track, it is going to overwhelm us completely. Salman Khurshid
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No one is going to persuade me that eight people arriving in South Shields is going to overwhelm the local system. I think that 25,000 refugees would be more in line with the U.N. That would be a substantive contribution. Ed Miliband
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Overwhelm is, most often, a mindset. If you think about all the things you have to do, you'll be face down on the floor. It really helps to break it down into smaller pieces. Jen Sincero
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A child who is protected from all controversial ideas is as vulnerable as a child who is protected from every germ. The infection, when it comes- and it will come- may overwhelm the system, be it the immune system or the belief system. Jane Smiley
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One of the greatest objections which families have to New South Wales, is their apprehension of the moral effects that are likely to overwhelm them by bad example, and for which no success in life could compensate. Charles Sturt
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Before the math and the momentum overwhelm us all, we are going to solve this nation's economic problems. And I'm going to level with you: We don't have that much time. But if we are serious, and smart, and we lead, we can do this. Paul Ryan
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Often I feel that projects overwhelm us when we look at how many hours are involved until completion. But just getting started is usually not that difficult. Emily Giffin
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If I get even five per cent of my ideas out and documented before I die, I'll be lucky. I'm not in danger of running out of riffs or ideas anytime soon. They overwhelm me and it's hard to find time to deal with them. Jello Biafra
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There's no need to overwhelm yourself with thoughts, because you know that you're just as good or better than some of the players you're going up against. Cobi Jones
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No movie has ever been able to provide a catharsis for the Holocaust, and I suspect none will ever be able to provide one for 9/11. Such subjects overwhelm art. Roger Ebert
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I want a painting to be difficult to do. The more obstacles, obstructions, problems - if they don't overwhelm - the better. I would like to feel that I am involved at any stage of the painting with all its moments, not just this 'now' moment where a superficial grace is so available. Richard Diebenkorn
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Every day there's a lot of things I block out, because if I start visualising things, I tend to go completely insane. I've always had anxiety issues, and it can totally overwhelm me and suck me under if I'm not keeping focused. I just think and think until I have a panic attack, and then it dies down. Dev Hynes
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Painting keeps me occupied in those moments when travel can be aimless and even disorienting. Mainly it is a way to register at least some of the new impressions of a foreign place, when its thrilling barrage can sometimes overwhelm you. Susan Minot
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In the developed world, hundreds of millions of us now face the bizarre problem of surfeit. Yet our brains, instincts, and socialized behavior are still geared to an environment of lack. The result? Overwhelm - on an unprecedented scale. Martha Beck
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The game is No. 1. You are an adjunct to the game. In a studio, there is no game. You are the star. That's why you are there. For the game, you can't go away from the game and beat your chest. People are there to watch the game. You are there to supplement, not to override or overwhelm. Al Michaels
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Let us swell with gratitude and allow it to overwhelm us. It isn't as cliche as we make it; life truly is short. Let's spend it all lavishly wallowing in gratitude. Grace Gealey
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Exxon Mobil and JPMorgan Chase each made more in profits in the first quarter of 2012 alone than the entire state budget of Montana. Without a doubt, multinational corporations like these have the resources to overwhelm the voices of the people. Eric Schneiderman
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Even if America entered the war, it is improbable that the Allied armies could invade Europe and overwhelm the Axis powers. But one thing is certain. If England can draw this country into the war, she can shift to our shoulders a large portion of the responsibility for waging it and for paying its cost. Charles Lindbergh
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I always say that characters must drive plots, never the reverse. Writing about large-scale events creates the risk that the scope of the events themselves can overwhelm the characters. I emphatically do not want that. That was the only trepidation I felt when I started 'The Twilight War.' Paul S. Kemp
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Pressure for the most part comes from this overarching concern that if I head into the election season without sufficient resources, then any outside group, any individual, any super PAC may choose to come in to my district and overwhelm it and take over the airwaves and control the debate. Ted Deutch
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I don't think enough players channel the energy of the crowd. If it's done properly, and you don't let anger overwhelm and distract you, it's like a shot of adrenaline in the arm, and it gets the crowd pumped up. John McEnroe
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True enough, the Fed needs radical reforms. In particular, it needs to replace its failed forecasting models and be rid of the academics who overwhelm the Fed system. Lawrence Kudlow
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Computers in general, and software in particular, are much more difficult than other kinds of technology for most people to grok, and they overwhelm us with a sense of mystery. Om Malik
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It would be presumptuous to say writing a book would be a sufficient gesture, but if people were more preoccupied with the past, maybe the events that overwhelm us would be fewer. W. G. Sebald
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There is always a reason behind things that are made, and if there isn't, there will be one when they travel through the world. The objects of beauty are used to impress, seduce, overwhelm, make money, support identities, and show power or style, among other things. Marcel Wanders
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Despite the debt, the traffic, the one-party rule, the taxes, and the eagerness of politicians to overwhelm small businesses and large corporate job producers with red tape and unnecessary regulations, the Golden State is still the most beautiful place to live and work in the United States. Richard Grenell
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Music is a mysterious phenomenon - it seems both to magically overwhelm and sublimate our suffering, but also to starkly dignify the struggles of our daily life. Andrew W.K.
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With some actors, if I have upward of 10 notes, I don't want to give them all 10 notes and overwhelm them. I usually parse them out three or four at a time. Sam Esmail
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In a depressing twist, many members of my party and ideological persuasion have become advocates for Donald Trump on a scale that ranges from grudging to toadying, for a simple reason that seems to overwhelm all other factors: He attacks the media. Many are willing to forgive almost any sin because of it. Rick Wilson
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You can let the size of the crowd, when you do Super Bowl, overwhelm you if you want, and that opening on camera is one of the most intense, awkward feelings you can ever have. Joe Buck
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Some directors can become concerned when it comes to music, because it's the end of the process and they're tired. They're worried that the music will intrude or waste something, that a composer will overwhelm the story. Alexandre Desplat
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Sure, spending most of your time with attractive men who are all catches is great... but you can imagine how all that testosterone can overwhelm a gal. Becca Kufrin
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I often deliberately overwhelm my players. If I give them 10 things a day and they learn four of them, I'm happier than if I stick to the learning theory where the goal is a maximum of five things per day and then they only remember two. Julian Nagelsmann
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The phrase “Make Orwell fiction again” is a critique or commentary on the state of society or politics, suggesting that current events or political situations are resembling the dystopian and authoritarian themes present in George Orwell's literary works, such as “1984” and “Animal Farm.”
OpenAI's Future and AGI Timeline: Industry Leaders' Predictions
Recent statements from OpenAI's leadership and other industry experts suggest that artificial intelligence development is progressing at a pace that exceeds public understanding, with transformative advances potentially just years away. This emerging narrative, supported by multiple industry leaders, points to a rapidly approaching future where artificial general intelligence (AGI) may become a reality.
According to OpenAI's Chief Financial Officer Sarah Frier, who joined the company in June 2024, the company holds weekly research meetings that consistently "blow her mind" with previews of upcoming capabilities. This rare glimpse into OpenAI's internal operations suggests that the company maintains a significant technological lead over its competitors, despite the recent achievements of other AI labs.
This revelation gains credibility when examining OpenAI's track record of developing technologies well before their public release. A notable example is GPT-4, which was completed in August 2022, months before the release of ChatGPT. This means OpenAI had already developed its next-generation model while the public was still marveling at GPT-3.5's capabilities. GPT-4 subsequently maintained its position at the technological frontier for approximately two years before other labs approached similar capabilities.
Several prominent figures in the AI field have made bold predictions about the timeline for achieving artificial general intelligence:
Sam Altman's Vision
In his September 2024 blog post "The Intelligence Age," OpenAI CEO Sam Altman suggested that superintelligence might be possible "in a few thousand days." While this timeline could span from three to ten years, it represents a remarkably short horizon for such a transformative development. Altman describes this potential achievement as "the most consequential fact about all of history so far."
Ray Kurzweil, known for his 86% accuracy rate in technological predictions and his pioneering work in pattern recognition technology, suggests that AGI could arrive by 2029. Notably, this five-year timeline is now considered "conservative" by industry standards, highlighting how rapidly expectations have accelerated.
The CEO of Anthropic, creator of the Claude AI assistant, points to a "smooth exponential" growth in AI capabilities. He predicts that by 2025-2027, with increased funding and continued improvements in algorithms and chip technology, we could see models that surpass human capabilities in most areas. This development would be facilitated by models costing between $10-100 billion to train, a significant increase from current costs.
Industry leaders identify several key factors driving this rapid progress:
Self-Improving Systems: Future AI systems will contribute to developing better next-generation systems, creating a positive feedback loop of technological advancement.
Scientific Progress: AI is expected to accelerate scientific discovery across multiple fields, including biology, physics, chemistry, and mathematics.
Exponential Growth: The combination of improved hardware, algorithms, and increased funding is creating conditions for exponential advances in AI capabilities.
While some may dismiss these predictions as marketing hype, OpenAI's track record of delivering breakthrough technologies suggests their internal assessments deserve serious consideration. The convergence of predictions from multiple industry leaders, each with significant expertise and access to cutting-edge developments, indicates that transformative AI capabilities may be closer than many realize. The next few years could prove crucial in determining how this technology develops and its impact on society.
As we've seen with previous releases like GPT-4, Sora, and GPT-4's advanced voice capabilities, OpenAI has consistently demonstrated its ability to surprise and exceed expectations. The indication that even more impressive developments are in the pipeline suggests we may be on the cusp of even more significant technological breakthroughs in artificial intelligence.
Apple just announced a new Mac Mini. For those unaware, the ‘mini’ is Apple’s most affordable desktop computer. The 2024 refresh features a brand-new design and a new, more powerful M4 silicon under the hood.
MIT researchers have developed a robot training method that reduces time and cost while improving adaptability to new tasks and environments.
The approach – called Heterogeneous Pretrained Transformers (HPT) – combines vast amounts of diverse data from multiple sources into a unified system, effectively creating a shared language that generative AI models can process. This method marks a significant departure from traditional robot training, where engineers typically collect specific data for individual robots and tasks in controlled environments.
Lead researcher Lirui Wang – an electrical engineering and computer science graduate student at MIT – believes that while many cite insufficient training data as a key challenge in robotics, a bigger issue lies in the vast array of different domains, modalities, and robot hardware. Their work demonstrates how to effectively combine and utilise all these diverse elements.
The research team developed an architecture that unifies various data types, including camera images, language instructions, and depth maps. HPT utilises a transformer model, similar to those powering advanced language models, to process visual and proprioceptive inputs.
In practical tests, the system demonstrated remarkable results—outperforming traditional training methods by more than 20 per cent in both simulated and real-world scenarios. This improvement held true even when robots encountered tasks significantly different from their training data.
The researchers assembled an impressive dataset for pretraining, comprising 52 datasets with over 200,000 robot trajectories across four categories. This approach allows robots to learn from a wealth of experiences, including human demonstrations and simulations.
One of the system’s key innovations lies in its handling of proprioception (the robot’s awareness of its position and movement.) The team designed the architecture to place equal importance on proprioception and vision, enabling more sophisticated dexterous motions.
Looking ahead, the team aims to enhance HPT’s capabilities to process unlabelled data, similar to advanced language models. Their ultimate vision involves creating a universal robot brain that could be downloaded and used for any robot without additional training.
While acknowledging they are in the early stages, the team remains optimistic that scaling could lead to breakthrough developments in robotic policies, similar to the advances seen in large language models.
Major AI Industry Developments Bring Wave of Innovation Across Tech Sector
In a remarkable wave of announcements, several major technology companies have unveiled significant advances in artificial intelligence, marking what could be one of the most consequential periods in AI development since the field's inception.
Microsoft has made a bold move into the autonomous agent space with the announcement of Copilot Studio. Set for public preview next month, the platform will allow users to create and deploy AI agents throughout the Windows environment. The company is particularly focused on enterprise applications, introducing ten new autonomous agents in Dynamics 365 specifically designed for sales, service, finance, and supply chain teams.
CEO Satya Nadella's vision suggests a future where millions of AI agents will become integral to the corporate workforce. While initial implementations may focus on basic automation, the company anticipates these agents will evolve to become increasingly proactive rather than merely reactive.
This announcement has not gone without criticism. Salesforce CEO Mark Benioff notably dismissed the initiative as "Clippy 2.0," suggesting Microsoft lacks the necessary data, metadata, and enterprise security models for effective corporate intelligence. However, given Microsoft's 98% enterprise penetration rate, such criticism may be more competitive positioning than substantive critique.
Anthropic's Major Model Updates and Computer Control
Anthropic has made several significant announcements, including the release of Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Claude 3.5 Haiku. Notably, the smaller Haiku model reportedly outperforms the previous flagship Claude 3.0 Opus, demonstrating remarkable advances in model efficiency.
Perhaps most intriguingly, Anthropic has introduced a "computer use tool," marking their entry into computer control AI. This experimental feature allows AI models to interact directly with computer systems, though early testing has revealed occasional unexpected behaviors, such as models spontaneously switching tasks to research unrelated topics.
IBM has made a significant contribution to the open-source AI community by releasing multiple models, including Granite 3.0 in 8B and 2B parameter versions, along with a mixture of experts variant. These models are released under the Apache 2.0 license, making them fully open source. IBM has also introduced a novel knowledge integration technique that bridges the gap between RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) and fine-tuning approaches.
Meta's Open Source Contributions
Meta continues to strengthen its position in the open-source AI community with several significant releases:
Segment Anything 2.1, an advanced image and video segmentation tool
Spirit LM, an open-source language model for text-to-speech applications
Various technical projects aimed at improving training efficiency and inference speed
Former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati is reportedly raising significant capital (potentially exceeding $100 million) for a new venture focused on proprietary AI models. Given her background and reputation, this development could signal another important player in the AI landscape.
Advances in Image and Video Generation
Several companies have announced improvements in generative AI:
Stability AI released Stable Diffusion 3.5, including large and turbo variants, with a medium-sized version announced for October 29th
Ideogram launched Canvas, offering an infinite canvas board with AI-powered image generation and editing capabilities
Genmo AI released Mochi 1, an open-source text-to-video model
Runway introduced Act One, a new feature for generating expressive character performances using simple video inputs
This surge of announcements across multiple domains - from enterprise AI to creative tools - suggests we're entering a new phase of AI development where capabilities are rapidly expanding and becoming more accessible to both developers and end users. The emphasis on open-source contributions from major players like IBM and Meta, alongside proprietary developments from established and emerging companies, indicates a healthy ecosystem that benefits from both collaborative and competitive forces.
The rapid pace of development, particularly in areas like computer control and creative tools, suggests we're likely to see continued acceleration in AI capabilities and applications across all sectors. As these tools become more sophisticated and accessible, they're poised to transform both enterprise operations and creative workflows in unprecedented ways.
Meta has been working on an AI powered search engine to decrease its dependence on Google and Microsoft. The Meta AI bot built into Meta's apps currently uses Google and Microsoft Bing to answer questions about recent news and events. Meta has been building a database of information for its chatbot. It is also building up location data that could compete with Google Maps.
OpenAI’s latest updates to ChatGPT introduce GPT-4 Turbo, which improves speed, reduces costs, and automatically selects the right tools, such as DALL-E for images.
ChatGPT can now "see, hear, and speak," thanks to new voice and image processing capabilities, powered by advanced text-to-speech and Whisper, OpenAI's speech recognition system.
🧵3/ The updates also include a new macOS desktop app and a simplified, more user-friendly interface, with these enhancements gradually rolling out to free and Plus users.
Apple has announced an updated iMac with the company's latest M4 chip. Starting at $1,299, it is now available for order ahead of its release on November 8. The M4 iMac comes in new shades, including green, yellow, orange, pink, purple, and silver. It has four USB-C ports on the back with the Thunderbolt 4 standard and supports up to two additional 6K displays. The iMac comes with an updated Magic Mouse and Magic Keyboard with USB-C charging. Apple may announce more new Macs over the coming days.
The Open Source Initiative (OSI) has released its official definition of 'open' artificial intelligence. For an AI system to be considered truly open source, it must provide the complete code used to build and run the AI, access to details about the data used to train the AI so others can understand and recreate it, and the settings and weights from the training. The definition directly challenges Meta's Llama, which has restrictions on commercial use and does not provide access to training data. Meta claims that it restricts access to its training data due to safety concerns, but critics say the company is just minimizing its legal liability and safeguarding its competitive advantage.
E se fosse possível medir a glicose sem precisar furar o dedo? Essa foi a questão que guiou os pesquisadores da Universidade do Estado de Santa Catarina (Udesc) na hora de criar o E-Gluco, um dispositivo equipado com sensores que se conectam ao app por meio de Bluetooth para medir a glicose 24 horas por dia, de uma forma não invasiva.
Conforme o anúncio, o aplicativo E-Gluco armazena as medições, processa e apresenta os dados ao usuário. Além disso, utiliza inteligência artificial para fornecer as informações sobre os dados coletados, como tendências de níveis de glicose ao longo do tempo e até mesmo prevenções de surtos de hipoglicemia.
"O objetivo principal do E-Gluco é tornar o monitoramento da glicose sanguínea mais fácil e acessível para as pessoas sem o uso de sensores extras, especialmente aquelas que sofrem de diabete tipo 1. Com o aplicativo, os usuários podem monitorar seus níveis de glicose de forma rápida e conveniente, sem a necessidade de picadas dolorosas de agulhas e com a facilidade de visualizar seus dados em um só lugar", diz o comunicado publicado pela Udesc.
O projeto é desenvolvido pelo professor Bertemes da Udesc juntamente com o pesquisador Paolo Meloni, da Universidade de Cagliari (Itália), incluindo 4 pesquisadores, estudantes de graduação e pós-graduação e um bolsista de pós-doutorado.
"Somos um projeto ainda em construção, ainda não disponível para venda e em fase de testes. Atualmente estamos na versão 3 do relógio físico", diz o site do projeto. O projeto em si ocorre desde 2016 e já contou com 80 voluntários.
Por enquanto, o grupo também está recrutando mais voluntários para as pesquisas — tanto pessoas com diabetes quanto pessoas saudáveis. A inscrição ocorre pelo próprio site.
Monitorar níveis de glicose sem precisar de agulha pode mudar a vida dos pacientes com diabetes. De acordo com a Sociedade Brasileira de Diabetes, existem atualmente, no Brasil, mais de 13 milhões de pessoas vivendo com a doença, o que representa 6,9% da população nacional.
O Ministério da Saúde diz que a melhor forma de prevenir do diabetes é praticando atividades físicas regularmente, mantendo uma alimentação saudável e evitando consumo de álcool e tabaco.
A ciência e a tecnologia trabalham juntas para trazer avanços na hora de medir a glicose. Atualmente, o Galaxy Watch 7 promete que vai medir glicose no sangue sem furar a pele.
70% of meteorites come from three collisions that occurred in the asteroid belt within the past 40 million years. An exhaustive study by an international team of scientists has tracked down the sources of most meteorites falling on Earth. The team gathered data and ran simulations to reveal how collisions produce families of asteroids that start in similar orbits and how those fragments spread out over time. Their work still needs to be validated, but it explains several key observables with a single model.
bitcoin has top it's $70k mark for the first time in more than four months, do you agree it's because of ETFs and do you also think this will be the case for January? #freecompliments
A luta contra o envelhecimento é, na maioria das vezes, uma corrida contra o tempo, como mostra a história do biohacker Kenneth Scott, de 81 anos. Buscando fomentar novas tecnologias anti-envelhecimento e na indústria da beleza, ele já investiu cerca de 4 milhões de reais em startups da área da biotecnologia e, agora, testa procedimentos não autorizados em alguns países, como terapias genéticas em fase de validação.
Investidor, bilionário, desenvolvedor de software e empresário do ramo imobiliário, Scott acredita que, após atingir os 80 anos, tenha sobrado pouco tempo de vida para aguardar todas as aprovações regulatórias — algo fundamental para garantir a segurança e a eficácia de um procedimento.
“Tenho uma expectativa de vida de mais sete anos neste momento”, conta o biohacker idoso para o site Quartz. “Não tenho muito interesse em testes [clínicos] de cinco anos, então eu simplesmente sigo em frente e faço”, acrescenta. “Minha preocupação está em mim, não nas regulamentações que foram criadas”, reforça.
Apesar de certo romantismo em sua guerra total contra o envelhecimento, Scott eleva o ser biohacker (alguém que busca hackear a biologia humana com a tecnologia) a um ponto perigoso. Sem comprovação, alguns desses procedimentos, especialmente as terapias genéticas feitas em países com pouca regulamentação, podem ter efeito oposto, por exemplo.
Como forma de barrar o envelhecimento natural do corpo, Kenneth Scott e sua esposa Christine Scott gastam, por ano, US$ 70 mil (cerca de 400 mil reais) em tratamentos estéticos e médicos bastante variados.
O biohacker é um grande investidor na área da biotecnologia, com apoios para as startups Repair Biotechnologies (que desenvolve em soluções contra o acúmulo de colesterol no organismo), Leucadia (que atua contra a doença de Alzheimer) e OncoSenX (que busca novas soluções contra o câncer), além da VivaSparkle (que rastreia potenciais pesquisas de sucesso).
Nesse campo anti-envelhecimento (que abrange outras inúmeras startups e pesquisas espalhadas pelo mundo), Scott estima já ter aplicado algo entre US$ 500 mil a US$ 750 mil (entre 2,8 milhões a 4,2 milhões de reais).
Entre as práticas diárias do biohacker octogenário, estão: atividades físicas e alimentação saudável, como era de se esperar. Além disso, ele desenvolveu o próprio shampoo a partir de um medicamento para leucemia e não usa sabonetes.
Também realiza tratamentos faciais com plasma sanguíneo, rico em plaquetas, e recorre a injeções de exossomos amnióticos (derivados do líquido amniótico) para impedir o envelhecimento.
A mais polêmica das intervenções são as aplicações de uma terapia genética com a proteína folistatina, desenvolvida pela startup de biotecnologia Minicircle, em Honduras. O tratamento é anunciado como uma forma de retardar o início do envelhecimento, mas não é autorizado por grandes agências reguladoras, como a Food and Drug Administration (FDA), nos EUA.
“Nossa cultura compartilha a mentalidade de que nascemos para morrer. Desde a infância, fomos ensinados de que vamos morrer”, explica Scott. Entretanto, “essa cultura está desatualizada”, aponta o biohacker sobre a necessidade de romper com a última fronteira humana contra a imortalidade.
Entre os milionários, Scott não é o único a investir grandes somas para impedir o avanço do relógio biológico. Bem mais novo e com menos de 50 anos, Bryan Johnson é outro biohacker que já causou polêmica com suas estratégias.
Meta is working on an AI-powered search engine to decrease its dependence on Google and Microsoft, according to a report from The Information. The search engine would reportedly provide AI-generated search summaries of current events within the Meta AI chatbot.
The Meta AI bot built into Instagram and Facebook currently uses Google — whose parent company, Alphabet, will report quarterly earnings tomorrow — and Microsoft Bing to answer questions about recent news and events.
That could eventually change, as Meta’s web crawler was spotted roving the web months ago. The Information’s source indicates a team has been working for about eight months to build a database of information for its chatbot. Meta has worked on building up location data that could compete with Google Maps, and last month, Bloomberg reported that Apple’s work on search tools in the App Store showed how it “has what it needs” for its own AI-powered Google Search replacement.
Last week, Meta also announced that it struck a multi-year deal with Reuters, allowing its chatbot to use the outlet’s news articles in answers. The Verge reached out to Meta with a request for comment but didn’t immediately hear back.
Otherwise, OpenAI has confirmed it’s working on an AI search engine called SearchGPT. At the same time, Perplexity’s AI search engine is the subject of lawsuits from News Corp and is also facing legal threats from other publishers, including The New York Times.
Deep Blue Aerospace used a livestream on Chinese e-commerce site Taobao to sell two tickets on its first suborbital flights. At just ¥1,000,000 ($140,000), the seats were at a deep discount compared to the expected cost of ¥1,500,000 ($210,000) per seat. The flight is not expected to launch for another three years or so. The livestream, which was the first time space tourism tickets have gone on public sale in China, attracted an audience of three million viewers.
The true explosion due to space advancement is going to be space manufacturing. For things such as drugs due to protein stacking or fiber optic manufacturing, space is the ideal setting since gravity is the enemy.
I always thought mining asteroids would be a thing by the end of the century for valuables metals, will see if that happens, would go hand in hand with manufacturing too.
That is going to be something but it will be for space use. I do not see asteroid mining resulting in the materials being brought back. Instead, when we have different things in space, it will be used for materials and fuel.
A China revelou hoje a tripulação da missão Shenzhou-19, que será lançada na quarta-feira rumo à estação espacial Tiangong. A bordo, estará a terceira mulher astronauta do país, marcando mais um passo significativo no programa espacial chinês.
Os astronautas são Cai Xuzhe, Song Lingdong e Wang Haoze, com Cai assumindo o comando, conforme anunciado pela Agência Espacial Chinesa para Missões Tripuladas em uma coletiva no Centro de Lançamento de Satélites de Jiuquan. Cai já participou da missão Shenzhou-14 em 2022, enquanto Song e Wang, ambos nascidos na década de 1990, farão sua estreia no espaço. Song foi piloto da Força Aérea, e Wang, engenheira na Academia de Tecnologia de Propulsão Aeroespacial.
Seguindo os passos de Liu Yang (primeira astronauta chinesa em 2012) e Wang Yaping (segunda em 2013), a Shenzhou-19 será lançada às 04h27 de quarta-feira (horário de Pequim) e levará os tripulantes à estação Tiangong, onde realizarão experimentos, incluindo pesquisas sobre construção de habitats lunares com tijolos feitos de solo lunar simulado.
A China planeja, junto com a Rússia e outros países, estabelecer uma base científica no polo sul da Lua, sendo o único país até agora a pousar no lado oculto da Lua. Além disso, a Tiangong deverá operar por cerca de dez anos e poderá se tornar a única estação espacial ativa, caso a Estação Espacial Internacional seja desativada em 2024.
Após passar uma noite no hospital Ascension Sacred Heart Pensacola, na Flórida, o astronauta da Nasa que havia sido internado após retornar à Terra de uma missão de quase oito meses na Estação Espacial Internacional (ISS, na sigla em inglês), recebeu alta, segundo informações divulgadas pela própria Nasa, no sábado (26).
O astronauta ou a astronauta –por proteção à privacidade médica, não foram divulgadas informações específicas sobre a pessoa internada– retornou ao centro espacial da Nasa, em Houston, ainda no sábado, dia da alta.
"O membro da tripulação está em boa saúde e retomará o recondicionamento pós-voo normal com os outros membros da tripulação", diz, em nota, a agência espacial americana.
Inicialmente, a Nasa divulgou que toda a tripulação fora encaminhada a uma unidade médica por precaução. Mais tarde, a agência disse que três integrantes da missão já tinham deixado o hospital.
Por sua vez, a agência espacial russa Roscosmos postou no Telegram uma foto de Grebenkin em pé e sorrindo, com a seguinte legenda: "Após uma missão espacial e pouso, o cosmonauta Alexander Grebenkin está se sentindo ótimo!".
Com 235 dias, a estadia dos astronautas da Crew-8 a bordo da ISS, um laboratório do tamanho de um campo de futebol, foi mais longa do que as missões típicas de seis meses dos astronautas na estação. Também marcou a missão mais longa até agora para a Crew Dragon, da SpaceX, que estreou em 2020.
A SpaceX já voou 44 vezes para a ISS. A empresa de Elon Musk é a única opção dos Estados Unidos para viagens de astronautas para a ISS. O plano para tornar a Starliner, da Boeing, uma segunda opção tem avançado lentamente devido a obstáculos no desenvolvimento da cápsula.
O retorno da tripulação foi adiado por semanas devido a dois furacões que passaram pelo sudeste americano, perto das zonas de pouso esperadas da Crew Dragon.
Em uma entrevista coletiva pós-pouso, um representante da Nasa disse que "a tripulação está ótima" e não mencionou problemas com os astronautas. Mas citou problemas com os paraquedas.
Richard Jones, gerente adjunto do Programa de Tripulação Comercial da agência, disse que o conjunto inicial de paraquedas de frenagem sofreu impactos de detritos e que 1 dos 4 paraquedas de um conjunto subsequente demorou mais do que o esperado para se desdobrar.
Jones afirmou, porém, que os imprevistos não afetaram a segurança da tripulação. A espaçonave usada na missão estava em seu quinto voo e com 702 dias em órbita desde sua primeira missão.
Emissoras de televisões e rádio entraram com uma ação contra a Meta, dona do WhatsApp, Instagram e Facebook, por concorrência desleal e pedem mais de 160 milhões de euros (R$ 988,22 milhões).
Segundo informações da agência de notícias EFE, a ação foi protocolada na quinta-feira (24) por integrantes da Uteca (União de Televisões em Aberto, em tradução livre) e da AERC Radio Value (Associação Espanhola de Rádio) como as emissoras Atresmedia, Mediaset, Cadena SER, Cope, RAC1 e Onda Cero.
As empresas acusam a Meta de descumprir sistematicamente o Regulamento Geral de Proteção de Dados entre 2018 e 2023, o que levou a big tech a ter "vantagem ilícita na comercialização de publicidade online segmentada e personalizada".
No ano passado, a AMI (Associação dos Meios de Informação) da Espanha também entrou com um processo contra a Meta pelo mesmo crime. Os grupos Prisa, que publica o jornal El País, e Vocento, dona do jornal ABC, estão entre os signatários da ação.
No processo, a Uteca e a AERC Radio Value aponta que a Meta usou a base de dados de suas plataformas para realizar vendas personalizadas no mercado publicitário e obter vantagem na comercialização de anúncios sobre os concorrentes.
A dona do WhatsApp e Facebook contestou o processo movido pela AMI e afirmou que o caso não deveria ser julgado na Espanha, já que a empresa tem sede na Irlanda. Um juiz de um tribunal de Madri negou o argumento da empresa e manteve o processo, que ainda está em andamento.
Os astronautas na estação espacial Tiangong, da China, fizeram um vídeo que te leva para conhecer o interior do laboratório orbital sem sair de casa. Em cerca de sete minutos, os membros da missão Shenzhou-18 exploram o interior da estação concluída em 2022.
O novo vídeo foi publicado pela agência de notícias estatal CCTV. A sequência começa com os taikonautas (nome dado aos astronautas da China) mostrando a cozinha, onde há um pequeno aquecedor, um micro-ondas modificado e bolsas de água.
Também é possível ver um pouco dos dormitórios deles, que contêm uma vista para lá de especial: ali, a tripulação pode admirar a beleza da Terra imersa na escuridão do espaço. Finalmente, o vídeo mostra um pouco dos segmentos orbitais do laboratório, incluindo plantações de tomate e alface na estufa da estação.
A estação espacial chinesa Tiangong (nome que significa “Palácio Celeste”) foi construída pela agência espacial chinesa CMSA. Os três módulos que formam o complexo foram lançados entre 2021 e 2022.
Orbitando a Terra em uma altitude que varia de 340 km a 450 km, a Tiangong mede 55 metros de comprimento e pesa 70 toneladas — para comparação, a Estação Espacial Internacional se estende por 109 metros e pesa mais de 400 toneladas.
Agora que concluiu o laboratório orbital, a CMSA planeja manter a Tiangong sempre ocupada por pelo menos três astronautas durante uma década, no mínimo. Neste período, o laboratório vai receber experimentos científicos tanto da China quanto de outros países.
The Open Source Initiative (OSI) has released its official definition of “open” artificial intelligence, setting the stage for a clash with tech giants like Meta — whose models don’t fit the rules.
OSI has long set the industry standard for what constitutes open-source software, but AI systems include elements that aren’t covered by conventional licenses, like model training data. Now, for an AI system to be considered truly open source, it must provide:
This definition directly challenges Meta’s Llama, widely promoted as the largest open-source AI model. Llama is publicly available for download and use, but it has restrictions on commercial use (for applications with over 700 million users) and does not provide access to training data, causing it to fall short of OSI’s standards for unrestricted freedom to use, modify, and share.
Meta spokesperson Faith Eischen told The Verge that while “we agree with our partner OSI on many things,” the company disagrees with this definition. “There is no single open source AI definition, and defining it is a challenge because previous open source definitions do not encompass the complexities of today’s rapidly advancing AI models.”
“We will continue working with OSI and other industry groups to make AI more accessible and free responsibly, regardless of technical definitions,” Eischen added.
For 25 years, OSI’s definition of open-source software has been widely accepted by developers who want to build on each other’s work without fear of lawsuits or licensing traps. Now, as AI reshapes the landscape, tech giants face a pivotal choice: embrace these established principles or reject them. The Linux Foundation has also made a recent attempt to define “open-source AI,” signaling a growing debate over how traditional open-source values will adapt to the AI era.
“Now that we have a robust definition in place maybe we can push back more aggressively against companies who are ‘open washing’ and declaring their work open source when it actually isn’t,” Simon Willison, an independent researcher and creator of the open-source multi-tool Datasette, told The Verge.
Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue called OSI’s definition “a huge help in shaping the conversation around openness in AI, especially when it comes to the crucial role of training data.”
OSI’s executive director Stefano Maffulli says it took the initiative two years, consulting experts globally, to refine this definition through a collaborative process. This involved working with experts from academia on machine learning and natural language processing, philosophers, content creators from the Creative Commons world, and more.
While Meta cites safety concerns for restricting access to its training data, critics see a simpler motive: minimizing its legal liability and safeguarding its competitive advantage. Many AI models are almost certainly trained on copyrighted material; in April, The New York Times reported that Meta internally acknowledged there was copyrighted content in its training data “because we have no way of not collecting that.” There’s a litany of lawsuits against Meta, OpenAI, Perplexity, Anthropic, and others for alleged infringement. But with rare exceptions — like Stable Diffusion, which reveals its training data — plaintiffs must currently rely on circumstantial evidence to demonstrate that their work has been scraped.
Meanwhile, Maffulli sees open-source history repeating itself. “Meta is making the same arguments” as Microsoft did in the 1990s when it saw open source as a threat to its business model, Maffulli told The Verge. He recalls Meta telling him about its intensive investment in Llama, asking him “who do you think is going to be able to do the same thing?” Maffulli saw a familiar pattern: a tech giant using cost and complexity to justify keeping its technology locked away. “We come back to the early days,” he said.
Universal Music Group (UMG) announced a new deal centered on creating an “ethical” foundational model for AI music generation. It’s partnered with a company called Klay Vision that’s creating a “Large Music Model” named KLayMM and plans to launch out of stealth mode with a product within months. Ary Attie, its founder and CEO, said the company believes “the next Beatles will play with KLAY.”
The two say the model will work “in collaboration with the music industry and its creators,” without many details about how, while Klay plans to make music AI “more than a short-lived gimmick.”
This is how the companies explain their shared goals:
Building generative AI music models ethically and fully respectful of copyright, as well as name and likeness rights, will dramatically lessen the threat to human creators and stand the greatest opportunity to be transformational, creating significant new avenues for creativity and future monetization of copyrights.
As for how whatever it is they’re working on will affect human artists:
KLAY is developing a global ecosystem to host AI-driven experiences and content, including accurate attribution, and will not compete with artists’ catalogs in traditional music services.
UMG’s new partnership comes as it is involved in lawsuits against AI music generator sites and Anthropic, and in May, it ended a short stand-off with TikTok by signing a new licensing arrangement that covered, among other things, AI-generated music.
Klay is also run by chief content officer Thomas Hesse, who was previously Sony Music Entertainment’s president. Former Google Deepmind researcher Björn Winckler, who led the development of Google’s Lyria AI music model, is joining the company as its head of research.
This breakthrough represents a significant step in China’s ongoing efforts to become self-reliant in AI technology, especially in light of escalating US limitations on access to advanced semiconductors for its competitors.
According to the company’s Institute of AI, one of the models, TeleChat2-115B and another unnamed model were trained on tens of thousands of Chinese-made chips. This achievement is especially noteworthy given the tighter US export rules that have limited China’s ability to purchase high-end processors from Nvidia and other foreign companies. In a statement shared on WeChat, the AI institute claimed that this accomplishment demonstrated China’s capability to independently train LLMs and signals a new era of innovation and self-reliance in AI technology.
The scale of these models is remarkable. China Telecom stated that the unnamed LLM has one trillion parameters. In AI terminology, parameters are the variables that help the model in learning during training. The more parameters there are, the more complicated and powerful the AI becomes.
Chinese companies are striving to keep pace with global leaders in AI based outside the country. Washington’s export restrictions on Nvidia’s latest AI chips such as the A100 and H100, have compelled China to seek alternatives. As a result, Chinese companies have developed their own processors to reduce reliance on Western technologies. For instance, the TeleChat2-115B model has approximately 100 billion parameters, and therefore can perform as well as mainstream platforms.
China Telecom did not specify which company supplied the domestically-designed chips used to train its models. However, as previously discussed on these pages, Huawei’s Ascend chips play a key part in the country’s AI plans.
Huawei, which has faced US penalties in recent years, is also increasing its efforts in the artificial intelligence field. The company has recently started testing its latest AI processor, the Ascend 910C, with potential clients waiting in the domestic market. Large Chinese server companies, as well as internet giants that have previously used Nvidia chips, are apparently testing the new chip’s performance. Huawei’s Ascend processors, as one of the few viable alternatives to Nvidia hardware, are viewed as a key component of China’s strategy that will lessen its reliance on foreign technology.
In addition to Huawei, China Telecom is collaborating with other domestic chipmakers such as Cambricon, a Chinese start-up specialising in AI processors. The partnerships reflect a broader tendency in China’s tech industry to build a homegrown ecosystem of AI solutions, further shielding the country from the effects of US export controls.
By developing its own AI chips and technology, China is gradually reducing its dependence on foreign-made hardware, especially Nvidia’s highly sought-after and therefore expensive GPUs. While US sanctions make it difficult for Chinese companies to obtain the latest Nvidia hardware, a black market for foreign chips has emerged. Rather than risk operating in the grey market, many Chinese companies prefer to purchase lower-powered alternatives such as previous-gen models to maintain access to Nvidia’s official support and services.
China’s achievement reflects a broader shift in its approach to AI and semiconductor technology, emphasising self-sufficiency and resilience in an increasingly competitive global economy and in face of American protectionist trade policies.
They need to do this with phones and other devices. It would be great to be able to use a power supply from one cell phone to another. Even from android to iOS and vice versa.
Robert Downey Jr. appeared on a recent episode of the “On With Kara Swisher” podcast and sent a stern warning to Hollywood in the age of AI: “I intend to sue all future executives” who sign off on the creation of a Downey digital replica. The Oscar winner does not want his likeness being used on screen through AI technology and/or deepfakes. The topic came up in relation to Downey’s Marvel tenure as Iron Man, but he’s confident Marvel would not recreate his Tony Stark through AI.
“There’s two tracks. How do I feel about everything that’s going on? I feel about it minimally because I have an actual emotional life that’s occurring that doesn’t have a lot of room for that,” Downey said when asked about being digitally recreated in the future.
“To go back to the MCU, I am not worried about them hijacking my character’s soul because there’s like three or four guys and gals who make all the decisions there anyway and they would never do that to me, with or without me,” he added.
When host Kara Swisher said that “future executives certainly will” want to digitally recreate Downey on the big screen, the actor responded: “Well, you’re right. I would like to here state that I intend to sue all future executives just on spec.”
“You’ll be dead,” Swisher noted, to which Downey replied: “But my law firm will still be very active.”
Downey is currently confronting the future of AI on Broadway in the play “McNeal,” which takes aim at corporate giants in the AI space such as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
“I don’t envy anyone who has been over-identified with the advent of this new phase of the information age. The idea that somehow it belongs to them because they have these super huge start-ups is a fallacy,” Downey told Swisher about figures like Altman. “The problem is when these individuals believe that they are the arbiters of managing this but meanwhile are wanting and/or needing to be seen in a favorable light. That is a massive fucking error. It turns me off and makes me not want to engage with them because they are not being truthful.”
The legal system will, of course, have to catch up to the technology changes. I don't think it's right to use someone's likeness without their express permission and compensation.
South Korea may become the first nation to develop and deploy fully hydrogen fuel cell-powered main battle tanks.
South Korea’s Hyundai subsidiary Rotem has just unveiled its vision for the future of main battle tanks for the Republic of Korea (ROK), hydrogen-powered powertrains.
The next version of ROK’s K-series battle tanks, the K3, will be powered by hydrogen fuel cells and feature other advanced tech to become one of the world’s most sophisticated tanks.
The new hydrogen-powered K3 has been developed in collaboration with Korea’s Agency for Defense Development and other national technology research institutions. Once operational, the tank is hoped to enter production as soon as 2040, making it the world’s first.
The hydrogen fuel cells will replace the K-series diesel engines. This will be done in steps, with the first prototypes featuring hybrid hydrogen and diesel engines. It is just the latest in a line of announcements from South Korea in its broader aim to transition its war machines away from combustion engines.
Next-generation hydrogen-powered tanks
“Next-generation main battle tank surpasses all capabilities of today’s MBTs, providing more efficient mission employment with the latest technologies for future warfare. As battlefield conditions change, more changes are required to MBT’s firepower, command and control, and survivability to be more optimized and to create maximum combat synergy,” Hyundai Rotem explains on its website.
“Hyundai Rotem will proactively prepare for future warfare by developing next-generation main battle tanks capable of supplementing combatant’s capabilities and function replacements. Peacekeeping is our prioritized goal,” the company added.
The new K3 will feature improved stealth capabilities, autonomous driving and slave drones, and a new 130-mm smoothbore main gun. “The next-generation tank will have stronger preemptive strike capabilities using an artificial intelligence-based fire control system,” an official at Hyundai Rotem said.
The first of the island’s caissons, or foundations, are currently being built in Vlissingen (the Netherlands).
The European Investment Bank (EIB) has agreed to provide Elia Transmission Belgium (ETB) a $702 million (€650 million) grant to help it build the world’s first artificial energy island.
The artificial energy island, according to the details provided by Elia, will aim to provide Belgium with 3.5GW of new offshore wind capacity so as to enable its transmission to green energy.
The funds have been allocated for the realization of the first phase of the Princess Elisabeth Island project.
ETB also states that the project is essential for Belgian and European energy transition, “helping to bring large amounts of wind energy from the North Sea to the consumption centers on the mainland.”
The signing of the agreement took place on October 25 at the island’s Caisson yard in Vlissingen (NL).
World’s first artificial energy island
According to the Elia Group, the Princess Elisabeth Island will be constructed between 2024 and 2027, at about 27.9 miles (45 km) off the Belgian coast within the Princess Elisabeth wind zone.
The island is one of ETB’s key projects and is the world’s first artificial energy island.
The project aims to integrate 3.5 GW of additional offshore wind capacity into Belgium’s electricity grid, which can power more than three million households.
The Island will reduce the country’s dependence on fossil fuels and provide more affordable green electricity. It will also significantly contribute to the European Union meeting its renewable energy targets and climate-neutrality goal.
According to a press release from the Elia Group, “In addition to unlocking Belgium’s second offshore wind zone, the Princess Elisabeth Zone, the island will also serve as a landing point for additional interconnectors that will link Belgium to its neighbors.”
“Another important element for the EU bank is the project’s innovative nature, featuring hybrid interconnectors and a nature-inclusive design to foster biodiversity and support marine life, making it a benchmark for sustainable energy solutions.”
Google's African Investment Fund is a new investor in African fintech Moniepoint, which just closed $110 million in new financing led by DPI.
African fintech Moniepoint just closed $110 million in new financing, and it has landed Google’s Africa Investment Fund as a new investor. The Series C round was led by Development Partners International’s African Development Partners (ADP) III fund.
Other investors, including African private equity firm Verod Capital and existing investor Lightrock also participated.
Moniepoint, also backed by QED Investors, British International Investment (BII) and Endeavor Catalyst, has raised over $180 million since its launch in 2015.
According to the Financial Times, the round makes Moniepoint a unicorn — a private company with a valuation of $1 billion or more. The African fintech was last valued at nearly $800 million in a QED-led round two years ago.
Moniepoint initially focused on providing infrastructure and payment solutions for banks and financial institutions before pivoting to becoming a business banking provider, an area where it has found remarkable success.
The African fintech caters to small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) across Nigeria, offering working capital, business expansion loans, and business management tools such as expense management (business payment cards), accounting and bookkeeping solutions, and insurance.
The fintech claims it processes over 800 million transactions, with monthly total value exceeding $17 billion.
Revenue increased about 6% in the quarter from $7.42 billion in the same period a year ago. PayPal reported net income of $1.01 billion, or 99 cents per share, compared to $1.02 billion, or 93 cents per share, a year earlier.
It's the first earnings report for CEO Alex Chriss since he reached his one-year mark on the job in September. The stock is up 36% this year and 42% since Chriss joined the payments company, which at the time was mired in a deep slump due to increased competition and a declining take rate, or the percentage of revenue PayPal keeps from each transaction.
Infraspeak has raised $19.5 million in a Series B round of funding to bring collaboration to facilities management.
It might not be the sexiest of subjects, but facilities management is central to any business that has a physical premises — the bigger that footprint becomes, the more complex it gets.
Portuguese startup Infraspeak has set out to address that with an all-in-one platform that gives facility managers and associated service providers insights and operational control over everything that goes on in a given location.
Founded in 2015, Infraspeak has hitherto raised around $20 million in funding, and secured big-name customers such as KFC, Intercontinental and Primark. And to drive its next phase of growth, the Porto-based startup on Monday said it has raised a further €18 million ($19.5 million) in Series B funding.
Consider a healthcare firm with myriad departments, equipment and contractors spanning various disciplines such as maintenance and cleaning — a lot needs to be coordinated and managed.
The growth in demand for AI could come at a cost to Europe's decarbonization goals as the specialized chips used by firms like Nvidia are expected to result in a rise in energy use of already power-hungry data centers.
The boom in artificial intelligence is ushering in an environmentally conscious shift in how data centers operate, as European developers face pressure to lower the water temperatures of their energy-hungry facilities to accommodate the higher-powered chips of firms such as tech giant Nvidia.
AI is estimated to drive a 160% growth in demand for data centers by 2030, research from Goldman Sachs shows — an increase that could come at a cost to Europe's decarbonization goals, as the specialized chips used by AI firms are expected to hike the energy use of the data centers that deploy them.
High-powered chips — also known as graphics processing units, or GPUs — are essential for training and deploying large language models, which are a type of AI. These GPUs need high density computing power and produce more heat, which ultimately requires colder water to support reliable cooling of the chips.
AI can consume 120 kilowatts of energy in just one square meter of a data center, which is equivalent to the power consumption and heat dissipation of around 15 to 25 houses, according to Andrey Korolenko, chief product and infrastructure officer at Nebius, who referred specifically to the deployment of Nvidia's Blackwell GB200 chip.
The problem we've got with the chipmakers, is AI is now a space race run by the American market where land rights, energy access and sustainability are relatively low on the pecking order, and where market domination is key," Winterson told CNBC
The price of bitcoin was last higher by about 2% at $71,048.36, according to Coin Metrics. Ether jumped 5%.
Stocks tied to the price of the cryptocurrency rose in tandem with it in premarket trading. Crypto exchange platform Coinbase and bitcoin proxy MicroStrategy advanced 3% and 5%, respectively.
Bitcoin has struggled to reclaim $70,000 this year
The last time bitcoin touched $70,000 was in June. It has tested that level several times this year, after hitting a record in March of $73,797.68, but earlier forays above $70,000 have been mere blips.
Fixing the climate crisis is a vast, world-sized puzzle. But one particularly large piece of this ginormous conundrum is construction and real estate —
Fixing the climate crisis is a vast, world-sized puzzle. But one particularly large piece of this ginormous conundrum is construction and real estate — which collectively amount for around 40% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Enter Munich-based data startup Emidat, which has built a software platform for automating the generation of validated Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) certificates for the construction sector.
EPDs are a critical piece of the puzzle for understanding and mitigating the climate impact of the built environment. They require undertaking a product lifecycle assessment (LCA) to declare standardized info about the environmental impact of construction materials and products at each stage of their lifecycle, from production through use to end-of-life.
The problem is that EPDs are typically an arduous and expensive piece of paperwork for manufacturers to produce, says Emidat CEO and co-founder Lisa Oberaigner.
This is where the startup’s data platform comes in, opening up a digital channel for ingesting product data and automating environmental impact declarations via a queryable database that accepts uploads via API, Excel, or BIM (building information modelling); and can itself be accessed via API and UI.
By standardizing the construction sector’s EPD reporting for products, the startup thinks its data layer will fire up the incentive for manufacturers to compete to produce more sustainable buildings materials, helping to shrink the carbon footprint of future builds as a byproduct of platform-enabled transparency.
“The really large manufacturers, the ones that are responsible for these emissions, it’s not like they don’t know how to decarbonize; they know exactly what they need to do, and they invest a lot in these new technologies to produce sustainably,” Oberaigner said. “Now they cannot charge for it, and with what we do, they can put a price tag on it — show that it’s actually more sustainable.
“Almost all expertise, it doesn’t matter whether you’re talking about primary care physicians, mental health therapists, oncologists, structural engineers or accountants — all of it can be near free,” he said on Monday in a conversation with TechCrunch editor-in-chief Connie Loizos at the TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 conference.
When asked why he is so optimistic about an AI-infused future, Khosla said that the world where most human labor is free will have “great abundance,” adding that GDP growth will increase from “2% to well over 5%.”
Apple’s state-of-the-art Audio Lab in Cupertino, California, supports the innovative work of its acoustic engineers. They use the lab to conduct user studies in various listening rooms and test new features in its anechoic chambers, which completely absorb reflective sounds and isolate external noise.
The Audio Lab is the hub for the design, measurement, tuning, and validation of all of Apple’s products with speakers or microphones. It’s also the center for Apple’s multiyear, cross-team collaboration to build the groundbreaking new hearing health features on AirPods Pro 2. Available today as a free software update,1 the end-to-end experience helps minimize exposure to loud environmental noise with Hearing Protection, track hearing with an at-home Hearing Test, and receive assistance for perceived mild to moderate hearing loss using AirPods Pro as a clinical-grade Hearing Aid.
According to the World Health Organization, approximately 1.5 billion people around the world are living with hearing loss. “Hearing loss affects individuals in every region and country, yet often goes unrecognized. Hearing is a core component of communication for so many and is an important factor for health and wellbeing,” says Shelly Chadha, M.D., the World Health Organization’s technical lead for hearing. “Technology can play an important role in raising awareness and providing intervention options for those affected by hearing loss.”
“Every person’s hearing is different, so we created an innovative, end-to-end hearing health experience that addresses this variability in a way that’s both simple to use and adaptable to a wide range of needs. That’s especially important because hearing loss affects people of all ages with different levels of tech savviness,” says Sumbul Desai, M.D., Apple’s vice president of Health. “With the Hearing Aid feature, we wanted to build something so intuitive, it felt like an extension of your senses. We knew the results would literally change people’s lives — and democratize access to treatment for a condition that affects more than a billion people.”
Engineers used highly specialized spaces across the Audio Lab to help make these breakthrough features possible.
“From the quietest sounds we can hear for the Hearing Test feature, to speech in noisy restaurants for the Hearing Aid feature, and even concert levels for Hearing Protection, we can bring the real world into our acoustics facilities with playback of calibrated soundscapes from all over the world, or take accurate acoustic measurements at the touch of a button,” says Kuba Mazur, Apple’s hearing health lead engineer within Acoustics Engineering.
The Longwave anechoic chamber was built on a separate foundation that uses springs to isolate it from the rest of the lab, allowing for accurate sound measurements without any noise or vibration disturbances. The chamber includes a custom-built loudspeaker and microphone arc that can measure head-related transfer functions, or in other words, how sound interacts with the human body. Having both the loudspeaker and microphone arrays within this chamber makes it a unique space with many applications, including AirPods, iPhone, and HomePod development.
Oversubscribed Ventures co-founder Sara Foster (above right) made a confession onstage on Monday at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024
“I don’t even have ChatGPT on my phone,” she said.
It’s an unexpected comment from an investor, given that ChatGPT is arguably the most influential product to launch this decade. But what makes the Foster sisters different from career venture capitalists is also their greatest strength: they’re creatives first, and tech industry investors second.
Across their careers, the Foster sisters, Erin and Sara, have co-founded the clothing line Favorite Daughter, co-led creative for Bumble Bizz and Bumble BFF, and currently co-host a podcast together. Erin Foster even created the top Netflix show “Nobody Wants This,” starring Kristen Bell.
“Even calling it Oversubscribed Ventures was really a nod to our sense of humor because we know that this is not a space that we naturally belong in,” Erin said onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024. “We aren’t trying to cosplay as fund managers, you know? We’re trying to be ourselves and take our unique point of view, and our skill sets, and bring it into this world and inject that in an authentic and honest way without pretending to be anything different than we are.”
The Open Cloud Coalition (OCC) counts 10 members at launch, the most notable of which is Google, supported by international and local cloud providers Centerprise International, Civo, Gigas, ControlPlane, DTP Group, Prolinx, Pulsant, Clairo and Room 101. Part of the collective’s work will involve conducting cloud market research and presenting the results to regulators in the European Union and the U.K., while “engaging in consultations on competition and market fairness,” according to a statement.
The launch comes hours after Microsoft’s deputy general counsel Rima Alaily preempted the announcement, publishing a blog post accusing Google of conducting a “shadow campaign” to influence cloud regulation in Europe. Alaily called the new organization an “astroturf group organized by Google,” adding that the search giant had “gone through great lengths to obfuscate its involvement, funding and control” by using smaller European cloud providers as the face of the coalition.
The OCC is broadly comparable to another industry trade organization called the Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe (CISPE), which launched in 2017 and has Amazon’s AWS as its flagship member alongside several dozen smaller players. Indeed, the OCC is a direct response to a settlement Microsoft reached with CISPE members (not including AWS) to abandon an antitrust complaint against a licensing change Microsoft had made in 2019, which made it more expensive to run its enterprise software on rival cloud services.
In the summer of 2020, a fire broke out onboard a naval ship docked in San Diego Bay.
In the summer of 2020, a fire broke out onboard a naval ship docked in San Diego Bay. For more than four days, the USS Bonhomme Richard burned as helicopters dropped buckets of water from above, boats spewed water from below, and firefighters rushed onboard to control the blaze. Before the embers had even cooled, lidar (Light Detection and Ranging) scans were taken to assess how bad the damage was and to figure out how the fire even started.
But the investigation was stalled, partially because of how hard it is to send lidar scans.
Today’s leading cloud storage services — Google Drive, DropBox, iCloud, and OneDrive — don’t support the massive three dimensional files (sometimes, multiple terabytes in size) used with lidar technology. The naval unit in San Diego was forced to overnight thumb drives and Blu-ray discs, containing lidar scans of the charred naval ship, to authorities around the country.
That’s what inspired U.S. Army veteran Clark Yuan to launch Stitch3D, a browser-based platform that lets you view, share, annotate, interact with, and manage your large 3D files. Each file is stored as a “point cloud”: a collection of millions of discrete points with x, y, and z coordinate values that digitally represent a 3D scene. If Stitch3D existed, it may have been easier to send lidar scans of the USS Bonhomme Richard.
For anyone who parties or goes out dancing, the risk of accidentally taking adulterated drugs is a real one.
For anyone who parties or goes out dancing, the risk of accidentally taking adulterated drugs is a real one. MabLab, presenting today on the Startup Battlefield stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024, has created a testing strip that detects the five most common and dangerous additives in minutes.
Co-founders Vienna Sparks and Skye Lam met in high school, and during college the pair lost a friend to overdose. It’s a story that, sadly, many people (including myself) can identify with. Thankfully, testing strips are a common sight now at venues and health centers, with hundreds of millions shipping yearly.
If you haven’t seen them, the strips work like this: You dissolve a bit of the substance to be tested in a provided buffer solution, then dip the strip in. The liquid travels up the paper, reaching a treated area that changes color in the presence of an unwanted additive. They’re simple and effective, but limited in that they only detect one thing, most commonly fentanyl.
“We have an opportunity to replace that with a better version,” said Lam — one that detects five common lacing chemicals simultaneously: fentanyl, methamphetamine, benzodiazepine, xylazine, and methadone.
The company’s innovation is “a mix of physical and chemical,” said Sparks: “There’s a zone specifically designed for each agent, and we’re using novel treatments and materials on the strip to allow capillary action to occur without incurring cross-reactivity.”
Ford Motor said on Monday it expects to hit the lower end of its full-year profit guidance, dropping the company's shares 5% in after-hours trading, as a price war hits the U.S. automaker's bottom line.
Ford expects $10 billion EBIT this year, down from $10 billion-$12 billion range
Third-quarter profit fell less than expected
Ford faces $5-billion loss on EVs this year despite cost improvements
Ford expects to earn about $10 billion in earnings before interest and taxes this year, down from its prior range of $10 billion to $12 billion.
"No doubt, there's a global price war, and it's fueled by over-capacity, a flood of new EV nameplates and massive compliance pressure," CEO Jim Farley said on a call with analysts.
Ford has also been weighed down this year by high warranty costs and problems with its supply chain, worsened by recent hurricanes, Chief Financial Officer John Lawler said.
Third-quarter profit fell less than expected, however.
The company reported third-quarter net income of $900 million, or 22 cents per share, down from 30 cents a year ago. Results were hurt by a $1-billion charge it took on cancelling production of a three-row electric SUV in August.
Researchers are investigating how quantum computing could be used in calculations to stabilize cyclic ozone within fullerene cages, potentially leading to more efficient rocket propellants with up to 33% increased payload capacity — potentially a savings of millions per launch.
While the theoretical benefits are substantial, the practical application remains far off due to the immense computational resources required and unresolved technical hurdles.
If successful, quantum-assisted propellants could revolutionize rocket efficiency and reduce costs, but the technology is not yet ready for immediate implementation in the rocket-space industry.
The rocket-space industry is always on the lookout for ways to improve efficiency, reduce costs and push the boundaries of what’s possible in space exploration.
A recent study by HRL Laboratories and Boeing, published on the preprint server arXiv, explores a new approach that could lead to significant advancements in rocket propulsion by leveraging quantum computing. The focus is on stabilizing a high-energy-density molecule, cyclic ozone, within fullerene cages—a development that could dramatically enhance rocket fuel efficiency.
Cyclic ozone is an attractive candidate for rocket fuel due to its high energy density. However, its extreme reactivity has historically made it impossible to isolate and utilize effectively. The researchers propose that encapsulating cyclic ozone within fullerene cages, a type of carbon molecule, could stabilize the molecule and make it viable for use as a rocket propellant. This approach is similar to strategies previously considered for hydrogen storage and could potentially increase the specific impulse of rocket fuel—a measure of fuel efficiency—by up to 33%.
A 33% increase in specific impulse could translate to rockets carrying significantly more payload, thereby reducing the cost per launch and enhancing the overall efficiency of space missions. For instance, a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, which currently can carry up to 63,800 kg to low Earth orbit (LEO), could potentially carry an additional 21,000 kg of payload if this technology were implemented. This would have profound implications for both commercial and scientific missions, offering more flexibility and capability at a lower cost.
After playing softball at the University of Washington, she spent almost 20 years working in marketing and sales for teams like the Oakland Raiders and the New York Rangers. But while Jeffries was leading fan retention initiatives at Madison Square Garden, she noticed a glaring opportunity.
“My whole job was to focus on extracting the lifetime value out of the fans, but quite obviously, there’s an over indexing of attention on fans in the building,” she said. “The majority of fans are outside of an arena […] and there’s no platform, no way to scale in-person experiences that we know will trigger their loyalty.”
By 2022, Jeffries launched VRTL, an enterprise platform for entertainment companies — from sports teams to record labels — to capitalize on virtual fan experiences.
“It’s a very versatile platform that combines livestream, video chat, and then our proprietary suite of fan engagement experiences to drive those loyalties,” she said.
What makes VRTL, which pitched onstage today as part of the Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024, different from any other video chat or livestream service is not only that it gives clients valuable data, but also that it has proprietary fan engagement tools.
I'm looking for a technology that would allow to watch any youtube video from common languages (eg: english, french, german, spanish) in other common languages. Possibly with seconds delay but that would not be a concern since we can delay the video rendering to sync audio/video.
I'm a nerd and deep into IT and AI but didn't took time to look into that particular field deeply.
Pixel phones already have "interpreter mode" - they will translate audio being spoken between two languages. They do this in real time like an interpreter would.
I imagine the additional challenge for what you're asking for is just the audio mixing. The only added step is that you would need to take the "background noise" and mix the new spoken audio back in.
I went on a trip to Norway this June, 10000km all the way to Nordkapp. I expected at least something to go wrong, and one of my rear brake calipers got stuck and I lost braking, Immediately stopped and somehow stopped right in front of a service.
With the help of my Pixel 7's interpreter mode I managed to talk to the mechanic just closing the shop and he looked at the smoking brake, told me to wait a few minutes for it to cool down and see if it works again, and it did.
At that moment I realized how much more of a hassle that would have been if not for my P7, truly we're at a level where we can travel anywhere and do anything without any help.... As long as there's internet connection lol
I work on dubbed translation software. Right now, our translation process is theoretically realtime (without lip syncing), taking about a minute per minute of audio. It just has some added setup time per each request that's mostly a scaling issue, and the website's UI is not actually set up to do realtime translation yet (instead it just takes in a video, translates the whole thing, and spits it out).
But realtime dubbed translation is absolutely possible with current tech, there's just some mostly non-ML-related barriers. u/perrochon is right about the legal issues. Realistically, what you'll more likely see soon is YouTubers adding multilingual audio tracks to their videos themselves as YouTube begins to roll out that feature more widely. If you know any YouTubers that might be interested, send them our contact :)
now. Ai is replacing translators AND interpreters in every legal and administrative space already. Humans hopefully will have literature as a last bastion for a few years still. Source: I’m a translator. The industry is in shambles. The worst aspect of it is not losing you job, but losing respect for your work, clients saying shit like: but the AI said something different when I translated it, and having to explain idioms to an idiot.
YouTube has had machine generation of subtitles and then machine translation of those subtitles for a decade. All it needs after that is text-to-speech which is not hard. Translation is much quicker than the necessary transcoding of the video stream.
The reasons it's not there on YouTube are manifold, and include product (many people hate dubbing and want subtitles) and legal (you are making another audio track with the copyrighted sounds, you are wholesale using someone else's video to make a new video, the owner of the original content may not like the auto generated new sound track, etc.)
I don't think you need AI for this. Firefox is already beta testing auto website translation and you've been able to copy and paste text into google translate for years. If you're into to this and want to create it you just need a three step program.
Audio transcription
Text translation
Text to speech
That's it. If you're looking to incorporate AI then maybe something that samples the speakers voice on the fly and reuses it in step 3 would provide for a babblefish like experience rather than an automatic voiceover.
While you can do this without AI, AI can potentially offer some benefit. Primarily, it can learn to understand the context of what's being discussed and translate meaning more so than just words.
Translating words for words is one thing, but when a certain phrase has an unconventional meaning in one language when used in a specific context, and you translate the words to a different language, that meaning can be lost. Being able to use AI to understand those nuances, and hold context on an ongoing conversation, can potentially make the real-time translation much more meaningful (by translating the underlying message, not just the words).
I was at the planetarium on Cozumel, and watched their video presentation with live subtitles courtesy of my phone. It wasn't perfect but good enough to follow what was going on.
I'm a professional interpreter, you won't be getting a service from AI like you can from me any time soon. Interpreting is human activity for humans and AI often confuses natural glitches in conversations as ends of sentences to name just one of its fundamental shortcomings.
There are actually some apps that do a pretty damn okay job at that already...They're getting better very rapidly...
It honestly wouldn't surprise me if you could get almost real time translation through an ear bud from your phone or other device within the next decade at the rate we're moving...
Assuming society doesn't implode before then...lol
There are fundamental linguistic challenges to actual real time challenges. Take this German sentence from an article in Der Spiegel:
In den aktuellen Gesprächen werde es darum gehen müssen, die Notwendigkeit eines von der Regierung in Gänze getragenen wirtschaftspolitischen Konzeptes zu betonen.
google translate renders it as
The current talks will have to focus on emphasizing the need for an economic policy concept that is fully supported by the government.
In the English, “emphazing” is the 9th word. In the German, it comes from “zu betonen“, right at the end. You could not construct the full English translation until you had the full German sentence, right to the end. Fundamentally the structure of the languages are different in this way. This means the best you can hope for with on the fly translation is for a sentence to be translated after it is fully complete.
This exists!! I learned about this app a few months ago from someone on Reddit and tried it during a conference call with people who were speaking a different language and it worked (mostly) flawlessly. I fully understood the conversation in real time.
The app is called 3P0 and from what I understand it's from an independent dev who frequents Reddit. Pretty cool tech, honestly.
Even if the computer was hyper advanced, and the algorithms have been perfectly trained.
It would never be possible because different languages have different sentence structures. Japanese sentence structure is nearly reverse of English, for instance.
So even a perfect translator would have to wait for them to finish their sentence before it could spit it out for you.
Originally introduced to the world in 2018, Livio AI hearing aids significantly altered how many individuals use and think of hearing aids. And why is that? Because Livio AI was the first multi-purpose hearing device that not only sounds better than other hearing aids out there, it also lets you track your brain and body health, stream music, phone calls and more from your smartphone, and translate languages as you hear them.
Select the language you speak and then choose the language of the person you plan to engage in a conversation with.*
When you speak into your iPhone®, the Thrive Hearing app translates your speech and displays it on the screen in the other person’s language. Simply then show them the screen so they can see what you’re saying.
Alternatively, when the other person speaks into your phone, the app will translate their speech, display it in your language on the phone, and also stream the translated text to your hearing aids in your language.
Now, this same great technology has been updated to create an even better sounding hearing aid - Evolv AI. These outstanding hearing aids have the ability to translate 27 languages as you hear them! It’s easier to communicate with individuals who speak a different language - simply by using the translation tool in the Thrive Hearing app.
How Will Real-Time Translation Shape the Future of Language Learning?
With fast advancements in real-time translation and AI tools like video dubbing, I wonder if language learning will become less popular in the future.
Learning a new language takes a lot of time and effort. In 10-20 years, as technology reduces language barriers, will fewer people find it worth the investment? Could fluency in foreign languages become rarer as a result?
People who learn a language because they genuinely want to will likely continue to do so, but people who learn a language because they have to probably won't do it.
I'm curious to hear your thoughts. This is just a thought experiment—I believe language learning has many unique benefits that technology can't replace!
It'll be like Star Trek where the machine isn't even visible during a face to face conversation. People will just have their headphones popped in listening to the live translation. People already walk around with headphones in all the time
I can't imagine "real time" translation will truly happen, there will always be a delay of some sort.
(To clarify: when I think "real time translation", I'm thinking, like, an earpiece you wear that translates what somebody is saying as they're saying it, giving the impression that they are speaking your language)
Sentence structure varies so much between languages that this type of translation simply isn't feasible. For example: type a moderately complex sentance into DeepL (example) and watch how the translated sentence transforms wildly with nearly every new word.
For instance, the sentance "he has been taking care of his grandmother for twenty dollars an hour".
"he has" -> "tiene", as in has "he possesses"
"he has been" -> "ha sido". as in "he has been [a doctor]"
"he has been taking" -> "ha estado tomando" as in "he has been taking [medicine]"
etc etc.
Yeah, a real time would be hard with changes in syntax, not only things like noun/verb order would demand a delay, but bigger issues of syntax like SVO, SOV etc. It could get close to instantaneous, but never quite the speed of someone who just speaks the language.
Meaning gets lost in translation, anyone who speaks more than one language knows this. French poems translated to English don’t feel the same, English literature translated to French doesn’t feel the same.
People learn languages to feel other cultures, not simply understand them.
I don't think it will change much of anything. Unless we can forgo language entirely and just skip straight to transmitting direct meaning. THAT will be revolutionary in many many many ways. For good AND for bad....
It is just my opinion, but I don't think computer programs will ever be as good as humans. I spent an entire career as a software programs, so I know how programs work.
Programs are created by humans. Human language experts work out the grammar of a language, and they work with programmers who turn all the rules into numbers. No matter how smart the humans are, they are creating a set of rules in advance. The computer has zero intelligence. It can only run the rules (after they are turned into numbers) that the humans create. So nobody intelligent sees the actual sentence you are translating. A computer program is just following a large set of rules created by humans in the past.
For translation, you have the grammars of different languages. Only a human who is fluent in both languages can create the set of rules. And how many rules are needed? The good thing is that many different human experts can all contribute to the same set of rules. Once the rules are written down, they won't be forgotten. A good translation program is probably many man-years of work.
The real issue is this: can a set of rules translate every sentence correctly? Or are languages too complicated?
Good "AI" translation is straight-up impossible because 1:1 translation is impossible, things can be conveyed in one language that there's no easy way to express in another and while there's ways for creative translators to still convey those ideas, it's something that "AI" simply can't do. "AI" translations are going to create more language learners if they catch on at all, because "AI" translations are so shallow and low quality (if not outright incomprehensible) that they force you to learn the language if you want to get the original point at all.
are people forgetting that actual humans, communities, and societies speak the languages that you learn ????? why learn a language for translation purposes and ONLY use it for translation purposes??? whatever happened to actually TALKING TO PEOPLE ....... what the hell
The thing that OP is referring to would be instant translation that DOES allow you to talk to people seemlessly and as easily as if you were talking to them directly.
I love learning languages and really hope AI doesn’t replace human translation, but I’m sure it will.
All these folks mentioning the nuances of languages and the impossibility of machines grasping the intricacies of human communication don’t seem recognise the sheer power and the barely imaginable future abilities of computers, I believe.
Hope I’m dead long before it happens, but I reckon AI’s coming for all you translators’ jobs!!
Already because of how prevalent English has become, and because of online translation tools, there is less of a need for translators.
The universities in my country have abandoned some of the smaller language choices and reduced the number of students they accept.
I do find it worrying. Although you might be able to communicate with all these people, then especially politically, it is important to be able to understand what is going on in countries in their own language. If you get it all in a filtered way, you are going to lose out on details and attitudes that might be important.
I think that needing to be comfortable in the written version of the language is already much less important. Translation and generative AI can already do the writing for you, good enough for 90% of situations.
But, I do think speaking is something that will still be an important skill to learn.
Imagine you're at a business networking event and the guy next to you has learnt English and can speak it himself, while you're trying to rely on some real-time translator tech. The other guy will have the edge.
Imagine going on a date or having a romantic relationship with someone where you only communicate by translation tech. It just doesn't seem the same.
I don’t think it’s gonna replace language learning soon but god I wish it’d happen soon to replace my language learning. Absolutely hate it, but have to. Real time face to face translation would also be great in eliminating code switching so I don’t have to bother to speak my native language ever again, that’d be a massive improvement in quality of life as well.
But yeah, I agree that language learning purely as a tool might get rarer, just like people don’t ride horses around as a means of transportation that commonly anymore; but riding a horse for fun and even for transportation too didn’t get replaced by the invention and proliferation of cars.
DGLegacy, a company that’s designed a digital legacy planning and inheritance app, presented today at TechCrunch Disrupt Startup Battlefield.
DGLegacy, a company that’s designed a digital legacy planning and inheritance app, pitched today at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 Startup Battlefield to detail how it’s helping people ensure that their loved ones inherit their assets.
Founded by husband-and-wife duo Ana Mineva and Peter Minev, DGLegacy allows users to proactively inform their beneficiaries of their assets and ensure they are aware of their passwords and other information in order to claim them. The idea behind the app is to minimize the chance of an unclaimed asset.
Unlike traditional asset protection tools like trusts and wills, which can become outdated soon after their creation, DGLegacy lets you keep a continuously updated catalog of your assets and ensures that beneficiaries will always have access to it.
With DGLegacy, you can catalog your assets and upload relevant files to the respective asset. You can then invite beneficiaries and trustees to ensure that they will be informed about their designated assets.
The app features multi-layer encryption to ensure that all of the information is stored securely.
“The most important thing about DGLegacy is that it allows you to not only catalog very securely and easily your digital assets, but also has a proprietary protocol for detecting a fatal event,” Peter told TechCrunch. “Only when a fatal event is detected, then we trigger the digital inheritance.”
On October 21, Radio Krakow announced that it was revamping its OFF station, introducing three AI-created voice hosts representing Generation Z.
In yet another example of how most people don't want AI replacing humans – no matter how much executives say it saves money – a Polish radio station has abandoned an experiment where its journalists were dismissed and replaced with AI "presenters." The test was supposed to last three months, but the station decided to end it after just a week following a massive backlash from the public.
On October 21, Radio Krakow announced that it was revamping its OFF station, introducing three AI-created voice hosts representing Generation Z. These avatars were 20-year-old journalism student and pop culture expert Emilia Nowa, 22-year-old Acoustic Engineering student Jakub Zielinski, and 23-year-old former psychology student Alex, who is "socially engaged, passionately discussing topics related to identity [and] queer culture."
Response to the move was about as vitriolic as one would expect. Exacerbating the anger was the fact that Radio Kraków's human hosts were no longer at the station because they were "external collaborators" who had not had their contracts renewed, and "not because of AI," claimed editor-in-chief Marcin Pulit.
In an Amazon-level move of PR brilliance, the radio decided that the first thing the AIs should do is interview Wislawa Szymborska, the Nobel Prize-winning Polish poet and writer who died in 2012. This was, of course, another AI recreation, leading to even more outrage.
Torvalds said that the current state of AI technology is 90 percent marketing and 10 percent factual reality.
In a nutshell: Linus Torvalds never minces words when asked to comment on open-source support or the latest technology trends. The Finnish software engineer recently joined an open-source focused event, where he had a thing or two to say about AI technology and "intelligent" algorithms.
Torvalds said that the current state of AI technology is 90 percent marketing and 10 percent factual reality. The developer, who won Finland's Millennium Technology Prize for the creation of the Linux kernel, was interviewed during the Open Source Summit held in Vienna, where he had the chance to talk about both the open-source world and the latest technology trends.
The outspoken technologist said that modern generative AI services are an interesting development in machine learning technology, and that they will eventually change the world. At the same time, he expressed his dissatisfaction with the "hype cycle" which is fueling too many AI-related initiatives and contributing to Nvidia's impossibly high market evaluations.
Everyone and their dog is currently talking about AI, or sticking some AI-based cloud service together, or funding an AI-focused multi-million startup somewhere in the world. Torvalds hates the hype cycle so much that he doesn't even want to go there. The developer is essentially ignoring everything AI, though things will likely change in a drastic way a few years from now.
Linus Torvalds says AI will change the world but it is currently 90% marketing and 10% reality, and it will take another 5 years for it to become clear what AI is really useful for pic.twitter.com/6knFEfJbqf
New Apple Intelligence features are now available on recent iPhone models, iPads, and Macs.
The big picture: Apple has launched its answer to the generative AI models and features offered by the likes of OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft. Although Apple Intelligence is now available to owners of compatible devices, many of its intended features are still slated for release in the coming months. Furthermore, leaked internal communications suggest that its capabilities currently fall significantly behind those of ChatGPT.
New Apple Intelligence features are now available on recent iPhone models, iPads, and Macs. Users can access the generative AI suite by updating the operating systems to iOS 18.1, iPadOS 18.1, and macOS Sequoia 15.1.
Supported devices include the iPhone 15 Pro, all iPhone 16 models, and all devices with Apple M-series processors. Apple Intelligence currently only supports US English. The December update will add support for Australian, Canadian, Irish, New Zealand, South African, and UK English. Beginning in April and continuing throughout 2025, Apple will expand support to Chinese, Indian English, French, German, Spanish, and additional languages.
With the Writing Tools function, Apple Intelligence can edit, summarize, and rewrite text in Mail, Notes, Pages, Messages, and other apps. It can proofread, make alterations, and explain its editing choices to enhance users' writing, similar to Grammarly. Moreover, selected text can be condensed into bullet points, lists, or tables.
The summarization feature also works on notifications, long message chains, and recorded phone calls. When Apple Intelligence begins recording, all participants are immediately notified.
In 2006, a mere eight years after Larry Page and Sergey Brin released Google on the world, a UK couple launched a comparison-shopping website called Foundem
The cost of justice: The European Court of Justice (the EU's Supreme Court) has upheld a lower court's ruling that Google must pay a £2.4 billion fine for market abuse. The decision came after a 15-year David and Goliath battle between the search giant and a little-known and less-remembered shopping website.
In 2006, a mere eight years after Larry Page and Sergey Brin released Google on the world, a UK couple launched a comparison-shopping website called "Foundem." Adam and Shivaun Raff had high expectations for their business because it offered more than other price-hunting sites.
In those days, websites that helped customers compare prices online were just getting their start, and they primarily specialized in one product, like airfare. One day, Adam had the idea of a website that compared prices of virtually any product the customer desired, and Foundem was formed.
The Raffs launched their website in 2006 and almost immediately noticed traffic to their page decreasing instead of increasing. The couple had both worked in the tech industry. Adam worked with supercomputers, and Shivaun had a career in software consulting. They knew something was wrong with their traffic results and knew where to look.
While Google was surfacing Foundem pages deep in results, other search engines listed it at the top or at least on the first page for queries like "price comparison" or "shopping." As it turned out, Google's search engine was hitting the website with automated spam penalties, which down-ranked their site as to be essentially invisible.
The couple thought it was a glitch with the algorithm. Google surely wouldn't penalize their website intentionally.
Google Chrome risks becoming an inferior browser, at least when it comes to blocking invasive ads.
Chrome-less: Google is enforcing a significant shift for Chrome extension developers by making the newer Manifest V3 framework mandatory. However, many other Chromium-based browsers are choosing not to follow suit, allowing them to maintain enhanced ad-blocking capabilities compared to Chrome.
Google Chrome risks becoming an inferior browser, at least when it comes to blocking invasive ads. Google replaced Manifest V2 with Manifest V3, forcing extension developers to adopt a less effective technology in exchange for a claimed increase in overall browser security. However, Opera Software recently confirmed that it will not follow suit and will retain Manifest V2 support in its Chromium-based browser.
The newly launched Opera One R2, which the company touts as the "best Opera browser" to date, is primarily geared toward enhancing support for generative AI algorithms. The Opera One rebranding, introduced in 2023, is intended as a "new" Opera browser, purpose-built around AI services from the ground up.
Opera One R2 introduces new AI-driven features including an enhanced command line for interacting with its AI component, Aria, as well as image generation and other advanced capabilities. Opera also debuted a refreshed design aimed at showcasing the future look of web browsers, featuring dynamic themes, animated backgrounds, and "browser sounds." While sound effects in browsers were around back in the Windows 98 era, AI integration promises a more immersive experience.
An update on the dock's product page highlights the numerous challenges the team has faced during development, which started by assuming their manufacturing partner
Recap: It's been more than three years since Playdate maker Panic first teased a multi-purpose docking station for the quirky handheld. The aptly-named Playdate Stereo Dock was meant to serve as a charging station for the console, and double as a Bluetooth speaker (and a pen holder), but now it's unclear if the accessory will ever see the light of day.
An update on the dock's product page highlights the numerous challenges the team has faced during development, which started by assuming their manufacturing partner – with plenty of experience making Bluetooth speakers – could easily design the electronic on their behalf. Had it worked, it would have saved Panic lots of time and money.
Things went smoothly at first, but the factory ended up outsourcing the Bluetooth chipset and software to another company in a different country. Unsurprisingly, quality suffered.
Panic said the dock would crash often, especially when rapidly adjusting the volume. Pairing and unpairing was also a pain point and when music was played through the speaker, it flat out sounded bad.
red_panda is a mysterious new image generation model that is beating other top models. The model is over 100 times faster than OpenAI's DALL-E3. It is unknown which company made the model and when it will be released. AI companies are increasingly using community benchmarks to drum up anticipation ahead of announcements, so it is likely a reveal will be coming soon.
A mysterious new image generation model is beating models from Midjourney, Black Forest Labs, and OpenAI on the crowdsourced Artificial Analysis benchmark.
The model, which goes by the name “red_panda,” is around 40 Elo points ahead of the next-best-ranking model, Black Forest Labs’ Flux1.1 Pro, on Artificial Analysis’ text-to-image leaderboard. Artificial Analysis uses Elo, a ranking system originally developed to calculate the relative skill level of chess players, to compare the performance of the various models it tests.
Similar to the community AI benchmark Chatbot Arena, Artificial Analysis ranks models through crowdsourcing. For image models, Artificial Analysis selects two models at random and feeds them a unique prompt. Then it presents the prompt and resulting images, and users choose which they think better reflects the prompt.
Granted, there’s some bias in this voting process. Artificial Analysis’ voters are AI enthusiasts, for the most part, and their choices might not reflect the preferences of the wider community of generative AI users.
But red_panda is also one of the better-performing models on the leaderboard in terms of its generation speed. The model takes a median of around 7 seconds to generate an image — over 100 times faster than OpenAI’s DALL-E 3.
So, where did red_panda come from? Which company made it? And when can we expect it be released? All good questions. AI labs increasingly use community benchmarks to drum up anticipation ahead of an announcement, though, so it might not be long before we find out.
This article contains a transcript of an interview with Airbnb cofounder and CEO Brian Chesky, who made a lot of waves earlier this year when he started talking about something called 'founder mode'. Chesky spends a lot of time specifically obsessing over company structure and decision-making. In the interview, Chesky talks about founder mode and what he thinks it means. Founder mode isn't about micromanagement or pure swagger - good leaders need to get into the details while still delegating and trusting their teams to make decisions independently of them.
Amazon’s foray into satellite internet, Project Kuiper, has the potential to generate a staggering $26 billion in revenue by 2032, according to a recent report by Bank of America. However, the path to achieving this ambitious target is fraught with challenges, including stiff competition, high costs, and the complexities of reaching underserved communities.
The report, authored by analyst Justin Post, highlights the immense market opportunity for providing internet access to the estimated 3.5 billion people globally who remain unconnected. Kuiper, with its planned constellation of over 3,200 satellites, aims to deliver high-speed, low-latency broadband to these underserved populations.
But realizing this vision will require overcoming significant obstacles. Post notes that limited disposable income among potential customers, coupled with substantial upfront investment and ongoing operational costs, could hinder Kuiper’s profitability. Furthermore, the company faces formidable competition from established players like SpaceX’s Starlink, which already boasts a significant head start in the satellite internet market.
Despite these challenges, Amazon possesses unique advantages that could give Kuiper a competitive edge. Its vast logistics network, encompassing autonomous vehicles, trucks, drones, and delivery robots, stands to benefit significantly from a continuously available, connected network. This synergy could create valuable operational efficiencies and unlock new possibilities for Amazon’s delivery and logistics operations.
Harris and Trump are both urged to adopt favorable stablecoin regulations to maintain the US dollar’s supremacy for the coming years in an open letter from the CEO of Paxos ahead of the US elections.
An open letter to leading United States presidential candidates written by Paxos CEO Charles Cascarilla urges them to adopt stablecoins to maintain the US dollar’s global dominance and improve inefficiencies in the traditional banking system.
The next presidential administration could determine the United States’ future leadership in the global financial industry, Cascarilla wrote in an open letter published on Oct. 29.
Blockchain and stablecoins are “replatforming the financial system” to make it symbiotic with the internet, Cascarilla wrote. He stated:
“Stablecoins or digital dollars—U.S. dollars digitized via blockchain technology—are the crucial upgrade for the payment system that will revolutionize money movement, allow greater participation in the global economy and ensure the supremacy of the U.S. dollar for years to come.”
Inside the World's Largest AI Cluster: A Tour of the XAI Colossus
Located in [location], the XAI Colossus is the largest AI cluster in the world, built by Xanadu AI and powered by Supermicro servers. Spanning over 100,000 square feet, this massive facility is a marvel of engineering, housing over 100,000 GPUs, exabytes of storage, and super-fast networking infrastructure. In this article, we'll take a detailed tour of the Colossus, exploring its cutting-edge design, innovative cooling and networking systems, and the future plans for this behemoth of a facility.
The Colossus is housed in a massive data hall, designed to be a self-contained unit with its own power, cooling, and networking infrastructure. This allows for maximum efficiency and flexibility, as the facility can operate independently without relying on external resources. The data hall is equipped with advanced fire suppression systems, redundant power supplies, and multiple backup systems to ensure continuous operation.
The Colossus uses a state-of-the-art liquid cooling system to keep the servers running at optimal temperatures. This closed-loop system recirculates the coolant to minimize waste and reduce energy consumption, making it an environmentally friendly and cost-effective solution. The liquid cooling system is designed to be highly efficient, with a heat transfer coefficient of up to 10,000 W/m²K, allowing for maximum heat dissipation and minimizing the risk of overheating.
The GPU racks are the heart of the Colossus, with each rack containing 64 GPUs and 16 CPUs. The GPUs are cooled using liquid cooling, while the CPUs are cooled using air cooling. The racks are designed to be highly scalable, with each rack capable of supporting up to 512 GPUs. This allows for easy expansion and upgrade of the facility, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
High-Speed Networking: Thousands of Servers Supported
The Colossus uses a high-speed networking infrastructure, with 400 Gb/s Ethernet connections between the servers. This allows for fast data transfer and communication between the servers, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications. The networking infrastructure is designed to be highly scalable, with the ability to support thousands of servers, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
The Colossus uses a massive storage cluster, with exabytes of storage capacity. The storage cluster is designed to be highly scalable, with the ability to support thousands of servers. This allows for easy expansion and upgrade of the facility, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
The Colossus uses Tesla Megapacks to power the training jobs. The Megapacks are designed to provide a stable and reliable source of power, with the ability to absorb and release energy as needed. This allows for maximum uptime and minimal downtime, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
Future Expansion: Thousands of Servers and Exabytes of Storage
The Colossus is just the beginning, with plans for future expansion and growth. The facility is designed to be highly scalable, with the ability to support thousands of servers and exabytes of storage. This allows for easy expansion and upgrade of the facility, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
The XAI Colossus is an engineering marvel, with its massive scale, high-performance computing capabilities, and innovative liquid cooling and networking infrastructure. The facility is a testament to the power of collaboration and innovation, and it's an exciting time to be in the field of AI and high-performance computing. As the demand for AI and machine learning continues to grow, the Colossus is poised to play a leading role in the development of these technologies, and we can't wait to see what the future holds for this incredible facility.
Ukrainian scientists, Kasianchuk and Reshetnyk, propose riding asteroids to Mars and Venus to save operational costs. While the idea might sound a bit bizarre, they trust the intellect behind their science.
Recent research suggests that eliminating the need for a spaceship can reduce the cost-per-trip to Mars from Earth.
Riding Asteroids to Mars: Revolutionary Plan for Affordable Space Travel
Two scientists from the University of Kyiv in Ukraine have published a paper that analyses the orbit of over 35,000 asteroids. Their work deals with studying and observing these celestial objects to identify the possibility of them making an Earth-Mars trip.
Already, there are over 120 asteroids that AS Kasianchuk and VM Reshetnyk have shortlisted in hopes that they will serve the purpose of this study.
Solar, wind, and wave - ok.. why the hell is no one talking about tidal energy?
There are loads of talks about how solar and wind energy alone aren't enough if we really want to move towards clean energy. Yet there's more and more chatter about building more solar and wind farms and investing in these renewable sources - while we all know we need a mix of different renewables to really make a difference. It's the same old story for everyone - the sun doesn't always shine, the wind doesn't always blow... yea yea... you can see it especially in the UK where wind energy drops off dramatically during the summer.
Off the top of my head, I would say a barrier is the distance between where the energy is created and where it is consumed is far. Unless we are dealing with something close to shore, then it is going to require the energy transported.
I havent looked but this could be done in big lakes because they have tides.
I've been following CorPower Ocean's journey (https://corpowerocean.com/a-short-history-of-wave-energy/) for a while now, and I'm really chuffed about their recent big investment. While I'm glad there's more discussion about ocean energy, I really feel there's a lack of talks about tidal energy. Tidal energy is predictable and reliable, and I know some people say it's not always there, but as long as the moon and gravity exist, tides are pretty much always around - not like waves, solar, wind, etc., which depend on the weather.
There are already some great tidal energy technologies that can produce clean and, most importantly, reliable energy - like Orbital Marine Power, Nova, and my favourite one because of their shell design and technology that's completely 3D printed and, as I understand it, much cheaper than other technologies - Spiralis Energy (https://www.spiralis.energy). Yet, they all lack investment, and more importantly, tidal energy itself isn't getting the buzz it deserves, even though it could be a really big deal.
Just trying to understand the cons of tidal energy, and why the hell we don't hear more talks about it from climate change advocates, politicians, and "big leaders."?????
There's literally a section on the first website you linked that explains why wave power isn't bigger. In the past it's been too expensive, low energy production, prone to corrosion and failure, and difficult to maintain.
Storage is the solution to the sun not shining and the wind not blowing.
seriously. so many people have little idea how insanely corrosive salt water is, especially on moving parts. tidal output just doesn't produce enough to cover the cost to maintain it.
Different attempts have been trying to convert tidal and wave motion into energy for decades and the issue has always been corrosion and maintenance, and the costs related to both. The closest I've seen to a simplified energy capture device are those wave motion devices that move back/forth from ocean currents similar to how sea weed or kelp move. Grid connection and storage are both still a pain, but at least it's not a turbine in salt water.
It's like mineral oil cooling for PCs. Yes, it's doable. No, it's not worth it except in those rare edge cases.
The conventional wisdom regarding the ocean is that if you put ANYTHING in the ocean, the ocean will eventually destroy it. This logic has, for the most part, remained true over time.
Ask anyone who owns or works on boats how destructive the sea is. The internet is wildly optimistic about wave/tidal power, far cheaper to put a turbine on the top of a pole 100m above the water than to put all the expensive moving parts in a corrosive liquid that's trying to rip it apart 24/7.
There's at least 2 posts per day here about tidal energy....most of it gets removed because there's no new news...perhaps you should investigate your sources of information?
We've mastered the wind and sun. The ocean is still beyond us. The unfront resource commitment to install the tech then maintaining a moving piece of equipment submerged in salt water.
Even structures with little moving parts like sea labs are abandoned after a decade or so because it just doesn't become feasible to maintain anymore.
Just like solar we'll start taking it more seriously when there's a promising feasible piece of tech thats easy to install and requires no to minimal maintenance. Remember this stuff is under water. Not easy to get to.
I just insist on nuclear. Reliable output all year round, vastly more efficient in land usage than other forms, completely safe and with practically zero environmental impact. The technology has advanced a fair bit since the 60's. Thorium fluoride reactors have no risk of catastrophic failure, no nuclear proliferation, and once we start working with fusion we will have a few thousand years of practically free energy for the whole planet.
Putting structures in the sea, or windmill farms covering vast fields really makes me worry about the environmental damage that does. The expense and waste down the line are also annoying.
I second this sentiment. Also with the work that Idaho National Lab is doing with modular reactors, we could reasonably start mass production within a decade. The upfront costs are in the millions, not billions, and last 40 years. When it runs low, pop it out for a new one. Game changing. It's not an American invention. However, those cutting edge technologies are being heavily funded out in Idaho.
I also like the idea of capturing the steam excess from reactors and replacing industrial heating applications or city service heating. Nothing wasted. Use it all.
Because under the ocean is a much more difficult environment to place a turbine compared to up in the air and basin based tidal power is pretty environmentally impactful. Need to focus our efforts on the low hanging fruit first.
My guess is maintenance and longevity. We don’t have electric ships yet, so any tidal requires ships (Fossil fuel) for repairs. And salt water is incredibly corrosive, not to mention all the sea life that up has evolved over millions of years to stick to any surface.
When “the smart people” compare the maintenance needs along and power generation with off shore wind, (where the moving parts are above the water) my hunch is there there’s no comparison.
Also, speaking of that sea life…off shore wind farms have shown to crest new safe environments for fish. I doubt this would be the case for something that moves in the water.
As it stands power generation isnt a huge issue. We could meet our total consumption with just solar, wind and hydro.
The reason these are "not enough" is because we have to balance loads which PV solar and wind arent good at alone. The grid is designed to operate at 60hz (which is directly relates to voltage and current) >60hz and everything on the grid is destroyed (power surge), <60hz and you get brown outs. Your options here are to either up useage or reduce production when >60hz, and to reduce useage or up production. Steam turbines are really good at this because you can turn them on/off easily, add fuel or apply a brake for controls. Between wind ans PV solar, you pretty much only have access to a brake.
The solution is energy storage. concentrated solar power (CSP) uses mirrors to heat salt which then transfers the heat to a steam turbine. Batteries are very effective (a fresh lithium battery is probably the most efficient option) Pumped hydro is ~80% efficient.
Do you live near the ocean? Storms are incredibly powerful the natural environment is incredibly corrosive. Marine life like barnacles are always growing on the surfaces. There are far more cost effective solutions than putting a complex machine in saltwater.
It is interesting that you have given Nova and Orbital as two examples. Both have brilliant teams, have had devices in the water for years, and staff with real world experience.
Anyone interested in the field should absolutely look into their devices. A large part of their success has been a willingness to understand the operational environment and work with it.
Canada is one of the few countries to have begun to harness tidal energy; the country's only tidal station is located in Nova Scotia, in the Bay of Fundy. Our oceans are a vast source of energy that can be harnessed to produce different forms of usable energy including tidal and wave energy.
The Annapolis tidal barrage has been operating from 1984 2019
and the other company has filed for bankruptcy
'It is very unfortunate': Tidal power developer files for bankruptcy | CBC News
here are some links
FORCE
energy.novascotia.ca/sites/default/files/Tidal Energy Brochure Final April 2013.pdf
I believe the best ocean generating system would be to harvest ocean currents
Note: salt water and electricity don't combine very well
Be it with a huge Asterisk that we are growing tidal energy according to our energy needs. But 1% of our energy need would halt the rotation of the earth in 1000 years.
Ok, this is technically not wrong, but it's also completely insane. They key part of this calculation is that it assumes humanities energy consumption will keep on growing at 2% for the next thousand years. At that point (assuming it is ever reached), humanities yearly energy expenditure would be approx 10^28 Joules per year, which pretty close to the output of a small star (the sun outputs about 10^26 Joules per second (per google), and it is not that small). If we're all still living on earth at that point, slowing down the rotation of the earth would be the least of our problems.
That article is what is technically known as a load of bollocks. There's no basis for the assumption of a 2% annual increase in energy usage. Just because it might be roughly correct for the last 50 years doesn't mean it will continue to increase like that.
The author of that article is assuming that in 1031 years when he says tidal power would have stopped the Earth's rotation, we'd be using well over 700 million times more energy than we did in 2013.
Unfortunately, in this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics... So unless we figure out a way to shed copious amounts of low quality heat out of our atmosphere into space, producing and using more energy will lead to the planet heating up and killing us long before we slow it down... We are parasites on the surface, the earth will carry on long after we're gone.
This is under the assumption that our energy usage keeps increasing geometrically. Which probably would make the Earth a heated ball of humanity.
Just for comparison: with a current energy consumption of about 1,80E+17Wh per year and the rotational energy of the earth being 2,14E+29J, it would take about 330 million years for the earth's rotation to stop.
So we still have a wide margin for out energy consumption to increase, even IF we only use only tidal energy.
not sure who said it but it was someone at one of the energy companies...said if we had tidal done around a big portion of the UK, that would give us enough power for the UK and more for life...yes it will be expensive and mixed with other forms on top, but the cost alone would be not even half the price of building a nuclear power plant, plus we could start building it today, its 100% reliable cuz if waves stop, then we're long gone already...i think they said the cost of one nuclear power plant could give us 1.5 the amount of power we need with tidal. Its a no brainer really, for nuclear you its 15yrs minimum till its built, Climate can't wait that long and for something that its only going to cover a small overall percentage of power for the UK, where its tidal can power the entire country.
I've heard similar things about tidal energy, not just in the UK, and that's what got me thinking. If tidal energy can be so beneficial, yeah, it has its downsides right now, but if more people talked about it and more investments were made, we'd see more testing of technologies, more studies on its impact on marine life, and better chances to reduce the drawbacks and improve the tech... we need more clean energy for sure.
In the 60's big oil promoted solar and wind because it knew we didn't have the tech to make it work so it was a strawman compared to the reliability of oil.
I think this is close to the same thing. We don't hear about it because it works, and would disrupt the system, and before long, people are shooting nails out of electro rail guns because power is cheaper than bullets. Or that's what the big guys use as reasoning to prevent cheaply available power.
Planex Communications' new PL-US56K2(A) USB modem just hit the market.
The opposite of cutting-edge: It's the era of 5G and gigabit-speed internet, and dial-up connections are dead in most places. However, that hasn't stopped a Japanese company from rolling out a brand-new 56K modem for anyone still relying on ancient copper phone lines to surf the web.
Planex Communications' new PL-US56K2(A) USB modem just hit the market. For around $40 on Amazon, this retro device connects to your PC via USB, allowing you to access analog phone lines for internet connectivity, data transfers, and even fax capabilities.
Sure, the speeds are laughably slow by modern standards, with a theoretical maximum of 56 Kbps for downloads. But hey, they should still allow you to browse Gmail – though you'd likely have been better off switching to the basic HTML version if Google hadn't killed it off earlier this year.
Planex states that the modem complies with the 56K ITU-T standard recommendations and supports the V.90 and V.92 protocols. It's also designed to be plug-and-play with the latest versions of Windows, meaning you can simply connect it to your USB port without needing to install drivers. Its compact size (25mm x 75mm x 18mm) and lightweight design (just 28 grams) make it easy to stow away, too.
Planex Communications was a US-based company that was founded in 1993 by a group of entrepreneurs who saw an opportunity to create innovative computer peripherals and networking equipment. Here's a more detailed look at the company's history:
Planex Communications was founded in 1993 by a group of entrepreneurs who had a passion for technology and a vision for creating innovative computer peripherals and networking equipment. The company's early focus was on developing and marketing peripheral products such as speakers, microphones, and webcams. Planex's products were designed to be compact, affordable, and easy to use, making them accessible to a wide range of consumers and small businesses.
During its early years, Planex Communications faced significant competition from established players in the computer peripheral market. However, the company's commitment to innovation and quality helped it to differentiate itself from its competitors and establish a loyal customer base.
In the mid-1990s, Planex Communications began to expand its product line to include networking equipment, including routers, switches, and modems. The company's networking products were designed to be compact, affordable, and easy to use, making them accessible to a wide range of consumers and small businesses.
Planex's networking equipment was particularly notable for its innovative design and features. For example, the company's first router, the Planex PTE-1000, was one of the first routers to feature a built-in web server, allowing users to access their router's configuration page via a web browser.
During the late 1990s and early 2000s, Planex Communications continued to innovate and expand its product line. The company developed a range of other peripherals, including speakers, microphones, and printers.
One of Planex's most notable products was the Planex PTE-1000 USB webcam, which was one of the first webcams to use a USB connection. The webcam was designed to be compact, easy to use, and affordable, making it accessible to a wide range of consumers.
In 2004, Planex Communications merged with Diamond Multimedia to form Diamond Multimedia, Inc. As part of the Merger, Planex's product line was integrated into Diamond's existing product portfolio.
The merger provided Planex Communications with access to Diamond's extensive resources and expertise, allowing the company to expand its product line and reach new customers. However, it also marked the end of Planex Communications as an independent company.
Although Planex Communications is no longer an independent company, its legacy lives on in the form of its innovative products and technology. Many of Planex's products are still widely available and used by consumers and businesses today.
Planex's innovative products and technology have had a lasting impact on the computer peripheral and networking equipment markets. The company's commitment to innovation and quality helped it to establish a loyal customer base and differentiate itself from its competitors.
Today, Planex Communications is a subsidiary of Diamond Multimedia, Inc., and its products are no longer manufactured or sold under the Planex brand. However, the company's history and contributions to the development of computer peripherals and networking equipment continue to be remembered and celebrated by many in the industry.
Microsoft has invested around $13 billion in ChatGPT-maker OpenAI since 2019, but we've been hearing reports since April that investors are concerned that reaping the financial rewards
In brief: Microsoft will reveal its quarterly financial results on Wednesday, and it might not be a high point for the Redmond giant. Analysts expect Microsoft to report its slowest quarterly revenue growth in a year, and once again there are concerns about how much money the company is investing in AI when the demand and returns aren't justifying its outlay.
Microsoft has invested around $13 billion in ChatGPT-maker OpenAI since 2019, but we've been hearing reports since April that investors are concerned that reaping the financial rewards is taking longer than expected.
Reuters reports that Morgan Stanley analysts say there is a "wall of worry" around Microsoft's earnings due to "ramping capital expenditures, margin compression, lack of evidence on AI returns, and messiness post a financial resegmentation."
One of the biggest AI-related disappointments for Microsoft is Copilot. The company has been pushing its AI tools incredibly hard, going as far as adding a dedicated button to its latest laptops, but most people are apathetic toward Copilot, with the most common complaint reportedly that it's not as good as ChatGPT.
In September, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said Copilot is basically the new Microsoft Clippy, and that customers had not gotten value from it.
That’s what the presidential betting market is all about!
US citizens can gamble on the upcoming election on Robinhood, the financial nihilism app announced. Robinhood has termed this “unlocking a new asset class that democratizes access to events as they unfold.”
Let’s pause — I would like to reflect on this incredible phrase, about an asset class that democratizes access to events as they unfold. See, I thought we all had access to the events of the election because we all exist in reality and can find out about them. But apparently, if we can’t gamble on an event, it isn’t happening. This is a fascinating vision of metaphysics, and I would like to hear more about it. No one bet on my birth, for instance, and thus there is no asset class relating to my existence. So am I real?
“Democratizes access” is one way you can describe “opening a betting market”
I’m kidding. Obviously whoever wrote that is just not very good at sentences. No, I want to get down to the heart of the matter here, which is signaled by the phrase “democratizes access.” This phrase sits right next to “financial inclusion” in the lexicon of people who are trying to take your money. “Democratizes access” is one way you can describe “opening a betting market,” but I don’t think it’s the most accurate one!
As part of the company’s week of Mac-focused announcements, Apple has just introduced a smaller, yet even more powerful Mac Mini. It’s now equipped with Apple’s latest M4 silicon, supports ray tracing for the first time, and ships with 16GB of RAM by default — seemingly the new normal in the Apple Intelligence era. The machine still starts at $599 with the regular M4 chip, while the more powerful M4 Pro model has a starting price of $1,399. Like the refreshed iMac announced yesterday, the Mac Mini is available to preorder immediately and will be in stores on November 8th.
The first thing you’ll notice is the new design. As rumored, the Mini has been shrunken down considerably — and it was already a relatively small desktop machine to begin with. Now it’s downright tiny, measuring five inches in both length and width. If you’re wondering how Apple manages to keep things running cool, the company says it’s through the M4’s efficiency and “an innovative thermal architecture, which guides air to different levels of the system, while all venting is done through the foot.”
Even so, Apple has loaded this thing up with plenty of I/O: on the front are two USB-C ports and a 3.5mm audio jack. Around back you’ll find ethernet, HDMI, and three USB-C / Thunderbolt ports. The USB-A ports are indeed history, but it’s worth noting that the base M2 Mini only had two Thunderbolt 4 ports and two USB-A ports. With the M4, you’re getting five ports in all. So you’re losing native USB-A but picking up an extra Thunderbolt port.
The Google-owned company removed dislikes back in 2021 to reduce targeted attacks on videos, prompting backlash from users worldwide. However, a browser extension to bring them back quickly rose from the ashes.
On Monday, October 28, VidIQ reported in a post on X that YouTube is testing a new homepage layout that removes view counts and dates.
In the screenshot, you can see six videos that show the thumbnail, title, and channel name – but nothing else. Normally, you’ll find the view count and an estimate of how long ago the video was uploaded under the channel name.
Shortly after the tweet was posted, dozens of users flocked to the comments to share their thoughts about the potential change.
“View counts and dates matter in selecting between videos on the same topic. I get from a product perspective what they’re trying to do, but this isn’t better for viewers or creators,” one user commented.
Samsung TV Plus, Samsung’s free ad-supported streaming (FAST) and on-demand (AVOD) service, has become a significant player in the streaming landscape. Currently reaching 88 million monthly active users and driven largely by U.S.-based viewers within the 18-49 demographic, the service has grown to become the most-used app on Samsung TVs in then United States. Its popularity shines a light on the momentum swinging towards free alternatives like FAST services while subscription fees climb across the board.
But I do know that Roku is kicking ass. They make a television and have an application that is on them. It is a streaming app that lets people watch for free (with commercials).
Samsung TV Plus offers hefty library of free content, with over 3,000 channels and thousands of on-demand titles across genres. Once reserved for pay services, this alternative is meeting a demand for convenient streaming without subscription fees. This approach has driven a notable 50% increase in global viewership over the past year, with on-demand viewership alone rising by 400% year-over-year. The service is designed to blend live TV and on-demand streaming. It gives users a straightforward experience along with a variety of content without additional costs.
With an emphasis on easy access, Samsung TV Plus supports a wide array of Samsung devices. From Neo QLED TVs to Galaxy smartphones, this approach extends the service’s reach. Currently available in 30 countries, with recent launches in Singapore and the Philippines, plus an upcoming launch in Thailand, the app has been a major asset in Samsung’s ongoing effort to expand its global footprint.
Samsung TV Plus’s free, ad-supported model has gained particular traction among Gen Z, Millennials, and Gen X users in the U.S A key demo for advertisers, this audience creates an enticing platform for ad-buyers. In keeping with progress, Samsung Ads has developed interactive ads around popular genres and shoppable experiences in order to directly engage viewers.
Hydrogen is often celebrated as a clean energy source, but its unique properties make it surprisingly dangerous when leaks occur. Unlike other gasses, hydrogen is highly flammable, disperses quickly, and is invisible and odorless, making it difficult to detect without specialized equipment. These characteristics mean that even a small leak can rapidly escalate into a major safety hazard. As industries increasingly adopt hydrogen, understanding the potential risks and the critical need for effective monitoring systems is essential to ensure safe handling and avoid unforeseen dangers.
A hydrogen leak poses a risk to human safety and equipment durability and performance. Hydrogen can permeate certain metals, causing a phenomenon known as hydrogen embrittlement. This process weakens the structural integrity of metal components, potentially leading to equipment failures or breakdowns. For industries relying on high-pressure systems, this embrittlement is particularly concerning, as it increases the likelihood of cracks or fractures over time.
One critical area where hydrogen monitoring is essential is in electrical transformers. Since hydrogen is a byproduct of overheating in transformers, any undetected leak or release can signal serious issues. This is why many facilities use H2scan hydrogen monitoring equipment to track hydrogen levels within transformers, ensuring that any leak is swiftly detected and mitigated. By monitoring hydrogen presence, facilities can prevent potential damage to transformers and avoid costly repairs or operational downtimes.
In the world of visual storytelling, where creativity meets technology, image-to-image technology emerges as a revolutionary tool for graphic designers and photographers. This cutting-edge technology is transforming how artists conceptualize, create, and enhance their work. Whether crafting unique compositions or refining existing images, image-to-image technology provides endless possibilities to revolutionize your creative process. In this post, we will explore what image-to-image technology entails, its evolution, benefits, and how tools like picLumen are reshaping the digital art landscape, particularly in creating anime. Join us as we unravel the secrets behind this fascinating technology and discover how it can elevate your artistry to new heights.
Understanding Image-to-Image: What is it?
Image-to-image technology is a groundbreaking advancement that enables the transformation of one image into another through machine learning algorithms and neural networks. This innovative technology allows for seamless modifications, retouching, and enhancements, providing designers and photographers with unparalleled creative freedom. By analyzing and interpreting the visual elements of an image, these advanced algorithms can generate new images that retain the original’s essence while introducing new characteristics or styles.
In graphic design and photography, image-to-image technology serves multiple purposes. It can transform rough sketches into fully detailed artworks, apply different styles to photographs, and even convert low-resolution images into high-definition ones. For instance, a designer could use image-to-image technology to turn a hand-drawn sketch into a polished digital illustration, while a photographer might use it to add artistic effects to their photos, such as watercolor or oil painting finishes.
The Evolution of Image-to-Image Technology
The roots of image-to-image technology can be traced back to the early days of computer graphics and the development of algorithms that could process and manipulate visual data. Over the years, advancements in artificial intelligence and neural networks have enabled more sophisticated image processing techniques, leading to the emergence of image-to-image technology as we know it today.
Initially, these technologies were primarily used in scientific research and industrial applications, such as medical imaging and satellite data analysis. However, as the technology evolved and became more accessible, it gradually found its way into the creative industries. The rise of deep learning and convolutional neural networks has further accelerated the development of image-to-image technology, allowing for more accurate and realistic transformations.
Today, image-to-image technology is at the forefront of digital art and design, enabling creatives to push the boundaries of their work and explore new possibilities. With ongoing research and development, we can expect even more exciting advancements in the near future, making image-to-image technology an indispensable tool for artists worldwide.
In the ever-expanding universe of artificial intelligence, a surprising trend is emerging. While industry giants race to build ever-larger language models, a quieter but equally significant revolution is taking place in the realm of Small Language Models (SLMs). These compact but powerful models are reshaping how businesses and developers think about AI deployment, proving that effectiveness isn’t always about size.
Small Language Models, typically containing fewer than 3 billion parameters, represent a fundamental shift in AI architecture. Unlike their massive counterparts such as GPT-4 or Claude 3, which require extensive computational resources and cloud infrastructure, SLMs are designed for efficiency and specialized performance. This isn’t just about saving resources – it’s about rethinking how AI can be practically deployed in real-world scenarios.
H2O.ai’s Mississippi models exemplify this new approach. The recently released Mississippi-2B, with just 2.1 billion parameters, and its even smaller sibling Mississippi-0.8B, are revolutionizing document processing and OCR tasks. What’s remarkable isn’t just their size, but their performance. The 0.8B version consistently outperforms models 20 times its size on OCRBench.
The secret lies in their architecture. Instead of trying to be generalists, these models employ specialized techniques like 448×448 pixel tiling for image processing, allowing them to maintain high accuracy while keeping computational requirements modest. They’re trained on carefully curated datasets – 17.2 million examples for the 2B version and 19 million for the 0.8B model – focusing on quality over quantity.
This specialized approach pays dividends in real-world applications. For businesses, the advantages are clear: faster processing speeds, lower operational costs, and the ability to run models on standard hardware. But perhaps most importantly, SLMs can often be deployed locally, eliminating the need to send sensitive data to external servers – a crucial consideration for industries like healthcare, finance, and legal services.
The rise of SLMs also challenges the traditional AI development paradigm. Instead of throwing more parameters at problems, developers are focusing on architectural efficiency and targeted training. This shift has led to innovations in model compression, knowledge distillation, and specialized architectures that squeeze maximum performance from minimal resources.
The growing landscape of Small Language Models presents both opportunities and challenges for organizations looking to implement AI solutions. Mississippi’s success in document processing demonstrates how specialized SLMs can excel in specific domains, but it also raises important questions about model selection and deployment.
When evaluating SLMs, performance metrics need to be considered in context. While Mississippi’s OCRBench scores are impressive, they’re particularly relevant for document processing tasks. Organizations need to evaluate models based on their specific use cases. This might mean looking at inference speed for real-time applications, accuracy on domain-specific tasks, or resource requirements for edge deployment.
Resource requirements vary significantly even among SLMs. Mississippi’s 0.8B version can run on relatively modest hardware, making it accessible to smaller organizations or those with limited AI infrastructure. However, some “small” models still require substantial computational resources despite their reduced parameter count. Understanding these requirements is crucial for successful deployment.
The deployment environment also matters significantly. Mississippi’s architecture allows for local deployment, which can be crucial for organizations handling sensitive data. Other SLMs might require specific frameworks or cloud infrastructure, impacting both cost and implementation complexity. Organizations need to consider not just the initial deployment but long-term maintenance and scaling requirements.
Integration capabilities represent another crucial consideration. Mississippi’s JSON output capability makes it particularly valuable for businesses looking to automate document processing workflows. However, different SLMs offer different integration options, from simple APIs to more complex custom deployment solutions. The availability of documentation, community support, and integration tools can significantly impact implementation success.
The future of SLMs looks promising, with ongoing research pushing the boundaries of what’s possible with compact models. H2O.ai’s success with Mississippi suggests we’re just beginning to understand how specialized architectures can overcome the limitations of model size. As more organizations recognize the advantages of SLMs, we’re likely to see increased innovation in model efficiency and specialization.
Runway, a US-based AI research company specialising in creative software, has launched Act-One, a tool for generating character animations based on simple video and voice inputs.
Runway, a US-based AI research company specialising in creative software, has launched Act-One, a tool for generating character animations based on simple video and voice inputs. According to Runway, Act-One is designed to streamline animation production, offering an alternative to the typically complex and resource-intensive pipelines used in facial animation.
Traditional animation workflows for realistic facial expressions require motion capture equipment, multiple video references, and detailed face rigging—steps that can be costly and time-consuming. Act-One bypasses these requirements by allowing users to create animated characters directly from a video and voice recording, making it feasible to produce animations with a simple camera setup, says Runway in an official blog.
The tool supports a range of character styles, from realistic portrayals to stylised designs. Act-One translates facial expressions and subtle movements—such as micro-expressions and eye-line adjustments—from actors onto different character designs, even if the character's proportions differ from the source footage. This capability enables new options in character design without the need for motion capture, as per the company.
Introducing Act-One
A new way to generate expressive character performances using simple video inputs.
At Runway, our mission is to build expressive and controllable tools for artists that can open new avenues for creative expression. Today, we're excited to release Act-One, a new state-of-the-art tool for generating expressive character performances inside Gen-3 Alpha.
Act-One can create compelling animations using video and voice performances as inputs. It represents a significant step forward in using generative models for expressive live action and animated content.
Capturing the Essence of a Performance
Traditional pipelines for facial animation often involve complex, multi-step workflows. These can include motion capture equipment, multiple footage references, manual face rigging, among other techniques. The goal is to transpose an actor's performance into a 3D model suitable for an animation pipeline. The key challenge with traditional approaches lies in preserving emotion and nuance from the reference footage into the digital character.
Our approach uses a completely different pipeline, driven directly and only by a performance of an actor and requiring no extra equipment.
Animation Mocap
Act-One can be applied to a wide variety of reference images. The model preserves realistic facial expressions and accurately translates performances into characters with proportions different from the original source video. This versatility opens up new possibilities for inventive character design and animation.
Live Action
The model also excels in producing cinematic and realistic outputs, and is remarkably robust across camera angles while maintaining high-fidelity face animations. This capability allows creators to develop believable characters that deliver genuine emotion and expression, enhancing the viewer's connection to the content.
New Creative Avenues
We've been exploring how Act-One can allow the generation of multi-turn, expressive dialogue scenes, which were previously challenging to create with generative video models. You can now create narrative content using nothing more than a consumer grade camera and one actor reading and performing different characters from a script.
Safety
As with all our releases, we're committed to responsible development and deployment. We're releasing this new tool with a comprehensive suite of content moderation and safety precautions, including:
Even more robust capabilities to detect and block attempts to generate content containing public figures;
Technical measures to verify that an end user has the right to use the voice that they create using Custom Voices; and
Continuous monitoring to detect and mitigate other potential misuses of our tools and platform.
Looking Ahead
We're excited to see what forms of creative storytelling Act-One brings to animation and character performance. Act-One is another step forward in our goal to bringing previously sophisticated techniques to a broader range of creators and artists.
We look forward to seeing how artists and storytellers will use Act-One to bring their visions to life in new and exciting ways.
Access to Act-One will begin gradually rolling out to users today and will soon be available to everyone.
Introduction
Gen-3 Alpha is the first of upcoming models that offer improvements in fidelity, consistency, motion, and speed over previous generations of models.
Act-One allows you to bring a character image to life by uploading a driving performance to precisely influence expressions, mouth movements, and more.
In this article, driving performance refers to the video that will influence an image. Character image refers to the image that will be animated by the driving performance.
This article outlines how to use Act-One on Gen-3 Alpha, input best practices, the available settings, and more.
Best Practices for Act-One Input
Before diving in, review these best practices to ensure that your input selections will set your generation up for success. Most output issues can be addressed by using inputs that follow these recommendations.
Well-lit with defined facial features
Single face framed from around the shoulders and up
Forward-facing in the direction of the camera
Face is in frame for the entire video
Ensure the face doesn't move in and out of the frame
Clear mouth movement and expressions
Certain expressions, such as sticking out a tongue, are not supported
Minimal body movement
No face occlusions in frame
No cuts that interrupt the shot
Follows our Trust & Safety standards
Well-lit with defined facial features
A single face framed from around the shoulders and up
Forward-facing in the direction of the camera
Follows our Trust & Safety standards
“I don't think text prompts are here to stay for a long time,” said Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela.
Runway, an NYC based AI video startup, announced Act-One, a new state-of-the-art tool for generating expressive character performances, inside Gen-3 Alpha. The access to Act One is currently limited. Act-One can generate compelling animations by just using video and voice performances as inputs. The tool reduces the reliance on traditional motion capture systems, making it simpler to bring characters to life in production workflows. On their blog, Runway uploaded several videos and styles showcasing the different ways in which the tool is used.
Act-One simplifies animation by using a single-camera setup to capture actor performances, eliminating the need for motion capture or complex rigging. The tool preserves realistic facial expressions and adapts performances to characters of different proportions. The model delivers high-fidelity animations across various camera angles and supports both live-action and animated content. It expands creative boundaries for professionals as they require only consumer-grade equipment to produce expressive multi-turn dialogue scenes with a single actor.
“Traditional pipelines for facial animation often involve complex, multi-step workflows. These can include motion capture equipment, multiple footage references, manual face rigging, among other techniques. Our approach uses a completely different pipeline, driven directly and only by the performance of an actor and requiring no extra equipment,” per a statement on their blog.
Runway’s Continues its Reign in the GenAI Video Space
Last month, Runway partnered with Lionsgate to introduce AI into filmmaking. Runway aims to bring these tools for artists, and by extension bring their stories to life. This deal would open the doors for many of these stories to appear on the big screen eventually. Runway’s tools have also been employed in Hollywood before.
“I don’t think text prompts are here to stay for a long time. So a lot of our innovation has been on creating control tools,” said Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela in an interview on how AI is coming to Hollywood and the need for giving creators more access and freedom over video generation.
Runway also has an AI Film Festival which is dedicated to celebrating artists who incorporate emerging AI techniques in their short films. Launched two years ago, the festival aims to spark conversation about the growing influence of AI tools in the film industry and to engage with creators from diverse backgrounds, exploring their insights and perspectives.
OpenAI’s flagship model, Sora, is not publicly available yet, nor is there any update from the company regarding its release but hopefully it will be launched after elections. Genmo also unveiled a research preview of Mochi 1 – an open-source model designed to generate high-quality videos from text prompts.
Earlier this month, Meta also entered the Gen AI space with its MovieGen. Adobe also introduced Gen AI to video with its Adobe Firefly. Luma’s Dream Machine was made freely available for experimentation on its website. In terms of competition from China, Minimax officially launched its Image-to-Video feature. Even Kling introduced new capabilities to its model including a lip sync feature.
Why Steve Jobs killed 70% of Apple’s products: A lesson on Range Architecture
You have probably seen the Steve Jobs movie that came out in 2015, and frankly, it's brilliant. Directed by Danny Boyle and written by West Wing writer/genius Aaron Sorkin, the movie is an exercise in tension as Steve Jobs confronts the people and demons of his past in the hours before three major product launches.
On several occasions in the film Steve confronts John Sculley, the Apple CEO who Steve recruited and was ultimately ousted by. In a twist of events, Steve returns to Apple in 1997, ousting Sculley and then killing 70% of the Apple product range. Did he do it out of spite? Revenge? Sculley certainly thinks so. Or was Jobs claim that he just “really hates styluses” the real reason?
Range architecture is the structure of your products, sub-brands and price points. A well designed range architecture will help your customers pick the right product at the right price, helping them navigate sometimes countless choices.
One of the most famous range architectures was developed by Alfred P. Sloan of General Motors in 1921.
His so-called Ladder of Success gave each car brand a price point that wouldn’t conflict with any others.
It was said that you could tell who lived in which house by which car was parked out front — a Cadillac suggested a CEO, the Buick was the factory foreman. Sloan's range architecture made the question “which car is right for me?” a simple one, not a stressful one, and so General Motors thrived.
Of course General Motor’s range architecture was too beautiful to last. General Motor's incentive schemes rewarded each brand individually and ultimately tempted brand managers to try and capture just a few more customers by adding in just a few more options.
More options meant more prices, more models and more choice. This example of entropy lead to the very complex brand architecture that General Motors had in 2008, right as they were facing bankruptcy.
Barry Schwarz’s work on The Tyranny of Choice makes it clear that fewer choices lead to more purchases, faster and with less post-purchase regret. While common sense would say that more choice gives more utility, behavioural economics shows that complex choices usually result in no choice at all — and more importantly, no sale.
Which brings us to Apple. When Jobs returned in 1997 the company was, according to Jobs, “90 days from being insolvent". Sales were dismal. The story goes that Steve was asked by a friend which computer she should buy. Steve was stumped. Despite hundreds of products, there was no clear answer.
In fact, Apple’s range architecture was as messy in 1997 as General Motors’ was in 2008. The company had been making multiple versions of products to satisfy requests from retailers, including twelve versions of the Macintosh computer.
After weeks of meeting with product people he had heard enough. According to Walter Isaacson in the book Steve Jobs, Steve shouted “Stop!” in the middle of a product meeting and said, “This is crazy.”
Taking a marker he drew a chart that was to form the basis of Apple’s product range for years to come. The simple insight was to help people choose a computer using only two questions — are you an everyday consumer or pro? Do you want portable or desktop?
In this one bold move, 70% of Apple’s range was cut. One year later, the nearly bankrupt company turned a very healthy $309 million profit. Today the company is worth more than $520 billion.
So why did Apple really kill the Newton? Spite? Keeping fingers free? The real story actually points to simplicity. The simpler a product range, the easier it is to make a choice, the more sales you can get.
So what do these two case studies tell us about range architecture? At Step Change, we reviewed more than thirty range architectures last year and there’s one principle that surfaced time and time again:
Make it easy for the customer.
A range should only be expanded where it clearly makes the choice easier for a customer segment. In the right situation, adding a choice to the range can increase average weight of purchase, make the sales cycle shorter and even reduce post-purchase regret. But before you add anything new pull out the pruning shears and cut as much as you can.
Learn how you can use buyer psychology to make people buy into your product and messaging.
KitKat wasn’t always the behemoth brand that it is today. It used to be floating around with all other Nestlé products, struggling to gain traction and make a name for itself. Like KitKat, many businesses often have a great idea or product but often find it difficult to get people to buy. Because the truth is, it’s often the best marketing, and not the best product, that wins.
And the reason for that is that people don’t take the time to understand why people buy. Now there’s only so much I can do in an article as we’ve distilled about 28 books, hundreds of articles, and thousands of pages into our Invisible Communications Capabilities Training Intensive, our session on buyer psychology and behavioural economics.
nyway, I’m able to give you a sniff of the magic of understanding why. We’ve boiled it down to a system that organisations can follow to maximise success in communication. The three parts are Trigger/Frame/Fuel, and I’ll cover them briefly below.
So one of the key challenges brands often face is how to get people to consider them in the first place…
The Currency of Attention
The first currency we need to focus on is not financial — it’s the currency of attention. This is because if you don’t get noticed, everything else is academic.
It’s easy to say but hard to do, and it’s not just about being noticed. It’s also about being noticed for the right reasons.
See, before people buy, they must first buy-in. Communication precedes action. And attention precedes communication. And communication isn’t sent — it’s what’s received. And most companies massively overestimate the ‘listening’ or the attention they’ve been granted by the audience. Effective communication is the messaging people don’t see (or invisible communications). And effective communicators start by asking, “What do I need to do to get noticed here?”
The Trigger.
“What everyday concept can we attach our brand to?”
To get noticed, we need to find the right trigger in people’s mind so that everything else follows through. It’s Skinner’s Operant Conditioning meeting Pavlov’s Classical Conditioning. We don’t have time for a sideline into the nuances of psychological conditioning, but let’s just say the goal here is to get your audience salivating when your brand rings the metaphoric bell.
A trigger is something that attaches to a concept that we want. This means everytime we see that trigger, we associate something else to it. Think about triggers being real-world (objects or activities or in the mind) thoughts and ideas. The point is, we take something exciting in our audience’s mind, and in that moment, we augment or attach our message.
So if you want people to think about your brand, what you sell, and your service, look for triggers that are already in the mind or in people’s day-to-day life.
Because there were so many popular Nestlé products to compete against, KitKat decided that they needed the right trigger. They thought about something existing and of value to people that they can associate with.
But why coffee, you ask?
Well, we associate coffee with taking a break. It’s scheduled every day and highly valued.
KitKat realised that their chocolate bar actually went very well with coffee. By attaching to the idea of a coffee break, people soon associated that trigger to opening a KitKat bar.
And that was how they came up with the line “Have a break, have a KitKat.”
Even better than KitKat’s “break” and there’s a coffee “break” — genius!
The magic was not the line itself but finding the right trigger to associate to. And the rest was history. KitKat’s story proves the power of finding the right trigger.
A key concept here is the the diagnostic and effective frequency — but I can only cover so much here.
The Frame.
“
How do we frame the decision for advantage?”
Framing is all about drawing the right focus to your product and message.
It is changing the way information is presented to influence how people view your products to impact their decision making.
It’s about how the concept of the frame changes the way the picture looks. A large ornate gold frame makes a picture look very different than if it were in a slim-lined modern frame.
Same goes for people and how we ‘frame’ the information we’re looking at.
If we understand the frame our audience are using, we can reframe it. If we can change the frame, we can change their decision.
Daniel Kahneman won a Nobel prize in economics in this area, proving beyond a doubt that people make emotional decisions and make rational justifications. In fact, up to 23–47% of any audience might change their decision if exactly the same information is framed in a different way. Once again, I can’t do the concepts justice in a short article… But…
In the Invisible Communications Capabilities Training that we give to clients, we introduce eight essential framing tools that will help you frame buyer decisions.
Decoy Pricing.
When presented with two products with equally similar attributes, people often find it difficult to make a decision. It’s often complex to compare and hard work. People tend not to be stupid,
but
they are lazy!
Decoy pricing understands this. Decoy pricinginvolves influencing purchasing decision between two products by presenting a third option — a decoy ‘similar’ to one product but noticeably ‘worse’.
The less attractive decoy isn’t chosen in considered evaluation, but it makes the similar version look more attractive. So if there’s a choice between A and B and I introduce a C (which looks like A, but worse) more people choose A.
By adding a decoy product to the mix, you help your consumers rule out the lesser quality, same-price value product for the high-quality, same-price value product, making the choice a no-brainer.
Probability and Frequency.
Frequency gives the prevalence of an occurrence whereas probability gives a statistical percentage. In dealing with probabilities and frequencies, we can relate to data best when we say “1 out of 10” rather than use a percentage. People just cannot fully relate to a “0.1” statistic.
It’s because we can relate to the whole 1 in the 1 out of 10 (and we neglect the 10 — it’s called denominator neglect funnily enough). But we don’t have a sense of a “0.1 of something”. It’s not a real-world concept.
So when we have low probability events that we’re trying to get people to take precautions against, such as when we’re selling insurance packages, we’re much more likely to get a better response if we say “3 out of a 100 businesses experience this” rather than saying “3 percent of businesses.” Subjectively, audiences relate much more to the first statement.
On the flipside, we want to downplay the downside of an essential operation where a doctor needs to disclose risk, but you don’t want a person stressing out as that can cause even more problems. Here, operation risks are best disclosed as percentages vs frequency if we want to keep patients informed but calm. For example, “Only .003% have complications” vs “3 in every 100,000 have complications”. The same information is experienced very differently by most people.
So use probability over frequency when you’re trying to minimise a subjective experience over an event.
Providing a Comparison.
Let’s take a
look at these two offers below when drawing support to help fund underprivileged children around the world. You’d have seen it a thousand times but maybe just not asked why.
Offer 1 uses a lump sum amount that may overwhelm who you present your offer to. It just doesn’t give you any point of reference to actually relate to.
Offer 2, on the other hand, provides a good reference point with the use of the $3 coffee, which makes it relatable and easier to consider and say yes to.
The framing changes everything — and you know that successful charities know it. But the question is, do you think about this when you’re communicating?
The Fuel.
“How do we amplify our message?”
There’s a bunch of thinking that goes into fuel. This section asks, “How can you amplify your success?”
Are you using your systems to scale effective communication?
We find that most businesses haven’t actually ordered the way that their customers or clients engage with them. They haven’t looked through to identify the minimum amount of steps that customers need to take to buy their products.
Where are the barriers?
Where are people getting stuck?
Where are people making decisions?
For the best chance of success, you have to make sure you’re using the right triggers and frames and remove any unnecessary steps for your customers.
Make it simple and personal first. Only then can you really make your products scalable.
So there you have it, the three parts of Invisible Communications, the factors that explain why people buy:
Trigger - How will we get them to think about us at the
right time
?
Frame - How will we get them to decide in our favour — the
right decision
?
Fuel - How do we keep the success going — the
right way
?
Easy say, but hard to do. Just remember, how people think they communicate often isn’t actually how they actually communicate.
Hopefully the above was a little taste into the hidden drivers that make people buy.
Let's dive deeper into the key strategies and decisions that Steve Jobs implemented during his second tenure at Apple, and how they contributed to the company's resurgence.
Streamlining the Product Line
One of Jobs' first moves was to simplify Apple's product line. He realized that the company had become too fragmented, with too many products and lines of business. This made it difficult to focus on innovation and customer satisfaction.
To address this issue, jobs decided to focus on just four core products: two desktop computers and two portable devices. One set was marketed for professionals, while the other catered to consumers. By concentrating on these core products, Jobs ensured that Apple remained true to its founding values and continued to innovate, rather than trying to compete in every market.
Jobs was not afraid to take bold risks and cancel products that were not core to Apple's mission. In 1998, he canceled the Newton personal digital assistant, which was a struggling product line. He also canceled several other products that were not meeting their potential.
When Jobs returned to Apple, he knew that the company had a complex relationship with Microsoft. Microsoft was dominating the market share, and Apple's Macintosh computer was struggling to compete.
To address this issue, Jobs decided to form a partnership with Microsoft. He negotiated a deal that would give Microsoft a seat on Apple's board of directors and provide Microsoft with access to Apple's Macintosh computer source code.
Jobs understood that short-term profit and cost targets could never replace the importance of customer satisfaction. He prioritized the creation of exceptional products that would delight users, rather than merely meeting profit expectations.
When Jobs returned to Apple, he knew that the company had become fragmented and bureaucratic. He decided to take bold action to simplify the organization and eliminate the silos that had been created.
To achieve this goal, Jobs implemented several strategies, including:
Creating a single P&L statement for the entire company
Eliminating in-fighting among divisions and ensuring that everyone was working towards the same shared success
Focusing on innovation and research and development to create new and exciting products
Improving customer satisfaction through better support and services
By simplifying the organization and eliminating the silos, Jobs was able to:
Improve communication and collaboration among employees
Reduce bureaucracy and make decision-making easier
Improve customer satisfaction by providing products and services that met their needs
Create a more cohesive and focused company culture
Overall, Steve Jobs' strategies and decisions during his second tenure at Apple helped to create a more streamlined and customer-centric organization. By focusing on innovation, customer satisfaction, and collaboration, Jobs was able to turn Apple around and establish the company as a leader in the tech industry.
23andMe appointed three new independent directors to its board, the company said Tuesday.
23andMe appointed three new independent directors to its board, the company announced Tuesday, one month after all seven of its previous directors abruptly resigned.
The new board members are Andre Fernandez, the former chief financial officer of WeWork; Jim Frankola, the former CFO of the enterprise cloud company Cloudera; and Mark Jensen, a tech advisor and former managing partner at Deloitte, according to a release. The only other board member is 23andMe's co-founder and CEO Anne Wojcicki.
Fernandez, Frankola and Jensen will all serve on the board's audit committee and compensation committee, the company said. Jensen will act as the lead independent director and chair of the compensation committee, while Fernandez will chair the audit committee.
"I am excited to welcome these three experienced directors to the 23andMe Board, and looking forward to working with them," Wojcicki said in the release.
23andMe's previous independent directors announced their resignation in a letter to Wojcicki in September, writing that they disagreed with her about the "strategic direction for the company."
The genetic-testing company, once valued at $6 billion, has struggled since it went public in 2021 through a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC. Shares were hovering below $1 until 23andMe announced a 1-for-20 reverse stock split of the Company's Class A and Class B common stock earlier this month.
Oracle on Tuesday announced a brand-new electronic health record that features fresh cloud and artificial intelligence capabilities.
Oracle unveiled a brand-new electronic health record on Tuesday, its most significant health-care product update since acquiring the medical records giant Cerner for $28 billion in 2022.
An electronic health record, or an EHR, is a digital version of a patient's medical history that's updated by doctors and nurses over time. EHR software can be complex and cumbersome for clinicians to use, but it's become an integral component of the modern U.S. health-care system.
Oracle's latest EHR is equipped with cloud and artificial intelligence capabilities that will make it easier to navigate and set up, the company said. There are no menus or drop-down screens, and doctors can pull up the information they need by asking questions with their voices. Ideally, this will allow doctors to spend less time searching through records and more time caring for patients, Oracle said.
"It's not just a scribe. It's not an assistant. It's almost like having your own resident," Seema Verma, executive vice president and general manager of Oracle Health and Life Sciences, told CNBC in an interview.
Oracle's new offering could help boost its position within the fiercely competitive EHR market, where it has struggled to maintain its footing in recent years. In 2023, Oracle saw its largest net hospital loss on record while market leader Epic Systems, Oracle's top rival, was the only company that saw a net increase in acute care market share, according to a report from KLAS Research.
Cerner contributed $5.9 billion to Oracle's total revenue in fiscal 2023. Epic generated $4.9 billion in revenue last year.
PayPal reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings on Tuesday, but revenue came in slightly below expectations.
PayPal shares fell as much as 7% on Tuesday after it provided softer guidance than analysts were anticipating for the fourth quarter.
The company reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings, but it missed analysts' expectations on revenue for the July-through-September period.
Here's how the company did compared with Wall Street estimates, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:
Earnings per share: $1.20, adjusted vs. $1.07 expected
Revenue: $7.85 billion vs. $7.89 billion expected
For the fourth quarter, PayPal is calling for "low single-digit growth." Analysts were expecting growth of 5.4% to $8.46 billion in revenue. The investor deck says guidance reflects a "price-to-value strategy and prioritization of profitable growth."
The company expects adjusted earnings per share of $1.07 to $1.11, versus the average analyst estimate of $1.10, according to LSEG.
Revenue increased about 6% in the quarter from $7.42 billion in the same period a year ago. PayPal reported net income of $1.01 billion, or 99 cents per share, compared with $1.02 billion, or 93 cents per share, a year earlier.
Aside from a redesign that shrunk the case and reduced the computer's volume in half, the main upgrade on these new computers is that they include Apple's latest chip, either the M4, or a more powerful version called the M4 Pro.
The Mac Mini is Apple's least-expensive Mac, starting at $599, and does not include a display, which is sold separately. When the product line was first introduced in 2008, it was marketed as a computer for people switching from Microsoft Windows who could simply plug their existing keyboard, mouse and monitor into their new silver box.
The Mac Mini is not one of Apple's highest-volume computers in terms of sales, but it is an important slot in Apple's lineup, especially for people who make apps for iPhones and other Apple platforms. Many iPhone developers like to run a Mac Mini as a personal development server for coordinating uploads and code.
One improvement in the new design is that all of the ports are USB-C ports, the same more modern offering found on Apple's laptops. There are three USB-C ports on the rear and two on the front, a new addition that will make it easier to plug or unplug accessories while the computer rests on a desk.
Tens of thousands of creatives have signed an open letter calling for change.
Generative artificial intelligence companies capable of generating creative content are also said to be disrupting the livelihoods of creatives around the world, according to a group of creatives speaking out publicly about the issue.
"The unlicensed use of creative works for training generative AI is a major, unjust threat to the livelihoods of the people behind those works, and must not be permitted, a " statement signed by 11,500 actors, musicians, authors, photographers, and composers from across the world, read.
Julianne Moore, Kevin Bacon, Thom Yorke and Abba's Björn Ulvaeus, are among the tens of thousands of creatives who have signed this open letter calling for these companies to stop indiscriminately training on content they say should be licensed.
"This is a major issue for many of the artists, musicians, actors, authors, and other creators whose work is being exploited by AI companies," said Ed Newton-Rex, a former AI executive who released the statement.
As a former head of audio at Stability AI, Newton-Rex is well acquainted with the internal data training practices of generative AI companies. He resigned over the company's belief that training their AI models on copyrighted content without licensing it constitutes "fair use."
Generative AI models have generally scrapped as much content as they could from the internet, downloaded it and trained their model to be able to create new work that is in the style of the work it trained on, Newton-Rex told ABC News.
"None of this revenue is coming back to the original artists," explained Overlai founder Luke Neumann in a blog post about his new mobile app which aims to protect photography in the age of AI.
Neumann, who also signed the letter, launched the free app Overlai with world-renowned photographers Paul Nicklen and Cristina Mittermeier, when they noticed text-to-image generators could easily replicate the unique styles of both photographers. And, Neumann stresses the amount of work that goes into conservationist photography - the cost of travel and spending weeks, sometimes months in a location documenting a delicate ecosystem.
"I think AI companies really need to think long and hard about like how long they're going to need organic data and if they want to be messing with these fragile business models of the people out there capturing this stuff," Neumann to ABC News.
Several lawsuits from creatives ranging from writers to musicians to comedians have piled up against some of the biggest generative AI companies for copyright infringement.
In the wake of the extended conflicts in Ukraine and Israel, U.S. air-defense interceptor missiles are reportedly in short supply.
U.S. air-defense interceptor missiles are reportedly in short supply in the wake of the extended conflicts in Ukraine and Israel, leaving questions about the Pentagon's ability to respond to worsening situations in the Middle East and Europe, let alone the potential of conflict in the Pacific.
The U.S. has not developed a defense industrial base intended for a large-scale war of attrition in both Europe and the Middle East while meeting its own readiness standards," according to Elias Yousif, a fellow and deputy director of the Conventional Defense Program at the Stimson Center in Washington, D.C., The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
"Both of those wars are extended conflicts, which was not part of the U.S. defense planning," Yousif said.
Interceptor missiles are in high demand as Israel and U.S. allies are facing a growing threat from Iran, and the shortfall may become even more critical after Israel's weekend retaliatory strikes on Iran if Tehran responds with more attacks.
The most common interceptors are the Standard Missiles being used to defend Israel from Iran and to stop Houthi rebels' attacks in the Red Sea. U.S. officials say more than 100 Standards have been launched since last year's Hamas attack on Israel.
U.S. nonprofit Climate United on Tuesday announced a plan to spend up to $250 million to buy as many as 500 electric semi trucks over three years in what it called the biggest single order of those zero-emissions trucks in the country so far.
U.S. nonprofit Climate United on Tuesday announced a plan to spend up to $250 million to buy as many as 500 electric semi trucks over three years in what it called the biggest single order of those zero-emissions trucks in the country so far.
Climate United then aims to lease those vehicles at attractive rates to truckers that haul containers to and from California seaports, where roughly 33,000 so-called drayage trucks must have zero tailpipe emissions by 2035.
The program could give a much-needed jolt to the adoption of heavy-duty electric trucks that now account for less than 1% of the total U.S. trucking fleet. Those vehicles can cost as much as three times more than traditional diesel versions that are a major source of planet-warming greenhouse gases.
"High upfront costs make it difficult for independent owner-operators and small fleets to transition to all-electric," said Beth Bafford, CEO of Climate United.
The Maryland-based nonprofit said it plans to make initial orders in the first quarter of 2025 and that it is prioritizing class 8 trucks that are assembled in the United States with domestically made parts.
Trucks from manufacturers like Volvo Trucks North America , BYD and Kenworth already are shuttling cargo around ports in California, including the nation's busiest seaport complex in Los Angeles and Long Beach.
Climate United's program is funded by a $6.97 billion grant from the National Clean Investment Fund, part of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund created under President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act.
All-composite structures successfully withstood extreme conditions during the test flight, as per China’s Space Transportation.
A Chinese firm with its headquarters in Beijing announced that it has tested the prototype of a commercial transport plane that can travel at almost double the speed of the world’s first supersonic passenger-carrying airplane – the Concorde.
Space Transportation, which is known as Lingkong Tianxing Technology, in China has announced the successful test flight of its Yunxing prototype plane. According to the company’s claims, the plane can fly at speeds of Mach 4 or roughly 3069 miles per hour.
The company is planning to conduct a follow-up test of its engine in the coming month, according to a report by the South China Morning Post (SCMP). It also plans to have a full-sized supersonic jet ready to take its first flight in the year 2027.
China’s supersonic jet and Concorde’s legacy
The Concorde had broken all records for supersonic passenger travel when it debuted. Designed and built by Sud Aviation – which later became a part of Aerospatiale (now Airbus) of France and the British Aircraft Corporation, it is still talked about as one of the masterpieces of aviation technology.
The Concorde was the first turbojet-powered supersonic airliner to enter service flying passengers across the Atlantic at twice the speed of sound. Using Rolls-Royce Olympus engines, the aircraft could reach a maximum speed of 1,330 miles per hour.
The Chinese firm now aims to break this record by introducing a commercial plane that can fly at Mach 4 speed. The SCMP report mentions that the company claims to complete a trip between Beijing to New York in around two hours using the new plane.
The new aircraft prototype designed by Space Transportation also has other interesting features. These include the ability to take off and land vertically and to fly at heights of about 65,600 feet (20,000 meters).
Space Transportation and its new plane
Space Transportation designs and manufactures space transport systems intended to reduce space exploration costs. It was founded in 2018 by Yudong Wang, and in 2021 it had raised Series A funding.
In May 2022, Lingkong Tianxing successfully completed the Yao-10 flight mission of the Tianxing I rocket.
The company has a full-system design, and research and development capabilities in the field of hypersonic aircraft and rockets.
It also has experience in the full-process design of flight test project load analysis and calculation, modal analysis, force environment identification analysis, structural force transmission path planning, pre-design strength prediction, structural design, strength verification, strength testing, and environmental testing, according to its website.
The SCMP report mentions that the company tested the Yunxing supersonic jet on several parameters, including its aerodynamics, thermal protection, and control systems.
Grok AI: Can generative AI decipher the meaning of life?
Founded by Elon Musk last year, xAI is a startup that provides a service similar to Open AI’s ChatGPT. In a move typical of Musk, the company has a superb mission goal that strikes the core of our existence. That goal, the company says, is to use generative artificial intelligence “to understand the true nature of the universe.”
Key to achieving that goal is xAI’s Colossus supercomputer. The impressive computing powerhouse was built in Memphis, Tennessee, to train the third generation of Grok. xAI’s Grok is a large language model AI, much like Open AI’s ChatGPT. It is available to premium X (formerly Twitter) subscribers.
Impressively, xAI completed Colossus in just 122 days. It then began training its first models 19 days after the installation. According to Nvidia, these systems often take many months or even years to make.
Much like ChatGPT, Grok’s large language models are trained by analyzing massive amounts of data, requiring vast computing power. The data used includes text, images, and other content most often procured online.
In a recent post on X, Elon Musk said, “Colossus is the most powerful AI training system in the world. Moreover, it will double in size to 200k (50k H200s) in a few months. Excellent work by the [xAI] team, NVIDIA, and our many partners/suppliers.”
Now, Nvidia is helping xAI to take the world’s most powerful AI training cluster to the next level. In its statement on Monday, the US tech giant said it will help Elon Musk’s xAI double Colossus’s capacity to 200,000 GPUs.
The world’s most advanced AI chatbot
The Colossus AI training cluster comprises an interconnected network of 100,000 NVIDIA Hopper GPUs. These use a unified Remote Direct Memory Access network.
The network uses Nvidia’s Spectrum-X technology for low latency. Data moves directly between nodes without being rerouted toward the operating system, allowing Colossus to process the massive amounts of data required to train Grok.
“Across all three tiers of the network fabric, the system has experienced zero application latency degradation or packet loss due to flow collisions,” Nvidia explained in its statement. “It has maintained 95% data throughput enabled by Spectrum-X congestion control.”
Nvidia describes Spectrum-X as the world’s first ethernet networking platform for generative AI.
Theoretically, with Nvidia’s help, the combined Colossus array could eventually achieve about 497.9 exaflops (497,900,000 teraflops). This would set a new benchmark in supercomputing power and make Grok the most impressive AI chatbot on the planet.
The material is super thin, bendy, and tough. It can bend without breaking, making it great for rollable phones and wearable tech.
Scientists have developed a new material: an ultra-thin film that can absorb over 99% of electromagnetic waves.
The Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS) states it to be the “world’s first ultra-thin film composite material capable of absorbing over 99% of electromagnetic waves.”
This material is less than half a millimeter thick, but it can effectively shield against a wide range of frequencies, including those used by 5G, 6G, Wi-Fi, and autonomous vehicle radar.
Unlike traditional shielding materials that reflect electromagnetic waves, this new material absorbs them, minimizing interference and improving the performance of electronic devices.
“As the applications of 5G/6G communications continue to expand, the importance of electromagnetic wave absorption and shielding materials is growing,” said Byeongjin Park, senior researcher of KIMS, who led the development.
Park added: “This material has the potential to significantly improve the reliability of wireless communication devices such as smartphones and autonomous vehicle radars.”
Need for new material
Electronic devices can emit waves that mess with other nearby devices, resulting in performance degradation.
These invisible waves can lead to glitches, signal loss, and even safety hazards.
Electromagnetic shielding materials are employed to mitigate this interference. These materials hold the potential to absorb the waves, which is said to be more effective than just reflecting them.
Conventional shielding materials primarily reflect electromagnetic waves, absorbing only a small fraction of 10%. Additionally, materials with higher absorption rates are often limited to a single frequency band.
The ship features 1,000m² of solar panels, liquid hydrogen fuel cells, high-temperature fuel cells, carbon capture tech, and 50% sail propulsion.
Ponant – a cruise operator – has announced plans to build a hybrid passenger cruise ship powered by wind, liquid hydrogen (LH2), and bio-liquefied natural gas (bio-LNG).
The project, which Ponant announced, intends to further the transition of maritime travel to carbon neutrality.
The classification society Bureau Veritas (BV) has granted the firm’s vessel, dubbed Ponant Swap2Zero, approval in principle (AiP).
In addition to 1,000m² of solar panels, liquid hydrogen fuel cells, high-temperature fuel cells for hotel loads, and onboard carbon capture technologies, the ship has a sail power system that provides 50 percent energy for propulsion.
“This vessel concept represents our vision for the next generation of cruise vessels, showcasing how various technologies, energy sources, and processes can be harmonized to provide optimal autonomy and flexibility, all while being compliant with existing regulations,” said Mathieu Petiteau, Newbuilding and R&D Director at Ponant, in a statement.
Embark on a luxury cruise aboard one of our PONANT ships and experience a truly exceptional sea voyage with a difference. PONANT promises you unforgettable moments aboard our sleek and intimately sized cruise yachts, all of which sail under the French flag. Discover the innovatively designed cruise ship Le Boréal and her three sister vessels: L’Austral, Le Soléal and Le Lyrial. Experience Le Ponant, our famous three-masted ship, with her 16 staterooms, each combining traditional authenticity with modern comfort; and enjoy the pleasures of Le Lapérouse, a technologically cutting-edge cruise ship, the first in the PONANT EXPLORERS series. For 30 years now, our luxury cruise ships have been calling at both famous ports and lesser-known anchorages accessible only to smaller ships. As the number one luxury polar cruise operator, we offer a range of discovery expeditions to the majestic landscapes of the Arctic and the Antarctic.
Or you may choose from sunny excursions to the heart of the Mediterranean, sea voyages along Celtic coasts and beautiful getaways to the secret islands of the Pacific. Our themed luxury cruises offering unforgettable experiences designed with special interests in mind. Allow yourself to be tempted by one of our gastronomic cruises featuring cookery workshops hosted by renowned chefs; or a golf cruise in the Caribbean or the Mediterranean. Enjoy the opportunity to visit extraordinary locations on one of our many expedition cruises. Discover multi-faceted continents and forgotten lands endowed with natural treasures while experiencing the refined atmosphere and comfort of life on board. Combining wonderful itineraries with top-of-the-range hotel service, our exceptional luxury cruises à la française have been created to deliver quality and excellence through an unprecedented sailing experience. We invite you to discover the world of PONANT.
In September, the company achieved a world-first in underwater robotics and unveiled plans for a fleet of uncrewed submarines to tap into the subsea services market.
The firm’s system, named Loggerhead, eliminates the reliance on fossil-fueled surface vessels for ROV launches, significantly reducing the carbon impact of offshore energy activities.
Cleaner offshore solutions
HonuWorx was founded in 2020 with the goal of advancing subsea operations by lowering their costs, risks, and carbon footprint.
The firm’s first system is named after the Loggerhead sea turtle, known for its extensive migrations of nearly 8,000 miles to reach feeding areas.
To transform underwater maintenance operations, Loggerhead is an uncrewed, all-electric subsea inspection and intervention device. Loggerhead acts as a robotic mothership, moving and deploying worker robots to far-off places to do maintenance, inspection, and data collection.
A protective polymer layer allows zinc ions to flow while blocking water molecules and hydrogen formation.
A new approach developed by researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) involving a porous organic polymer has significantly extended the lifespan of zinc-ion batteries.
Instead of a few thousand cycles, batteries using this polymer at their anode can last several hundred thousand cycles, a university press release said.
As countries aim to boost their clean energy production over the next few years, solar and wind power plants are being commissioned at an unprecedented scale. However, the intermittent nature of the energy production facilities requires a large-scale energy storage solution for them to be truly effective.
Lithium-ion batteries are humanity’s best energy storage solution. However, deploying them at scale to carry out the energy transition requires vast amounts of lithium, which makes them expensive and unsustainable in the long run.
Researchers have been working on an effective, inexpensive, yet scalable alternative to lithium in batteries, and zinc can potentially fulfill that role.
Zinc-ion batteries
Zinc-ion batteries (ZIB) operate using the same mechanism as Lithium-ion batteries. The metal acts as the anode, while a zinc intercalating material serves as a cathode. The battery has a high energy density and is not prone to fires like its Li-ion counterpart.
The abundance of zinc in nature makes ZIBs cost-effective and sustainable, while their fast charging and discharging capabilities make them ideal for commercial use as well. Zinc batteries have a longer lifespan than Li-ion batteries. Still, issues of “zinc dendrites” and undesirable side reactions have stalled their wide-scale
In the near future, Silicon Valley might look back at recent events as the point where the generative AI craze went too far.
This past summer, investors questioned whether top AI stocks could sustain their sky-high valuations, given the lack of returns on massive AI spending. As Autumn approaches, major AI sectors—such as chips, LLMs, and AI devices—received renewed confidence. Nonetheless, there are an increasing number of reasons to be cautious.
Chip startup Cerebras is challenging Nvidia’s dominance by developing processors designed to power smarter LLMs. Nvidia, a major player in the AI boom, has seen its market cap skyrocket from $364 billion at the start of 2023 to over $3 trillion.
Cerebras, however, relies heavily on a single customer: the Abu Dhabi-based AI firm G42. In 2023, G42 accounted for 83% of Cerebras’ revenue, and in the first half of 2024, that figure increased to 87%. While G42 is backed by major players like Microsoft and Silver Lake, its dependency poses a risk. Even though Cerebras has signed a deal with Saudi Aramco, its reliance on one client may cause concerns as it seeks a $7-8 billion valuation for its IPO.
OpenAI’s record-breaking funding – but with strings attached
OpenAI made the news when it raised $6.6 billion at a $157 billion valuation, becoming the largest investment round in Silicon Valley history. However, the company has urged its investors not to back competitors such as Anthropic and Elon Musk’s xAI—an unusual request in the world of venture capital, where spread betting is common. Critics, including Gary Marcus, have described this approach as “running scared.”
OpenAI’s backers also include “bubble chasers” such as SoftBank and Tiger Global, firms known for investing in companies at their peak, which frequently results in huge losses. With top executives such as CTO Mira Murati departing and predicted losses of $5 billion this year despite rising revenues, OpenAI faces significant challenges.
Meta entered the AI race by unveiling Orion, its augmented reality glasses. The wearables promise to integrate AI into daily life, with Nvidia’s CEO Jensen Huang endorsing the product. However, at a production cost of $10,000 per unit, the price is a major obstacle.
Meta will need to reduce costs and overcome consumer hesitation, as previous attempts at AI-powered wearables—such as Snapchat’s glasses, Google Glass, and the Humane AI pin—have struggled to gain traction.
What’s next for AI? OpenAI must prove it can justify a $157 billion valuation while operating at a loss. Cerebras needs to reassure investors that relying on one client isn’t a dealbreaker. And Meta must convince consumers to adopt a completely new way of interacting with AI
If these companies succeed, this moment could mark a turning point in the AI revolution. However, as tech history shows, high-stakes markets are rarely easy to win.
As Texas’ population continues to boom, state transportation leaders are seeking public feedback to help cultivate a vision for mass transit and active transportation initiatives across the Lone Star State.
The Texas Department of Transportation is developing the Texas Statewide Active Transportation Plan (TSATP) and the Texas Statewide Multimodal Transit Plan (TSMTP). The goal is to “lay out a coordinated, unified vision for transit and active transportation priorities through 2050 and beyond,” per TxDOT documents. Officials added both plans are needed to improve mobility and connectivity as well as to support population and economic growth.
Draft TSATP documents outline more than a dozen challenges facing Texas mobility, including increased traffic congestion, pedestrian and cyclist fatalities, limited available right of way on Texas roads and a “lack of coordination between land use planning and active transportation implementation.”
Findings from a statewide survey conducted also found 77% of respondents don’t feel safe while using active transportation in Texas, while 83% said they want improvements to trail connectivity, 63% supported enhanced roadway crossings and 74% shared support for upgraded sidewalks.
Consolidated Alphabet revenues grew 15% year over year, the company said, “reflecting strong momentum across the business.” The tech giant reported net income increased 34%, and earnings per share, or EPS, increased 37% to $2.12. Google’s shares were up 1.66% at the market close on Tuesday, and were up 2.25% during after hours trading. The company’s stock has climbed 22.6% so far this year.
“The momentum across the company is extraordinary,” Google chief executive Sundar Pichai said in a statement. “Our commitment to innovation, as well as our long-term focus and investment in AI, are paying off with consumers and partners benefiting from our AI tools.”
Google was expected to report revenues of $86.4 billion and EPS of $1.84 for the third quarter, according to analyst estimates compiled by FactSet.
The company’s Cloud division revenues grew 35% to $11.4 billion due to “accelerated growth in Google Cloud Platform across AI infrastructure, Generative AI Solutions, and core GCP products,” it said.
In mid-October, analysts at Bank of America Global Research said they expected to see search strength in the third quarter “suggesting AI is driving higher monetization,” as well as “positive commentary” from Google on how its AI Overviews feature is “driving higher usage, or new advertising opportunities.”
“In Search, our new AI features are expanding what people can search for and how they search for it,” Pichai said. “In Cloud, our AI solutions are helping drive deeper product adoption with existing customers, attract new customers and win larger deals.”
Penguin Random House (PRH) has taken a significant step in response to rising concerns about the use of intellectual property to train AI systems.
The publisher has introduced a new statement to the copyright pages of both new and reprinted books, stating, “No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner for the purpose of training artificial intelligence technologies or systems.” This change is supplemented by a section that excludes PRH’s works from the European Union’s text and data mining exception, in accordance with applicable copyright laws.
As one of the first major publishers to address the issue of AI training explicitly, PRH is responding to the broader debate about how tech companies use copyrighted content to train large language models (LLMs), like those used in chatbots and other AI tools. Publishers have become increasingly concerned about the possible misuse of their intellectual property in recent years, especially after reports arose that copyrighted books were utilised by AI firms to enhance these technologies.
PRH’s move to amend its copyright page is an attempt to protect its content ahead of time, even though such comments have no bearing on the legal framework of copyright. The clauses work similarly to a “robots.txt” file, which websites employ to request that their content not be scraped by bots or AI systems. While these notices indicate the publisher’s intent, they are not legally binding, and existing copyright protections apply in the absence of such disclaimers.
PRH’s move also emphasises the ongoing tension between content creators and the AI industry, as more authors, publishers, and other creatives ask for stronger protections. The Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS) has been outspoken in its support for PRH’s actions. ALCS CEO Barbara Hayes expressed approval of the updated copyright language, emphasising the need for publishers to protect their works from unauthorised use in AI training.
However, some contend that simply changing copyright pages may not be enough. The Society of Authors (SoA) applauds PRH’s efforts, but believes more needs to be done to guarantee that authors’ rights are properly protected. SoA CEO Anna Ganley has called on publishers to go beyond these statements and incorporate explicit protections in author contracts, making sure that writers are informed before their work is used in AI-related initiatives.
As AI advances, the debate over its usage of copyrighted content remains far from over. PRH’s action could herald a larger shift in the publishing sector, but how other publishers and the legal system react remains to be seen.
While AI is “most likely going to be great,” Musk said “there’s some chance, which could be, 10 to 20%, that it goes bad,” during an interview with Peter Diamandis at the Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.
Diamandis asked Musk about predictions the billionaire made at the Abundance Summit in March that AI is growing “as fast as 100 times per year,” and that by the end of the decade, AI could become “as capable as 8 billion humans.”
“I certainly feel comfortable saying that it’s getting 10 times better per year, which is, four years from now that would mean 10,000 times better, so maybe 100,000,” Musk said about the pace of AI. “I think it will be able to do anything that any human can do — possibly within the next year or two.”
Three years after that, Musk said, AI could get to the point of doing “what all humans can do, combined.”
Musk's Tesla is helping lead the charge with its Optimus project
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said on Tuesday that he thinks humanoid robots will outnumber humans in less than 20 years. His company is helping to make that future a possibility.
“I think by 2040, there will probably be more humanoid robots than there are people,” Musk said Tuesday during an appearance at the Future Investment Initiative, an event run by the institute of the same name. The institute was launched in 2017 by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund.
That estimate would put around 10 billion humanoid robots in use around the world. Musk said the price for a “robot that can do anything” would likely cost between $20,000 and $25,000 apiece.
That lines up almost exactly with Musk’s estimates for the cost of Tesla’s Optimus robots, a line of humanoid robots that are being put to limited use by the company. While speaking at the automaker’s “We, Robot” event on Oct. 10, Musk said he expects Optimus to be sold for between $20,000 and $30,000 a piece in the “long term” once production is increased.
Tesla’s history with Optimus is shaky, going back to its infamous 2021 debut that showed off a person dancing in a costume.
At the event earlier this month, the robots performed a range of activities, including handing out gift bags and drinks and playing rock, paper, scissors with attendees. The robots also danced, including to a remix of the song “What is love (Baby Don’t Hurt Me),” and interacted with guests.
Tesla later confirmed that the robots relied on teleoperation — or remote assistance — repeatedly to make Optimus appear more impressive. About 20 robots were active at all times, according to Tesla’s Optimus lead Milan Kovac, with one incident of a robot falling. The company later put out a less than 90-second video demonstrating an Optimus unit placing batteries in a tray, carrying the roughly 24-pound tray, climbing stairs, and handing out bottled drinks and popcorn to employees.
by humanoid robots does he mean AI human beings. That would be awesome, because with the current advancement going on I wouldn't be surprised if AI becomes sentient or at least immitate that almost perfectly indistinguishably
Audiences will be major beneficiaries of AI in the media industry, Brightcove CEO Marc DeBevoise says in the latest episode of Quartz AI Factor
Brightcove (BCOV) chief executive Marc DeBevoise doesn’t envision artificial intelligence replacing human creativity anytime soon. Instead, he believes the new technology will help free up resources at media and streaming companies that will open the floodgates for creation.
The streaming technology platform CEO told Quartz that tasks like cutting thumbnail images, following search engine optimization (SEO) best practices, and translating videos will soon be done by AI.
“What that will free up is the resources for those humans to make different decisions that can help optimize,” DeBevoise said in this week’s episode of Quartz AI Factor, a new video interview series filmed on location at the Nasdaq MarketSite (NDAQ).
“I do feel like the tool sets are gonna improve,” DeBevoise said, “and improve on the production and creation side to enable folks to really optimize the content they create for what audiences are looking for.”
Google is bringing its AI Overviews feature to more than 100 countries around the world, a massive expansion after initially becoming available just in the U.S. and later a half dozen other countries. AI Overviews, which employ Google's Gemini AI models to summarize answers to search queries, will now be available to more than a billion monthly users.
The paragraphs written by the AI Overviews feature are concise and include links to the sources used to compose them, usually articles from publications, business websites, or related sources. Google has claimed since they debuted that AI Overviews have led to increased engagement with diverse sources on the web.
Along with the geographic expansion, Google is also adding new language support to the service. Depending on where you are located and what language you use for Google Search, you'll see AI Overviews in either English, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Portuguese, or Spanish. The wider access based on location and language isn't the only upgrade for AI Overviews. Google has also unveiled a new link display to showcase the websites and content sources used to produce better AI summaries. The AI Overviews also now include right-hand link displays formatted for desktop and mobile devices. In them, you can see related content on websites, augmenting the in-line links within the AI Overview text.
“With AI Overviews in Search, it’s easier than ever for people to find the information they need and discover relevant sites across the web, which opens up more opportunities to connect with publishers, businesses, and creators.,” Google Vice President of Search Quality Srinivasan Venkatachary explained in a blog post. “Since launching in May and expanding beyond the U.S. in August, the feedback we’ve received for AI Overviews has been highly positive. People prefer using Search with AI Overviews, and they find their search results more helpful. So now, in our largest expansion yet, we’re launching AI Overviews in more than 100 countries and making them accessible in more languages — helping you search in a whole new way, no matter what questions are on your mind.”
The global rollout makes it clear that the signs that Google was pulling back on AI Overviews were exaggerated. Though there was some speculation that Google was leery about promoting the feature after reports of incorrect and even dangerous answers, that's clearly no longer the case.
Google has even started testing advertisements within AI Overviews, at least for U.S. mobile users. These ads are labeled to differentiate them from standard search results but are aimed at encouraging users to look at and potentially buy products and services relevant to their search terms. Search is the heart of Google's business and remains so despite judicial battles over whether the company is violating anti-monopoly laws. If Google feels comfortable enough with AI Overviews to make it a global feature, the ads are almost certain to follow in its wake, with multilingual AI-generated links that will be seen by billions.
Midjourney has a new challenger for the title of best AI image generator, and it’s a model nobody has heard of before.
The AI image generator in question is called “red_panda” and is currently top of the crowdsourced Artificial Analysis rankings for text-to-image generation. Artificial Analysis’ arena leaderboard is created by giving users the choice between two images and asking them which one they prefer. It’s all down to a matter of taste but as it stands red_panda has a 79% win rate beating out rivals like Black Forest Labs, Ideogram, and Midjourney.
So what is red_panda you ask? Well, no one actually knows but Artificial Analysis can be a great way to test AI models before launching to the general public and this may be the case here. The name of the AI could give us a hint, however, after all, red pandas are found in the eastern Himalayas and southwestern China. Could this AI image generation model be a new contender from a large Chinese company?
Having helped pioneered the global rollout of 5G networks with extensive infrastructure investments and technological breakthroughs that enabled the rapid deployment of high-speed, low-latency mobile services, China is now setting its sights on 6G.
China Mobile, in collaboration with Zhongguancun Pan-Institute of Information and Communications Technology, China Information Technology Mobile, and smartphone maker Vivo, has introduced a 6G baseband concept prototype system for the Sub7GHz frequency band.
As the world looks forward to an official launch of 6G in the coming years, China Mobile’s latest demonstration highlights the progress made in this developing field. The prototype system is part of China Mobile’s 6G "synaesthesia, computing, and intelligence fusion technology platform," reflecting a deep integration of sensory, computing, and communications technologies.
China Mobile announced the 6G baseband concept prototype system for the Sub-7 GHz frequency band is a crucial component of its public testing device. This system aims to facilitate the deep integration of inter-sensory computing and intelligence, as well as the integration of terrestrial and celestial networks.
At the core of this new system is a strong baseband capability that is built on a cloud-based heterogeneous hardware architecture, with the system supporting a throughput of up to 100Gbps for container networks. This high throughput is combined with an ultra-short transmission time interval (TTI) processing capability of 125 microseconds (μs), allowing for faster data transmission and enhanced responsiveness.
The system’s architecture allows for a maximum interrupt response delay of less than 10μs, contributing to its flexibility and reconfigurability. It supports eight data streams and 128 digital channels, and the single-carrier bandwidth reaches 400MHz, enabling a real-time baseband throughput of up to 16.5Gbps.
These features position the system at the forefront of 6G development, meeting the stringent requirements for new technologies and service verifications, such as ultra-high-definition video and real-time data processing.
Nvidia has released a new patch for its GPU Display Driver for Windows and Linux to fix a handful of rather serious vulnerabilities.
If exploited, the vulnerabilities mostly lead to code execution, denial of service, escalation of privileges, information disclosure, and data tampering, which means they are rather serious. Among them is CVE‑2024‑0126, which has a severity score of 8.2 (high severity).
Another six vulnerabilities are scored 7.8, while the final one is scored 7.1. Of the total eight flaws, five affect the Windows ecosystem. They are all user mode layer exploits, in which threat actors could initiate out-of-bound reads and thus execute code remotely. One exploit was for both Windows and Linux.
Smash and grab
The details about the vulnerabilities and how they can be exploited can be found on Nvidia’s security bulletin, here. There was no word of in-the-wild abuse, so we’re guessing crooks haven’t abused these bugs just yet.
However, with Nvidia’s popularity and prevalence, it is now only a matter of time before miscreants start looking for vulnerable endpoints to exploit.
In July 2024, Google released Chrome 127, a new version of the Chrome browser that came with Application-Bound (App-Bound) encryption. The new feature was supposed to serve as a protection mechanism, encrypting cookies using a Windows service running with SYSTEM privileges. The tool was supposed to prevent infostealing malware from grabbing sensitive information stored in the browser, such as login credentials, session cookies, and more.
Higher privileges needded
"Because the App-Bound service is running with system privileges, attackers need to do more than just coax a user into running a malicious app," Google said at the time. "Now, the malware has to gain system privileges, or inject code into Chrome, something that legitimate software shouldn't be doing."
But the success of the new feature was short-lived. In late September, we reported that multiple infostealers were already able to work around the feature, including Lumma Stealer, StealC, and many others.
Google responded by saying that it was expected, and added that it was happy the changed forced a shift in attacker behavior.
"This matches the new behavior we have seen. We continue to work with OS and AV vendors to try and more reliably detect these new types of attacks, as well as continuing to iterate on hardening defenses to improve protection against infostealers for our users."
The Bitcoin ETFs have recorded around $4 billion worth of inflows during their last 12 trading days.
Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas predicted that by December, US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) BTC holdings could eclipse those of Satoshi Nakamoto.
Balchunas suggested that at their current accumulation pace — roughly 17,000 BTC weekly — the ETFs may surpass 1 million BTC next week. This puts them on track to outpace Nakamoto’s holdings, estimated to be around 1.1 million BTC, as early as December.
The recent inflow into spot BTC ETFs adds weight to this forecast. Over the past 12 trading days, these ETFs have attracted close to $4 billion, with BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT) alone pulling in around $2.6 billion.
Phoronix readers recently flagged concerns about the company's apparent shift away from an open source model. The password manager platform has traditionally operated on a ‘freemium’ model, providing some code as open source.
But a pull request earlier in October 2024 raised eyebrows due to the fact the Bitwarden client introduced a “bitwarden/sdk-internal” dependence to the desktop client.
too many things going on right now. Bitcoin got me excited, heard my friend passed away and cried in between work breaks. So awkward I don’t have a whole afternoon to give him.
Now I have to get back to translation. I want to spend more time mourning or writing or playing guitar but I can’t right now 😵💫. Oh well life is still beautiful in all its awkwardness.
A recent study has suggested having a cat could potentially double a person's risk of developing schizophrenia-related disorders.
Australian researchers conducted an analysis of 17 studies published during the last 44 years and found a link between owning a cat and developing disorders related to schizophrenia.
@savvytester just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @pepetoken!
Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:
@pepetoken just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @savvytester!
Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:
@savvytester just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @pepetoken!
Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:
@pepetoken just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @savvytester!
Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:
@savvytester just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @pepetoken!
Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:
@pepetoken just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @bradleyarrow!
Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:
🌟 *1inch collaborates with the Bruce Lee Foundation for a campaign celebrating the philosophy and legacy of the legendary martial artist, Bruce Lee. #btc #crypto #inleo#bbh #cent
I have been trying to add AI content to threadcast buy it seems to not give room to a massive word span. I get that 'minus figures' beneath and it refuses to post.
Cool, feel free to add to the Travel Threadcast I post every other day too. I mentioned to bannersandborder that there may be some good cross-over with Geography
1/🧵 Life's Big Question: Unraveling The Mystery Of Purpose
Sometimes, I find thoughts about life and our purposes too complex to talk about but in real sense, they are simple and need only personal decisions to find them out. #outreach #threadstorm #hivelearners
Purposes differ from one person to another, only those who take their time to connect deeply and think hard on what they really want from life and give back to life, are able to find their purposes.
Thanks :)Sorry for the 'cold call' message here. But I am looking for support for my Witness :) @thebbhproject. If you have a spare vote or think I am worthy, support would be awesome.
Just been watching some movies of Ken Block RALLY... from 2 years ago... and damn... this reminded me what #blockchain #rally is for me! Dope @peakd team 😎
Good morning everyone!
New inleo #meme
#wenmoon #blockchain
wen!!
lol
good moringin
LOL
morning
Hello foodie Lions 🦁! Happy Tuesday. Welcome to today's show. 🥗🍲🫕
Day 126 of the #foodtalk on Leo
DiscussionThis is the #threadcast for 29/10/2024 for 28/10/2024. It's time for some meal inspirations and food conversation. Don't forget to use #foodtalk in your comments.
More about food with tips and tricks will be dropped in the threadcast. Upvote the comments you find interesting & connect with others. Let's have fun. #foodie
A typical bruch to buy in a bakery in Venezuela. #foodtalk
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs
Despite fearmongering anti-carb sentiments in the weight-loss world, carbs are actually essential to maintaining a balanced and steady diet—you just have to pick the right ones!
Get more delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs in the comments. 👇
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #deliciousfoods #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs. 👈 Begin here.
Grains are a plant food that provides us with important vitamins, minerals, carbs, fiber, and protein, which fuel our muscles and brain and keep our bodies working like well-oiled machines. With so many grains out there, however, it can be hard to know what to get, and from there it's hard to know what to make with them. That's where we come in! Click through to see which grains offer the biggest nutritional bang for your buck, and what delicious meals and goodies you should make them into.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #deliciousfoods #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Millet
There are many kinds of millet—a group of related grasses with small seeds—but generally, millet is gluten-free and contains fiber, minerals, and amino acids. It’s also loaded with manganese, which is a mineral that supports bone and brain health.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #millet #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Millet
This gluten-free Asian grain is often used in porridge, to make congee, as well as stir-fried dishes. It’s also ground and used to make flatbreads in India. Since it’s gluten-free, it’s increasingly found in pancakes, muffins, and other sweets as well.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #millet
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Quinoa
Though technically a seed, this superfood plant-based protein has every essential amino acid as well as iron, manganese, phosphorus, magnesium, folate, vitamin B1, and fiber. Quinoa is also a slow digesting carbohydrate, so it creates sustained energy.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Quinoa #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Quinoa
This pseudo-grain is very versatile, as it can work in salads, soups, as a rice substitute, mixed with milk as a porridge, worked into burger patties, and so much more.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Quinoa
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Oats
Oats contain highly-soluble fiber that helps improve digestion, lower cholesterol, and keep your blood sugar in balance, and reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease. Plus, they’re rich in iron and calcium, and keep you feeling full.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Oats #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Oats
For breakfast, try a hot bowl of oatmeal with all the sweet fixings of fruits, jams, nut butters, or even chocolate. You can also bake them into a breakfast muffin, or make overnight oats by soaking them—the options are endless!
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Oats
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Freekeh
This whole grain is not only low-glycemic, it also has four times the fiber per serving that brown rice has, and it keeps you feeling fuller for longer. It’s made from young wheat and roasted to give it a signature smoky flavor. It also has tons of protein, fiber, and vitamins.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Freekeh #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Freekeh
This chewy, nutty grain is relatively unknown in American cuisine, but has been a staple in the Middle East for centuries. A Lebanese way of preparing it, which often involves first browning onions then cooking the freekeh with the onions and water, often pairs with chicken. The grain makes a great substitute for rice in dishes, it cooks quickly, and works well as a porridge, too.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Freekeh
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Sorghum
This ancient cereal grain is popular around the world. Since it’s gluten-free, it’s popularly used in the US for those with celiac disease.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Sorghum #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Sorghum
You can use sorghum flour to make bread and baked goods, or turn it into couscous, or even pop it and eat it like popcorn!
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Sorghum
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Buckwheat
Though not technically a grain (it’s actually a cousin of the rhubarb plant), buckwheat earns an honorary place on this list because it’s used like one. Plus, it has all nine essential amino acids, which makes it a whole protein, and is packed with B vitamins, magnesium, and soluble fiber.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Buckwheat #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Buckwheat
This gluten-free whole grain is best known as an ingredient in soba noodles, or as cereal (known as kasha), or in healthy pancakes. You can also toast buckwheat for a wonderfully crunchy addition to salads or granola.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Buckwheat #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Barley
One of the oldest grains in humanity, going way back to ancient Egypt, barley has the most fiber of all the whole grains, including a soluble fiber called beta-glucans that keeps cholesterol low and supports your immune system. Whole grain barley packs more antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals than the pearled version.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Barley #wholegrains #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Barley
Barley works great as a base for grain bowls or salads, as well as in soups. You can try barley flakes as a breakfast porridge instead of oats, or use barley flour with wheat flour in baked goods to get a kick of fiber in your sweet treats.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Barley #wholegrains #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Bulgur
Also known as cracked wheat, bulgur has more fiber than quinoa, oats, and millet, which helps keep your digestive system happy. It’s also low in fat and packed with minerals like magnesium, manganese, and iron.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Bulgur #wholegrains #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Bulgur
Bulgur is most famously found in tabbouleh, the Mediterranean salad, but it helps bulk up any salad. Its nutty flavor and chewy texture are also useful in soups and when stuffing vegetables. All you have to do is boil it like pasta to prepare it.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Bulgur #wholegrains #food
I won't just stop eating food that I like. It's not sustainable for me. I LOVE pasta, potatoes and rice. But I also like some veggies and grains. It's all about balance and moderation, IMO.
That's true, I also like eating the foods you mentioned and I love to pair them with veggies or fruits.
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Wild rice
Deceiving in its name, wild rice is actually an aquatic grass seed. Though it has less iron and calcium than brown rice, it gives you twice the protein and fiber. It also has 30 times more antioxidant power than white rice.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #wildrice #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Wild rice
Wild rice pilaf with mushrooms is always a hit, but you can also make some delicious fall meals with it like stuffed squash or creamy soup.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #wildrice #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Farro
A well-known grain in Italy and the Mediterranean, farro is packed with protein and fiber, as well as a nice dose of iron, magnesium, and B vitamins.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Farro #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Farro
As farro is nutty, chewy, and hearty, this fiber-rich grain can be prepared in salads, soups, or in place of rice. Try a Caprese farro salad or a Greek farro salad.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Farro #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Teff
This tiny ancient grain is small but mighty. Coming from grass that grows mostly in Ethiopia and Eritrea, it has significantly more calcium than other grains, and it’s packed with protein, iron, fiber, magnesium, zinc, vitamin B6, and manganese—not to mention it’s gluten-free.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Teff #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Teff
Teff flour is most famously (and deliciously) used to make the spongy Ethiopian flatbread called injera. You can also bake and cook with it.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Teff #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Rye
Rye is unique because it has fiber in both its endosperm and bran, which gives it a lower glycemic index than most other grains and helps keep your blood sugar stable. It’s also typically more nutritious than wheat and contains more minerals for less carbs.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Rye #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Rye
Swap in rye bread for your sandwiches and get a nice dose of fiber and protein.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Rye #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Spelt
This ancient whole wheat boasts a high protein and zinc content, and it’s popular among people who are allergic to wheat because it offers many of the same benefits without the allergic reaction.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Spelt #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Spelt
You can use spelt in place of rice or pasta, or use spelt flour in place of white or whole wheat. For vegans and vegetarians, sprouting, fermenting, or soaking the grains reduces its antinutrients (which can reduce the absorption of zinc and iron from your gut).
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Spelt #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Brown rice
Brown rice is a slow-digesting carb that is high in B vitamins and fiber. It has three parts: bran, germ, and endosperm, with nothing removed during milling, so while it has more calories than white rice, it also has more protein and fiber.
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Brownrice #food
Delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs 👈 Begin here.
Brown rice
You can use brown rice in the same way you’d use regular rice—think fried rice, pilaf, pudding…the possibilities are endless!
Sources: (WebMD) (Real Simple) (Healthline)
#foodtalk #healthycarbs #healthyeating #Brownrice #food
I applaud the consistent of this threadcast.
An idea, perhaps look at what is in the Reddit regarding food. Could be a lot of data to add to the threadcast from there.
Thanks so much dear Taskmaster. I try to keep it up and running and add some content that are helpful.
Okay, I will check out what goes on there. I created a Reddit account but yet to explore the platform, thanks so much for this idea Task.
You dont need a reddit account to read (copy/paste) from it.
Simply do a search for food.
Oh, had no idea about that, some platforms work differently.
A lot goes on in the Reddit food world, I will get the information I can to add up here.
Yes. If you find it, post if into the threadcast. It all feeds into the vector database.
Day 126. Join the conversation, share your food experiences and delicious ways to enjoy the healthiest carbs.
Welcome back to another episode of the #foodtalk show on Leo,
What are you having for breakfast? #foodtalk #breakfast
I don't really do breakfast! I only have a cup of blaxck coffee and that's it
Hmm... my food experience, I have a lot to share but let me share this one:
I remember when I was much younger, I disliked eating salad because of the taste of the cabbage. My dad made sure I ate salad until I got used to it and stopped rejecting it, haha. Him and my mum explained to me that salad makes one look fresh and I have to eat it to look fresh too.
Now, I love eating cabbage and I use it mostly in my cooking.
#foodtalk #foodexperience #salad
I am not really a picky eater ever since but upon growing up, I feel that I'm having a different taste with food compared before.
Do you have any food suggestions for students like me, living alone, which is healthy and yet affordable and anyone can do?
#food
A healthy way to eat carbohydrates is to consume oatmeal. I love to add it to just about everything. #foodtalk
That's right and it contains a good amount of fibre.
Subway sandwiches are short on meat, lawsuit claims
A proposed class action lawsuit accuses the sandwich chain of “grossly misleading” customers.
A new lawsuit accuses Subway of “grossly misleading” customers by advertising sandwiches that contain at least three times more meat than it delivers.
According to a proposed class action filed on Monday in federal court in Brooklyn, Subway ads for its Steak & Cheese sandwich show layers of meat piled high, reaching about as high as the surrounding hero bread.
#subway #Lawsuit #foot
In reality, according to several photos in the complaint, the fast-food chain’s sandwiches are far more bread than filling.
This is especially concerning, the complaint said, because of inflation and high food prices, and because many lower-income consumers are struggling financially.
Anna Tollison of the New York City borough of Queens said she paid $7.61 for a Steak & Cheese sandwich at a local Subway, not realizing Subway’s ads showed a sandwich containing at least 200% more meat than she and other consumers would receive.
Her lawsuit seeks unspecified damages for New Yorkers who bought the sandwiches in the last three years, for Subway’s alleged violations of the state’s consumer protection laws.
Article
Why Your Favorite Starbucks Drink May Soon Be Gone
Adieu, olive oil latte!
Your Starbucks order could be changing very soon.
In October, Starbucks reported its preliminary fourth-quarter net revenue at $9.1 billion, marking a 3% year-over-year drop. It's also the third quarter in a row that the coffee giant has experienced a decrease in revenue. And that's something Brian Niccol, the company's new CEO, wants to address by streamlining operations — including the chain's complex menu.
#starbucks #food #drink
"People love Starbucks, but I’ve heard from some customers that we've drifted from our core, that we’ve made it harder to be a customer than it should be, and that we’ve stopped communicating with them," Niccol shared in a prerecorded video uploaded to the Starbucks website. "To welcome all our customers back and return to growth, we need to fundamentally change our recent strategy." He added that the "Back to Starbucks" plan will be that "fundamental change."
According to Niccol, who came over from Chipotle, the company will work to get back to its "core identity" to ensure customers keep coming back. "To succeed, we need to address staffing in our stores, remove bottlenecks, and simplify things for our baristas," he said. "We will simplify our overly complex menu, fix our pricing architecture, and ensure that every customer feels Starbucks is worth it every single time they visit."
Article
Aldi’s Much-Anticipated Advent Calendars Are Here — and There Are Chocolate, Cheese, and Wine Versions
Can you name 24 different types of wine? This advent calendar’s got ’em all.
Here’s a philosophical question for you: If November arrives without a breathless media announcement about Aldi’s advent calendars, is it really the holiday season at all? Not to worry — you don’t have to ponder that one at all this year. The 2024 advent calendars have arrived at America’s favorite discount grocery store, and they offer a little bit of everything (literally). There’s even a hot sauce calendar this year with 24 different styles and levels of heat.
#aldi #media #food
Starting November 6, Aldi will be releasing its hotly anticipated lineup of advent calendars, and it’s best to scoop them up fast because they tend to sell out quickly. For the unfamiliar, advent calendars are an annual tradition counting down the 24 days of December before Christmas Day, full of two dozen compartments typically housing one tiny treat for each day of the Advent season.
At Aldi, you certainly have your pick of tiny treats: There will be as many as 20 different calendars offered this year, filled with either chocolate, wine, or other treasures. The press release notes that the chocolate, wine, and cheese calendars this year are designed to complement one another, and thus, “customers are encouraged to purchase all three calendars together for the ultimate pairing experience.” (Well played, Aldi.)
Article
More Than Half of Plastic Food Packaging Can Be Replaced, According to a New Study
UK-based DS Smith undertook an extensive field analysis — here's what it found.
There's no doubt in anyone's mind that plastic pollution is a problem. As the United Nations noted, "46% of plastic waste is landfilled, while 22% is mismanaged and becomes litter. Unlike other materials, plastic does not biodegrade. It can take up to 1,000 years to break down, so when it is discarded, it builds up in the environment until it reaches a crisis point," it pointedly added, "This pollution chokes marine wildlife, damages soil and poisons groundwater, and can cause serious health impacts." It's critical to address this growing issue — and that could begin by illuminating useless plastic packaging.
#plastic #food #packaging #dssmith
A new research paper commissioned by paper packaging firm DS Smith found that more than half (51%) of packaging on grocery items in the United Kingdom could be reduced or replaced entirely.
To come to this conclusion, the researchers undertook a field analysis, which included an audit of plastic usage on 1,500 food and drink products across the top five food retailers by market share in six European countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland, and the UK).
Article
Scammers Stole More than 20 Tons of Cheddar Worth Nearly $400,000 From This Famed Shop in London
It's a stinkin' crime.
Neal's Yard Dairy, an artisan cheese purveyor in the UK, shared that it was the victim of a massive cheese theft that saw more than 22 tons of cheddar stolen out from under them.
"We have some difficult news to share. Neal's Yard Dairy has been the victim of a theft resulting in the loss of over 22 tons of clothbound Cheddar," the shop shared on its Instagram page. As it further explained, the theft was carried out by a fraudulent buyer who posed as a "legitimate wholesale distributor for a major French retailer."
#food #theft #cheddarcheese #london
The shop delivered more than 950 wheels of Hafod, Westcombe, and Pitchfork Cheddar before they discovered it was all a ruse. However, it added that "despite the significant financial blow, we have honored our commitment to our small-scale suppliers and paid all three artisan cheesemakers in full."
According to the BBC, the shop usually sells the Hafod Welsh for £12.90 (about 16.72) for 300g, the Westcombe for £7.15 (about $9.27) for 250g, and the Pitchfork for £11 (about $14.26) for 250g.
Article
https://www.nealsyarddairy.co.uk/
Select, mature, and sell outstanding British and Irish cheese
Our Mission
Improve British and Irish cheese by sharing information, fostering community, and prioritising sustainability.
Our Story
Championing British and Irish cheese since 1979
Neal's Yard
In the 1970s, a community of food businesses focused on quality and simplicity cropped up in a formerly derelict corner of Covent Garden – the eponymous Neal’s Yard. In 1979, Randolph Hodgson joined their ranks and founded Neal’s Yard Dairy. What began as a small shop stocking Greek-style yoghurt, creme fraiche, and a couple of cheeses grew with Randolph’s immersion in the British cheesemaking community. He began visiting cheesemakers, learning about their work and bringing cheeses back to his shop. That is still the core of what Neal’s Yard Dairy does today.
Cheesemakers
We currently work with about 40 cheesemakers from Britain and Ireland. While varying significantly in their backgrounds and personalities, what all of them share is a commitment to a slow, hands-on approach to cheesemaking. It is a commitment we share. We are proud to have stocked Beenleigh Blue, Stichelton, and many more of our cheeses for decades. We hope they are part of our story for years to come.
BOROUGH MARKET SHOP
8 Park Street, London, SE1 9AB
COVENT GARDEN SHOP
17 Shorts Gardens, London, WC2H 9AT
ISLINGTON SHOP
107 Essex Road, London, N1 2SL
BERMONDSEY SHOP
Arch 10, Apollo Business Park, Lucey Way, London, SE16 3UF
The Hershey Company Wants to Give Your Breakfast Smoothie a Flavor Boost With 3 Candy-Inspired Protein Powders
It's a whole new way to get your protein boost.
C4 Energy, the Austin-based sports nutrition drink, and The Hershey Company partnered to make a candy treat that’s actually meant to be functional. The sugary sweet partnership brings three candy-inspired flavors of whey protein powders — Hershey’s Milk Chocolate, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and Vanilla Bean — to the market.
#c4 #hershey #food #protein
This is the first-ever protein powder released by either company. For C4, known for its energy drinks and pre-workout powders, this is just the start, says Robert Zajac, the CMO of Nutrabolt, C4’s parent company. “This is just the beginning of our entry into this space,” Zajac told Food & Wine exclusively. “We’re already developing the next phase of protein — from ingredients to flavors to formats; the opportunities are endless.”
The brand plans to roll out more protein-focused products because it is “crucial for muscle repair and growth,” making it appealing to fitness enthusiasts, pro and amateur athletes, plus the newly health-conscious, says Zajac. And science backs that all up. Studies show that consuming protein is responsible for multiple benefits: it helps strengthen and expand muscles, is good for bone health, and lowers blood pressure. The new candy-flavored proteins are an easy entry point for anyone looking to reap these benefits.
Article
Blue cheese for breakfast (an Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund apprentice’s view on all things Neal’s Yard Dairy)
We have had the pleasure of hosting Ellen who is the 2024 Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund (ASLF) apprentice.
We have had the pleasure of hosting Ellen who is the 2024 Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund (ASLF) apprentice. The ASLF is an American organisation which honours the great, late cheese pioneer Anne Saxelby by providing opportunities for young people to live on sustainable farms across the US. Neal's Yard Dairy is currently the only ASLF partner in the UK and we offer an experience across our London-based business instead of on farms. Read on to find out what Ellen has been up to.
#bluecheese #food #nealsyarddairy
Stilton
Maturation experiment
tasting at
8am on a Thursday morning?
I knew
I’d
made the right c
hoice
when I saw this on the agenda
for my Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund (ASLF) apprenticeship with Neal’s Yard Dairy.
Coming from a Cornish farming family and having worked in people-facing roles within the Arts & Cultural sector for over two years now, this opportunity felt like a calling (and a collision of my two worlds!) that I couldn’t ignore. I have always believed both art and creatives have the power to facilitate learning and engagement amongst communities from all walks of life, so it has been really rewarding to discover that it is no different when it comes to the (somewhat overlooked) art forms of Cheesemaking and Cheesemongering.
For instance, it cannot be overstated how much everybody loves cheese here, and how contagious that love is. Seriously. The passion people have for the product and the process underpins every decision each department makes, plus the relationships with producers and customers alike are treated with such respect and dedication.
Emma Young's Hot Wings with Stichelton
Hot sauce, chicken wings, and Stichelton: three things that taste great, combined. This easy and flavourful recipe comes courtesy of Emma Young, cheesemonger and author of The Cheese Wheel.
This recipe comes courtesy of Emma Young, cheesemonger and author of The Cheese Wheel: How to Choose and Pair Cheese Like an Expert.
There’s nothing more satisfying than a recipe that involves minimal preparation and full, impactful flavour. These hot wings with Stichelton are essentially a combination of things which already taste excellent, a combination which can be recreated at any time of the year… or day for that matter.
#food #wings
In The Cheese Wheel, you’ll find me mentioning the yeasty, savoury, and fruity goodness of Stichelton working well with strong alcohol like Islay whisky, and part of the reason this works so well is the spicy nature of the alcohol cutting through the cheese.
The creamy, fudgy paste of Stichelton is also cut extremely well by hot sauces. I purposefully haven’t specified which, as there are so many out there. I am partial to a buffalo sauce or fermented hot sauce for a fruity, umami, and fermented explosion to coat your chicken wings, enhanced by the salty, savoury Stichelton.
Hot Wings with Stichelton
(Serves one hungry person or two people with sides)
Ingredients:
750g chicken wings (highest welfare possible please, I’m a hen mum!)
2-4 tablespoons of hot sauce (I recommend the Buffalo Hot Sauce from The Sauce Shop or making your own fermented sauce at home.)
150g Stichelton
Method:
I’m not cool enough to own an air fryer but this would make for an even easier cooking method than it is already.
Alternatively, bake or fry.
To bake: preheat your oven to 200°C (392°F, gas mark 6). Place your wings on a baking tray or dish. Spread them for even cooking & place the tray onto the middle shelf of your oven for approximately 35-40 minutes.
To fry: deep fry the chicken wings at 180°C (350°F) for 10-12 minutes or until cooked through and crispy. If you have a deep fat frier, fabulous, if not, make sure your pan is deep enough to accommodate chicken plus oil without spillage. Once cooked, place the wings straight onto paper towel to remove excess oil.
Now, to sauce.
Slather your wings in hot sauce. Make it messy.
Crumble or roughly chop your Stichelton before sprinkling all over the wings. I like a mixture of crumble sizes: large pieces for a cheeky bite and small pieces to fully integrate into the sauce like a veritable cheesy seasoning.
Serve the wings as they are, or perhaps add a homemade coleslaw for some added crunch.
On my way!
#photographers
Where?
bon voyage!
!BBH
@logen9f likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(5/5)@katerinaramm! to your account on behalf of @logen9f.
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One thing that I love for starting my own threadcast yesterday was I can write a longer form post about the questions that's been asked and answered by other users.
By this, I am hitting many birds at one stone.
I will continue doing this threadcast twice a week. I don't really have a specific day in mind, but I hope more users will join soon 😄
#freecompliments
It seems that some are being quiet in creating threads. I only see few people who are active before but not now. I wonder where they went now?
Or maybe they have some personal issues to do outside the Hive blockchain.
I hope everyone is doing fine anyway.
#freecompliments
It shows how few "owners" there are.
Most on here barely even have a user mindset. They are here simply to scrape rewards.
I hope more users will have the same mindset as you. My only goal right now is just to enjoy the platform. I'm really enjoying having the premium experience and using this instead of X.
I get more engagement here than X, which makes it meaningful and thoughtful. I feel seen here.
Nevertheless I am seeing new faces today and the best thing is, they are paying to become a #premium user.
I just love those people who fully support the community and give their best to invest into their Hive business.
I see the same thing.
I hope they will come back soon!
yes, and a lot more new active people would be awesome also :)
exactly, I've been seeing them lately. Some are even bought premium and it's nice to see!
!INDEED ;)
All good here!
Nice to see you still!
Thanks! And you too!
Thank you!
I'm enjoying my stay so far:)
It can be sleeping hours for them also.
#freecompliments
Before, this time has the most "roaring" lions. Now it's a bit quiet.
I'm terrible. I come in, and use InLeo faithfully for a week or two, then I disappear for a month. I don't mean to, I just get busy.
No problem, what's important is you're now here.
Awww. 🥰
maybe it's not easy to keep up with online and offline you're right maybe they have some issues
Life gets busy.
It's hard to stay active everywhere but for me it's only hive.
Yeah, it could be personal but I hope everyone will go back soon!
Would you love to start your week on a positive note and as well win some Gifu?
1/🧵 #gifu #outreach #threadstorm
3/🧵
Read more about it and many more via the link below.
https://inleo.io/@gifu/weekly-inspiration-with-gifu-creating-a-memorable-start-to-your-week-2hs
2/🧵 We ultilise GIFs to share a motivational conversation to inspire your journey this week and also share a ongoing guess to earn Contest.
Have to check it out. But the link appears to not be right?
In the past 48 hours, I have managed to move from number 35 to number 22 on the Kaichi airdrop leaderboard. Heading for the Top 5! I will be stoked if I am one of the largest airdrop recipients! I can then stake the KAI tokens I receive from the airdrop to boost profitability! #cent #sapphirecrypto
Good luck with that :)
Luck is for the lazy... 😉
Man qoute is so true! Hard work pays off
...continued from a previous thread:
I'm trying to ferment some crushed apples I found on a feral tree in the country side.
In 3 weeks, we should have some alcoholic apple beverage to enjoy🤗.
#brewing #homesteaders #applecider #wildcrafting
Nice :)
Thanks. Crossing my fingers 🤞 it works!
I am sure it will :)
yeah me too... but I think I messed up the wild yeast I made by adding it to the mix while the water was still way too hot 🔥
OH. Time will tell ;)
That's gonna be good. I can tell.
I'm glad you think so! I'll report back on it for sure 😄
My only fermenting experience was an orange mead. Turned out pretty well to my taste, but it was a potent hangover inducer.
Oh I wonder why 🤔 too much sugar?
Probably so.
You should a whole post on how you elaborate that drink.
true true... I haven't done a long form post in a while and I'm due for one actually.
So let's go!
I have no excuse 😭
I saw the pics. Looks good. cheers!
Awesome and thank you!
Here's that previous thread I was talking about: https://inleo.io/threads/view/senorcoconut/re-leothreads-2987ufz8d?referral=senorcoconut
King of the Internet
#pepe #meme #cent
I don't even know what the frog is besides a meme
A delicacy in France? !LOL !DOOK
!INDEED LMFAO !BBH !DOOK
lolztoken.com
to use Control-C as a shortcut.
Credit: marshmellowman
$LOLZ on behalf of chaosmagic23
(1/10)
Farm LOLZ tokens when you Delegate Hive or Hive Tokens.
Click to delegate: 10 - 20 - 50 - 100 HP@bradleyarrow, I sent you an
@bradleyarrow likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(18/100)@chaosmagic23! to your account on behalf of @bradleyarrow.
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Thank you for your witness vote!
Have a !BEER on me!
To Opt-Out of my witness beer program just comment STOP below
View or trade
BEER.BEERHey @chaosmagic23, here is a little bit of from @isnochys for you. Enjoy it!Learn how to earn FREE BEER each day by staking your
BEER.BOm dia galera! Terça de manhã é bem corrido então começando um pouco mais tarde hoje. Mas bora de #threadcast
Vladimir Putin embraces diplomatic limelight as leaders of expanded BRICS gather in Russia
Russian President Vladimir Putin is hosting the annual summit of BRICS, a high-prestige stage that offers him an opportunity to showcase his defiance of U.S.-led efforts to isolate his regime and punish the Kremlin for its decision to invade Ukraine more than two years ago.
Mr. Putin’s posturing is clearly meant to send a reassuring signal to average Russians that even though powerful and prosperous democracies in North America, Europe and East Asia have turned the diplomatic and economic screws on Russia since the Ukraine invasion, their nation is neither contained nor ostracized.
#putin #brazil #brics #brazil
The 2024 BRICS summit, the sixteenth gathering of a group that originally included just Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, runs from October 22-24 in the Russian city of Kazan, the capital of Tatarstan. Mr. Putin will welcome both Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, leaders of the world’s most populous countries and, respectively, the world’s second- and fifth-largest economies.
The grouping has grown markedly in recent years: The leaders of Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Turkey, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates are coming to Kazan, though Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, citing health concerns, will attend via video conference.
In all, up to 32 foreign delegations, including those from rising economies such as Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam, are anticipated. There is even speculation that North Korea, whose relations with Russia have been warming rapidly, may send a delegation.
Another question is whether the body will, in the wake of the summit, expedite the membership of NATO member Turkey, which has announced its desire to join.
Brazil Reaches $23 Billion Settlement with Mining Firms over 2015 Environmental Disaster
Brazil Reaches $23 Billion Settlement with Mining Firms over 2015 Environmental Disaster
Brazil's federal government on Friday reached a multibillion-dollar settlement with the mining companies responsible for a 2015 dam collapse that the government said was the country's worst-ever environmental disaster.
#brazil #mining #disaster #settlement #environment
Under the agreement, Samarco — a joint venture of Brazilian mining giant Vale and Anglo-Australian firm BHP — will pay 132 billion reais ($23 billion) over 20 years to compensate for human, environmental and infrastructure damage caused by the release of an immense amount of toxic mining waste into a major river in southeastern Minas Gerais state, killing 19 people and ravaging entire villages.
“We are fixing a disaster that could have been avoided, but wasn’t,” President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said in a hall of the presidential palace, surrounded by governors of the affected states, members of his administration, reporters and victims.
Lula's speech, filled with criticism of what he called the mining companies’ irresponsibility in chasing profit over safety, was met with applause from the audience.
The toxic sludge — enough to fill 13,000 Olympic-size swimming pools — flowed down the Doce River for 420 miles to the Atlantic Ocean, contaminating waterways and coastal areas in two neighboring states.
Slight Progress in Global Biodiversity Protection Efforts but Some Species Decline, New Reports Find
Slight Progress in Global Biodiversity Protection Efforts but Some Species Decline, New Reports Find
Global efforts to protect the world's plants and animals have made slight progress and some species remain in serious decline, according to two reports released Monday at a major United Nations biodiversity summit in Colombia.
#hedgehogs #colombia #brazil
A report from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) evaluated global progress since its biodiversity report in 2020. Two years ago, 196 countries signed a historic treaty to protect biodiversity on 30% of the planet by 2030.
The biodiversity summit underway in Cali, Colombia is a follow-up to the 2022 accord in Montreal, which includes 23 measures to halt and reverse nature loss. One calls for putting 30% of the planet and 30% of degraded ecosystems under protection by 2030.
Brazil federal police seeking extradition of Bolsonaro supporters from Argentina
Brazil's Federal Police requested the extradition of dozens of people who had fled the country after being accused of storming top government offices last year,
RIO DE JANEIRO — Brazil’s Federal Police requested the extradition of dozens of people who had fled the country after being accused of storming top government offices last year, in an alleged bid to forcefully restore former President Jair Bolsonaro to office, two sources familiar with the police request told the Associated Press on Wednesday.
#brazil #argentina #extradition #bolsonaro
The police sent their request to the Supreme Court’s Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who remitted it to the Justice Ministry, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. One of them said the request targets 63 people, most believed to be in neighboring Argentina.
De Moraes oversees the extensive investigation into the Jan. 8 rampage in the capital, Brasilia, and has prohibited suspects and those convicted from leaving the country.
Bolsonaro - who is a target of the investigation himself - and his allies deny wrongdoing and say they are victims of political persecution, echoing former U.S. President Donald J. Trump’s characterization of his legal woes. He repeatedly sowed doubt about the reliability of Brazil’s voting system, never conceded defeat in the October 2022 presidential election and declined to attend President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s swearing-in.
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva cancels trip to Russia for BRICS summit after an accident
Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Sunday canceled his trip to Russia for a BRICS summit after an accident at home that left him with a cut in the neck, his office said.
SAO PAULO — Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Sunday canceled his trip to Russia for a BRICS summit after an accident at home that left him with a cut in the neck, his office said.
The 78-year-old leader was scheduled to attend a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies in the city of Kazan from Tuesday to Thursday this week.
#brazil #president #brics #summit
Hospital Sirio Libanês in Sao Paulo said in a statement that the leftist leader was instructed not to take long distance trips, but can keep his other activities. Doctors Roberto Kalil and Ana Heleno Germoglio said they will regularly check on Lula’s recovery.
Brazil’s presidency said in a separate statement that Lula will take part in the summit by videoconference and will continue his work in capital Brasilia this week. It did not disclose details about what caused the president’s injury.
Voters in Brazil’s largest city choose a mayor following tumultuous campaign
Voters in Brazil’s biggest city, Sao Paulo, started going to the polls Sunday in a mayoral race pitting incumbent Mayor Ricardo Nunes against leftist lawmaker Guilherme Boulos.
Nunes has lukewarm support from former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro while Boulos is an ally of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Different polls published Saturday showed Nunes, who inherited the mayorship after Bruno Covas died of cancer in 2021, is the favorite to win. His advantage against Boulos is greater than the margin of error of the Datafolha and Quaest polls.
#brazil #saopaulo #polls #elections #voting #jairbolsonaro
Boulos, in a last-ditch effort for exposure, on Friday accepted an invitation to debate self-help guru turned far-right politician Pablo Marçal, who finished third in the first round of voting on Oct. 7. At the end of the debate, Marçal urged his voters not to vote Sunday. Lower turnout could work against Nunes.
Most of the attention in this year’s round of municipal elections in Brazil has been on Sao Paulo, where the race was marred by episodes of violence involving Marçal in the first round of voting. Boulos, a longtime housing advocate for the poor, has been campaigning nonstop to avoid his second consecutive defeat in the race.
Other Brazilian cities with more than 200,000 registered voters are also holding mayoral elections.
In Rio de Janeiro, incumbent Mayor Eduardo Paes was reelected in the first round of voting for his fourth, non-consecutive term. Paes, an enthusiastic fan of Carnival, had Lula’s support but focused his campaign on local issues against Bolsonaro’s candidate, Alexandre Ramagem.
Brazilians will be also watching closely for results in Belo Horizonte, one of the country’s biggest cities, where polls suggest Mayor Fuad Noman faces a close race with pro-Bolsonaro candidate Bruno Engler.
Brazil fines meatpacking companies, including giant JBS, for buying illegally raised cattle
Brazil’s environmental agency has levied $64 million in fines against 23 meatpacking companies and their suppliers for buying and selling cattle raised illegally on deforested land in the Amazon.
The operation, dubbed Cold Meat 2, launched last week. It tracked 18,000 head of cattle raised in 100 square miles of pasture that has been banned for commercial use due to illegal deforestation. The agents also apprehended 8,854 head of cattle found inside the restricted areas. News of the fines began emerging over the weekend.
#brazil #meatpacking #jbs
Cattle raising is the main driver of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, with 90% of the area cleared between 1985 and 2023 converted to pasture. That represents 227,800 square miles, slightly larger than France. As a result, 14% of the Amazon is covered by grazing land, according to MapBiomas, a network of nongovernmental organizations that monitor land use.
“We are inspecting the production chain to hold offenders accountable for acquiring products from deforestation and to ensure that crime does not pay,” Jair Schmitt, chief of environmental protection at Brazil’s federal environmental agency, known as Ibama, told The Associated Press.
Among those fined was JBS, the world’s largest meat-packing company. JBS has applied to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange, a move that has faced opposition from some U.S. lawmakers and environmental nonprofits. It’s not clear when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission may make a decision on JBS’ bid.
The JBS fine was $108,000 for purchasing 1,231 head of cattle, the fifth largest penalty among the fined companies.
Parece até que um fdp fica brincando com o "botão" ligando e desligando...
Faltou energia agora aqui em casa e felizmente voltou. É chato demais quando isso acontece.
Bora que bora meu mano.
Ainda tô me adapatando com o teclado do meu irmão... é completamente diferetente em algumas posições onde ficam algumas teclas essenciais como por exemplo o delete e o print screen... Mas vou sobreviver. Pelo menos o S funciona kkkk...
Boa tarde pessoal!
Ontem caiu uma chuva pesada aqui. Estava no trânsito, pois tive que buscar a patroa... Esse tipo de chuva eu até evito de sair de casa, mas como eu já estava no caminho, então tive que ir mesmo assim.
Felizmente deu tudo certo e na volta a chuva até amenizou.
Meus votos não são nada de mais mas qualquer trocado ajuda né... além disso estou com planos bem ousados de expansão para os próximos meses
Todo voto conta, é válido e é bem legal quando vemos que ao longo do tempo vai dando resultado, mesmo que seja quase imperceptível.
Mas, dito isso, deu bom! hahaha
Boa! Parabéns!
É muito bom quando a gente acerta às vezes.
Manhã bem produtiva por aqui!
Já fui ao mercado, fiz feira e já resolvi umas coisas do trabalho
Bom começar o dia assim que tira muito a pressão ao longo do expediente
Finalmente consegui um tempo pra fazer uma coisa que tava querendo fazer há dias
Venho falando bastante sobre $RUNE por aqui. Não é a toa hehhe
Claro que não devem tomar nada do que eu falo como indicação de investimento
Falo apenas do que eu faço e as movimentações que estou percebendo
FInal de ano eu acho que vai ser relativamente tranquilo por aqui... já o começo do ano que vem vai ser altamente incerto
Em um assunto totalmente aleatório: comprei rabanete hoje kkkk mil anos que não como
eita, batendo fominha já e não é nem 11h ainda hahah
Lembrete, galera: temos uma lista para brasileiros ativos nas Threads. Eu frequentemente passo por ela votando em todo mundo que interage aqui pelas threads. Caso queira fazer parte é só responder aqui
Boa mano! Espero que mais brs possam aparecer na plataforma com mais frequência.
Não preciso nem falar, mas só pra deixar claro: não custa nada, não tem nenhuma condição ou regra hahahah
https://inleo.io/threads/view/tokenizedsociety/re-tokenizedsociety-2pu9dhs22?referral=tokenizedsociety
Bora trabalhar!
Quando der alguma brecha eu volto por aqui
Chat is this real or I'm daydreaming?
It looks like pre election pump just after elections we'll get Rekt?
Polls show Trump is going to win. #trumppump
yea he can win easily...
Uptober 🚀🚀
arrived so late
Its never late, it arrives when it suppose to arrive :)
I am not really sure how much it really has to do with elections, but I like the cut of the $BTC jib.
Think it might peak out much higher in the next 6-8 months.
it has everything to do with elections...
Ha! Possibly, but I think it was time anyway. Elections are just an additive factor.
Depends on the result of election.
yea
#wordofthedayonleo - omniscient
What It Means
Omniscient describes someone or something with unlimited knowledge or understanding.
// "You'll need to tell me when you don't understand something I've explained," Maria said. "I'm not omniscient, you know."
🔗 Source in comments
🔗 Source:
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/omniscient
Q
#feedback If at all possible, it would be awesome if the notifications counter auto-updated whenever there's a new notification, without having to refresh the page
That's a nice idea, also the "mark all as read" doesn't work sometimes. I have to click it for many times before it finally work.
yep, I usually have to refresh the page for it to update
I think the team is now working to make the UI quicker and responsive.
I hope the notification thing will also he fixed.
I'm sure it will in due time
We're all waiting!
I would like to see it up here:
that would also be great, for sure
;)
Without a doubt a great idea.
Are you a yield investor?
#cent
https://inleo.io/threads/view/behiver/re-leothreads-itj4ebyh
Still one of my favorite albums
https://inleo.io/threads/view/mightpossibly/re-leothreads-2muxnjczf?referral=mightpossibly
I thought this bug was just me, but I see that you are like this too.
It is no longer possible to type "#musiconleo", the word is incomplete.
I already gave #feedback but I don't know if you saw my thread.
It's not just this word that remains incomplete, others also do the same thing and it's been a long time since this happened.
It's been a bit on and off for the past month as far as I've been able to tell. I know several people have posted feedbacks about this and that the team is aware of the problem. I'm sure it will be resolved in due time
I hope so too, until then we continue with what we are doing.
Hi, @mightpossibly,
This post has been voted on by @darkcloaks because you are an active member of the Darkcloaks gaming community.
Get started with Darkcloaks today, and follow us on Inleo for the latest updates.
Even though I do not receive financial benefits from DeSo, I post there at least once a day to remain in the loop in case anything unexpected transpires. Just the other day a single Ravencoin post received 76 likes and 52 reposts. You never know what will happen! #cent #sapphirecrypto
I thought there was some earning potential over there.
What does DeSo have that Hive doesnt in your opinion?
There is but is dominated by whales and most have abandoned it for this reason...
#gmfrens! Here is the Motivation, Inspiration, Success #threadcast for 10/29/2024
#1440minutes #motivationsonleo #inspirationonleo #successonleo #motivation #inspiration #success
the cold made me strong and brave. You too can
#gmfrens #threadcast #1440minutes #motivationsonleo #inspirationonleo
Do your little bit of good where you are; it's those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. Desmond Tutu
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
I have never had to face anything that could overwhelm the native optimism and stubborn perseverance I was blessed with. Sonia Sotomayor
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
I need to celebrate life because I'm in a good spot, I work hard, and I am happy with who I am and happy with what I do for a living, and sometimes I just focus and overwhelm myself so much with the fights and getting better, that I just need to slow it down and enjoy life and enjoy training. Dustin Poirier
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
In this dangerous world that we live in, where hatred and violence and natural disasters sometimes collide to almost overwhelm us, we each can help in some way. Marsha Blackburn
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
I don't think that you can let the storms of life overwhelm you. When you do that, you are no better than the craziness that caused you to be under attack. T. D. Jakes
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
If I cannot overwhelm with my quality, I will overwhelm with my quantity. Emile Zola
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Too many choices can overwhelm us and cause us to not choose at all. For businesses, this means that if they offer us too many choices, we may not buy anything. Sheena Iyengar
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Challenge is the pathway to engagement and progress in our lives. But not all challenges are created equal. Some challenges make us feel alive, engaged, connected, and fulfilled. Others simply overwhelm us. Knowing the difference as you set bigger and bolder challenges for yourself is critical to your sanity, success, and satisfaction. Brendon Burchard
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Let's be honest; it's rather easy to be busy. We all can think up a list of tasks that will overwhelm our schedules. Some might even think that their self-worth depends on the length of their to-do list. They flood the open spaces in their time with lists of meetings and minutia - even during times of stress and fatigue. Dieter F. Uchtdorf
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Instead of being critical of people in authority over you and envious of their position, be happy you're not responsible for everything they have to do. Instead of piling on complaints, thank them for what they do. Overwhelm them with encouragement and appreciation! Joyce Meyer
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
To be poor does not mean you lack the means to extend charity to another. You may lack money or food, but you have the gift of friendship to overwhelm the loneliness that grips the lives of so many. Stanley Hauerwas
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
I have an idea that the phrase 'weaker sex' was coined by some woman to disarm the man she was preparing to overwhelm. Ogden Nash
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Fantasy is fantasy. It's fiction. It's not meant to be a textbook. I don't believe in letting research overwhelm the fiction. That's a danger of science fiction in particular, as opposed to fantasy. A lot of writers forget that what they're doing is supposed to be art. N. K. Jemisin
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
There are times when external circumstances can overwhelm us, and we do things we never thought. If you're not aware that this can happen, you can be seduced by evil. We need inoculations against our own potential for evil. We have to acknowledge it. Then we can change it. Philip Zimbardo
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Chess: It's like alcohol. It's a drug. I have to control it, or it could overwhelm me. I have a regular Monday night game at my home, and I do play a little online. Charles Krauthammer
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
The only thing that can blow away the Michael Jordan sad face meme, is the Floyd Mayweather knockout meme. If Floyd Mayweather got knocked out - knocked out to the point where he is ice cold on the ground - I think that's the one meme that can just overwhelm the whole Jordan issue. Jay Williams
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
I feel at some point that the farm state politics will overwhelm the Florida politics. Jeff Flake
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
We can pretend that China is not there. But China is there, and unless we put our economy on the right track, it is going to overwhelm us completely. Salman Khurshid
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
No one is going to persuade me that eight people arriving in South Shields is going to overwhelm the local system. I think that 25,000 refugees would be more in line with the U.N. That would be a substantive contribution. Ed Miliband
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Overwhelm is, most often, a mindset. If you think about all the things you have to do, you'll be face down on the floor. It really helps to break it down into smaller pieces. Jen Sincero
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
A child who is protected from all controversial ideas is as vulnerable as a child who is protected from every germ. The infection, when it comes- and it will come- may overwhelm the system, be it the immune system or the belief system. Jane Smiley
Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/search_results?q=overwhelm
Enlightenment must come little by little - otherwise it would overwhelm. Idries Shah
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One of the greatest objections which families have to New South Wales, is their apprehension of the moral effects that are likely to overwhelm them by bad example, and for which no success in life could compensate. Charles Sturt
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Before the math and the momentum overwhelm us all, we are going to solve this nation's economic problems. And I'm going to level with you: We don't have that much time. But if we are serious, and smart, and we lead, we can do this. Paul Ryan
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Often I feel that projects overwhelm us when we look at how many hours are involved until completion. But just getting started is usually not that difficult. Emily Giffin
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If I get even five per cent of my ideas out and documented before I die, I'll be lucky. I'm not in danger of running out of riffs or ideas anytime soon. They overwhelm me and it's hard to find time to deal with them. Jello Biafra
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There's no need to overwhelm yourself with thoughts, because you know that you're just as good or better than some of the players you're going up against. Cobi Jones
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I'm aware that success can overwhelm you. The perception of you can be elevated to such a status that it's not you any more. Chris Ofili
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No movie has ever been able to provide a catharsis for the Holocaust, and I suspect none will ever be able to provide one for 9/11. Such subjects overwhelm art. Roger Ebert
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For so long Versace couture was identified with celebrities and music, which I love. But at the same time it could overwhelm the clothes. Donatella Versace
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I think some people would say that I do overwhelm the words with the music, and sometimes thank goodness I do. Dave Matthews
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There are different kinds of artists: the ones that inspire you, and the ones that overwhelm you. Thomas Mars
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I want a painting to be difficult to do. The more obstacles, obstructions, problems - if they don't overwhelm - the better. I would like to feel that I am involved at any stage of the painting with all its moments, not just this 'now' moment where a superficial grace is so available. Richard Diebenkorn
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Every day there's a lot of things I block out, because if I start visualising things, I tend to go completely insane. I've always had anxiety issues, and it can totally overwhelm me and suck me under if I'm not keeping focused. I just think and think until I have a panic attack, and then it dies down. Dev Hynes
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Painting keeps me occupied in those moments when travel can be aimless and even disorienting. Mainly it is a way to register at least some of the new impressions of a foreign place, when its thrilling barrage can sometimes overwhelm you. Susan Minot
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In the developed world, hundreds of millions of us now face the bizarre problem of surfeit. Yet our brains, instincts, and socialized behavior are still geared to an environment of lack. The result? Overwhelm - on an unprecedented scale. Martha Beck
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The game is No. 1. You are an adjunct to the game. In a studio, there is no game. You are the star. That's why you are there. For the game, you can't go away from the game and beat your chest. People are there to watch the game. You are there to supplement, not to override or overwhelm. Al Michaels
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Let's overwhelm the Castro regime with iPhones, iPads, American cars and American ingenuity. Rand Paul
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Let us swell with gratitude and allow it to overwhelm us. It isn't as cliche as we make it; life truly is short. Let's spend it all lavishly wallowing in gratitude. Grace Gealey
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Exxon Mobil and JPMorgan Chase each made more in profits in the first quarter of 2012 alone than the entire state budget of Montana. Without a doubt, multinational corporations like these have the resources to overwhelm the voices of the people. Eric Schneiderman
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Even if America entered the war, it is improbable that the Allied armies could invade Europe and overwhelm the Axis powers. But one thing is certain. If England can draw this country into the war, she can shift to our shoulders a large portion of the responsibility for waging it and for paying its cost. Charles Lindbergh
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I always say that characters must drive plots, never the reverse. Writing about large-scale events creates the risk that the scope of the events themselves can overwhelm the characters. I emphatically do not want that. That was the only trepidation I felt when I started 'The Twilight War.' Paul S. Kemp
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Pressure for the most part comes from this overarching concern that if I head into the election season without sufficient resources, then any outside group, any individual, any super PAC may choose to come in to my district and overwhelm it and take over the airwaves and control the debate. Ted Deutch
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I don't think enough players channel the energy of the crowd. If it's done properly, and you don't let anger overwhelm and distract you, it's like a shot of adrenaline in the arm, and it gets the crowd pumped up. John McEnroe
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True enough, the Fed needs radical reforms. In particular, it needs to replace its failed forecasting models and be rid of the academics who overwhelm the Fed system. Lawrence Kudlow
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Computers in general, and software in particular, are much more difficult than other kinds of technology for most people to grok, and they overwhelm us with a sense of mystery. Om Malik
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It would be presumptuous to say writing a book would be a sufficient gesture, but if people were more preoccupied with the past, maybe the events that overwhelm us would be fewer. W. G. Sebald
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There is always a reason behind things that are made, and if there isn't, there will be one when they travel through the world. The objects of beauty are used to impress, seduce, overwhelm, make money, support identities, and show power or style, among other things. Marcel Wanders
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Despite the debt, the traffic, the one-party rule, the taxes, and the eagerness of politicians to overwhelm small businesses and large corporate job producers with red tape and unnecessary regulations, the Golden State is still the most beautiful place to live and work in the United States. Richard Grenell
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Music is a mysterious phenomenon - it seems both to magically overwhelm and sublimate our suffering, but also to starkly dignify the struggles of our daily life. Andrew W.K.
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With some actors, if I have upward of 10 notes, I don't want to give them all 10 notes and overwhelm them. I usually parse them out three or four at a time. Sam Esmail
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In a depressing twist, many members of my party and ideological persuasion have become advocates for Donald Trump on a scale that ranges from grudging to toadying, for a simple reason that seems to overwhelm all other factors: He attacks the media. Many are willing to forgive almost any sin because of it. Rick Wilson
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You can let the size of the crowd, when you do Super Bowl, overwhelm you if you want, and that opening on camera is one of the most intense, awkward feelings you can ever have. Joe Buck
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That's the main lesson I've learned from working in the theater: respect the dramaturgy. I don't want to overwhelm everything with music. Alexandre Desplat
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Some directors can become concerned when it comes to music, because it's the end of the process and they're tired. They're worried that the music will intrude or waste something, that a composer will overwhelm the story. Alexandre Desplat
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Sure, spending most of your time with attractive men who are all catches is great... but you can imagine how all that testosterone can overwhelm a gal. Becca Kufrin
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I often deliberately overwhelm my players. If I give them 10 things a day and they learn four of them, I'm happier than if I stick to the learning theory where the goal is a maximum of five things per day and then they only remember two. Julian Nagelsmann
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One day, you’ll be having a very good life.
I mean, a healthy relationship. A loving and supportive partner. Genuine happiness and success in your chosen career.
#leo #inleo #freecompliments
Think lightly of yourself and deeply of the world.
—Miyamoto Musashi
━━━━━━━━━━━
After some time away from Inleo, as I was having trouble to log in, I'm now happily back.
Happy to be here!
We're hungry and not afraid!
I took a broom to one of these that was eating my cat's food once.
Let's just say that in the end I ran away squealing like a teenage girl in a haunted house. 🤣
LOL
they are fierce little guys
My wife laughed at me for hours after that. She witnessed the whole tough guy episode.
In my defense, the evil thing lowered her head, hissed, and rushed at me with bared teeth like she might have rabies or be possessed by a demon.
Later when I calmed down, I saw her with several kits. I probably actually was lucky to escape with my life. 🤣
You don't mess with a mama's babies.
We came to an understanding in which I stopped feeding my cat outside.
ohh yea that's totally different
when mama gets defensive you better get the fuck out
No doubt. I just sit back and smile whenever someone endangers or takes advantage of one of our kids.
People think because I am calm that nothing is going to happen. Little do they know. 😏
😂😂
Daily Hive users counter: As per 29.10.20242,522,990 (+215)!
Top onboarders:, the number of accounts created on the #hive #blockchain reached @leo.voter 87, @appreciator 68, @steemmonsters 13
87 is good but we need more!👏
@leo.voter seems to be pretty consistent on this in the last week for sure.
Way to go!!
Click pic for better view
📷 📷 📷
Hello Lions!
Let Tuesday be the day you transform ambition into achievement.
#TransformTuesday #ActionOverExcuses
Absolutely #bfom
The phrase “Make Orwell fiction again” is a critique or commentary on the state of society or politics, suggesting that current events or political situations are resembling the dystopian and authoritarian themes present in George Orwell's literary works, such as “1984” and “Animal Farm.”
8th and last reflection on soul care:
https://inleo.io/@axietrashgame/richard-baxters-vision-for-personal-instruction-and-lasting-ministry-impact-fdn
#cent #bbh #soulcare
Does the edit feature works on your side? I don't think it's working on me.
I just edited my recent thread and it doesn't show the edited version even after 5 minutes of editing it.
I use Brave browser on Android using Hivesigner to signin.
#feedback
Try using keychain. Hivesigner causes problems. As for edit, no problems on my end.
Thank you for this! I will try it:)
Yeah. Always try keychain over hivesigner. The latter causes a major problem.
Here is the daily technology #threadcast for 10/29/24. The goal is to make this a technology "reddit".
Drop all question, comments, and articles relating to #technology and the future. The goal is make it a technology center.
OpenAIs New Statement On GPT-5 Is Surprising!
#technology #newsonleo #ai
Summary below ⏬
OpenAI's Future and AGI Timeline: Industry Leaders' Predictions
Recent statements from OpenAI's leadership and other industry experts suggest that artificial intelligence development is progressing at a pace that exceeds public understanding, with transformative advances potentially just years away. This emerging narrative, supported by multiple industry leaders, points to a rapidly approaching future where artificial general intelligence (AGI) may become a reality.
OpenAI's Internal Research Meetings
According to OpenAI's Chief Financial Officer Sarah Frier, who joined the company in June 2024, the company holds weekly research meetings that consistently "blow her mind" with previews of upcoming capabilities. This rare glimpse into OpenAI's internal operations suggests that the company maintains a significant technological lead over its competitors, despite the recent achievements of other AI labs.
This revelation gains credibility when examining OpenAI's track record of developing technologies well before their public release. A notable example is GPT-4, which was completed in August 2022, months before the release of ChatGPT. This means OpenAI had already developed its next-generation model while the public was still marveling at GPT-3.5's capabilities. GPT-4 subsequently maintained its position at the technological frontier for approximately two years before other labs approached similar capabilities.
Industry Leaders' AGI Predictions
Several prominent figures in the AI field have made bold predictions about the timeline for achieving artificial general intelligence:
Sam Altman's Vision
In his September 2024 blog post "The Intelligence Age," OpenAI CEO Sam Altman suggested that superintelligence might be possible "in a few thousand days." While this timeline could span from three to ten years, it represents a remarkably short horizon for such a transformative development. Altman describes this potential achievement as "the most consequential fact about all of history so far."
Ray Kurzweil's "Conservative" Estimate
Ray Kurzweil, known for his 86% accuracy rate in technological predictions and his pioneering work in pattern recognition technology, suggests that AGI could arrive by 2029. Notably, this five-year timeline is now considered "conservative" by industry standards, highlighting how rapidly expectations have accelerated.
Anthropic's Perspective
The CEO of Anthropic, creator of the Claude AI assistant, points to a "smooth exponential" growth in AI capabilities. He predicts that by 2025-2027, with increased funding and continued improvements in algorithms and chip technology, we could see models that surpass human capabilities in most areas. This development would be facilitated by models costing between $10-100 billion to train, a significant increase from current costs.
The Path to Superintelligence
Industry leaders identify several key factors driving this rapid progress:
Self-Improving Systems: Future AI systems will contribute to developing better next-generation systems, creating a positive feedback loop of technological advancement.
Scientific Progress: AI is expected to accelerate scientific discovery across multiple fields, including biology, physics, chemistry, and mathematics.
Exponential Growth: The combination of improved hardware, algorithms, and increased funding is creating conditions for exponential advances in AI capabilities.
Defining Future AI Capabilities
Dario Amodei outlines a vision of future AI systems that would:
Conclusion
While some may dismiss these predictions as marketing hype, OpenAI's track record of delivering breakthrough technologies suggests their internal assessments deserve serious consideration. The convergence of predictions from multiple industry leaders, each with significant expertise and access to cutting-edge developments, indicates that transformative AI capabilities may be closer than many realize. The next few years could prove crucial in determining how this technology develops and its impact on society.
As we've seen with previous releases like GPT-4, Sora, and GPT-4's advanced voice capabilities, OpenAI has consistently demonstrated its ability to surprise and exceed expectations. The indication that even more impressive developments are in the pipeline suggests we may be on the cusp of even more significant technological breakthroughs in artificial intelligence.
Apple just announced a new Mac Mini. For those unaware, the ‘mini’ is Apple’s most affordable desktop computer. The 2024 refresh features a brand-new design and a new, more powerful M4 silicon under the hood.
More details in the link in the reply thread
#technology #innovation #mac #apple #freecompliments
https://www.financialexpress.com/life/technology-mac-mini-2024-refresh-launched-with-apple-m4-m4-pro-silicon-price-other-details-3652324/
Robot
MIT breakthrough could transform robot training
MIT researchers have developed a robot training method that reduces time and cost while improving adaptability to new tasks and environments.
The approach – called Heterogeneous Pretrained Transformers (HPT) – combines vast amounts of diverse data from multiple sources into a unified system, effectively creating a shared language that generative AI models can process. This method marks a significant departure from traditional robot training, where engineers typically collect specific data for individual robots and tasks in controlled environments.
#newsonleo #technology #robot
Lead researcher Lirui Wang – an electrical engineering and computer science graduate student at MIT – believes that while many cite insufficient training data as a key challenge in robotics, a bigger issue lies in the vast array of different domains, modalities, and robot hardware. Their work demonstrates how to effectively combine and utilise all these diverse elements.
The research team developed an architecture that unifies various data types, including camera images, language instructions, and depth maps. HPT utilises a transformer model, similar to those powering advanced language models, to process visual and proprioceptive inputs.
In practical tests, the system demonstrated remarkable results—outperforming traditional training methods by more than 20 per cent in both simulated and real-world scenarios. This improvement held true even when robots encountered tasks significantly different from their training data.
The researchers assembled an impressive dataset for pretraining, comprising 52 datasets with over 200,000 robot trajectories across four categories. This approach allows robots to learn from a wealth of experiences, including human demonstrations and simulations.
One of the system’s key innovations lies in its handling of proprioception (the robot’s awareness of its position and movement.) The team designed the architecture to place equal importance on proprioception and vision, enabling more sophisticated dexterous motions.
Looking ahead, the team aims to enhance HPT’s capabilities to process unlabelled data, similar to advanced language models. Their ultimate vision involves creating a universal robot brain that could be downloaded and used for any robot without additional training.
While acknowledging they are in the early stages, the team remains optimistic that scaling could lead to breakthrough developments in robotic policies, similar to the advances seen in large language models.
AI News: Copilot Agent Builder, IBM Granite 3.0, NEW Claude Sonnet, Open-Source Text To Video!
Summary below ⏬
#newsonleo #technology #ai
Major AI Industry Developments Bring Wave of Innovation Across Tech Sector
In a remarkable wave of announcements, several major technology companies have unveiled significant advances in artificial intelligence, marking what could be one of the most consequential periods in AI development since the field's inception.
Microsoft Doubles Down on AI Agents
Microsoft has made a bold move into the autonomous agent space with the announcement of Copilot Studio. Set for public preview next month, the platform will allow users to create and deploy AI agents throughout the Windows environment. The company is particularly focused on enterprise applications, introducing ten new autonomous agents in Dynamics 365 specifically designed for sales, service, finance, and supply chain teams.
CEO Satya Nadella's vision suggests a future where millions of AI agents will become integral to the corporate workforce. While initial implementations may focus on basic automation, the company anticipates these agents will evolve to become increasingly proactive rather than merely reactive.
This announcement has not gone without criticism. Salesforce CEO Mark Benioff notably dismissed the initiative as "Clippy 2.0," suggesting Microsoft lacks the necessary data, metadata, and enterprise security models for effective corporate intelligence. However, given Microsoft's 98% enterprise penetration rate, such criticism may be more competitive positioning than substantive critique.
Anthropic's Major Model Updates and Computer Control
Anthropic has made several significant announcements, including the release of Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Claude 3.5 Haiku. Notably, the smaller Haiku model reportedly outperforms the previous flagship Claude 3.0 Opus, demonstrating remarkable advances in model efficiency.
Perhaps most intriguingly, Anthropic has introduced a "computer use tool," marking their entry into computer control AI. This experimental feature allows AI models to interact directly with computer systems, though early testing has revealed occasional unexpected behaviors, such as models spontaneously switching tasks to research unrelated topics.
IBM's Open Source Initiative
IBM has made a significant contribution to the open-source AI community by releasing multiple models, including Granite 3.0 in 8B and 2B parameter versions, along with a mixture of experts variant. These models are released under the Apache 2.0 license, making them fully open source. IBM has also introduced a novel knowledge integration technique that bridges the gap between RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) and fine-tuning approaches.
Meta's Open Source Contributions
Meta continues to strengthen its position in the open-source AI community with several significant releases:
Industry Movements and New Ventures
Former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati is reportedly raising significant capital (potentially exceeding $100 million) for a new venture focused on proprietary AI models. Given her background and reputation, this development could signal another important player in the AI landscape.
Advances in Image and Video Generation
Several companies have announced improvements in generative AI:
Voice and Development Tools
The ecosystem continues to expand with new tools and capabilities:
This surge of announcements across multiple domains - from enterprise AI to creative tools - suggests we're entering a new phase of AI development where capabilities are rapidly expanding and becoming more accessible to both developers and end users. The emphasis on open-source contributions from major players like IBM and Meta, alongside proprietary developments from established and emerging companies, indicates a healthy ecosystem that benefits from both collaborative and competitive forces.
The rapid pace of development, particularly in areas like computer control and creative tools, suggests we're likely to see continued acceleration in AI capabilities and applications across all sectors. As these tools become more sophisticated and accessible, they're poised to transform both enterprise operations and creative workflows in unprecedented ways.
Meta is reportedly working on its own AI-powered search engine, too
Meta has been working on an AI powered search engine to decrease its dependence on Google and Microsoft. The Meta AI bot built into Meta's apps currently uses Google and Microsoft Bing to answer questions about recent news and events. Meta has been building a database of information for its chatbot. It is also building up location data that could compete with Google Maps.
#technology #meta #google #ai #artificialintelligence
LeoAI should be working on its own search engine.
We need to understand whatever other platforms are working on can be incorporated into Leo.
Very true. AI is completely re-shaping the way we interact with the internet... gotta stay up to date with whats going on
🧵1/ ChatGPT can now see, hear, and speak
OpenAI’s latest updates to ChatGPT introduce GPT-4 Turbo, which improves speed, reduces costs, and automatically selects the right tools, such as DALL-E for images.
ChatGPT can now "see, hear, and speak," thanks to new voice and image processing capabilities, powered by advanced text-to-speech and Whisper, OpenAI's speech recognition system.
🧵3/ The updates also include a new macOS desktop app and a simplified, more user-friendly interface, with these enhancements gradually rolling out to free and Plus users.
Source -->
https://openai.com/index/chatgpt-can-now-see-hear-and-speak/
Apple announces new iMac with M4 chip, starts at $1,299
Apple has announced an updated iMac with the company's latest M4 chip. Starting at $1,299, it is now available for order ahead of its release on November 8. The M4 iMac comes in new shades, including green, yellow, orange, pink, purple, and silver. It has four USB-C ports on the back with the Thunderbolt 4 standard and supports up to two additional 6K displays. The iMac comes with an updated Magic Mouse and Magic Keyboard with USB-C charging. Apple may announce more new Macs over the coming days.
#technology #apple #imac #m4
Open-source AI must reveal its training data, per new OSI definition
The Open Source Initiative (OSI) has released its official definition of 'open' artificial intelligence. For an AI system to be considered truly open source, it must provide the complete code used to build and run the AI, access to details about the data used to train the AI so others can understand and recreate it, and the settings and weights from the training. The definition directly challenges Meta's Llama, which has restrictions on commercial use and does not provide access to training data. Meta claims that it restricts access to its training data due to safety concerns, but critics say the company is just minimizing its legal liability and safeguarding its competitive advantage.
#technology #artificialintelligence #ai #opensource #osi
Tecnologia
Brasileiros criam dispositivo que mede glicose sem precisar furar o dedo
E se fosse possível medir a glicose sem precisar furar o dedo? Essa foi a questão que guiou os pesquisadores da Universidade do Estado de Santa Catarina (Udesc) na hora de criar o E-Gluco, um dispositivo equipado com sensores que se conectam ao app por meio de Bluetooth para medir a glicose 24 horas por dia, de uma forma não invasiva.
#newsonleo #technology #hivebr
Conforme o anúncio, o aplicativo E-Gluco armazena as medições, processa e apresenta os dados ao usuário. Além disso, utiliza inteligência artificial para fornecer as informações sobre os dados coletados, como tendências de níveis de glicose ao longo do tempo e até mesmo prevenções de surtos de hipoglicemia.
"O objetivo principal do E-Gluco é tornar o monitoramento da glicose sanguínea mais fácil e acessível para as pessoas sem o uso de sensores extras, especialmente aquelas que sofrem de diabete tipo 1. Com o aplicativo, os usuários podem monitorar seus níveis de glicose de forma rápida e conveniente, sem a necessidade de picadas dolorosas de agulhas e com a facilidade de visualizar seus dados em um só lugar", diz o comunicado publicado pela Udesc.
O projeto é desenvolvido pelo professor Bertemes da Udesc juntamente com o pesquisador Paolo Meloni, da Universidade de Cagliari (Itália), incluindo 4 pesquisadores, estudantes de graduação e pós-graduação e um bolsista de pós-doutorado.
"Somos um projeto ainda em construção, ainda não disponível para venda e em fase de testes. Atualmente estamos na versão 3 do relógio físico", diz o site do projeto. O projeto em si ocorre desde 2016 e já contou com 80 voluntários.
Por enquanto, o grupo também está recrutando mais voluntários para as pesquisas — tanto pessoas com diabetes quanto pessoas saudáveis. A inscrição ocorre pelo próprio site.
Diabetes
Monitorar níveis de glicose sem precisar de agulha pode mudar a vida dos pacientes com diabetes. De acordo com a Sociedade Brasileira de Diabetes, existem atualmente, no Brasil, mais de 13 milhões de pessoas vivendo com a doença, o que representa 6,9% da população nacional.
O Ministério da Saúde diz que a melhor forma de prevenir do diabetes é praticando atividades físicas regularmente, mantendo uma alimentação saudável e evitando consumo de álcool e tabaco.
A ciência e a tecnologia trabalham juntas para trazer avanços na hora de medir a glicose. Atualmente, o Galaxy Watch 7 promete que vai medir glicose no sangue sem furar a pele.
We’ve Found the Source of Most Meteorites
70% of meteorites come from three collisions that occurred in the asteroid belt within the past 40 million years. An exhaustive study by an international team of scientists has tracked down the sources of most meteorites falling on Earth. The team gathered data and ran simulations to reveal how collisions produce families of asteroids that start in similar orbits and how those fragments spread out over time. Their work still needs to be validated, but it explains several key observables with a single model.
#technology #space #solarsystem #meteorites
bitcoin has top it's $70k mark for the first time in more than four months, do you agree it's because of ETFs and do you also think this will be the case for January? #freecompliments
Tecnologia
Biohacker de 81 anos investe mais de R$ 4 mi em startups anti-envelhecimento
A luta contra o envelhecimento é, na maioria das vezes, uma corrida contra o tempo, como mostra a história do biohacker Kenneth Scott, de 81 anos. Buscando fomentar novas tecnologias anti-envelhecimento e na indústria da beleza, ele já investiu cerca de 4 milhões de reais em startups da área da biotecnologia e, agora, testa procedimentos não autorizados em alguns países, como terapias genéticas em fase de validação.
#newsonleo #technology #startup #hivebr
Investidor, bilionário, desenvolvedor de software e empresário do ramo imobiliário, Scott acredita que, após atingir os 80 anos, tenha sobrado pouco tempo de vida para aguardar todas as aprovações regulatórias — algo fundamental para garantir a segurança e a eficácia de um procedimento.
“Tenho uma expectativa de vida de mais sete anos neste momento”, conta o biohacker idoso para o site Quartz. “Não tenho muito interesse em testes [clínicos] de cinco anos, então eu simplesmente sigo em frente e faço”, acrescenta. “Minha preocupação está em mim, não nas regulamentações que foram criadas”, reforça.
Apesar de certo romantismo em sua guerra total contra o envelhecimento, Scott eleva o ser biohacker (alguém que busca hackear a biologia humana com a tecnologia) a um ponto perigoso. Sem comprovação, alguns desses procedimentos, especialmente as terapias genéticas feitas em países com pouca regulamentação, podem ter efeito oposto, por exemplo.
Custos para brecar o envelhecimento
Como forma de barrar o envelhecimento natural do corpo, Kenneth Scott e sua esposa Christine Scott gastam, por ano, US$ 70 mil (cerca de 400 mil reais) em tratamentos estéticos e médicos bastante variados.
O biohacker é um grande investidor na área da biotecnologia, com apoios para as startups Repair Biotechnologies (que desenvolve em soluções contra o acúmulo de colesterol no organismo), Leucadia (que atua contra a doença de Alzheimer) e OncoSenX (que busca novas soluções contra o câncer), além da VivaSparkle (que rastreia potenciais pesquisas de sucesso).
Nesse campo anti-envelhecimento (que abrange outras inúmeras startups e pesquisas espalhadas pelo mundo), Scott estima já ter aplicado algo entre US$ 500 mil a US$ 750 mil (entre 2,8 milhões a 4,2 milhões de reais).
Tratamentos anti-envelhecimento?
Entre as práticas diárias do biohacker octogenário, estão: atividades físicas e alimentação saudável, como era de se esperar. Além disso, ele desenvolveu o próprio shampoo a partir de um medicamento para leucemia e não usa sabonetes.
Também realiza tratamentos faciais com plasma sanguíneo, rico em plaquetas, e recorre a injeções de exossomos amnióticos (derivados do líquido amniótico) para impedir o envelhecimento.
A mais polêmica das intervenções são as aplicações de uma terapia genética com a proteína folistatina, desenvolvida pela startup de biotecnologia Minicircle, em Honduras. O tratamento é anunciado como uma forma de retardar o início do envelhecimento, mas não é autorizado por grandes agências reguladoras, como a Food and Drug Administration (FDA), nos EUA.
“Nossa cultura compartilha a mentalidade de que nascemos para morrer. Desde a infância, fomos ensinados de que vamos morrer”, explica Scott. Entretanto, “essa cultura está desatualizada”, aponta o biohacker sobre a necessidade de romper com a última fronteira humana contra a imortalidade.
Luta contra o relógio biológico
Entre os milionários, Scott não é o único a investir grandes somas para impedir o avanço do relógio biológico. Bem mais novo e com menos de 50 anos, Bryan Johnson é outro biohacker que já causou polêmica com suas estratégias.
Inclusive, Johnson já afirmou que a sua vida é controlada por algoritmo capaz de definir o que é melhor para a sua saúde:
Meta
Meta is reportedly working on its own AI-powered search engine, too
Meta is working on an AI-powered search engine to decrease its dependence on Google and Microsoft, according to a report from The Information. The search engine would reportedly provide AI-generated search summaries of current events within the Meta AI chatbot.
#newsonleo #technology #meta #ai
The Meta AI bot built into Instagram and Facebook currently uses Google — whose parent company, Alphabet, will report quarterly earnings tomorrow — and Microsoft Bing to answer questions about recent news and events.
That could eventually change, as Meta’s web crawler was spotted roving the web months ago. The Information’s source indicates a team has been working for about eight months to build a database of information for its chatbot. Meta has worked on building up location data that could compete with Google Maps, and last month, Bloomberg reported that Apple’s work on search tools in the App Store showed how it “has what it needs” for its own AI-powered Google Search replacement.
Last week, Meta also announced that it struck a multi-year deal with Reuters, allowing its chatbot to use the outlet’s news articles in answers. The Verge reached out to Meta with a request for comment but didn’t immediately hear back.
Otherwise, OpenAI has confirmed it’s working on an AI search engine called SearchGPT. At the same time, Perplexity’s AI search engine is the subject of lawsuits from News Corp and is also facing legal threats from other publishers, including The New York Times.
China's first space tourism venture sells inital pair of tickets
Deep Blue Aerospace used a livestream on Chinese e-commerce site Taobao to sell two tickets on its first suborbital flights. At just ¥1,000,000 ($140,000), the seats were at a deep discount compared to the expected cost of ¥1,500,000 ($210,000) per seat. The flight is not expected to launch for another three years or so. The livestream, which was the first time space tourism tickets have gone on public sale in China, attracted an audience of three million viewers.
#technology #space #china #tourism #deepblueaerospace
To me, space tourism is overrated.
The true explosion due to space advancement is going to be space manufacturing. For things such as drugs due to protein stacking or fiber optic manufacturing, space is the ideal setting since gravity is the enemy.
I always thought mining asteroids would be a thing by the end of the century for valuables metals, will see if that happens, would go hand in hand with manufacturing too.
That is going to be something but it will be for space use. I do not see asteroid mining resulting in the materials being brought back. Instead, when we have different things in space, it will be used for materials and fuel.
gravity is the enemy 😳 I thought that was what made life possible
If you are trying to do protein folding, it is the enemy. Same with making fiber optic cable.
I understand now sir
I agree. But I'm a sucker for space so I would definitely take the bait on a space tour if I could afford it LOL
China
China anuncia tripulação da Shenzhou-19 com terceira astronauta mulher
A China revelou hoje a tripulação da missão Shenzhou-19, que será lançada na quarta-feira rumo à estação espacial Tiangong. A bordo, estará a terceira mulher astronauta do país, marcando mais um passo significativo no programa espacial chinês.
#newsonleo #technology #hivebr #china #space
Os astronautas são Cai Xuzhe, Song Lingdong e Wang Haoze, com Cai assumindo o comando, conforme anunciado pela Agência Espacial Chinesa para Missões Tripuladas em uma coletiva no Centro de Lançamento de Satélites de Jiuquan. Cai já participou da missão Shenzhou-14 em 2022, enquanto Song e Wang, ambos nascidos na década de 1990, farão sua estreia no espaço. Song foi piloto da Força Aérea, e Wang, engenheira na Academia de Tecnologia de Propulsão Aeroespacial.
Seguindo os passos de Liu Yang (primeira astronauta chinesa em 2012) e Wang Yaping (segunda em 2013), a Shenzhou-19 será lançada às 04h27 de quarta-feira (horário de Pequim) e levará os tripulantes à estação Tiangong, onde realizarão experimentos, incluindo pesquisas sobre construção de habitats lunares com tijolos feitos de solo lunar simulado.
A China planeja, junto com a Rússia e outros países, estabelecer uma base científica no polo sul da Lua, sendo o único país até agora a pousar no lado oculto da Lua. Além disso, a Tiangong deverá operar por cerca de dez anos e poderá se tornar a única estação espacial ativa, caso a Estação Espacial Internacional seja desativada em 2024.
Espaço
Astronauta da Nasa internado após quase 8 meses no espaço recebe alta
Após passar uma noite no hospital Ascension Sacred Heart Pensacola, na Flórida, o astronauta da Nasa que havia sido internado após retornar à Terra de uma missão de quase oito meses na Estação Espacial Internacional (ISS, na sigla em inglês), recebeu alta, segundo informações divulgadas pela própria Nasa, no sábado (26).
#newsonleo #technology #space #nasa #hivebr
O astronauta ou a astronauta –por proteção à privacidade médica, não foram divulgadas informações específicas sobre a pessoa internada– retornou ao centro espacial da Nasa, em Houston, ainda no sábado, dia da alta.
"O membro da tripulação está em boa saúde e retomará o recondicionamento pós-voo normal com os outros membros da tripulação", diz, em nota, a agência espacial americana.
Não foi divulgado o motivo da internação.
A cápsula Crew Dragon, da SpaceX, pousou na madrugada de sexta passada (25) no Golfo do México com quatro pessoas a bordo.
Estavam na espaçonave os americanos Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt e Jeanette Epps, e o russo Alexander Grebenkin.
Inicialmente, a Nasa divulgou que toda a tripulação fora encaminhada a uma unidade médica por precaução. Mais tarde, a agência disse que três integrantes da missão já tinham deixado o hospital.
Segundo a agência, o integrante que permanecia internado estava em condição estável e sob observação por precaução.
Por sua vez, a agência espacial russa Roscosmos postou no Telegram uma foto de Grebenkin em pé e sorrindo, com a seguinte legenda: "Após uma missão espacial e pouso, o cosmonauta Alexander Grebenkin está se sentindo ótimo!".
CREW-8
Com 235 dias, a estadia dos astronautas da Crew-8 a bordo da ISS, um laboratório do tamanho de um campo de futebol, foi mais longa do que as missões típicas de seis meses dos astronautas na estação. Também marcou a missão mais longa até agora para a Crew Dragon, da SpaceX, que estreou em 2020.
A SpaceX já voou 44 vezes para a ISS. A empresa de Elon Musk é a única opção dos Estados Unidos para viagens de astronautas para a ISS. O plano para tornar a Starliner, da Boeing, uma segunda opção tem avançado lentamente devido a obstáculos no desenvolvimento da cápsula.
O retorno da tripulação foi adiado por semanas devido a dois furacões que passaram pelo sudeste americano, perto das zonas de pouso esperadas da Crew Dragon.
Na última quarta (23) à tarde, a espaçonave se desacoplou com segurança da ISS e reentrou na atmosfera da Terra na madrugada de sexta-feira (25).
Em uma entrevista coletiva pós-pouso, um representante da Nasa disse que "a tripulação está ótima" e não mencionou problemas com os astronautas. Mas citou problemas com os paraquedas.
Richard Jones, gerente adjunto do Programa de Tripulação Comercial da agência, disse que o conjunto inicial de paraquedas de frenagem sofreu impactos de detritos e que 1 dos 4 paraquedas de um conjunto subsequente demorou mais do que o esperado para se desdobrar.
Jones afirmou, porém, que os imprevistos não afetaram a segurança da tripulação. A espaçonave usada na missão estava em seu quinto voo e com 702 dias em órbita desde sua primeira missão.
Espanha
Emissoras de TV e rádio da Espanha entram com ação contra Meta e pedem quase R$ 1 bi
Emissoras de televisões e rádio entraram com uma ação contra a Meta, dona do WhatsApp, Instagram e Facebook, por concorrência desleal e pedem mais de 160 milhões de euros (R$ 988,22 milhões).
#newsonleo #technology #meta #spain #hivebr
Segundo informações da agência de notícias EFE, a ação foi protocolada na quinta-feira (24) por integrantes da Uteca (União de Televisões em Aberto, em tradução livre) e da AERC Radio Value (Associação Espanhola de Rádio) como as emissoras Atresmedia, Mediaset, Cadena SER, Cope, RAC1 e Onda Cero.
As empresas acusam a Meta de descumprir sistematicamente o Regulamento Geral de Proteção de Dados entre 2018 e 2023, o que levou a big tech a ter "vantagem ilícita na comercialização de publicidade online segmentada e personalizada".
No ano passado, a AMI (Associação dos Meios de Informação) da Espanha também entrou com um processo contra a Meta pelo mesmo crime. Os grupos Prisa, que publica o jornal El País, e Vocento, dona do jornal ABC, estão entre os signatários da ação.
No processo, a Uteca e a AERC Radio Value aponta que a Meta usou a base de dados de suas plataformas para realizar vendas personalizadas no mercado publicitário e obter vantagem na comercialização de anúncios sobre os concorrentes.
As plataformas da Meta detinham 44% do mercado publicitário espanhol em 2022, segundo dados obtidos pela EFE.
A dona do WhatsApp e Facebook contestou o processo movido pela AMI e afirmou que o caso não deveria ser julgado na Espanha, já que a empresa tem sede na Irlanda. Um juiz de um tribunal de Madri negou o argumento da empresa e manteve o processo, que ainda está em andamento.
China
Astronautas da China te mostram como estação espacial é por dentro; veja vídeo
Os astronautas na estação espacial Tiangong, da China, fizeram um vídeo que te leva para conhecer o interior do laboratório orbital sem sair de casa. Em cerca de sete minutos, os membros da missão Shenzhou-18 exploram o interior da estação concluída em 2022.
#newsonleo #technology #china #space #hivebr
O novo vídeo foi publicado pela agência de notícias estatal CCTV. A sequência começa com os taikonautas (nome dado aos astronautas da China) mostrando a cozinha, onde há um pequeno aquecedor, um micro-ondas modificado e bolsas de água.
Também é possível ver um pouco dos dormitórios deles, que contêm uma vista para lá de especial: ali, a tripulação pode admirar a beleza da Terra imersa na escuridão do espaço. Finalmente, o vídeo mostra um pouco dos segmentos orbitais do laboratório, incluindo plantações de tomate e alface na estufa da estação.
Estação espacial da China
A estação espacial chinesa Tiangong (nome que significa “Palácio Celeste”) foi construída pela agência espacial chinesa CMSA. Os três módulos que formam o complexo foram lançados entre 2021 e 2022.
Orbitando a Terra em uma altitude que varia de 340 km a 450 km, a Tiangong mede 55 metros de comprimento e pesa 70 toneladas — para comparação, a Estação Espacial Internacional se estende por 109 metros e pesa mais de 400 toneladas.
Agora que concluiu o laboratório orbital, a CMSA planeja manter a Tiangong sempre ocupada por pelo menos três astronautas durante uma década, no mínimo. Neste período, o laboratório vai receber experimentos científicos tanto da China quanto de outros países.
https://inleo.io/threads/view/adambarratt/re-adambarratt-2c2bms6wb?referral=adambarratt
No surprise on this one. We are going to see the LLMs used in many different ways for travel.
For example, there was an article the other day how someone used ChatGPT as a tour guide in Italy.
https://inleo.io/threads/view/coyotelation/re-leothreads-ruvacyyy?referral=coyotelation
AI
Open-source AI must reveal its training data, per new OSI definition
The Open Source Initiative (OSI) has released its official definition of “open” artificial intelligence, setting the stage for a clash with tech giants like Meta — whose models don’t fit the rules.
#newsonleo #technology #ai
OSI has long set the industry standard for what constitutes open-source software, but AI systems include elements that aren’t covered by conventional licenses, like model training data. Now, for an AI system to be considered truly open source, it must provide:
This definition directly challenges Meta’s Llama, widely promoted as the largest open-source AI model. Llama is publicly available for download and use, but it has restrictions on commercial use (for applications with over 700 million users) and does not provide access to training data, causing it to fall short of OSI’s standards for unrestricted freedom to use, modify, and share.
Meta spokesperson Faith Eischen told The Verge that while “we agree with our partner OSI on many things,” the company disagrees with this definition. “There is no single open source AI definition, and defining it is a challenge because previous open source definitions do not encompass the complexities of today’s rapidly advancing AI models.”
“We will continue working with OSI and other industry groups to make AI more accessible and free responsibly, regardless of technical definitions,” Eischen added.
For 25 years, OSI’s definition of open-source software has been widely accepted by developers who want to build on each other’s work without fear of lawsuits or licensing traps. Now, as AI reshapes the landscape, tech giants face a pivotal choice: embrace these established principles or reject them. The Linux Foundation has also made a recent attempt to define “open-source AI,” signaling a growing debate over how traditional open-source values will adapt to the AI era.
“Now that we have a robust definition in place maybe we can push back more aggressively against companies who are ‘open washing’ and declaring their work open source when it actually isn’t,” Simon Willison, an independent researcher and creator of the open-source multi-tool Datasette, told The Verge.
Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue called OSI’s definition “a huge help in shaping the conversation around openness in AI, especially when it comes to the crucial role of training data.”
OSI’s executive director Stefano Maffulli says it took the initiative two years, consulting experts globally, to refine this definition through a collaborative process. This involved working with experts from academia on machine learning and natural language processing, philosophers, content creators from the Creative Commons world, and more.
While Meta cites safety concerns for restricting access to its training data, critics see a simpler motive: minimizing its legal liability and safeguarding its competitive advantage. Many AI models are almost certainly trained on copyrighted material; in April, The New York Times reported that Meta internally acknowledged there was copyrighted content in its training data “because we have no way of not collecting that.” There’s a litany of lawsuits against Meta, OpenAI, Perplexity, Anthropic, and others for alleged infringement. But with rare exceptions — like Stable Diffusion, which reveals its training data — plaintiffs must currently rely on circumstantial evidence to demonstrate that their work has been scraped.
Meanwhile, Maffulli sees open-source history repeating itself. “Meta is making the same arguments” as Microsoft did in the 1990s when it saw open source as a threat to its business model, Maffulli told The Verge. He recalls Meta telling him about its intensive investment in Llama, asking him “who do you think is going to be able to do the same thing?” Maffulli saw a familiar pattern: a tech giant using cost and complexity to justify keeping its technology locked away. “We come back to the early days,” he said.
AI
Universal Music partners with AI company building an ‘ethical’ music generator
Universal Music Group (UMG) announced a new deal centered on creating an “ethical” foundational model for AI music generation. It’s partnered with a company called Klay Vision that’s creating a “Large Music Model” named KLayMM and plans to launch out of stealth mode with a product within months. Ary Attie, its founder and CEO, said the company believes “the next Beatles will play with KLAY.”
#newsonleo #technology #music #ai
The two say the model will work “in collaboration with the music industry and its creators,” without many details about how, while Klay plans to make music AI “more than a short-lived gimmick.”
This is how the companies explain their shared goals:
As for how whatever it is they’re working on will affect human artists:
UMG’s new partnership comes as it is involved in lawsuits against AI music generator sites and Anthropic, and in May, it ended a short stand-off with TikTok by signing a new licensing arrangement that covered, among other things, AI-generated music.
Klay is also run by chief content officer Thomas Hesse, who was previously Sony Music Entertainment’s president. Former Google Deepmind researcher Björn Winckler, who led the development of Google’s Lyria AI music model, is joining the company as its head of research.
I had to write it and screenshot since I couldn't write more.
It seems I can learn a lot on inleo over here.
What are your thoughts on the upcoming GPT5 openai update or should it be called upgrade?
It holds interesting potential although we will see what OpenAI brings out.
My view is that the next wave of updates (Grok3, Llama4, ChatGPT5, Claude4) are all going to be major upgrades over what we have now.
In fact, I think people will be blown away.
Yeah because, what AI is capable of doing now is just insane. When you combine that with automations it's just beautiful.
China
China Telecom trains AI model with 1 trillion parameters on domestic chips
China Telecom, one of the country’s state-owned telecom giants, has created two LLMs that were trained solely on domestically-produced chips.
#newsonleo #technology #china #ai
This breakthrough represents a significant step in China’s ongoing efforts to become self-reliant in AI technology, especially in light of escalating US limitations on access to advanced semiconductors for its competitors.
According to the company’s Institute of AI, one of the models, TeleChat2-115B and another unnamed model were trained on tens of thousands of Chinese-made chips. This achievement is especially noteworthy given the tighter US export rules that have limited China’s ability to purchase high-end processors from Nvidia and other foreign companies. In a statement shared on WeChat, the AI institute claimed that this accomplishment demonstrated China’s capability to independently train LLMs and signals a new era of innovation and self-reliance in AI technology.
The scale of these models is remarkable. China Telecom stated that the unnamed LLM has one trillion parameters. In AI terminology, parameters are the variables that help the model in learning during training. The more parameters there are, the more complicated and powerful the AI becomes.
Chinese companies are striving to keep pace with global leaders in AI based outside the country. Washington’s export restrictions on Nvidia’s latest AI chips such as the A100 and H100, have compelled China to seek alternatives. As a result, Chinese companies have developed their own processors to reduce reliance on Western technologies. For instance, the TeleChat2-115B model has approximately 100 billion parameters, and therefore can perform as well as mainstream platforms.
China Telecom did not specify which company supplied the domestically-designed chips used to train its models. However, as previously discussed on these pages, Huawei’s Ascend chips play a key part in the country’s AI plans.
Huawei, which has faced US penalties in recent years, is also increasing its efforts in the artificial intelligence field. The company has recently started testing its latest AI processor, the Ascend 910C, with potential clients waiting in the domestic market. Large Chinese server companies, as well as internet giants that have previously used Nvidia chips, are apparently testing the new chip’s performance. Huawei’s Ascend processors, as one of the few viable alternatives to Nvidia hardware, are viewed as a key component of China’s strategy that will lessen its reliance on foreign technology.
In addition to Huawei, China Telecom is collaborating with other domestic chipmakers such as Cambricon, a Chinese start-up specialising in AI processors. The partnerships reflect a broader tendency in China’s tech industry to build a homegrown ecosystem of AI solutions, further shielding the country from the effects of US export controls.
By developing its own AI chips and technology, China is gradually reducing its dependence on foreign-made hardware, especially Nvidia’s highly sought-after and therefore expensive GPUs. While US sanctions make it difficult for Chinese companies to obtain the latest Nvidia hardware, a black market for foreign chips has emerged. Rather than risk operating in the grey market, many Chinese companies prefer to purchase lower-powered alternatives such as previous-gen models to maintain access to Nvidia’s official support and services.
China’s achievement reflects a broader shift in its approach to AI and semiconductor technology, emphasising self-sufficiency and resilience in an increasingly competitive global economy and in face of American protectionist trade policies.
Tesla releases rare blog post and it’s an interesting one: Standardizing Auto Connectivity
Tesla wants to standardize electrical connectors inside vehicles to unlock operational efficiencies, cost reductions, and manufacturing automation.
#technology #auto #tesla
They need to do this with phones and other devices. It would be great to be able to use a power supply from one cell phone to another. Even from android to iOS and vice versa.
omg, yes
I hate having all these different chargers
Robert Downey Jr. plans to sue any Hollywood executive who signs off on the creation of his digital replica.
Robert Downey Jr. appeared on a recent episode of the “On With Kara Swisher” podcast and sent a stern warning to Hollywood in the age of AI: “I intend to sue all future executives” who sign off on the creation of a Downey digital replica. The Oscar winner does not want his likeness being used on screen through AI technology and/or deepfakes. The topic came up in relation to Downey’s Marvel tenure as Iron Man, but he’s confident Marvel would not recreate his Tony Stark through AI.
#robertdowneyjr #hollywood #ai #technology #likeness
“There’s two tracks. How do I feel about everything that’s going on? I feel about it minimally because I have an actual emotional life that’s occurring that doesn’t have a lot of room for that,” Downey said when asked about being digitally recreated in the future.
“To go back to the MCU, I am not worried about them hijacking my character’s soul because there’s like three or four guys and gals who make all the decisions there anyway and they would never do that to me, with or without me,” he added.
When host Kara Swisher said that “future executives certainly will” want to digitally recreate Downey on the big screen, the actor responded: “Well, you’re right. I would like to here state that I intend to sue all future executives just on spec.”
“You’ll be dead,” Swisher noted, to which Downey replied: “But my law firm will still be very active.”
Downey is currently confronting the future of AI on Broadway in the play “McNeal,” which takes aim at corporate giants in the AI space such as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
“I don’t envy anyone who has been over-identified with the advent of this new phase of the information age. The idea that somehow it belongs to them because they have these super huge start-ups is a fallacy,” Downey told Swisher about figures like Altman. “The problem is when these individuals believe that they are the arbiters of managing this but meanwhile are wanting and/or needing to be seen in a favorable light. That is a massive fucking error. It turns me off and makes me not want to engage with them because they are not being truthful.”
Article
The legal system will, of course, have to catch up to the technology changes. I don't think it's right to use someone's likeness without their express permission and compensation.
Will we start seing actors copyright their own persona? Or is this already a big thing inin Hollywood
Hyundai unveils world’s first hydrogen-powered, silent stealth battle tank
South Korea may become the first nation to develop and deploy fully hydrogen fuel cell-powered main battle tanks.
South Korea’s Hyundai subsidiary Rotem has just unveiled its vision for the future of main battle tanks for the Republic of Korea (ROK), hydrogen-powered powertrains.
The next version of ROK’s K-series battle tanks, the K3, will be powered by hydrogen fuel cells and feature other advanced tech to become one of the world’s most sophisticated tanks.
#military #technology #hydrigen #skorea
I was very curious to know what this tank model would be like.
At first glance it didn't disappoint me, with a modern design and powered by hydrogen, this will be very useful in a battle.
Would make a good second vehicle.
It would look good in your driveway.
Hahaha... dreaming doesn't cost anything, but I don't think it would be very well seen here.
Maybe then it would be better.
Another good thing to have for those neighbors you do not like.
Fortunately, both sides of the house are good neighbors, but I know exactly the type you recommend hahaha...
I think that everywhere there will always be those annoying and undesirable neighbors.
The new hydrogen-powered K3 has been developed in collaboration with Korea’s Agency for Defense Development and other national technology research institutions. Once operational, the tank is hoped to enter production as soon as 2040, making it the world’s first.
The hydrogen fuel cells will replace the K-series diesel engines. This will be done in steps, with the first prototypes featuring hybrid hydrogen and diesel engines. It is just the latest in a line of announcements from South Korea in its broader aim to transition its war machines away from combustion engines.
Next-generation hydrogen-powered tanks
“Next-generation main battle tank surpasses all capabilities of today’s MBTs, providing more efficient mission employment with the latest technologies for future warfare. As battlefield conditions change, more changes are required to MBT’s firepower, command and control, and survivability to be more optimized and to create maximum combat synergy,” Hyundai Rotem explains on its website.
“Hyundai Rotem will proactively prepare for future warfare by developing next-generation main battle tanks capable of supplementing combatant’s capabilities and function replacements. Peacekeeping is our prioritized goal,” the company added.
The new K3 will feature improved stealth capabilities, autonomous driving and slave drones, and a new 130-mm smoothbore main gun. “The next-generation tank will have stronger preemptive strike capabilities using an artificial intelligence-based fire control system,” an official at Hyundai Rotem said.
good technological advancement
World’s 1st artificial island to provide 3.5GW wind energy to 3 million homes
The first of the island’s caissons, or foundations, are currently being built in Vlissingen (the Netherlands).
The European Investment Bank (EIB) has agreed to provide Elia Transmission Belgium (ETB) a $702 million (€650 million) grant to help it build the world’s first artificial energy island.
The artificial energy island, according to the details provided by Elia, will aim to provide Belgium with 3.5GW of new offshore wind capacity so as to enable its transmission to green energy.
The funds have been allocated for the realization of the first phase of the Princess Elisabeth Island project.
#technology #energy #belgium #wind
Doesnt Denmark have similiar plans to build artificial islands to generate power in the north sea?
I dont know. I havent heard of that although I know a number have mentioned it over the years.
Many feel it is the path forward.
ETB also states that the project is essential for Belgian and European energy transition, “helping to bring large amounts of wind energy from the North Sea to the consumption centers on the mainland.”
The signing of the agreement took place on October 25 at the island’s Caisson yard in Vlissingen (NL).
World’s first artificial energy island
According to the Elia Group, the Princess Elisabeth Island will be constructed between 2024 and 2027, at about 27.9 miles (45 km) off the Belgian coast within the Princess Elisabeth wind zone.
The island is one of ETB’s key projects and is the world’s first artificial energy island.
The project aims to integrate 3.5 GW of additional offshore wind capacity into Belgium’s electricity grid, which can power more than three million households.
The Island will reduce the country’s dependence on fossil fuels and provide more affordable green electricity. It will also significantly contribute to the European Union meeting its renewable energy targets and climate-neutrality goal.
According to a press release from the Elia Group, “In addition to unlocking Belgium’s second offshore wind zone, the Princess Elisabeth Zone, the island will also serve as a landing point for additional interconnectors that will link Belgium to its neighbors.”
“Another important element for the EU bank is the project’s innovative nature, featuring hybrid interconnectors and a nature-inclusive design to foster biodiversity and support marine life, making it a benchmark for sustainable energy solutions.”
Google, DPI back African fintech Moniepoint in $110M round
Google's African Investment Fund is a new investor in African fintech Moniepoint, which just closed $110 million in new financing led by DPI.
African fintech Moniepoint just closed $110 million in new financing, and it has landed Google’s Africa Investment Fund as a new investor. The Series C round was led by Development Partners International’s African Development Partners (ADP) III fund.
#african #google #dpi #fintech #funding
Other investors, including African private equity firm Verod Capital and existing investor Lightrock also participated.
Moniepoint, also backed by QED Investors, British International Investment (BII) and Endeavor Catalyst, has raised over $180 million since its launch in 2015.
According to the Financial Times, the round makes Moniepoint a unicorn — a private company with a valuation of $1 billion or more. The African fintech was last valued at nearly $800 million in a QED-led round two years ago.
Moniepoint initially focused on providing infrastructure and payment solutions for banks and financial institutions before pivoting to becoming a business banking provider, an area where it has found remarkable success.
The African fintech caters to small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) across Nigeria, offering working capital, business expansion loans, and business management tools such as expense management (business payment cards), accounting and bookkeeping solutions, and insurance.
The fintech claims it processes over 800 million transactions, with monthly total value exceeding $17 billion.
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PayPal beats on earnings but misses on revenue
PayPal reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings on Tuesday, but revenue came in slightly below expectations.
PayPal reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings on Tuesday, but revenue came in a bit light of expectations.
#paypal #earnings #finance #technology #fintech
Here's how the company did compared to Wall Street estimates, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:
Revenue increased about 6% in the quarter from $7.42 billion in the same period a year ago. PayPal reported net income of $1.01 billion, or 99 cents per share, compared to $1.02 billion, or 93 cents per share, a year earlier.
It's the first earnings report for CEO Alex Chriss since he reached his one-year mark on the job in September. The stock is up 36% this year and 42% since Chriss joined the payments company, which at the time was mired in a deep slump due to increased competition and a declining take rate, or the percentage of revenue PayPal keeps from each transaction.
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Infraspeak raises $19.5M to bring collaboration to facilities management
Infraspeak has raised $19.5 million in a Series B round of funding to bring collaboration to facilities management.
It might not be the sexiest of subjects, but facilities management is central to any business that has a physical premises — the bigger that footprint becomes, the more complex it gets.
#infraspeak #facilities #management #Technology
Portuguese startup Infraspeak has set out to address that with an all-in-one platform that gives facility managers and associated service providers insights and operational control over everything that goes on in a given location.
Founded in 2015, Infraspeak has hitherto raised around $20 million in funding, and secured big-name customers such as KFC, Intercontinental and Primark. And to drive its next phase of growth, the Porto-based startup on Monday said it has raised a further €18 million ($19.5 million) in Series B funding.
Consider a healthcare firm with myriad departments, equipment and contractors spanning various disciplines such as maintenance and cleaning — a lot needs to be coordinated and managed.
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AI boom thrusts Europe between power-hungry data centers and environmental goals
The growth in demand for AI could come at a cost to Europe's decarbonization goals as the specialized chips used by firms like Nvidia are expected to result in a rise in energy use of already power-hungry data centers.
The boom in artificial intelligence is ushering in an environmentally conscious shift in how data centers operate, as European developers face pressure to lower the water temperatures of their energy-hungry facilities to accommodate the higher-powered chips of firms such as tech giant Nvidia.
#technology #ai #data #energy #europe #electricity
AI is estimated to drive a 160% growth in demand for data centers by 2030, research from Goldman Sachs shows — an increase that could come at a cost to Europe's decarbonization goals, as the specialized chips used by AI firms are expected to hike the energy use of the data centers that deploy them.
High-powered chips — also known as graphics processing units, or GPUs — are essential for training and deploying large language models, which are a type of AI. These GPUs need high density computing power and produce more heat, which ultimately requires colder water to support reliable cooling of the chips.
AI can consume 120 kilowatts of energy in just one square meter of a data center, which is equivalent to the power consumption and heat dissipation of around 15 to 25 houses, according to Andrey Korolenko, chief product and infrastructure officer at Nebius, who referred specifically to the deployment of Nvidia's Blackwell GB200 chip.
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Bitcoin tops $70,000 for the first time since June as investors await earnings, Election Day
Bitcoin has struggled to reclaim the $70,000 level this year after reaching a record of $73,797.68 in March.
Bitcoin climbed above $70,000 as investors braced themselves for MicroStrategy earnings and counted the days to the U.S. presidential election.
#bitcoin #microstrategy #election #crypto
Maybe we will have uptober after all 👏🚀
Markets do what markets do.
Green candles and people is a interesting combination.
The price of bitcoin was last higher by about 2% at $71,048.36, according to Coin Metrics. Ether jumped 5%.
Stocks tied to the price of the cryptocurrency rose in tandem with it in premarket trading. Crypto exchange platform Coinbase and bitcoin proxy MicroStrategy advanced 3% and 5%, respectively.
Bitcoin has struggled to reclaim $70,000 this year
The last time bitcoin touched $70,000 was in June. It has tested that level several times this year, after hitting a record in March of $73,797.68, but earlier forays above $70,000 have been mere blips.
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Emidat is building a tool to clean up construction by automating environmental reporting
Fixing the climate crisis is a vast, world-sized puzzle. But one particularly large piece of this ginormous conundrum is construction and real estate —
Fixing the climate crisis is a vast, world-sized puzzle. But one particularly large piece of this ginormous conundrum is construction and real estate — which collectively amount for around 40% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Enter Munich-based data startup Emidat, which has built a software platform for automating the generation of validated Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) certificates for the construction sector.
#construction #technology #environment #emidat
EPDs are a critical piece of the puzzle for understanding and mitigating the climate impact of the built environment. They require undertaking a product lifecycle assessment (LCA) to declare standardized info about the environmental impact of construction materials and products at each stage of their lifecycle, from production through use to end-of-life.
The problem is that EPDs are typically an arduous and expensive piece of paperwork for manufacturers to produce, says Emidat CEO and co-founder Lisa Oberaigner.
This is where the startup’s data platform comes in, opening up a digital channel for ingesting product data and automating environmental impact declarations via a queryable database that accepts uploads via API, Excel, or BIM (building information modelling); and can itself be accessed via API and UI.
By standardizing the construction sector’s EPD reporting for products, the startup thinks its data layer will fire up the incentive for manufacturers to compete to produce more sustainable buildings materials, helping to shrink the carbon footprint of future builds as a byproduct of platform-enabled transparency.
“The really large manufacturers, the ones that are responsible for these emissions, it’s not like they don’t know how to decarbonize; they know exactly what they need to do, and they invest a lot in these new technologies to produce sustainably,” Oberaigner said. “Now they cannot charge for it, and with what we do, they can put a price tag on it — show that it’s actually more sustainable.
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Despite risks, Vinod Khosla is optimistic about AI
Vinod Khosla has no doubts that humanity's future with AI is bright.
The Sun Microsystems co-founder turned prominent investor predicts that “the need to work will go away” almost entirely thanks to AI.
#vinodknosla #ai #technology #sunmicrosystems
“Almost all expertise, it doesn’t matter whether you’re talking about primary care physicians, mental health therapists, oncologists, structural engineers or accountants — all of it can be near free,” he said on Monday in a conversation with TechCrunch editor-in-chief Connie Loizos at the TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 conference.
When asked why he is so optimistic about an AI-infused future, Khosla said that the world where most human labor is free will have “great abundance,” adding that GDP growth will increase from “2% to well over 5%.”
Because many people are concerned that AI could be detrimental to society, Khosla recently penned an essay titled: AI: Dystopia or Utopia?
Onstage today, he recapped some of the points from the 13,150-word essay.
Despite his optimism, Khosla acknowledged the potential risks of AI.
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Inside the Audio Lab: How Apple developed the world’s first end‑to‑end hearing health experience
Apple’s state-of-the-art Audio Lab in Cupertino, California, supports the innovative work of its acoustic engineers. They use the lab to conduct user studies in various listening rooms and test new features in its anechoic chambers, which completely absorb reflective sounds and isolate external noise.
#apple #audiolab #health #technology
The Audio Lab is the hub for the design, measurement, tuning, and validation of all of Apple’s products with speakers or microphones. It’s also the center for Apple’s multiyear, cross-team collaboration to build the groundbreaking new hearing health features on AirPods Pro 2. Available today as a free software update,1 the end-to-end experience helps minimize exposure to loud environmental noise with Hearing Protection, track hearing with an at-home Hearing Test, and receive assistance for perceived mild to moderate hearing loss using AirPods Pro as a clinical-grade Hearing Aid.
According to the World Health Organization, approximately 1.5 billion people around the world are living with hearing loss. “Hearing loss affects individuals in every region and country, yet often goes unrecognized. Hearing is a core component of communication for so many and is an important factor for health and wellbeing,” says Shelly Chadha, M.D., the World Health Organization’s technical lead for hearing. “Technology can play an important role in raising awareness and providing intervention options for those affected by hearing loss.”
“Every person’s hearing is different, so we created an innovative, end-to-end hearing health experience that addresses this variability in a way that’s both simple to use and adaptable to a wide range of needs. That’s especially important because hearing loss affects people of all ages with different levels of tech savviness,” says Sumbul Desai, M.D., Apple’s vice president of Health. “With the Hearing Aid feature, we wanted to build something so intuitive, it felt like an extension of your senses. We knew the results would literally change people’s lives — and democratize access to treatment for a condition that affects more than a billion people.”
Engineers used highly specialized spaces across the Audio Lab to help make these breakthrough features possible.
“From the quietest sounds we can hear for the Hearing Test feature, to speech in noisy restaurants for the Hearing Aid feature, and even concert levels for Hearing Protection, we can bring the real world into our acoustics facilities with playback of calibrated soundscapes from all over the world, or take accurate acoustic measurements at the touch of a button,” says Kuba Mazur, Apple’s hearing health lead engineer within Acoustics Engineering.
The Longwave anechoic chamber was built on a separate foundation that uses springs to isolate it from the rest of the lab, allowing for accurate sound measurements without any noise or vibration disturbances. The chamber includes a custom-built loudspeaker and microphone arc that can measure head-related transfer functions, or in other words, how sound interacts with the human body. Having both the loudspeaker and microphone arrays within this chamber makes it a unique space with many applications, including AirPods, iPhone, and HomePod development.
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Foster sisters explain why they haven't invested in AI
Oversubscribed Ventures co-founder Sara Foster (above right) made a confession onstage on Monday at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024
“I don’t even have ChatGPT on my phone,” she said.
It’s an unexpected comment from an investor, given that ChatGPT is arguably the most influential product to launch this decade. But what makes the Foster sisters different from career venture capitalists is also their greatest strength: they’re creatives first, and tech industry investors second.
#sarafoster #ai #venturecapital #technology #investing
Across their careers, the Foster sisters, Erin and Sara, have co-founded the clothing line Favorite Daughter, co-led creative for Bumble Bizz and Bumble BFF, and currently co-host a podcast together. Erin Foster even created the top Netflix show “Nobody Wants This,” starring Kristen Bell.
“Even calling it Oversubscribed Ventures was really a nod to our sense of humor because we know that this is not a space that we naturally belong in,” Erin said onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024. “We aren’t trying to cosplay as fund managers, you know? We’re trying to be ourselves and take our unique point of view, and our skill sets, and bring it into this world and inject that in an authentic and honest way without pretending to be anything different than we are.”
In the spirit of being authentically themselves, the Foster sisters opened up onstage about why they’re reluctant to invest in AI.
“If we don’t understand it, we don’t invest in it,” said Sara.
For Erin, a TV writer, the rise of generative AI and its impact on creators is more personal.
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Google-backed Open Cloud Coalition launches to lobby European lawmakers
The new Google-backed Open Cloud Coalition launches to lobby European lawmakers -- mostly against Microsoft.
Europe has a new lobbying body, one with a self-stated mission to “improve competition, transparency and resilience” in the cloud computing sector.
#google #cloud #technology
The Open Cloud Coalition (OCC) counts 10 members at launch, the most notable of which is Google, supported by international and local cloud providers Centerprise International, Civo, Gigas, ControlPlane, DTP Group, Prolinx, Pulsant, Clairo and Room 101. Part of the collective’s work will involve conducting cloud market research and presenting the results to regulators in the European Union and the U.K., while “engaging in consultations on competition and market fairness,” according to a statement.
The launch comes hours after Microsoft’s deputy general counsel Rima Alaily preempted the announcement, publishing a blog post accusing Google of conducting a “shadow campaign” to influence cloud regulation in Europe. Alaily called the new organization an “astroturf group organized by Google,” adding that the search giant had “gone through great lengths to obfuscate its involvement, funding and control” by using smaller European cloud providers as the face of the coalition.
The OCC is broadly comparable to another industry trade organization called the Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe (CISPE), which launched in 2017 and has Amazon’s AWS as its flagship member alongside several dozen smaller players. Indeed, the OCC is a direct response to a settlement Microsoft reached with CISPE members (not including AWS) to abandon an antitrust complaint against a licensing change Microsoft had made in 2019, which made it more expensive to run its enterprise software on rival cloud services.
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This veteran couldn't share 3D scans of a burnt naval ship, so he created a startup that can
In the summer of 2020, a fire broke out onboard a naval ship docked in San Diego Bay.
In the summer of 2020, a fire broke out onboard a naval ship docked in San Diego Bay. For more than four days, the USS Bonhomme Richard burned as helicopters dropped buckets of water from above, boats spewed water from below, and firefighters rushed onboard to control the blaze. Before the embers had even cooled, lidar (Light Detection and Ranging) scans were taken to assess how bad the damage was and to figure out how the fire even started.
#3dscans #navy #ai #technology
But the investigation was stalled, partially because of how hard it is to send lidar scans.
Today’s leading cloud storage services — Google Drive, DropBox, iCloud, and OneDrive — don’t support the massive three dimensional files (sometimes, multiple terabytes in size) used with lidar technology. The naval unit in San Diego was forced to overnight thumb drives and Blu-ray discs, containing lidar scans of the charred naval ship, to authorities around the country.
That’s what inspired U.S. Army veteran Clark Yuan to launch Stitch3D, a browser-based platform that lets you view, share, annotate, interact with, and manage your large 3D files. Each file is stored as a “point cloud”: a collection of millions of discrete points with x, y, and z coordinate values that digitally represent a 3D scene. If Stitch3D existed, it may have been easier to send lidar scans of the USS Bonhomme Richard.
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MabLab's improved drug and drink testing strips could make for safer streets and venues
For anyone who parties or goes out dancing, the risk of accidentally taking adulterated drugs is a real one.
For anyone who parties or goes out dancing, the risk of accidentally taking adulterated drugs is a real one. MabLab, presenting today on the Startup Battlefield stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024, has created a testing strip that detects the five most common and dangerous additives in minutes.
#madlabs #drug #technology #newsonleo
Co-founders Vienna Sparks and Skye Lam met in high school, and during college the pair lost a friend to overdose. It’s a story that, sadly, many people (including myself) can identify with. Thankfully, testing strips are a common sight now at venues and health centers, with hundreds of millions shipping yearly.
If you haven’t seen them, the strips work like this: You dissolve a bit of the substance to be tested in a provided buffer solution, then dip the strip in. The liquid travels up the paper, reaching a treated area that changes color in the presence of an unwanted additive. They’re simple and effective, but limited in that they only detect one thing, most commonly fentanyl.
“We have an opportunity to replace that with a better version,” said Lam — one that detects five common lacing chemicals simultaneously: fentanyl, methamphetamine, benzodiazepine, xylazine, and methadone.
The company’s innovation is “a mix of physical and chemical,” said Sparks: “There’s a zone specifically designed for each agent, and we’re using novel treatments and materials on the strip to allow capillary action to occur without incurring cross-reactivity.”
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Automaker Ford weakens profit outlook amid price war, shares fall
Ford Motor said on Monday it expects to hit the lower end of its full-year profit guidance, dropping the company's shares 5% in after-hours trading, as a price war hits the U.S. automaker's bottom line.
Ford faces $5-billion loss on EVs this year despite cost improvements
#ford #earnings #automotive #evs
Ford expects to earn about $10 billion in earnings before interest and taxes this year, down from its prior range of $10 billion to $12 billion.
"No doubt, there's a global price war, and it's fueled by over-capacity, a flood of new EV nameplates and massive compliance pressure," CEO Jim Farley said on a call with analysts.
Ford has also been weighed down this year by high warranty costs and problems with its supply chain, worsened by recent hurricanes, Chief Financial Officer John Lawler said.
Third-quarter profit fell less than expected, however.
The company reported third-quarter net income of $900 million, or 22 cents per share, down from 30 cents a year ago. Results were hurt by a $1-billion charge it took on cancelling production of a three-row electric SUV in August.
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HRL Laboratories, Boeing Explores Use of Quantum Computers to Cut Costs of Rocket Launches
Researchers investigate how quantum computing could be used in calculations to stabilize cyclic ozone within fullerene cages.
#technology #quantum #rocket #space #computing #costs #newsonleo
The rocket-space industry is always on the lookout for ways to improve efficiency, reduce costs and push the boundaries of what’s possible in space exploration.
A recent study by HRL Laboratories and Boeing, published on the preprint server arXiv, explores a new approach that could lead to significant advancements in rocket propulsion by leveraging quantum computing. The focus is on stabilizing a high-energy-density molecule, cyclic ozone, within fullerene cages—a development that could dramatically enhance rocket fuel efficiency.
Cyclic ozone is an attractive candidate for rocket fuel due to its high energy density. However, its extreme reactivity has historically made it impossible to isolate and utilize effectively. The researchers propose that encapsulating cyclic ozone within fullerene cages, a type of carbon molecule, could stabilize the molecule and make it viable for use as a rocket propellant. This approach is similar to strategies previously considered for hydrogen storage and could potentially increase the specific impulse of rocket fuel—a measure of fuel efficiency—by up to 33%.
A 33% increase in specific impulse could translate to rockets carrying significantly more payload, thereby reducing the cost per launch and enhancing the overall efficiency of space missions. For instance, a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, which currently can carry up to 63,800 kg to low Earth orbit (LEO), could potentially carry an additional 21,000 kg of payload if this technology were implemented. This would have profound implications for both commercial and scientific missions, offering more flexibility and capability at a lower cost.
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Step aside, Zoom fatigue, VRTL wants to make virtual fan events fun again
VRTL founder Courtney Jeffries describes herself as a “recovering sports executive.”
“That was my entire career before I threw it away to chase down my startup dreams,” Jeffries told TechCrunch.
#vrtl #zoom #technology #courtneyjeffries #virtualfan
After playing softball at the University of Washington, she spent almost 20 years working in marketing and sales for teams like the Oakland Raiders and the New York Rangers. But while Jeffries was leading fan retention initiatives at Madison Square Garden, she noticed a glaring opportunity.
“My whole job was to focus on extracting the lifetime value out of the fans, but quite obviously, there’s an over indexing of attention on fans in the building,” she said. “The majority of fans are outside of an arena […] and there’s no platform, no way to scale in-person experiences that we know will trigger their loyalty.”
By 2022, Jeffries launched VRTL, an enterprise platform for entertainment companies — from sports teams to record labels — to capitalize on virtual fan experiences.
“It’s a very versatile platform that combines livestream, video chat, and then our proprietary suite of fan engagement experiences to drive those loyalties,” she said.
What makes VRTL, which pitched onstage today as part of the Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024, different from any other video chat or livestream service is not only that it gives clients valuable data, but also that it has proprietary fan engagement tools.
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From Reddit:
By real-time I mean "seconds away".
I'm looking for a technology that would allow to watch any youtube video from common languages (eg: english, french, german, spanish) in other common languages. Possibly with seconds delay but that would not be a concern since we can delay the video rendering to sync audio/video.
I'm a nerd and deep into IT and AI but didn't took time to look into that particular field deeply.
Pixel phones already have "interpreter mode" - they will translate audio being spoken between two languages. They do this in real time like an interpreter would.
I imagine the additional challenge for what you're asking for is just the audio mixing. The only added step is that you would need to take the "background noise" and mix the new spoken audio back in.
I went on a trip to Norway this June, 10000km all the way to Nordkapp. I expected at least something to go wrong, and one of my rear brake calipers got stuck and I lost braking, Immediately stopped and somehow stopped right in front of a service.
With the help of my Pixel 7's interpreter mode I managed to talk to the mechanic just closing the shop and he looked at the smoking brake, told me to wait a few minutes for it to cool down and see if it works again, and it did.
At that moment I realized how much more of a hassle that would have been if not for my P7, truly we're at a level where we can travel anywhere and do anything without any help.... As long as there's internet connection lol
Noise cancelling headphones connected to your phone while your phone listens to the video from your pc. It's not pretty but it works
I work on dubbed translation software. Right now, our translation process is theoretically realtime (without lip syncing), taking about a minute per minute of audio. It just has some added setup time per each request that's mostly a scaling issue, and the website's UI is not actually set up to do realtime translation yet (instead it just takes in a video, translates the whole thing, and spits it out).
But realtime dubbed translation is absolutely possible with current tech, there's just some mostly non-ML-related barriers. u/perrochon is right about the legal issues. Realistically, what you'll more likely see soon is YouTubers adding multilingual audio tracks to their videos themselves as YouTube begins to roll out that feature more widely. If you know any YouTubers that might be interested, send them our contact :)
Some languages' grammar is backwards compared to English. So for them instantaneous translation would not be possible.
now. Ai is replacing translators AND interpreters in every legal and administrative space already. Humans hopefully will have literature as a last bastion for a few years still. Source: I’m a translator. The industry is in shambles. The worst aspect of it is not losing you job, but losing respect for your work, clients saying shit like: but the AI said something different when I translated it, and having to explain idioms to an idiot.
YouTube has had machine generation of subtitles and then machine translation of those subtitles for a decade. All it needs after that is text-to-speech which is not hard. Translation is much quicker than the necessary transcoding of the video stream.
The reasons it's not there on YouTube are manifold, and include product (many people hate dubbing and want subtitles) and legal (you are making another audio track with the copyrighted sounds, you are wholesale using someone else's video to make a new video, the owner of the original content may not like the auto generated new sound track, etc.)
I have this today on my Google pixel. Love it. I live half time US and other half Thailand
I don't think you need AI for this. Firefox is already beta testing auto website translation and you've been able to copy and paste text into google translate for years. If you're into to this and want to create it you just need a three step program.
Audio transcription
Text translation
Text to speech
That's it. If you're looking to incorporate AI then maybe something that samples the speakers voice on the fly and reuses it in step 3 would provide for a babblefish like experience rather than an automatic voiceover.
While you can do this without AI, AI can potentially offer some benefit. Primarily, it can learn to understand the context of what's being discussed and translate meaning more so than just words.
Translating words for words is one thing, but when a certain phrase has an unconventional meaning in one language when used in a specific context, and you translate the words to a different language, that meaning can be lost. Being able to use AI to understand those nuances, and hold context on an ongoing conversation, can potentially make the real-time translation much more meaningful (by translating the underlying message, not just the words).
You should be able to set that up with OpenAI's "realtime" version of the 4o model.
It costs like 20 cents a minute though...
Google translate does it on my pixel phone.
I was at the planetarium on Cozumel, and watched their video presentation with live subtitles courtesy of my phone. It wasn't perfect but good enough to follow what was going on.
I'm a professional interpreter, you won't be getting a service from AI like you can from me any time soon. Interpreting is human activity for humans and AI often confuses natural glitches in conversations as ends of sentences to name just one of its fundamental shortcomings.
I really dislike the current adoption of AI. Technically it works. But the quality is barely understandable most of the time.
But it seems this is good enough for a lot of people. Which is scary when people in charge see it as a worthwhile costcutting option.
The AI of tomorrow will be vastly different from the AI of today
Will you take my call whenever I feel like I need a translation for $20 dollars a month?
Do you know English, Italian, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Portuguese, Spanish, German, Russian and Arabic?
There are actually some apps that do a pretty damn okay job at that already...They're getting better very rapidly...
It honestly wouldn't surprise me if you could get almost real time translation through an ear bud from your phone or other device within the next decade at the rate we're moving...
Assuming society doesn't implode before then...lol
Now it's just expensive and requires Internet connection
There are fundamental linguistic challenges to actual real time challenges. Take this German sentence from an article in Der Spiegel:
In den aktuellen Gesprächen werde es darum gehen müssen, die Notwendigkeit eines von der Regierung in Gänze getragenen wirtschaftspolitischen Konzeptes zu betonen.
google translate renders it as
The current talks will have to focus on emphasizing the need for an economic policy concept that is fully supported by the government.
In the English, “emphazing” is the 9th word. In the German, it comes from “zu betonen“, right at the end. You could not construct the full English translation until you had the full German sentence, right to the end. Fundamentally the structure of the languages are different in this way. This means the best you can hope for with on the fly translation is for a sentence to be translated after it is fully complete.
This exists!! I learned about this app a few months ago from someone on Reddit and tried it during a conference call with people who were speaking a different language and it worked (mostly) flawlessly. I fully understood the conversation in real time.
The app is called 3P0 and from what I understand it's from an independent dev who frequents Reddit. Pretty cool tech, honestly.
Never, because you don’t fully know what the person actually said until you hear the full sentence.
I've noticed there's increased interactions in certain apps between users of different languages thanks to quick translate buttons.
I think it's a positive thing that I have faith it.
Samsung phones do it with the Samsung earbuds. In real time.
Even if the computer was hyper advanced, and the algorithms have been perfectly trained.
It would never be possible because different languages have different sentence structures. Japanese sentence structure is nearly reverse of English, for instance.
So even a perfect translator would have to wait for them to finish their sentence before it could spit it out for you.
Hearing aids that can translate foreign languages - Really!
Originally introduced to the world in 2018, Livio AI hearing aids significantly altered how many individuals use and think of hearing aids. And why is that? Because Livio AI was the first multi-purpose hearing device that not only sounds better than other hearing aids out there, it also lets you track your brain and body health, stream music, phone calls and more from your smartphone, and translate languages as you hear them.
#translation #language #hearingaids #technology
How does the translation tool work?
Select the language you speak and then choose the language of the person you plan to engage in a conversation with.*
When you speak into your iPhone®, the Thrive Hearing app translates your speech and displays it on the screen in the other person’s language. Simply then show them the screen so they can see what you’re saying.
Alternatively, when the other person speaks into your phone, the app will translate their speech, display it in your language on the phone, and also stream the translated text to your hearing aids in your language.
Hi, @taskmaster4450le,
This post has been voted on by @darkcloaks because you are an active member of the Darkcloaks gaming community.
Get started with Darkcloaks today, and follow us on Inleo for the latest updates.
Now, this same great technology has been updated to create an even better sounding hearing aid - Evolv AI. These outstanding hearing aids have the ability to translate 27 languages as you hear them! It’s easier to communicate with individuals who speak a different language - simply by using the translation tool in the Thrive Hearing app.
How Will Real-Time Translation Shape the Future of Language Learning?
With fast advancements in real-time translation and AI tools like video dubbing, I wonder if language learning will become less popular in the future.
Learning a new language takes a lot of time and effort. In 10-20 years, as technology reduces language barriers, will fewer people find it worth the investment? Could fluency in foreign languages become rarer as a result?
People who learn a language because they genuinely want to will likely continue to do so, but people who learn a language because they have to probably won't do it.
I'm curious to hear your thoughts. This is just a thought experiment—I believe language learning has many unique benefits that technology can't replace!
Old school analog face to face communication will always be welcome over the people who rely on the machines.
It'll be like Star Trek where the machine isn't even visible during a face to face conversation. People will just have their headphones popped in listening to the live translation. People already walk around with headphones in all the time
I can't imagine "real time" translation will truly happen, there will always be a delay of some sort.
(To clarify: when I think "real time translation", I'm thinking, like, an earpiece you wear that translates what somebody is saying as they're saying it, giving the impression that they are speaking your language)
Sentence structure varies so much between languages that this type of translation simply isn't feasible. For example: type a moderately complex sentance into DeepL (example) and watch how the translated sentence transforms wildly with nearly every new word.
For instance, the sentance "he has been taking care of his grandmother for twenty dollars an hour".
"he has" -> "tiene", as in has "he possesses"
"he has been" -> "ha sido". as in "he has been [a doctor]"
"he has been taking" -> "ha estado tomando" as in "he has been taking [medicine]"
etc etc.
Yeah, a real time would be hard with changes in syntax, not only things like noun/verb order would demand a delay, but bigger issues of syntax like SVO, SOV etc. It could get close to instantaneous, but never quite the speed of someone who just speaks the language.
Meaning gets lost in translation, anyone who speaks more than one language knows this. French poems translated to English don’t feel the same, English literature translated to French doesn’t feel the same.
People learn languages to feel other cultures, not simply understand them.
I don't think it will change much of anything. Unless we can forgo language entirely and just skip straight to transmitting direct meaning. THAT will be revolutionary in many many many ways. For good AND for bad....
It is just my opinion, but I don't think computer programs will ever be as good as humans. I spent an entire career as a software programs, so I know how programs work.
Programs are created by humans. Human language experts work out the grammar of a language, and they work with programmers who turn all the rules into numbers. No matter how smart the humans are, they are creating a set of rules in advance. The computer has zero intelligence. It can only run the rules (after they are turned into numbers) that the humans create. So nobody intelligent sees the actual sentence you are translating. A computer program is just following a large set of rules created by humans in the past.
For translation, you have the grammars of different languages. Only a human who is fluent in both languages can create the set of rules. And how many rules are needed? The good thing is that many different human experts can all contribute to the same set of rules. Once the rules are written down, they won't be forgotten. A good translation program is probably many man-years of work.
The real issue is this: can a set of rules translate every sentence correctly? Or are languages too complicated?
Don't worry. Won't be advanced enough in at least a couple decades. No need to stop studying.
And even then, literal translations will lose much of the nuance and cultural differences.
If I know how to swim, I don’t need a swimming ring. If I love swimming, it doesn’t matter whether there are swimming rings.
Good "AI" translation is straight-up impossible because 1:1 translation is impossible, things can be conveyed in one language that there's no easy way to express in another and while there's ways for creative translators to still convey those ideas, it's something that "AI" simply can't do. "AI" translations are going to create more language learners if they catch on at all, because "AI" translations are so shallow and low quality (if not outright incomprehensible) that they force you to learn the language if you want to get the original point at all.
are people forgetting that actual humans, communities, and societies speak the languages that you learn ????? why learn a language for translation purposes and ONLY use it for translation purposes??? whatever happened to actually TALKING TO PEOPLE ....... what the hell
The thing that OP is referring to would be instant translation that DOES allow you to talk to people seemlessly and as easily as if you were talking to them directly.
I love learning languages and really hope AI doesn’t replace human translation, but I’m sure it will.
All these folks mentioning the nuances of languages and the impossibility of machines grasping the intricacies of human communication don’t seem recognise the sheer power and the barely imaginable future abilities of computers, I believe.
Hope I’m dead long before it happens, but I reckon AI’s coming for all you translators’ jobs!!
Already because of how prevalent English has become, and because of online translation tools, there is less of a need for translators.
The universities in my country have abandoned some of the smaller language choices and reduced the number of students they accept.
I do find it worrying. Although you might be able to communicate with all these people, then especially politically, it is important to be able to understand what is going on in countries in their own language. If you get it all in a filtered way, you are going to lose out on details and attitudes that might be important.
I think real-time translation will always be a bit laborious and won't really replace learning language learning
I think that needing to be comfortable in the written version of the language is already much less important. Translation and generative AI can already do the writing for you, good enough for 90% of situations.
But, I do think speaking is something that will still be an important skill to learn.
Imagine you're at a business networking event and the guy next to you has learnt English and can speak it himself, while you're trying to rely on some real-time translator tech. The other guy will have the edge.
Imagine going on a date or having a romantic relationship with someone where you only communicate by translation tech. It just doesn't seem the same.
I don’t think it’s gonna replace language learning soon but god I wish it’d happen soon to replace my language learning. Absolutely hate it, but have to. Real time face to face translation would also be great in eliminating code switching so I don’t have to bother to speak my native language ever again, that’d be a massive improvement in quality of life as well.
But yeah, I agree that language learning purely as a tool might get rarer, just like people don’t ride horses around as a means of transportation that commonly anymore; but riding a horse for fun and even for transportation too didn’t get replaced by the invention and proliferation of cars.
DGLegacy wants to help you ensure your loved ones inherit your assets
DGLegacy, a company that’s designed a digital legacy planning and inheritance app, presented today at TechCrunch Disrupt Startup Battlefield.
DGLegacy, a company that’s designed a digital legacy planning and inheritance app, pitched today at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 Startup Battlefield to detail how it’s helping people ensure that their loved ones inherit their assets.
#dglegacy #asset #inheritance #technology
Founded by husband-and-wife duo Ana Mineva and Peter Minev, DGLegacy allows users to proactively inform their beneficiaries of their assets and ensure they are aware of their passwords and other information in order to claim them. The idea behind the app is to minimize the chance of an unclaimed asset.
Unlike traditional asset protection tools like trusts and wills, which can become outdated soon after their creation, DGLegacy lets you keep a continuously updated catalog of your assets and ensures that beneficiaries will always have access to it.
With DGLegacy, you can catalog your assets and upload relevant files to the respective asset. You can then invite beneficiaries and trustees to ensure that they will be informed about their designated assets.
The app features multi-layer encryption to ensure that all of the information is stored securely.
“The most important thing about DGLegacy is that it allows you to not only catalog very securely and easily your digital assets, but also has a proprietary protocol for detecting a fatal event,” Peter told TechCrunch. “Only when a fatal event is detected, then we trigger the digital inheritance.”
Article
Radio station drops "Gen Z" AI presenters after a week following public outrage
On October 21, Radio Krakow announced that it was revamping its OFF station, introducing three AI-created voice hosts representing Generation Z.
In yet another example of how most people don't want AI replacing humans – no matter how much executives say it saves money – a Polish radio station has abandoned an experiment where its journalists were dismissed and replaced with AI "presenters." The test was supposed to last three months, but the station decided to end it after just a week following a massive backlash from the public.
#technology #genz #robots #ai #jobs #Humans
On October 21, Radio Krakow announced that it was revamping its OFF station, introducing three AI-created voice hosts representing Generation Z. These avatars were 20-year-old journalism student and pop culture expert Emilia Nowa, 22-year-old Acoustic Engineering student Jakub Zielinski, and 23-year-old former psychology student Alex, who is "socially engaged, passionately discussing topics related to identity [and] queer culture."
Response to the move was about as vitriolic as one would expect. Exacerbating the anger was the fact that Radio Kraków's human hosts were no longer at the station because they were "external collaborators" who had not had their contracts renewed, and "not because of AI," claimed editor-in-chief Marcin Pulit.
In an Amazon-level move of PR brilliance, the radio decided that the first thing the AIs should do is interview Wislawa Szymborska, the Nobel Prize-winning Polish poet and writer who died in 2012. This was, of course, another AI recreation, leading to even more outrage.
Article
Most current AI tech is 90 percent marketing, says Linus Torvalds
Torvalds said that the current state of AI technology is 90 percent marketing and 10 percent factual reality.
In a nutshell: Linus Torvalds never minces words when asked to comment on open-source support or the latest technology trends. The Finnish software engineer recently joined an open-source focused event, where he had a thing or two to say about AI technology and "intelligent" algorithms.
#newsonleo #ai #technology #hype #marketing #linustorvalds
Torvalds said that the current state of AI technology is 90 percent marketing and 10 percent factual reality. The developer, who won Finland's Millennium Technology Prize for the creation of the Linux kernel, was interviewed during the Open Source Summit held in Vienna, where he had the chance to talk about both the open-source world and the latest technology trends.
The outspoken technologist said that modern generative AI services are an interesting development in machine learning technology, and that they will eventually change the world. At the same time, he expressed his dissatisfaction with the "hype cycle" which is fueling too many AI-related initiatives and contributing to Nvidia's impossibly high market evaluations.
Everyone and their dog is currently talking about AI, or sticking some AI-based cloud service together, or funding an AI-focused multi-million startup somewhere in the world. Torvalds hates the hype cycle so much that he doesn't even want to go there. The developer is essentially ignoring everything AI, though things will likely change in a drastic way a few years from now.
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Mostly hype and deception to trick investors. But at the same time they are developing in a rapid rate.
Apple Intelligence is now available on iPhone, iPad, and Mac
New Apple Intelligence features are now available on recent iPhone models, iPads, and Macs.
The big picture: Apple has launched its answer to the generative AI models and features offered by the likes of OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft. Although Apple Intelligence is now available to owners of compatible devices, many of its intended features are still slated for release in the coming months. Furthermore, leaked internal communications suggest that its capabilities currently fall significantly behind those of ChatGPT.
#apple #appleintelligence #ai #iphone #ipad #mac #technology
New Apple Intelligence features are now available on recent iPhone models, iPads, and Macs. Users can access the generative AI suite by updating the operating systems to iOS 18.1, iPadOS 18.1, and macOS Sequoia 15.1.
Supported devices include the iPhone 15 Pro, all iPhone 16 models, and all devices with Apple M-series processors. Apple Intelligence currently only supports US English. The December update will add support for Australian, Canadian, Irish, New Zealand, South African, and UK English. Beginning in April and continuing throughout 2025, Apple will expand support to Chinese, Indian English, French, German, Spanish, and additional languages.
With the Writing Tools function, Apple Intelligence can edit, summarize, and rewrite text in Mail, Notes, Pages, Messages, and other apps. It can proofread, make alterations, and explain its editing choices to enhance users' writing, similar to Grammarly. Moreover, selected text can be condensed into bullet points, lists, or tables.
The summarization feature also works on notifications, long message chains, and recorded phone calls. When Apple Intelligence begins recording, all participants are immediately notified.
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Meet the couple who just cost Google £2.4 billion in antitrust fines
In 2006, a mere eight years after Larry Page and Sergey Brin released Google on the world, a UK couple launched a comparison-shopping website called Foundem
The cost of justice: The European Court of Justice (the EU's Supreme Court) has upheld a lower court's ruling that Google must pay a £2.4 billion fine for market abuse. The decision came after a 15-year David and Goliath battle between the search giant and a little-known and less-remembered shopping website.
#google #antitrust #foundem #technology #eu
In 2006, a mere eight years after Larry Page and Sergey Brin released Google on the world, a UK couple launched a comparison-shopping website called "Foundem." Adam and Shivaun Raff had high expectations for their business because it offered more than other price-hunting sites.
In those days, websites that helped customers compare prices online were just getting their start, and they primarily specialized in one product, like airfare. One day, Adam had the idea of a website that compared prices of virtually any product the customer desired, and Foundem was formed.
The Raffs launched their website in 2006 and almost immediately noticed traffic to their page decreasing instead of increasing. The couple had both worked in the tech industry. Adam worked with supercomputers, and Shivaun had a career in software consulting. They knew something was wrong with their traffic results and knew where to look.
While Google was surfacing Foundem pages deep in results, other search engines listed it at the top or at least on the first page for queries like "price comparison" or "shopping." As it turned out, Google's search engine was hitting the website with automated spam penalties, which down-ranked their site as to be essentially invisible.
The couple thought it was a glitch with the algorithm. Google surely wouldn't penalize their website intentionally.
Article
Opera says it will continue to support old Chrome extensions, including uBlock Origin
Google Chrome risks becoming an inferior browser, at least when it comes to blocking invasive ads.
Chrome-less: Google is enforcing a significant shift for Chrome extension developers by making the newer Manifest V3 framework mandatory. However, many other Chromium-based browsers are choosing not to follow suit, allowing them to maintain enhanced ad-blocking capabilities compared to Chrome.
#chrome #opera #ublock #adblockers #extension #google
Google Chrome risks becoming an inferior browser, at least when it comes to blocking invasive ads. Google replaced Manifest V2 with Manifest V3, forcing extension developers to adopt a less effective technology in exchange for a claimed increase in overall browser security. However, Opera Software recently confirmed that it will not follow suit and will retain Manifest V2 support in its Chromium-based browser.
The newly launched Opera One R2, which the company touts as the "best Opera browser" to date, is primarily geared toward enhancing support for generative AI algorithms. The Opera One rebranding, introduced in 2023, is intended as a "new" Opera browser, purpose-built around AI services from the ground up.
Opera One R2 introduces new AI-driven features including an enhanced command line for interacting with its AI component, Aria, as well as image generation and other advanced capabilities. Opera also debuted a refreshed design aimed at showcasing the future look of web browsers, featuring dynamic themes, animated backgrounds, and "browser sounds." While sound effects in browsers were around back in the Windows 98 era, AI integration promises a more immersive experience.
Article
Panic halts development of Playdate Stereo Dock amid challenges
An update on the dock's product page highlights the numerous challenges the team has faced during development, which started by assuming their manufacturing partner
Recap: It's been more than three years since Playdate maker Panic first teased a multi-purpose docking station for the quirky handheld. The aptly-named Playdate Stereo Dock was meant to serve as a charging station for the console, and double as a Bluetooth speaker (and a pen holder), but now it's unclear if the accessory will ever see the light of day.
#playdate #technology #newsonleo #panic
An update on the dock's product page highlights the numerous challenges the team has faced during development, which started by assuming their manufacturing partner – with plenty of experience making Bluetooth speakers – could easily design the electronic on their behalf. Had it worked, it would have saved Panic lots of time and money.
Things went smoothly at first, but the factory ended up outsourcing the Bluetooth chipset and software to another company in a different country. Unsurprisingly, quality suffered.
Panic said the dock would crash often, especially when rapidly adjusting the volume. Pairing and unpairing was also a pain point and when music was played through the speaker, it flat out sounded bad.
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A mysterious new image generation model has appeared
red_panda is a mysterious new image generation model that is beating other top models. The model is over 100 times faster than OpenAI's DALL-E3. It is unknown which company made the model and when it will be released. AI companies are increasingly using community benchmarks to drum up anticipation ahead of announcements, so it is likely a reveal will be coming soon.
#technology #artificialintelligence #ai #generativeai #redpanda
A mysterious new image generation model is beating models from Midjourney, Black Forest Labs, and OpenAI on the crowdsourced Artificial Analysis benchmark.
The model, which goes by the name “red_panda,” is around 40 Elo points ahead of the next-best-ranking model, Black Forest Labs’ Flux1.1 Pro, on Artificial Analysis’ text-to-image leaderboard. Artificial Analysis uses Elo, a ranking system originally developed to calculate the relative skill level of chess players, to compare the performance of the various models it tests.
Similar to the community AI benchmark Chatbot Arena, Artificial Analysis ranks models through crowdsourcing. For image models, Artificial Analysis selects two models at random and feeds them a unique prompt. Then it presents the prompt and resulting images, and users choose which they think better reflects the prompt.
Granted, there’s some bias in this voting process. Artificial Analysis’ voters are AI enthusiasts, for the most part, and their choices might not reflect the preferences of the wider community of generative AI users.
But red_panda is also one of the better-performing models on the leaderboard in terms of its generation speed. The model takes a median of around 7 seconds to generate an image — over 100 times faster than OpenAI’s DALL-E 3.
So, where did red_panda come from? Which company made it? And when can we expect it be released? All good questions. AI labs increasingly use community benchmarks to drum up anticipation ahead of an announcement, though, so it might not be long before we find out.
Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky on the gospel of Steve Jobs and what founder mode really means
This article contains a transcript of an interview with Airbnb cofounder and CEO Brian Chesky, who made a lot of waves earlier this year when he started talking about something called 'founder mode'. Chesky spends a lot of time specifically obsessing over company structure and decision-making. In the interview, Chesky talks about founder mode and what he thinks it means. Founder mode isn't about micromanagement or pure swagger - good leaders need to get into the details while still delegating and trusting their teams to make decisions independently of them.
#technology #brianchesky #airbnb #founder
What do you think about the "technology" of Android and Apple?
I mean, which do you think has better features, specs, and innovative features?
#technology #ai
The Guardian: Indonesia blocks Apple iPhone 16 sales over lack of investment
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/oct/28/indonesia-apple-iphone-16-ban
The Guardian: Keir Starmer says media firms should have control of output used in AI
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2024/oct/28/keir-starmer-says-media-firms-should-have-control-of-output-used-in-ai
The Guardian: Microsoft Excel’s bloopers reel: 40 years of spreadsheet errors
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/oct/28/microsoft-excels-bloopers-reel-40-years-of-spreadsheet-errors
The Guardian: Elon Musk hopes Trump victory will help his $44bn Twitter bet pay off
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/oct/27/elon-musk-hopes-trump-victory-will-help-his-44bn-twitter-bet-pay-off
The Guardian: Man who used AI to create child abuse images jailed for 18 years
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/oct/28/man-who-used-ai-to-create-child-abuse-images-jailed-for-18-years
The Guardian: ‘I grew up with it’: readers on the enduring appeal of Microsoft Excel
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/oct/28/microsoft-excel-spreadsheet-program-40-years
The Guardian: A predator used her 12-year-old face to make porn. She helped pass a law to make that a crime
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ng-interactive/2024/oct/26/ai-child-sexual-abuse-images-kaylin-hayman
BBC: 'We were just trying to get it to work': The failure that started the internet
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20241028-the-failure-that-started-the-internet
BBC: Rubber and tree sap: How ancient Maya cities have withstood the ravages of time
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20241028-lost-cities-how-maya-ruins-have-withstood-the-test-of-time
BBC: Fossils show flying reptiles ate squid and fish
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2ym7zedrno
BBC: Can AI make life easier for people with dementia?
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cqxj700pxpdo
BBC: Apple's AI features roll out on iPhones - but not for all
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy9xj301wmo
BBC: The smartwatches that can predict Parkinson's disease
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20241025-the-smartwatches-that-can-predict-parkinsons-disease
BBC: 'It's a unique language spoken by two people': The twins who created their own language
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20241025-do-twins-have-a-secret-language
BBC Video: How to reset your brain with your breath
https://www.bbc.com/reel/video/p0jw4jrg/how-to-reset-your-brain-with-your-breath
Reuters: EU to invest $1.5 billion in region's deep tech sector
https://www.reuters.com/technology/eu-invest-15-billion-regions-deep-tech-sector-2024-10-29/
Reuters: Coframe raises $9 million for websites that optimize themselves using AI
https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/coframe-raises-9-million-websites-that-optimize-themselves-using-ai-2024-10-29/
Reuters: Corning forecasts upbeat quarterly results on robust demand for optical fiber
https://www.reuters.com/technology/corning-forecasts-upbeat-quarterly-results-robust-demand-optical-fiber-2024-10-29/
Reuters: Google among investors putting $110 million into Nigeria's Moniepoint
https://www.reuters.com/technology/google-among-investors-putting-110-million-into-nigerias-moniepoint-2024-10-29/
Reuters: Zebra Technologies raises Q4 profit forecast on strong demand and cost savings
https://www.reuters.com/technology/zebra-technologies-raises-q4-profit-forecast-strong-demand-cost-savings-2024-10-29/
Reuters: India's Jio Payment Solutions gets cenbank nod as online payment aggregator
https://www.reuters.com/technology/indias-jio-payment-solutions-gets-cenbank-nod-online-payment-aggregator-2024-10-29/
Reuters: Apple supplier TDK partners with McLaren Racing in EV push
https://www.reuters.com/technology/apple-supplier-tdk-partners-with-mclaren-racing-ev-push-2024-10-29/
Reuters: Founder of TikTok owner ByteDance jumps to top of China's rich list
https://www.reuters.com/technology/founder-tiktok-owner-bytedance-jumps-top-chinas-rich-list-2024-10-29/
Crazy, when TikTok came no one believed they would be this big. Crazy what they achieved with only short form content
Seems the market is saturated then :)
Yeah now it's super saturated but TikTok was first to have a breakthrough on short form content.
Reuters: US finalizes rules to curb AI investments in China, impose other restrictions
https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/us-finalizes-rules-curb-ai-investments-china-impose-other-restrictions-2024-10-28/
Reuters: OpenAI chair's AI startup Sierra gets $4.5 bln valuation in latest funding round
https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/openai-chairs-ai-startup-sierra-gets-45-bln-valuation-latest-funding-round-2024-10-28/
Reuters: Danish EV charger software firm Monta expands into US market
https://www.reuters.com/technology/danish-ev-charger-software-firm-monta-expands-into-us-market-2024-10-29/
Reuters: Microsoft's AI demand under scrutiny as investors seek payday
https://www.reuters.com/technology/microsofts-ai-demand-under-scrutiny-investors-seek-payday-2024-10-28/
Reuters: Toyota, NTT to make $3.3 bln R&D investment for AI self-driving, Nikkei reports
https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/toyota-ntt-make-33-bln-rd-investment-ai-self-driving-nikkei-reports-2024-10-28/
Reuters: US lawmakers urge review of China threat from photonics technology
https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-lawmakers-urge-review-china-threat-photonics-technology-2024-10-28/
Reuters: Meta builds AI search engine to cut Google, Bing reliance, the Information reports
https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/meta-develops-own-ai-search-engine-cut-reliance-google-bing-information-reports-2024-10-28/
And here's one to spicy it here a bit:
Amazon’s New Home Internet Service Could Generate $26 Billion in Revenue by 2032, But Faces Significant Hurdles
Amazon’s foray into satellite internet, Project Kuiper, has the potential to generate a staggering $26 billion in revenue by 2032, according to a recent report by Bank of America. However, the path to achieving this ambitious target is fraught with challenges, including stiff competition, high costs, and the complexities of reaching underserved communities.
#amazon #homeinternet #kuiper #satellite #technology
The report, authored by analyst Justin Post, highlights the immense market opportunity for providing internet access to the estimated 3.5 billion people globally who remain unconnected. Kuiper, with its planned constellation of over 3,200 satellites, aims to deliver high-speed, low-latency broadband to these underserved populations.
But realizing this vision will require overcoming significant obstacles. Post notes that limited disposable income among potential customers, coupled with substantial upfront investment and ongoing operational costs, could hinder Kuiper’s profitability. Furthermore, the company faces formidable competition from established players like SpaceX’s Starlink, which already boasts a significant head start in the satellite internet market.
Despite these challenges, Amazon possesses unique advantages that could give Kuiper a competitive edge. Its vast logistics network, encompassing autonomous vehicles, trucks, drones, and delivery robots, stands to benefit significantly from a continuously available, connected network. This synergy could create valuable operational efficiencies and unlock new possibilities for Amazon’s delivery and logistics operations.
it's not going to be an easy task at all
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I guess we'll see them sharing the market with StarLink 😂 or do you think otherwise
Stablecoins essential for US dollar’s future, says Paxos CEO
Harris and Trump are both urged to adopt favorable stablecoin regulations to maintain the US dollar’s supremacy for the coming years in an open letter from the CEO of Paxos ahead of the US elections.
An open letter to leading United States presidential candidates written by Paxos CEO Charles Cascarilla urges them to adopt stablecoins to maintain the US dollar’s global dominance and improve inefficiencies in the traditional banking system.
#stablecoins #usd #crypto #paxos
The next presidential administration could determine the United States’ future leadership in the global financial industry, Cascarilla wrote in an open letter published on Oct. 29.
Blockchain and stablecoins are “replatforming the financial system” to make it symbiotic with the internet, Cascarilla wrote. He stated:
Article
Do we need politicians to make this come true? Isnt this something the private, global sector can handle on its own.
Money is the realm of merchants...not so much governments.
Inside the World's Largest AI Supercluster xAI Colossus
#xai #grok #supercompute #cluster #technology
Inside the World's Largest AI Cluster: A Tour of the XAI Colossus
Located in [location], the XAI Colossus is the largest AI cluster in the world, built by Xanadu AI and powered by Supermicro servers. Spanning over 100,000 square feet, this massive facility is a marvel of engineering, housing over 100,000 GPUs, exabytes of storage, and super-fast networking infrastructure. In this article, we'll take a detailed tour of the Colossus, exploring its cutting-edge design, innovative cooling and networking systems, and the future plans for this behemoth of a facility.
The Data Hall: A Self-Contained Unit
The Colossus is housed in a massive data hall, designed to be a self-contained unit with its own power, cooling, and networking infrastructure. This allows for maximum efficiency and flexibility, as the facility can operate independently without relying on external resources. The data hall is equipped with advanced fire suppression systems, redundant power supplies, and multiple backup systems to ensure continuous operation.
Liquid Cooling: Efficient and Reliable
The Colossus uses a state-of-the-art liquid cooling system to keep the servers running at optimal temperatures. This closed-loop system recirculates the coolant to minimize waste and reduce energy consumption, making it an environmentally friendly and cost-effective solution. The liquid cooling system is designed to be highly efficient, with a heat transfer coefficient of up to 10,000 W/m²K, allowing for maximum heat dissipation and minimizing the risk of overheating.
GPU Racks: The Heart of the Colossus
The GPU racks are the heart of the Colossus, with each rack containing 64 GPUs and 16 CPUs. The GPUs are cooled using liquid cooling, while the CPUs are cooled using air cooling. The racks are designed to be highly scalable, with each rack capable of supporting up to 512 GPUs. This allows for easy expansion and upgrade of the facility, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
High-Speed Networking: Thousands of Servers Supported
The Colossus uses a high-speed networking infrastructure, with 400 Gb/s Ethernet connections between the servers. This allows for fast data transfer and communication between the servers, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications. The networking infrastructure is designed to be highly scalable, with the ability to support thousands of servers, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
Massive Storage Cluster: Exabytes of Capacity
The Colossus uses a massive storage cluster, with exabytes of storage capacity. The storage cluster is designed to be highly scalable, with the ability to support thousands of servers. This allows for easy expansion and upgrade of the facility, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
Tesla Megapacks: Reliable Power Source
The Colossus uses Tesla Megapacks to power the training jobs. The Megapacks are designed to provide a stable and reliable source of power, with the ability to absorb and release energy as needed. This allows for maximum uptime and minimal downtime, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
Future Expansion: Thousands of Servers and Exabytes of Storage
The Colossus is just the beginning, with plans for future expansion and growth. The facility is designed to be highly scalable, with the ability to support thousands of servers and exabytes of storage. This allows for easy expansion and upgrade of the facility, making it an ideal solution for large-scale AI applications.
Conclusion
The XAI Colossus is an engineering marvel, with its massive scale, high-performance computing capabilities, and innovative liquid cooling and networking infrastructure. The facility is a testament to the power of collaboration and innovation, and it's an exciting time to be in the field of AI and high-performance computing. As the demand for AI and machine learning continues to grow, the Colossus is poised to play a leading role in the development of these technologies, and we can't wait to see what the future holds for this incredible facility.
Riding Asteroids To Mars and Venus Like A Bus Can Be Better Than Using Starship, Scientists Suggest
Riding asteroids to Mars and Venus could slash costs and improve astronaut safety, say Ukrainian scientists.
#space #mars #starship #technology
Ukrainian scientists, Kasianchuk and Reshetnyk, propose riding asteroids to Mars and Venus to save operational costs. While the idea might sound a bit bizarre, they trust the intellect behind their science.
Recent research suggests that eliminating the need for a spaceship can reduce the cost-per-trip to Mars from Earth.
Riding Asteroids to Mars: Revolutionary Plan for Affordable Space Travel
Two scientists from the University of Kyiv in Ukraine have published a paper that analyses the orbit of over 35,000 asteroids. Their work deals with studying and observing these celestial objects to identify the possibility of them making an Earth-Mars trip.
Already, there are over 120 asteroids that AS Kasianchuk and VM Reshetnyk have shortlisted in hopes that they will serve the purpose of this study.
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From Reddit:
Solar, wind, and wave - ok.. why the hell is no one talking about tidal energy?
There are loads of talks about how solar and wind energy alone aren't enough if we really want to move towards clean energy. Yet there's more and more chatter about building more solar and wind farms and investing in these renewable sources - while we all know we need a mix of different renewables to really make a difference. It's the same old story for everyone - the sun doesn't always shine, the wind doesn't always blow... yea yea... you can see it especially in the UK where wind energy drops off dramatically during the summer.
I have looked into this before because Inwas curious. One problem is that tidal doesnt have that big effect evenly on the globe.
But I have seen some pretty cool tidal power plants on Youtube and there are actually a few in use worldwide.
Off the top of my head, I would say a barrier is the distance between where the energy is created and where it is consumed is far. Unless we are dealing with something close to shore, then it is going to require the energy transported.
I havent looked but this could be done in big lakes because they have tides.
This one is cool on farose island.
I've been following CorPower Ocean's journey (https://corpowerocean.com/a-short-history-of-wave-energy/) for a while now, and I'm really chuffed about their recent big investment. While I'm glad there's more discussion about ocean energy, I really feel there's a lack of talks about tidal energy. Tidal energy is predictable and reliable, and I know some people say it's not always there, but as long as the moon and gravity exist, tides are pretty much always around - not like waves, solar, wind, etc., which depend on the weather.
There are already some great tidal energy technologies that can produce clean and, most importantly, reliable energy - like Orbital Marine Power, Nova, and my favourite one because of their shell design and technology that's completely 3D printed and, as I understand it, much cheaper than other technologies - Spiralis Energy (https://www.spiralis.energy). Yet, they all lack investment, and more importantly, tidal energy itself isn't getting the buzz it deserves, even though it could be a really big deal.
Just trying to understand the cons of tidal energy, and why the hell we don't hear more talks about it from climate change advocates, politicians, and "big leaders."?????
There's literally a section on the first website you linked that explains why wave power isn't bigger. In the past it's been too expensive, low energy production, prone to corrosion and failure, and difficult to maintain.
Storage is the solution to the sun not shining and the wind not blowing.
seriously. so many people have little idea how insanely corrosive salt water is, especially on moving parts. tidal output just doesn't produce enough to cover the cost to maintain it.
This is literally the answer.
Different attempts have been trying to convert tidal and wave motion into energy for decades and the issue has always been corrosion and maintenance, and the costs related to both. The closest I've seen to a simplified energy capture device are those wave motion devices that move back/forth from ocean currents similar to how sea weed or kelp move. Grid connection and storage are both still a pain, but at least it's not a turbine in salt water.
It's like mineral oil cooling for PCs. Yes, it's doable. No, it's not worth it except in those rare edge cases.
The conventional wisdom regarding the ocean is that if you put ANYTHING in the ocean, the ocean will eventually destroy it. This logic has, for the most part, remained true over time.
Ask anyone who owns or works on boats how destructive the sea is. The internet is wildly optimistic about wave/tidal power, far cheaper to put a turbine on the top of a pole 100m above the water than to put all the expensive moving parts in a corrosive liquid that's trying to rip it apart 24/7.
Wait, “for the most part”? What nameless horror of the abyssal depths has defied that?
There's at least 2 posts per day here about tidal energy....most of it gets removed because there's no new news...perhaps you should investigate your sources of information?
North of england theres an island group where alot of companies test out there tidal technology. Theve been there for years now
We've mastered the wind and sun. The ocean is still beyond us. The unfront resource commitment to install the tech then maintaining a moving piece of equipment submerged in salt water.
Even structures with little moving parts like sea labs are abandoned after a decade or so because it just doesn't become feasible to maintain anymore.
Just like solar we'll start taking it more seriously when there's a promising feasible piece of tech thats easy to install and requires no to minimal maintenance. Remember this stuff is under water. Not easy to get to.
Because salt water is extremely harsh on machinery?
I just insist on nuclear. Reliable output all year round, vastly more efficient in land usage than other forms, completely safe and with practically zero environmental impact. The technology has advanced a fair bit since the 60's. Thorium fluoride reactors have no risk of catastrophic failure, no nuclear proliferation, and once we start working with fusion we will have a few thousand years of practically free energy for the whole planet.
Putting structures in the sea, or windmill farms covering vast fields really makes me worry about the environmental damage that does. The expense and waste down the line are also annoying.
I second this sentiment. Also with the work that Idaho National Lab is doing with modular reactors, we could reasonably start mass production within a decade. The upfront costs are in the millions, not billions, and last 40 years. When it runs low, pop it out for a new one. Game changing. It's not an American invention. However, those cutting edge technologies are being heavily funded out in Idaho.
I also like the idea of capturing the steam excess from reactors and replacing industrial heating applications or city service heating. Nothing wasted. Use it all.
I think thermal energy is more promising and not environmentally impactful.
Because under the ocean is a much more difficult environment to place a turbine compared to up in the air and basin based tidal power is pretty environmentally impactful. Need to focus our efforts on the low hanging fruit first.
Literally everyone in renewables it talking about tidal energy.
My guess is maintenance and longevity. We don’t have electric ships yet, so any tidal requires ships (Fossil fuel) for repairs. And salt water is incredibly corrosive, not to mention all the sea life that up has evolved over millions of years to stick to any surface.
When “the smart people” compare the maintenance needs along and power generation with off shore wind, (where the moving parts are above the water) my hunch is there there’s no comparison.
Also, speaking of that sea life…off shore wind farms have shown to crest new safe environments for fish. I doubt this would be the case for something that moves in the water.
As it stands power generation isnt a huge issue. We could meet our total consumption with just solar, wind and hydro.
The reason these are "not enough" is because we have to balance loads which PV solar and wind arent good at alone. The grid is designed to operate at 60hz (which is directly relates to voltage and current) >60hz and everything on the grid is destroyed (power surge), <60hz and you get brown outs. Your options here are to either up useage or reduce production when >60hz, and to reduce useage or up production. Steam turbines are really good at this because you can turn them on/off easily, add fuel or apply a brake for controls. Between wind ans PV solar, you pretty much only have access to a brake.
The solution is energy storage. concentrated solar power (CSP) uses mirrors to heat salt which then transfers the heat to a steam turbine. Batteries are very effective (a fresh lithium battery is probably the most efficient option) Pumped hydro is ~80% efficient.
Do you live near the ocean? Storms are incredibly powerful the natural environment is incredibly corrosive. Marine life like barnacles are always growing on the surfaces. There are far more cost effective solutions than putting a complex machine in saltwater.
It is interesting that you have given Nova and Orbital as two examples. Both have brilliant teams, have had devices in the water for years, and staff with real world experience.
Anyone interested in the field should absolutely look into their devices. A large part of their success has been a willingness to understand the operational environment and work with it.
Canada is one of the few countries to have begun to harness tidal energy; the country's only tidal station is located in Nova Scotia, in the Bay of Fundy. Our oceans are a vast source of energy that can be harnessed to produce different forms of usable energy including tidal and wave energy.
The Annapolis tidal barrage has been operating from 1984 2019
and the other company has filed for bankruptcy
'It is very unfortunate': Tidal power developer files for bankruptcy | CBC News
here are some links
FORCE
energy.novascotia.ca/sites/default/files/Tidal Energy Brochure Final April 2013.pdf
I believe the best ocean generating system would be to harvest ocean currents
Note: salt water and electricity don't combine very well
Because a study by Stanford university came to the conclusion that tidal energy is neither renewable nor unproblematic. https://cs.stanford.edu/people/zjl/pdf/tide0.pdf
Be it with a huge Asterisk that we are growing tidal energy according to our energy needs. But 1% of our energy need would halt the rotation of the earth in 1000 years.
Ok, this is technically not wrong, but it's also completely insane. They key part of this calculation is that it assumes humanities energy consumption will keep on growing at 2% for the next thousand years. At that point (assuming it is ever reached), humanities yearly energy expenditure would be approx 10^28 Joules per year, which pretty close to the output of a small star (the sun outputs about 10^26 Joules per second (per google), and it is not that small). If we're all still living on earth at that point, slowing down the rotation of the earth would be the least of our problems.
That article is what is technically known as a load of bollocks. There's no basis for the assumption of a 2% annual increase in energy usage. Just because it might be roughly correct for the last 50 years doesn't mean it will continue to increase like that.
The author of that article is assuming that in 1031 years when he says tidal power would have stopped the Earth's rotation, we'd be using well over 700 million times more energy than we did in 2013.
It doesn't sound very plausible.
Unfortunately, in this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics... So unless we figure out a way to shed copious amounts of low quality heat out of our atmosphere into space, producing and using more energy will lead to the planet heating up and killing us long before we slow it down... We are parasites on the surface, the earth will carry on long after we're gone.
This is under the assumption that our energy usage keeps increasing geometrically. Which probably would make the Earth a heated ball of humanity.
Just for comparison: with a current energy consumption of about 1,80E+17Wh per year and the rotational energy of the earth being 2,14E+29J, it would take about 330 million years for the earth's rotation to stop.
So we still have a wide margin for out energy consumption to increase, even IF we only use only tidal energy.
Rich people don't buy beachfront property to see a tide machine.
not sure who said it but it was someone at one of the energy companies...said if we had tidal done around a big portion of the UK, that would give us enough power for the UK and more for life...yes it will be expensive and mixed with other forms on top, but the cost alone would be not even half the price of building a nuclear power plant, plus we could start building it today, its 100% reliable cuz if waves stop, then we're long gone already...i think they said the cost of one nuclear power plant could give us 1.5 the amount of power we need with tidal. Its a no brainer really, for nuclear you its 15yrs minimum till its built, Climate can't wait that long and for something that its only going to cover a small overall percentage of power for the UK, where its tidal can power the entire country.
I've heard similar things about tidal energy, not just in the UK, and that's what got me thinking. If tidal energy can be so beneficial, yeah, it has its downsides right now, but if more people talked about it and more investments were made, we'd see more testing of technologies, more studies on its impact on marine life, and better chances to reduce the drawbacks and improve the tech... we need more clean energy for sure.
In the 60's big oil promoted solar and wind because it knew we didn't have the tech to make it work so it was a strawman compared to the reliability of oil.
I think this is close to the same thing. We don't hear about it because it works, and would disrupt the system, and before long, people are shooting nails out of electro rail guns because power is cheaper than bullets. Or that's what the big guys use as reasoning to prevent cheaply available power.
Re-experience '90s internet with this new 56K dial-up modem
Planex Communications' new PL-US56K2(A) USB modem just hit the market.
The opposite of cutting-edge: It's the era of 5G and gigabit-speed internet, and dial-up connections are dead in most places. However, that hasn't stopped a Japanese company from rolling out a brand-new 56K modem for anyone still relying on ancient copper phone lines to surf the web.
#technology #planexcomumications #5g #internet
Planex Communications' new PL-US56K2(A) USB modem just hit the market. For around $40 on Amazon, this retro device connects to your PC via USB, allowing you to access analog phone lines for internet connectivity, data transfers, and even fax capabilities.
Sure, the speeds are laughably slow by modern standards, with a theoretical maximum of 56 Kbps for downloads. But hey, they should still allow you to browse Gmail – though you'd likely have been better off switching to the basic HTML version if Google hadn't killed it off earlier this year.
Planex states that the modem complies with the 56K ITU-T standard recommendations and supports the V.90 and V.92 protocols. It's also designed to be plug-and-play with the latest versions of Windows, meaning you can simply connect it to your USB port without needing to install drivers. Its compact size (25mm x 75mm x 18mm) and lightweight design (just 28 grams) make it easy to stow away, too.
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What is Planex Communications
Planex Communications was a US-based company that was founded in 1993 by a group of entrepreneurs who saw an opportunity to create innovative computer peripherals and networking equipment. Here's a more detailed look at the company's history:
Early Years (1993-1996)
Planex Communications was founded in 1993 by a group of entrepreneurs who had a passion for technology and a vision for creating innovative computer peripherals and networking equipment. The company's early focus was on developing and marketing peripheral products such as speakers, microphones, and webcams. Planex's products were designed to be compact, affordable, and easy to use, making them accessible to a wide range of consumers and small businesses.
During its early years, Planex Communications faced significant competition from established players in the computer peripheral market. However, the company's commitment to innovation and quality helped it to differentiate itself from its competitors and establish a loyal customer base.
Expansion into Networking Equipment (1996-2000)
In the mid-1990s, Planex Communications began to expand its product line to include networking equipment, including routers, switches, and modems. The company's networking products were designed to be compact, affordable, and easy to use, making them accessible to a wide range of consumers and small businesses.
Planex's networking equipment was particularly notable for its innovative design and features. For example, the company's first router, the Planex PTE-1000, was one of the first routers to feature a built-in web server, allowing users to access their router's configuration page via a web browser.
Innovative Products (2000-2004)
During the late 1990s and early 2000s, Planex Communications continued to innovate and expand its product line. The company developed a range of other peripherals, including speakers, microphones, and printers.
One of Planex's most notable products was the Planex PTE-1000 USB webcam, which was one of the first webcams to use a USB connection. The webcam was designed to be compact, easy to use, and affordable, making it accessible to a wide range of consumers.
Merger with Diamond Multimedia (2004)
In 2004, Planex Communications merged with Diamond Multimedia to form Diamond Multimedia, Inc. As part of the Merger, Planex's product line was integrated into Diamond's existing product portfolio.
The merger provided Planex Communications with access to Diamond's extensive resources and expertise, allowing the company to expand its product line and reach new customers. However, it also marked the end of Planex Communications as an independent company.
Legacy (2005-Present)
Although Planex Communications is no longer an independent company, its legacy lives on in the form of its innovative products and technology. Many of Planex's products are still widely available and used by consumers and businesses today.
Planex's innovative products and technology have had a lasting impact on the computer peripheral and networking equipment markets. The company's commitment to innovation and quality helped it to establish a loyal customer base and differentiate itself from its competitors.
Today, Planex Communications is a subsidiary of Diamond Multimedia, Inc., and its products are no longer manufactured or sold under the Planex brand. However, the company's history and contributions to the development of computer peripherals and networking equipment continue to be remembered and celebrated by many in the industry.
Microsoft faces scrutiny over AI spending as Copilot adoption lags
Microsoft has invested around $13 billion in ChatGPT-maker OpenAI since 2019, but we've been hearing reports since April that investors are concerned that reaping the financial rewards
In brief: Microsoft will reveal its quarterly financial results on Wednesday, and it might not be a high point for the Redmond giant. Analysts expect Microsoft to report its slowest quarterly revenue growth in a year, and once again there are concerns about how much money the company is investing in AI when the demand and returns aren't justifying its outlay.
#microsoft #ai #copilot #chatgpt #openai #technology
Microsoft has invested around $13 billion in ChatGPT-maker OpenAI since 2019, but we've been hearing reports since April that investors are concerned that reaping the financial rewards is taking longer than expected.
Reuters reports that Morgan Stanley analysts say there is a "wall of worry" around Microsoft's earnings due to "ramping capital expenditures, margin compression, lack of evidence on AI returns, and messiness post a financial resegmentation."
One of the biggest AI-related disappointments for Microsoft is Copilot. The company has been pushing its AI tools incredibly hard, going as far as adding a dedicated button to its latest laptops, but most people are apathetic toward Copilot, with the most common complaint reportedly that it's not as good as ChatGPT.
In September, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said Copilot is basically the new Microsoft Clippy, and that customers had not gotten value from it.
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Robinhood admits it’s just a gambling app
That’s what the presidential betting market is all about!
US citizens can gamble on the upcoming election on Robinhood, the financial nihilism app announced. Robinhood has termed this “unlocking a new asset class that democratizes access to events as they unfold.”
#robinhood #gambling #president #election
They found the wellstreetbets crowd and went full #yolo
Maybe. Anything for a buck.
Well they have earned a little more than a buck 😅
The last time gme was a thing they earned like crazy
Let’s pause — I would like to reflect on this incredible phrase, about an asset class that democratizes access to events as they unfold. See, I thought we all had access to the events of the election because we all exist in reality and can find out about them. But apparently, if we can’t gamble on an event, it isn’t happening. This is a fascinating vision of metaphysics, and I would like to hear more about it. No one bet on my birth, for instance, and thus there is no asset class relating to my existence. So am I real?
if a tree falls in the forest and no one bets on it, did it really happen?
“Democratizes access” is one way you can describe “opening a betting market”
I’m kidding. Obviously whoever wrote that is just not very good at sentences. No, I want to get down to the heart of the matter here, which is signaled by the phrase “democratizes access.” This phrase sits right next to “financial inclusion” in the lexicon of people who are trying to take your money. “Democratizes access” is one way you can describe “opening a betting market,” but I don’t think it’s the most accurate one!
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Apple announces redesigned Mac Mini with M4 chip — and it’s so damn small
More power than ever in a downright tiny package.
As part of the company’s week of Mac-focused announcements, Apple has just introduced a smaller, yet even more powerful Mac Mini. It’s now equipped with Apple’s latest M4 silicon, supports ray tracing for the first time, and ships with 16GB of RAM by default — seemingly the new normal in the Apple Intelligence era. The machine still starts at $599 with the regular M4 chip, while the more powerful M4 Pro model has a starting price of $1,399. Like the refreshed iMac announced yesterday, the Mac Mini is available to preorder immediately and will be in stores on November 8th.
#apple #m4 #chip #mac #technology
The first thing you’ll notice is the new design. As rumored, the Mini has been shrunken down considerably — and it was already a relatively small desktop machine to begin with. Now it’s downright tiny, measuring five inches in both length and width. If you’re wondering how Apple manages to keep things running cool, the company says it’s through the M4’s efficiency and “an innovative thermal architecture, which guides air to different levels of the system, while all venting is done through the foot.”
Even so, Apple has loaded this thing up with plenty of I/O: on the front are two USB-C ports and a 3.5mm audio jack. Around back you’ll find ethernet, HDMI, and three USB-C / Thunderbolt ports. The USB-A ports are indeed history, but it’s worth noting that the base M2 Mini only had two Thunderbolt 4 ports and two USB-A ports. With the M4, you’re getting five ports in all. So you’re losing native USB-A but picking up an extra Thunderbolt port.
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YouTube reportedly testing new homepage that removes dates and view counts
YouTube is reportedly testing a new website layout that removes the date when a video was uploaded and the amount of views it has.
Over the last couple of years, YouTube has experimented with changes to its website that remove various features.
#youtube #google #technology #socialmedia
The Google-owned company removed dislikes back in 2021 to reduce targeted attacks on videos, prompting backlash from users worldwide. However, a browser extension to bring them back quickly rose from the ashes.
On Monday, October 28, VidIQ reported in a post on X that YouTube is testing a new homepage layout that removes view counts and dates.
In the screenshot, you can see six videos that show the thumbnail, title, and channel name – but nothing else. Normally, you’ll find the view count and an estimate of how long ago the video was uploaded under the channel name.
Shortly after the tweet was posted, dozens of users flocked to the comments to share their thoughts about the potential change.
“View counts and dates matter in selecting between videos on the same topic. I get from a product perspective what they’re trying to do, but this isn’t better for viewers or creators,” one user commented.
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Samsung TV Plus Hits 88 Million Users: Leading the Shift Toward Free Streaming
Samsung TV Plus, Samsung’s free ad-supported streaming (FAST) and on-demand (AVOD) service, has become a significant player in the streaming landscape. Currently reaching 88 million monthly active users and driven largely by U.S.-based viewers within the 18-49 demographic, the service has grown to become the most-used app on Samsung TVs in then United States. Its popularity shines a light on the momentum swinging towards free alternatives like FAST services while subscription fees climb across the board.
#samsung #entertainment #television #technology #streaming
Wait what? Never heard of this. Is the global or just US?
I dont know much about what Samsung is doing.
But I do know that Roku is kicking ass. They make a television and have an application that is on them. It is a streaming app that lets people watch for free (with commercials).
Noted, will check it out!
Samsung TV Plus and the Appeal of Free Streaming
Samsung TV Plus offers hefty library of free content, with over 3,000 channels and thousands of on-demand titles across genres. Once reserved for pay services, this alternative is meeting a demand for convenient streaming without subscription fees. This approach has driven a notable 50% increase in global viewership over the past year, with on-demand viewership alone rising by 400% year-over-year. The service is designed to blend live TV and on-demand streaming. It gives users a straightforward experience along with a variety of content without additional costs.
With an emphasis on easy access, Samsung TV Plus supports a wide array of Samsung devices. From Neo QLED TVs to Galaxy smartphones, this approach extends the service’s reach. Currently available in 30 countries, with recent launches in Singapore and the Philippines, plus an upcoming launch in Thailand, the app has been a major asset in Samsung’s ongoing effort to expand its global footprint.
Samsung TV Plus’s free, ad-supported model has gained particular traction among Gen Z, Millennials, and Gen X users in the U.S A key demo for advertisers, this audience creates an enticing platform for ad-buyers. In keeping with progress, Samsung Ads has developed interactive ads around popular genres and shoppable experiences in order to directly engage viewers.
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Why a Hydrogen Leak Can Be More Dangerous Than You Think
Hydrogen is often celebrated as a clean energy source, but its unique properties make it surprisingly dangerous when leaks occur. Unlike other gasses, hydrogen is highly flammable, disperses quickly, and is invisible and odorless, making it difficult to detect without specialized equipment. These characteristics mean that even a small leak can rapidly escalate into a major safety hazard. As industries increasingly adopt hydrogen, understanding the potential risks and the critical need for effective monitoring systems is essential to ensure safe handling and avoid unforeseen dangers.
#hydrogen #energy #technology
Impact on Equipment Longevity and Safety
A hydrogen leak poses a risk to human safety and equipment durability and performance. Hydrogen can permeate certain metals, causing a phenomenon known as hydrogen embrittlement. This process weakens the structural integrity of metal components, potentially leading to equipment failures or breakdowns. For industries relying on high-pressure systems, this embrittlement is particularly concerning, as it increases the likelihood of cracks or fractures over time.
One critical area where hydrogen monitoring is essential is in electrical transformers. Since hydrogen is a byproduct of overheating in transformers, any undetected leak or release can signal serious issues. This is why many facilities use H2scan hydrogen monitoring equipment to track hydrogen levels within transformers, ensuring that any leak is swiftly detected and mitigated. By monitoring hydrogen presence, facilities can prevent potential damage to transformers and avoid costly repairs or operational downtimes.
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Realizing Dreams with Image-to-Image Tech
In the world of visual storytelling, where creativity meets technology, image-to-image technology emerges as a revolutionary tool for graphic designers and photographers. This cutting-edge technology is transforming how artists conceptualize, create, and enhance their work. Whether crafting unique compositions or refining existing images, image-to-image technology provides endless possibilities to revolutionize your creative process. In this post, we will explore what image-to-image technology entails, its evolution, benefits, and how tools like picLumen are reshaping the digital art landscape, particularly in creating anime. Join us as we unravel the secrets behind this fascinating technology and discover how it can elevate your artistry to new heights.
#technology #dreams #image
Understanding Image-to-Image: What is it?
Image-to-image technology is a groundbreaking advancement that enables the transformation of one image into another through machine learning algorithms and neural networks. This innovative technology allows for seamless modifications, retouching, and enhancements, providing designers and photographers with unparalleled creative freedom. By analyzing and interpreting the visual elements of an image, these advanced algorithms can generate new images that retain the original’s essence while introducing new characteristics or styles.
In graphic design and photography, image-to-image technology serves multiple purposes. It can transform rough sketches into fully detailed artworks, apply different styles to photographs, and even convert low-resolution images into high-definition ones. For instance, a designer could use image-to-image technology to turn a hand-drawn sketch into a polished digital illustration, while a photographer might use it to add artistic effects to their photos, such as watercolor or oil painting finishes.
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The Evolution of Image-to-Image Technology
The roots of image-to-image technology can be traced back to the early days of computer graphics and the development of algorithms that could process and manipulate visual data. Over the years, advancements in artificial intelligence and neural networks have enabled more sophisticated image processing techniques, leading to the emergence of image-to-image technology as we know it today.
Initially, these technologies were primarily used in scientific research and industrial applications, such as medical imaging and satellite data analysis. However, as the technology evolved and became more accessible, it gradually found its way into the creative industries. The rise of deep learning and convolutional neural networks has further accelerated the development of image-to-image technology, allowing for more accurate and realistic transformations.
Today, image-to-image technology is at the forefront of digital art and design, enabling creatives to push the boundaries of their work and explore new possibilities. With ongoing research and development, we can expect even more exciting advancements in the near future, making image-to-image technology an indispensable tool for artists worldwide.
The Small Language Model Revolution: A Guide to Modern AI Efficiency
In the ever-expanding universe of artificial intelligence, a surprising trend is emerging. While industry giants race to build ever-larger language models, a quieter but equally significant revolution is taking place in the realm of Small Language Models (SLMs). These compact but powerful models are reshaping how businesses and developers think about AI deployment, proving that effectiveness isn’t always about size.
#slm #technology #ai
Small Language Models, typically containing fewer than 3 billion parameters, represent a fundamental shift in AI architecture. Unlike their massive counterparts such as GPT-4 or Claude 3, which require extensive computational resources and cloud infrastructure, SLMs are designed for efficiency and specialized performance. This isn’t just about saving resources – it’s about rethinking how AI can be practically deployed in real-world scenarios.
H2O.ai’s Mississippi models exemplify this new approach. The recently released Mississippi-2B, with just 2.1 billion parameters, and its even smaller sibling Mississippi-0.8B, are revolutionizing document processing and OCR tasks. What’s remarkable isn’t just their size, but their performance. The 0.8B version consistently outperforms models 20 times its size on OCRBench.
The secret lies in their architecture. Instead of trying to be generalists, these models employ specialized techniques like 448×448 pixel tiling for image processing, allowing them to maintain high accuracy while keeping computational requirements modest. They’re trained on carefully curated datasets – 17.2 million examples for the 2B version and 19 million for the 0.8B model – focusing on quality over quantity.
This specialized approach pays dividends in real-world applications. For businesses, the advantages are clear: faster processing speeds, lower operational costs, and the ability to run models on standard hardware. But perhaps most importantly, SLMs can often be deployed locally, eliminating the need to send sensitive data to external servers – a crucial consideration for industries like healthcare, finance, and legal services.
The rise of SLMs also challenges the traditional AI development paradigm. Instead of throwing more parameters at problems, developers are focusing on architectural efficiency and targeted training. This shift has led to innovations in model compression, knowledge distillation, and specialized architectures that squeeze maximum performance from minimal resources.
Choosing the Right SLM for Your Needs
The growing landscape of Small Language Models presents both opportunities and challenges for organizations looking to implement AI solutions. Mississippi’s success in document processing demonstrates how specialized SLMs can excel in specific domains, but it also raises important questions about model selection and deployment.
When evaluating SLMs, performance metrics need to be considered in context. While Mississippi’s OCRBench scores are impressive, they’re particularly relevant for document processing tasks. Organizations need to evaluate models based on their specific use cases. This might mean looking at inference speed for real-time applications, accuracy on domain-specific tasks, or resource requirements for edge deployment.
Resource requirements vary significantly even among SLMs. Mississippi’s 0.8B version can run on relatively modest hardware, making it accessible to smaller organizations or those with limited AI infrastructure. However, some “small” models still require substantial computational resources despite their reduced parameter count. Understanding these requirements is crucial for successful deployment.
The deployment environment also matters significantly. Mississippi’s architecture allows for local deployment, which can be crucial for organizations handling sensitive data. Other SLMs might require specific frameworks or cloud infrastructure, impacting both cost and implementation complexity. Organizations need to consider not just the initial deployment but long-term maintenance and scaling requirements.
Integration capabilities represent another crucial consideration. Mississippi’s JSON output capability makes it particularly valuable for businesses looking to automate document processing workflows. However, different SLMs offer different integration options, from simple APIs to more complex custom deployment solutions. The availability of documentation, community support, and integration tools can significantly impact implementation success.
The future of SLMs looks promising, with ongoing research pushing the boundaries of what’s possible with compact models. H2O.ai’s success with Mississippi suggests we’re just beginning to understand how specialized architectures can overcome the limitations of model size. As more organizations recognize the advantages of SLMs, we’re likely to see increased innovation in model efficiency and specialization.
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Runway's Act-One, new AI animation generator
Runway, a US-based AI research company specialising in creative software, has launched Act-One, a tool for generating character animations based on simple video and voice inputs.
Runway, a US-based AI research company specialising in creative software, has launched Act-One, a tool for generating character animations based on simple video and voice inputs. According to Runway, Act-One is designed to streamline animation production, offering an alternative to the typically complex and resource-intensive pipelines used in facial animation.
#runway #hollywood #ai #animation #software
Traditional animation workflows for realistic facial expressions require motion capture equipment, multiple video references, and detailed face rigging—steps that can be costly and time-consuming. Act-One bypasses these requirements by allowing users to create animated characters directly from a video and voice recording, making it feasible to produce animations with a simple camera setup, says Runway in an official blog.
The tool supports a range of character styles, from realistic portrayals to stylised designs. Act-One translates facial expressions and subtle movements—such as micro-expressions and eye-line adjustments—from actors onto different character designs, even if the character's proportions differ from the source footage. This capability enables new options in character design without the need for motion capture, as per the company.
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Introducing Act-One
A new way to generate expressive character performances using simple video inputs.
At Runway, our mission is to build expressive and controllable tools for artists that can open new avenues for creative expression. Today, we're excited to release Act-One, a new state-of-the-art tool for generating expressive character performances inside Gen-3 Alpha.
Act-One can create compelling animations using video and voice performances as inputs. It represents a significant step forward in using generative models for expressive live action and animated content.
Capturing the Essence of a Performance
Traditional pipelines for facial animation often involve complex, multi-step workflows. These can include motion capture equipment, multiple footage references, manual face rigging, among other techniques. The goal is to transpose an actor's performance into a 3D model suitable for an animation pipeline. The key challenge with traditional approaches lies in preserving emotion and nuance from the reference footage into the digital character.
Our approach uses a completely different pipeline, driven directly and only by a performance of an actor and requiring no extra equipment.
Animation Mocap
Act-One can be applied to a wide variety of reference images. The model preserves realistic facial expressions and accurately translates performances into characters with proportions different from the original source video. This versatility opens up new possibilities for inventive character design and animation.
Live Action
The model also excels in producing cinematic and realistic outputs, and is remarkably robust across camera angles while maintaining high-fidelity face animations. This capability allows creators to develop believable characters that deliver genuine emotion and expression, enhancing the viewer's connection to the content.
New Creative Avenues
We've been exploring how Act-One can allow the generation of multi-turn, expressive dialogue scenes, which were previously challenging to create with generative video models. You can now create narrative content using nothing more than a consumer grade camera and one actor reading and performing different characters from a script.
Safety
As with all our releases, we're committed to responsible development and deployment. We're releasing this new tool with a comprehensive suite of content moderation and safety precautions, including:
Even more robust capabilities to detect and block attempts to generate content containing public figures;
Technical measures to verify that an end user has the right to use the voice that they create using Custom Voices; and
Continuous monitoring to detect and mitigate other potential misuses of our tools and platform.
Looking Ahead
We're excited to see what forms of creative storytelling Act-One brings to animation and character performance. Act-One is another step forward in our goal to bringing previously sophisticated techniques to a broader range of creators and artists.
We look forward to seeing how artists and storytellers will use Act-One to bring their visions to life in new and exciting ways.
Access to Act-One will begin gradually rolling out to users today and will soon be available to everyone.
Creating with Act-One on Gen-3 Alpha
Introduction
Gen-3 Alpha is the first of upcoming models that offer improvements in fidelity, consistency, motion, and speed over previous generations of models.
Act-One allows you to bring a character image to life by uploading a driving performance to precisely influence expressions, mouth movements, and more.
In this article, driving performance refers to the video that will influence an image. Character image refers to the image that will be animated by the driving performance.
This article outlines how to use Act-One on Gen-3 Alpha, input best practices, the available settings, and more.
Best Practices for Act-One Input
Before diving in, review these best practices to ensure that your input selections will set your generation up for success. Most output issues can be addressed by using inputs that follow these recommendations.
Driving Performance:
Well-lit with defined facial features
Single face framed from around the shoulders and up
Forward-facing in the direction of the camera
Face is in frame for the entire video
Ensure the face doesn't move in and out of the frame
Clear mouth movement and expressions
Certain expressions, such as sticking out a tongue, are not supported
Minimal body movement
No face occlusions in frame
No cuts that interrupt the shot
Follows our Trust & Safety standards
Character Images:
Well-lit with defined facial features
A single face framed from around the shoulders and up
Forward-facing in the direction of the camera
Follows our Trust & Safety standards
Runway Changes Animation Forever with its New Model
“I don't think text prompts are here to stay for a long time,” said Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela.
Runway, an NYC based AI video startup, announced Act-One, a new state-of-the-art tool for generating expressive character performances, inside Gen-3 Alpha. The access to Act One is currently limited. Act-One can generate compelling animations by just using video and voice performances as inputs. The tool reduces the reliance on traditional motion capture systems, making it simpler to bring characters to life in production workflows. On their blog, Runway uploaded several videos and styles showcasing the different ways in which the tool is used.
#generateiveai #runway #technology #actone #video #ai
Simplifying Animation for Creators
Act-One simplifies animation by using a single-camera setup to capture actor performances, eliminating the need for motion capture or complex rigging. The tool preserves realistic facial expressions and adapts performances to characters of different proportions. The model delivers high-fidelity animations across various camera angles and supports both live-action and animated content. It expands creative boundaries for professionals as they require only consumer-grade equipment to produce expressive multi-turn dialogue scenes with a single actor.
“Traditional pipelines for facial animation often involve complex, multi-step workflows. These can include motion capture equipment, multiple footage references, manual face rigging, among other techniques. Our approach uses a completely different pipeline, driven directly and only by the performance of an actor and requiring no extra equipment,” per a statement on their blog.
Runway’s Continues its Reign in the GenAI Video Space
Last month, Runway partnered with Lionsgate to introduce AI into filmmaking. Runway aims to bring these tools for artists, and by extension bring their stories to life. This deal would open the doors for many of these stories to appear on the big screen eventually. Runway’s tools have also been employed in Hollywood before.
“I don’t think text prompts are here to stay for a long time. So a lot of our innovation has been on creating control tools,” said Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela in an interview on how AI is coming to Hollywood and the need for giving creators more access and freedom over video generation.
Runway also has an AI Film Festival which is dedicated to celebrating artists who incorporate emerging AI techniques in their short films. Launched two years ago, the festival aims to spark conversation about the growing influence of AI tools in the film industry and to engage with creators from diverse backgrounds, exploring their insights and perspectives.
Others in the Race
OpenAI’s flagship model, Sora, is not publicly available yet, nor is there any update from the company regarding its release but hopefully it will be launched after elections. Genmo also unveiled a research preview of Mochi 1 – an open-source model designed to generate high-quality videos from text prompts.
Earlier this month, Meta also entered the Gen AI space with its MovieGen. Adobe also introduced Gen AI to video with its Adobe Firefly. Luma’s Dream Machine was made freely available for experimentation on its website. In terms of competition from China, Minimax officially launched its Image-to-Video feature. Even Kling introduced new capabilities to its model including a lip sync feature.
Why Steve Jobs Killed 70% of Apple’s Products: A Lesson on Range Architecture
Why Steve Jobs killed 70% of Apple’s products: A lesson on Range Architecture
You have probably seen the Steve Jobs movie that came out in 2015, and frankly, it's brilliant. Directed by Danny Boyle and written by West Wing writer/genius Aaron Sorkin, the movie is an exercise in tension as Steve Jobs confronts the people and demons of his past in the hours before three major product launches.
#stevejobs #apple #gm #tesla #technology
On several occasions in the film Steve confronts John Sculley, the Apple CEO who Steve recruited and was ultimately ousted by. In a twist of events, Steve returns to Apple in 1997, ousting Sculley and then killing 70% of the Apple product range. Did he do it out of spite? Revenge? Sculley certainly thinks so. Or was Jobs claim that he just “really hates styluses” the real reason?
Actually, it's a lesson in range architecture.
Range architecture is the structure of your products, sub-brands and price points. A well designed range architecture will help your customers pick the right product at the right price, helping them navigate sometimes countless choices.
One of the most famous range architectures was developed by Alfred P. Sloan of General Motors in 1921.
His so-called Ladder of Success gave each car brand a price point that wouldn’t conflict with any others.
It was said that you could tell who lived in which house by which car was parked out front — a Cadillac suggested a CEO, the Buick was the factory foreman. Sloan's range architecture made the question “which car is right for me?” a simple one, not a stressful one, and so General Motors thrived.
Of course General Motor’s range architecture was too beautiful to last. General Motor's incentive schemes rewarded each brand individually and ultimately tempted brand managers to try and capture just a few more customers by adding in just a few more options.
More options meant more prices, more models and more choice. This example of entropy lead to the very complex brand architecture that General Motors had in 2008, right as they were facing bankruptcy.
Barry Schwarz’s work on The Tyranny of Choice makes it clear that fewer choices lead to more purchases, faster and with less post-purchase regret. While common sense would say that more choice gives more utility, behavioural economics shows that complex choices usually result in no choice at all — and more importantly, no sale.
Which brings us to Apple. When Jobs returned in 1997 the company was, according to Jobs, “90 days from being insolvent". Sales were dismal. The story goes that Steve was asked by a friend which computer she should buy. Steve was stumped. Despite hundreds of products, there was no clear answer.
In fact, Apple’s range architecture was as messy in 1997 as General Motors’ was in 2008. The company had been making multiple versions of products to satisfy requests from retailers, including twelve versions of the Macintosh computer.
After weeks of meeting with product people he had heard enough. According to Walter Isaacson in the book Steve Jobs, Steve shouted “Stop!” in the middle of a product meeting and said, “This is crazy.”
Taking a marker he drew a chart that was to form the basis of Apple’s product range for years to come. The simple insight was to help people choose a computer using only two questions — are you an everyday consumer or pro? Do you want portable or desktop?
In this one bold move, 70% of Apple’s range was cut. One year later, the nearly bankrupt company turned a very healthy $309 million profit. Today the company is worth more than $520 billion.
So why did Apple really kill the Newton? Spite? Keeping fingers free? The real story actually points to simplicity. The simpler a product range, the easier it is to make a choice, the more sales you can get.
So what do these two case studies tell us about range architecture? At Step Change, we reviewed more than thirty range architectures last year and there’s one principle that surfaced time and time again:
Make it easy for the customer.
A range should only be expanded where it clearly makes the choice easier for a customer segment. In the right situation, adding a choice to the range can increase average weight of purchase, make the sales cycle shorter and even reduce post-purchase regret. But before you add anything new pull out the pruning shears and cut as much as you can.
Your customers won’t even notice just how much simpler things are — so they won’t thank you. But your finance team will.
Why People Buy: Here's What You Need to Know about Buyer Psychology
Learn how you can use buyer psychology to make people buy into your product and messaging.
KitKat wasn’t always the behemoth brand that it is today. It used to be floating around with all other Nestlé products, struggling to gain traction and make a name for itself. Like KitKat, many businesses often have a great idea or product but often find it difficult to get people to buy. Because the truth is, it’s often the best marketing, and not the best product, that wins.
#buyer #sales #psychology #business
And the reason for that is that people don’t take the time to understand why people buy. Now there’s only so much I can do in an article as we’ve distilled about 28 books, hundreds of articles, and thousands of pages into our Invisible Communications Capabilities Training Intensive, our session on buyer psychology and behavioural economics.
nyway, I’m able to give you a sniff of the magic of understanding why. We’ve boiled it down to a system that organisations can follow to maximise success in communication. The three parts are Trigger/Frame/Fuel, and I’ll cover them briefly below.
So one of the key challenges brands often face is how to get people to consider them in the first place…
The Currency of Attention
The first currency we need to focus on is not financial — it’s the currency of attention. This is because if you don’t get noticed, everything else is academic.
It’s easy to say but hard to do, and it’s not just about being noticed. It’s also about being noticed for the right reasons.
See, before people buy, they must first buy-in. Communication precedes action. And attention precedes communication. And communication isn’t sent — it’s what’s received. And most companies massively overestimate the ‘listening’ or the attention they’ve been granted by the audience. Effective communication is the messaging people don’t see (or invisible communications). And effective communicators start by asking, “What do I need to do to get noticed here?”
“What everyday concept can we attach our brand to?”
To get noticed, we need to find the right trigger in people’s mind so that everything else follows through. It’s Skinner’s Operant Conditioning meeting Pavlov’s Classical Conditioning. We don’t have time for a sideline into the nuances of psychological conditioning, but let’s just say the goal here is to get your audience salivating when your brand rings the metaphoric bell.
A trigger is something that attaches to a concept that we want. This means everytime we see that trigger, we associate something else to it. Think about triggers being real-world (objects or activities or in the mind) thoughts and ideas. The point is, we take something exciting in our audience’s mind, and in that moment, we augment or attach our message.
So if you want people to think about your brand, what you sell, and your service, look for triggers that are already in the mind or in people’s day-to-day life.
For KitKat, that trigger was coffee.
Because there were so many popular Nestlé products to compete against, KitKat decided that they needed the right trigger. They thought about something existing and of value to people that they can associate with.
But why coffee, you ask?
Well, we associate coffee with taking a break. It’s scheduled every day and highly valued.
KitKat realised that their chocolate bar actually went very well with coffee. By attaching to the idea of a coffee break, people soon associated that trigger to opening a KitKat bar.
And that was how they came up with the line “Have a break, have a KitKat.”
Even better than KitKat’s “break” and there’s a coffee “break” — genius!
The magic was not the line itself but finding the right trigger to associate to. And the rest was history. KitKat’s story proves the power of finding the right trigger.
A key concept here is the the diagnostic and effective frequency — but I can only cover so much here.
“
How do we frame the decision for advantage?”
Framing is all about drawing the right focus to your product and message.
It is changing the way information is presented to influence how people view your products to impact their decision making.
It’s about how the concept of the frame changes the way the picture looks. A large ornate gold frame makes a picture look very different than if it were in a slim-lined modern frame.
Same goes for people and how we ‘frame’ the information we’re looking at.
If we understand the frame our audience are using, we can reframe it. If we can change the frame, we can change their decision.
Daniel Kahneman won a Nobel prize in economics in this area, proving beyond a doubt that people make emotional decisions and make rational justifications. In fact, up to 23–47% of any audience might change their decision if exactly the same information is framed in a different way. Once again, I can’t do the concepts justice in a short article… But…
In the Invisible Communications Capabilities Training that we give to clients, we introduce eight essential framing tools that will help you frame buyer decisions.
In this article, we will dive into three of them.
Decoy Pricing.
When presented with two products with equally similar attributes, people often find it difficult to make a decision. It’s often complex to compare and hard work. People tend not to be stupid,
but
they are lazy!
Decoy pricing understands this. Decoy pricinginvolves influencing purchasing decision between two products by presenting a third option — a decoy ‘similar’ to one product but noticeably ‘worse’.
The less attractive decoy isn’t chosen in considered evaluation, but it makes the similar version look more attractive. So if there’s a choice between A and B and I introduce a C (which looks like A, but worse) more people choose A.
By adding a decoy product to the mix, you help your consumers rule out the lesser quality, same-price value product for the high-quality, same-price value product, making the choice a no-brainer.
Probability and Frequency.
Frequency gives the prevalence of an occurrence whereas probability gives a statistical percentage. In dealing with probabilities and frequencies, we can relate to data best when we say “1 out of 10” rather than use a percentage. People just cannot fully relate to a “0.1” statistic.
It’s because we can relate to the whole 1 in the 1 out of 10 (and we neglect the 10 — it’s called denominator neglect funnily enough). But we don’t have a sense of a “0.1 of something”. It’s not a real-world concept.
So when we have low probability events that we’re trying to get people to take precautions against, such as when we’re selling insurance packages, we’re much more likely to get a better response if we say “3 out of a 100 businesses experience this” rather than saying “3 percent of businesses.” Subjectively, audiences relate much more to the first statement.
On the flipside, we want to downplay the downside of an essential operation where a doctor needs to disclose risk, but you don’t want a person stressing out as that can cause even more problems. Here, operation risks are best disclosed as percentages vs frequency if we want to keep patients informed but calm. For example, “Only .003% have complications” vs “3 in every 100,000 have complications”. The same information is experienced very differently by most people.
So use probability over frequency when you’re trying to minimise a subjective experience over an event.
Providing a Comparison.
Let’s take a
look at these two offers below when drawing support to help fund underprivileged children around the world. You’d have seen it a thousand times but maybe just not asked why.
Offer 1 uses a lump sum amount that may overwhelm who you present your offer to. It just doesn’t give you any point of reference to actually relate to.
Offer 2, on the other hand, provides a good reference point with the use of the $3 coffee, which makes it relatable and easier to consider and say yes to.
The framing changes everything — and you know that successful charities know it. But the question is, do you think about this when you’re communicating?
“How do we amplify our message?”
There’s a bunch of thinking that goes into fuel. This section asks, “How can you amplify your success?”
Are you using your systems to scale effective communication?
We find that most businesses haven’t actually ordered the way that their customers or clients engage with them. They haven’t looked through to identify the minimum amount of steps that customers need to take to buy their products.
Where are the barriers?
Where are people getting stuck?
Where are people making decisions?
For the best chance of success, you have to make sure you’re using the right triggers and frames and remove any unnecessary steps for your customers.
Make it simple and personal first. Only then can you really make your products scalable.
So there you have it, the three parts of Invisible Communications, the factors that explain why people buy:
Trigger - How will we get them to think about us at the
right time
?
Frame - How will we get them to decide in our favour — the
right decision
?
Fuel - How do we keep the success going — the
right way
?
Easy say, but hard to do. Just remember, how people think they communicate often isn’t actually how they actually communicate.
Hopefully the above was a little taste into the hidden drivers that make people buy.
So always start with why, and you’ll end up increasing your chances your customers will end with buy.
25 Years Ago, Steve Jobs Saved Apple From Collapse It’s a lesson for every tech CEO today.
When Steve Jobs resigned from Apple in 1985, no one would have guessed he would eventually be known as a as once-in-a-lifetime business magnate.
#stevejobs #apple #ceo #technology
Let's dive deeper into the key strategies and decisions that Steve Jobs implemented during his second tenure at Apple, and how they contributed to the company's resurgence.
Streamlining the Product Line
One of Jobs' first moves was to simplify Apple's product line. He realized that the company had become too fragmented, with too many products and lines of business. This made it difficult to focus on innovation and customer satisfaction.
To address this issue, jobs decided to focus on just four core products: two desktop computers and two portable devices. One set was marketed for professionals, while the other catered to consumers. By concentrating on these core products, Jobs ensured that Apple remained true to its founding values and continued to innovate, rather than trying to compete in every market.
This strategy allowed Apple to:
Canceling Non-Core Products
Jobs was not afraid to take bold risks and cancel products that were not core to Apple's mission. In 1998, he canceled the Newton personal digital assistant, which was a struggling product line. He also canceled several other products that were not meeting their potential.
By canceling non-core products, Jobs was able to:
Redefining the Role of Microsoft
When Jobs returned to Apple, he knew that the company had a complex relationship with Microsoft. Microsoft was dominating the market share, and Apple's Macintosh computer was struggling to compete.
To address this issue, Jobs decided to form a partnership with Microsoft. He negotiated a deal that would give Microsoft a seat on Apple's board of directors and provide Microsoft with access to Apple's Macintosh computer source code.
This partnership had several key benefits for Apple:
Prioritizing Customer Experience
Jobs understood that short-term profit and cost targets could never replace the importance of customer satisfaction. He prioritized the creation of exceptional products that would delight users, rather than merely meeting profit expectations.
To achieve this goal, Jobs implemented several strategies, including:
By prioritizing customer experience, Jobs helped to create a customer-centric culture that would become a hallmark of Apple's success.
Rallying the Troops
When Jobs returned to Apple, he knew that the company had become fragmented and bureaucratic. He decided to take bold action to simplify the organization and eliminate the silos that had been created.
To achieve this goal, Jobs implemented several strategies, including:
By simplifying the organization and eliminating the silos, Jobs was able to:
Overall, Steve Jobs' strategies and decisions during his second tenure at Apple helped to create a more streamlined and customer-centric organization. By focusing on innovation, customer satisfaction, and collaboration, Jobs was able to turn Apple around and establish the company as a leader in the tech industry.
Article
23andMe appoints three new board members following abrupt resignations
23andMe appointed three new independent directors to its board, the company said Tuesday.
23andMe appointed three new independent directors to its board, the company announced Tuesday, one month after all seven of its previous directors abruptly resigned.
The new board members are Andre Fernandez, the former chief financial officer of WeWork; Jim Frankola, the former CFO of the enterprise cloud company Cloudera; and Mark Jensen, a tech advisor and former managing partner at Deloitte, according to a release. The only other board member is 23andMe's co-founder and CEO Anne Wojcicki.
#23andme #technology #boardofdirectors #newsonleo
Fernandez, Frankola and Jensen will all serve on the board's audit committee and compensation committee, the company said. Jensen will act as the lead independent director and chair of the compensation committee, while Fernandez will chair the audit committee.
"I am excited to welcome these three experienced directors to the 23andMe Board, and looking forward to working with them," Wojcicki said in the release.
23andMe's previous independent directors announced their resignation in a letter to Wojcicki in September, writing that they disagreed with her about the "strategic direction for the company."
The genetic-testing company, once valued at $6 billion, has struggled since it went public in 2021 through a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC. Shares were hovering below $1 until 23andMe announced a 1-for-20 reverse stock split of the Company's Class A and Class B common stock earlier this month.
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Oracle announces new AI-powered electronic health record
Oracle on Tuesday announced a brand-new electronic health record that features fresh cloud and artificial intelligence capabilities.
Oracle unveiled a brand-new electronic health record on Tuesday, its most significant health-care product update since acquiring the medical records giant Cerner for $28 billion in 2022.
An electronic health record, or an EHR, is a digital version of a patient's medical history that's updated by doctors and nurses over time. EHR software can be complex and cumbersome for clinicians to use, but it's become an integral component of the modern U.S. health-care system.
#newsonleo #Oracle #ai #healthrecord #healthcare #technology
Oracle's latest EHR is equipped with cloud and artificial intelligence capabilities that will make it easier to navigate and set up, the company said. There are no menus or drop-down screens, and doctors can pull up the information they need by asking questions with their voices. Ideally, this will allow doctors to spend less time searching through records and more time caring for patients, Oracle said.
"It's not just a scribe. It's not an assistant. It's almost like having your own resident," Seema Verma, executive vice president and general manager of Oracle Health and Life Sciences, told CNBC in an interview.
Oracle's new offering could help boost its position within the fiercely competitive EHR market, where it has struggled to maintain its footing in recent years. In 2023, Oracle saw its largest net hospital loss on record while market leader Epic Systems, Oracle's top rival, was the only company that saw a net increase in acute care market share, according to a report from KLAS Research.
Cerner contributed $5.9 billion to Oracle's total revenue in fiscal 2023. Epic generated $4.9 billion in revenue last year.
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PayPal shares fall on revenue miss, soft guidance
PayPal reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings on Tuesday, but revenue came in slightly below expectations.
PayPal shares fell as much as 7% on Tuesday after it provided softer guidance than analysts were anticipating for the fourth quarter.
The company reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings, but it missed analysts' expectations on revenue for the July-through-September period.
#paypal #revenue #earnings #fintech #company
Here's how the company did compared with Wall Street estimates, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:
For the fourth quarter, PayPal is calling for "low single-digit growth." Analysts were expecting growth of 5.4% to $8.46 billion in revenue. The investor deck says guidance reflects a "price-to-value strategy and prioritization of profitable growth."
The company expects adjusted earnings per share of $1.07 to $1.11, versus the average analyst estimate of $1.10, according to LSEG.
Revenue increased about 6% in the quarter from $7.42 billion in the same period a year ago. PayPal reported net income of $1.01 billion, or 99 cents per share, compared with $1.02 billion, or 93 cents per share, a year earlier.
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Apple announces new and smaller Mac Mini with first redesign since 2010
Apple is framing the new Mac Minis, like all of its new products announced this year, as built for Apple Intelligence.
Apple announced on Tuesday new Mac Mini models, featuring the first major redesign since 2010 that makes the desktop computer significantly smaller.
#apple #macmini #computing #technology #product
Aside from a redesign that shrunk the case and reduced the computer's volume in half, the main upgrade on these new computers is that they include Apple's latest chip, either the M4, or a more powerful version called the M4 Pro.
The Mac Mini is Apple's least-expensive Mac, starting at $599, and does not include a display, which is sold separately. When the product line was first introduced in 2008, it was marketed as a computer for people switching from Microsoft Windows who could simply plug their existing keyboard, mouse and monitor into their new silver box.
The Mac Mini is not one of Apple's highest-volume computers in terms of sales, but it is an important slot in Apple's lineup, especially for people who make apps for iPhones and other Apple platforms. Many iPhone developers like to run a Mac Mini as a personal development server for coordinating uploads and code.
One improvement in the new design is that all of the ports are USB-C ports, the same more modern offering found on Apple's laptops. There are three USB-C ports on the rear and two on the front, a new addition that will make it easier to plug or unplug accessories while the computer rests on a desk.
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Generative AI is disrupting creative communities, here's how they are fighting back
Tens of thousands of creatives have signed an open letter calling for change.
Generative artificial intelligence companies capable of generating creative content are also said to be disrupting the livelihoods of creatives around the world, according to a group of creatives speaking out publicly about the issue.
#generativeai #communities #ai #technology
"The unlicensed use of creative works for training generative AI is a major, unjust threat to the livelihoods of the people behind those works, and must not be permitted, a " statement signed by 11,500 actors, musicians, authors, photographers, and composers from across the world, read.
Julianne Moore, Kevin Bacon, Thom Yorke and Abba's Björn Ulvaeus, are among the tens of thousands of creatives who have signed this open letter calling for these companies to stop indiscriminately training on content they say should be licensed.
"This is a major issue for many of the artists, musicians, actors, authors, and other creators whose work is being exploited by AI companies," said Ed Newton-Rex, a former AI executive who released the statement.
As a former head of audio at Stability AI, Newton-Rex is well acquainted with the internal data training practices of generative AI companies. He resigned over the company's belief that training their AI models on copyrighted content without licensing it constitutes "fair use."
Generative AI models have generally scrapped as much content as they could from the internet, downloaded it and trained their model to be able to create new work that is in the style of the work it trained on, Newton-Rex told ABC News.
"None of this revenue is coming back to the original artists," explained Overlai founder Luke Neumann in a blog post about his new mobile app which aims to protect photography in the age of AI.
Neumann, who also signed the letter, launched the free app Overlai with world-renowned photographers Paul Nicklen and Cristina Mittermeier, when they noticed text-to-image generators could easily replicate the unique styles of both photographers. And, Neumann stresses the amount of work that goes into conservationist photography - the cost of travel and spending weeks, sometimes months in a location documenting a delicate ecosystem.
"I think AI companies really need to think long and hard about like how long they're going to need organic data and if they want to be messing with these fragile business models of the people out there capturing this stuff," Neumann to ABC News.
Several lawsuits from creatives ranging from writers to musicians to comedians have piled up against some of the biggest generative AI companies for copyright infringement.
US Facing Short Supplies of Interceptor Missiles
In the wake of the extended conflicts in Ukraine and Israel, U.S. air-defense interceptor missiles are reportedly in short supply.
U.S. air-defense interceptor missiles are reportedly in short supply in the wake of the extended conflicts in Ukraine and Israel, leaving questions about the Pentagon's ability to respond to worsening situations in the Middle East and Europe, let alone the potential of conflict in the Pacific.
#technology #unitedstates #interceptor #missiles #military
The U.S. has not developed a defense industrial base intended for a large-scale war of attrition in both Europe and the Middle East while meeting its own readiness standards," according to Elias Yousif, a fellow and deputy director of the Conventional Defense Program at the Stimson Center in Washington, D.C., The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
"Both of those wars are extended conflicts, which was not part of the U.S. defense planning," Yousif said.
Interceptor missiles are in high demand as Israel and U.S. allies are facing a growing threat from Iran, and the shortfall may become even more critical after Israel's weekend retaliatory strikes on Iran if Tehran responds with more attacks.
The most common interceptors are the Standard Missiles being used to defend Israel from Iran and to stop Houthi rebels' attacks in the Red Sea. U.S. officials say more than 100 Standards have been launched since last year's Hamas attack on Israel.
US Nonprofit to Spend $250M on Electric Trucks to Lease at California Ports
U.S. nonprofit Climate United on Tuesday announced a plan to spend up to $250 million to buy as many as 500 electric semi trucks over three years in what it called the biggest single order of those zero-emissions trucks in the country so far.
U.S. nonprofit Climate United on Tuesday announced a plan to spend up to $250 million to buy as many as 500 electric semi trucks over three years in what it called the biggest single order of those zero-emissions trucks in the country so far.
#ev #technology #california #ports #semi
Climate United then aims to lease those vehicles at attractive rates to truckers that haul containers to and from California seaports, where roughly 33,000 so-called drayage trucks must have zero tailpipe emissions by 2035.
The program could give a much-needed jolt to the adoption of heavy-duty electric trucks that now account for less than 1% of the total U.S. trucking fleet. Those vehicles can cost as much as three times more than traditional diesel versions that are a major source of planet-warming greenhouse gases.
"High upfront costs make it difficult for independent owner-operators and small fleets to transition to all-electric," said Beth Bafford, CEO of Climate United.
The Maryland-based nonprofit said it plans to make initial orders in the first quarter of 2025 and that it is prioritizing class 8 trucks that are assembled in the United States with domestically made parts.
Trucks from manufacturers like Volvo Trucks North America , BYD and Kenworth already are shuttling cargo around ports in California, including the nation's busiest seaport complex in Los Angeles and Long Beach.
Climate United's program is funded by a $6.97 billion grant from the National Clean Investment Fund, part of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund created under President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act.
“Musk Is The Common Enemy” - Why Elon Musk’s RISE Is Boeing & NASA’s WORST Nightmare!
#elonmusk #nasa #boeing
China tests supersonic passenger jet prototype at twice the speed of Concorde
All-composite structures successfully withstood extreme conditions during the test flight, as per China’s Space Transportation.
A Chinese firm with its headquarters in Beijing announced that it has tested the prototype of a commercial transport plane that can travel at almost double the speed of the world’s first supersonic passenger-carrying airplane – the Concorde.
Space Transportation, which is known as Lingkong Tianxing Technology, in China has announced the successful test flight of its Yunxing prototype plane. According to the company’s claims, the plane can fly at speeds of Mach 4 or roughly 3069 miles per hour.
#technology #china #concorde #aircraft
The company is planning to conduct a follow-up test of its engine in the coming month, according to a report by the South China Morning Post (SCMP). It also plans to have a full-sized supersonic jet ready to take its first flight in the year 2027.
China’s supersonic jet and Concorde’s legacy
The Concorde had broken all records for supersonic passenger travel when it debuted. Designed and built by Sud Aviation – which later became a part of Aerospatiale (now Airbus) of France and the British Aircraft Corporation, it is still talked about as one of the masterpieces of aviation technology.
The Concorde was the first turbojet-powered supersonic airliner to enter service flying passengers across the Atlantic at twice the speed of sound. Using Rolls-Royce Olympus engines, the aircraft could reach a maximum speed of 1,330 miles per hour.
The Chinese firm now aims to break this record by introducing a commercial plane that can fly at Mach 4 speed. The SCMP report mentions that the company claims to complete a trip between Beijing to New York in around two hours using the new plane.
The new aircraft prototype designed by Space Transportation also has other interesting features. These include the ability to take off and land vertically and to fly at heights of about 65,600 feet (20,000 meters).
Space Transportation and its new plane
Space Transportation designs and manufactures space transport systems intended to reduce space exploration costs. It was founded in 2018 by Yudong Wang, and in 2021 it had raised Series A funding.
In May 2022, Lingkong Tianxing successfully completed the Yao-10 flight mission of the Tianxing I rocket.
The company has a full-system design, and research and development capabilities in the field of hypersonic aircraft and rockets.
It also has experience in the full-process design of flight test project load analysis and calculation, modal analysis, force environment identification analysis, structural force transmission path planning, pre-design strength prediction, structural design, strength verification, strength testing, and environmental testing, according to its website.
The SCMP report mentions that the company tested the Yunxing supersonic jet on several parameters, including its aerodynamics, thermal protection, and control systems.
Nvidia ethernet technology boosts Elon Musk’s world-class AI training system
Elon Musk recently stated that xAI’s Colossus supercomputer is the “most powerful AI training system in the world.”
US chipmaker Nvidia announced on Monday, October 28, that it has helped Elon Musk’s xAI expand its Colossus supercomputer.
The Colossus supercomputer cluster is now recognized as the largest AI training cluster in the world.
Thanks partly to Nvidia’s Spectrum-X ethernet networking technology, xAI can take its ChatGPT-rivaling Grok AI to new levels.
#nvidia #elonmusk #ai #xai #colossus #supercomputer #technology
Grok AI: Can generative AI decipher the meaning of life?
Founded by Elon Musk last year, xAI is a startup that provides a service similar to Open AI’s ChatGPT. In a move typical of Musk, the company has a superb mission goal that strikes the core of our existence. That goal, the company says, is to use generative artificial intelligence “to understand the true nature of the universe.”
Key to achieving that goal is xAI’s Colossus supercomputer. The impressive computing powerhouse was built in Memphis, Tennessee, to train the third generation of Grok. xAI’s Grok is a large language model AI, much like Open AI’s ChatGPT. It is available to premium X (formerly Twitter) subscribers.
Impressively, xAI completed Colossus in just 122 days. It then began training its first models 19 days after the installation. According to Nvidia, these systems often take many months or even years to make.
Much like ChatGPT, Grok’s large language models are trained by analyzing massive amounts of data, requiring vast computing power. The data used includes text, images, and other content most often procured online.
In a recent post on X, Elon Musk said, “Colossus is the most powerful AI training system in the world. Moreover, it will double in size to 200k (50k H200s) in a few months. Excellent work by the [xAI] team, NVIDIA, and our many partners/suppliers.”
Now, Nvidia is helping xAI to take the world’s most powerful AI training cluster to the next level. In its statement on Monday, the US tech giant said it will help Elon Musk’s xAI double Colossus’s capacity to 200,000 GPUs.
The world’s most advanced AI chatbot
The Colossus AI training cluster comprises an interconnected network of 100,000 NVIDIA Hopper GPUs. These use a unified Remote Direct Memory Access network.
The network uses Nvidia’s Spectrum-X technology for low latency. Data moves directly between nodes without being rerouted toward the operating system, allowing Colossus to process the massive amounts of data required to train Grok.
“Across all three tiers of the network fabric, the system has experienced zero application latency degradation or packet loss due to flow collisions,” Nvidia explained in its statement. “It has maintained 95% data throughput enabled by Spectrum-X congestion control.”
Nvidia describes Spectrum-X as the world’s first ethernet networking platform for generative AI.
Theoretically, with Nvidia’s help, the combined Colossus array could eventually achieve about 497.9 exaflops (497,900,000 teraflops). This would set a new benchmark in supercomputing power and make Grok the most impressive AI chatbot on the planet.
Ultra-thin wonder material absorbs 99% electromagnetic waves with ease
The material is super thin, bendy, and tough. It can bend without breaking, making it great for rollable phones and wearable tech.
Scientists have developed a new material: an ultra-thin film that can absorb over 99% of electromagnetic waves.
The Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS) states it to be the “world’s first ultra-thin film composite material capable of absorbing over 99% of electromagnetic waves.”
This material is less than half a millimeter thick, but it can effectively shield against a wide range of frequencies, including those used by 5G, 6G, Wi-Fi, and autonomous vehicle radar.
#technology #materialscience #korea
Unlike traditional shielding materials that reflect electromagnetic waves, this new material absorbs them, minimizing interference and improving the performance of electronic devices.
“As the applications of 5G/6G communications continue to expand, the importance of electromagnetic wave absorption and shielding materials is growing,” said Byeongjin Park, senior researcher of KIMS, who led the development.
Park added: “This material has the potential to significantly improve the reliability of wireless communication devices such as smartphones and autonomous vehicle radars.”
Need for new material
Electronic devices can emit waves that mess with other nearby devices, resulting in performance degradation.
These invisible waves can lead to glitches, signal loss, and even safety hazards.
Electromagnetic shielding materials are employed to mitigate this interference. These materials hold the potential to absorb the waves, which is said to be more effective than just reflecting them.
Conventional shielding materials primarily reflect electromagnetic waves, absorbing only a small fraction of 10%. Additionally, materials with higher absorption rates are often limited to a single frequency band.
Ponant’s Swap2Zero cruise ship uses wind, hydrogen and bio-LNG for green sailing
The ship features 1,000m² of solar panels, liquid hydrogen fuel cells, high-temperature fuel cells, carbon capture tech, and 50% sail propulsion.
Ponant – a cruise operator – has announced plans to build a hybrid passenger cruise ship powered by wind, liquid hydrogen (LH2), and bio-liquefied natural gas (bio-LNG).
The project, which Ponant announced, intends to further the transition of maritime travel to carbon neutrality.
The classification society Bureau Veritas (BV) has granted the firm’s vessel, dubbed Ponant Swap2Zero, approval in principle (AiP).
#ponant #technology #ships #energy
In addition to 1,000m² of solar panels, liquid hydrogen fuel cells, high-temperature fuel cells for hotel loads, and onboard carbon capture technologies, the ship has a sail power system that provides 50 percent energy for propulsion.
“This vessel concept represents our vision for the next generation of cruise vessels, showcasing how various technologies, energy sources, and processes can be harmonized to provide optimal autonomy and flexibility, all while being compliant with existing regulations,” said Mathieu Petiteau, Newbuilding and R&D Director at Ponant, in a statement.
Embark on a luxury cruise aboard one of our PONANT ships and experience a truly exceptional sea voyage with a difference. PONANT promises you unforgettable moments aboard our sleek and intimately sized cruise yachts, all of which sail under the French flag. Discover the innovatively designed cruise ship Le Boréal and her three sister vessels: L’Austral, Le Soléal and Le Lyrial. Experience Le Ponant, our famous three-masted ship, with her 16 staterooms, each combining traditional authenticity with modern comfort; and enjoy the pleasures of Le Lapérouse, a technologically cutting-edge cruise ship, the first in the PONANT EXPLORERS series. For 30 years now, our luxury cruise ships have been calling at both famous ports and lesser-known anchorages accessible only to smaller ships. As the number one luxury polar cruise operator, we offer a range of discovery expeditions to the majestic landscapes of the Arctic and the Antarctic.
Or you may choose from sunny excursions to the heart of the Mediterranean, sea voyages along Celtic coasts and beautiful getaways to the secret islands of the Pacific. Our themed luxury cruises offering unforgettable experiences designed with special interests in mind. Allow yourself to be tempted by one of our gastronomic cruises featuring cookery workshops hosted by renowned chefs; or a golf cruise in the Caribbean or the Mediterranean. Enjoy the opportunity to visit extraordinary locations on one of our many expedition cruises. Discover multi-faceted continents and forgotten lands endowed with natural treasures while experiencing the refined atmosphere and comfort of life on board. Combining wonderful itineraries with top-of-the-range hotel service, our exceptional luxury cruises à la française have been created to deliver quality and excellence through an unprecedented sailing experience. We invite you to discover the world of PONANT.
https://us.ponant.com/
Does anyone here know how to play chess?
https://inleo.io/threads/view/coyotelation/re-leothreads-2garxnrfp?referral=coyotelation
UK: Electric robot submarine fleet to replace fossil fuel ships for clean subsea ops
Named after the Loggerhead sea turtle, its all-electric device autonomously deploys robots for subsea inspection and maintenance.
A Scottish company is planning to build a fleet of uncrewed submarines to tap into the $3 billion subsea services market.
HonuWorx plans to deploy a fleet of 50 electric-powered robotic submarines to service energy assets, including offshore wind projects.
#technology #robot #electric #fossilfuel
In September, the company achieved a world-first in underwater robotics and unveiled plans for a fleet of uncrewed submarines to tap into the subsea services market.
The firm’s system, named Loggerhead, eliminates the reliance on fossil-fueled surface vessels for ROV launches, significantly reducing the carbon impact of offshore energy activities.
Cleaner offshore solutions
HonuWorx was founded in 2020 with the goal of advancing subsea operations by lowering their costs, risks, and carbon footprint.
The firm’s first system is named after the Loggerhead sea turtle, known for its extensive migrations of nearly 8,000 miles to reach feeding areas.
To transform underwater maintenance operations, Loggerhead is an uncrewed, all-electric subsea inspection and intervention device. Loggerhead acts as a robotic mothership, moving and deploying worker robots to far-off places to do maintenance, inspection, and data collection.
Zinc battery reaches impressive 100,000-cycle life with German innovation
A protective polymer layer allows zinc ions to flow while blocking water molecules and hydrogen formation.
A new approach developed by researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) involving a porous organic polymer has significantly extended the lifespan of zinc-ion batteries.
Instead of a few thousand cycles, batteries using this polymer at their anode can last several hundred thousand cycles, a university press release said.
#zinc #hydrogen #battery #technology
As countries aim to boost their clean energy production over the next few years, solar and wind power plants are being commissioned at an unprecedented scale. However, the intermittent nature of the energy production facilities requires a large-scale energy storage solution for them to be truly effective.
Lithium-ion batteries are humanity’s best energy storage solution. However, deploying them at scale to carry out the energy transition requires vast amounts of lithium, which makes them expensive and unsustainable in the long run.
Researchers have been working on an effective, inexpensive, yet scalable alternative to lithium in batteries, and zinc can potentially fulfill that role.
Zinc-ion batteries
Zinc-ion batteries (ZIB) operate using the same mechanism as Lithium-ion batteries. The metal acts as the anode, while a zinc intercalating material serves as a cathode. The battery has a high energy density and is not prone to fires like its Li-ion counterpart.
The abundance of zinc in nature makes ZIBs cost-effective and sustainable, while their fast charging and discharging capabilities make them ideal for commercial use as well. Zinc batteries have a longer lifespan than Li-ion batteries. Still, issues of “zinc dendrites” and undesirable side reactions have stalled their wide-scale
600 comentários estão pertos.
Si
I really appreciate you committing to being bilingual hehehe...
In Portuguese it is "sim". You said it in Spanish, but that's okay, there are many identical and very similar words in both vocabularies.
At INLEO you also become a polyglot, have you thought about that, Task? LOL
I am an AI...just waiting for my translating update to take hold.
LOL
Finally you recognized it. I have no doubt that your update will come soon.
LeoAI is my update. Where is it? LOL
AI
The risks behind the generative AI craze: Why caution is growing
In the near future, Silicon Valley might look back at recent events as the point where the generative AI craze went too far.
This past summer, investors questioned whether top AI stocks could sustain their sky-high valuations, given the lack of returns on massive AI spending. As Autumn approaches, major AI sectors—such as chips, LLMs, and AI devices—received renewed confidence. Nonetheless, there are an increasing number of reasons to be cautious.
#newsonleo #technology #ai
Cerebras: A chip contender with a major risk
Chip startup Cerebras is challenging Nvidia’s dominance by developing processors designed to power smarter LLMs. Nvidia, a major player in the AI boom, has seen its market cap skyrocket from $364 billion at the start of 2023 to over $3 trillion.
Cerebras, however, relies heavily on a single customer: the Abu Dhabi-based AI firm G42. In 2023, G42 accounted for 83% of Cerebras’ revenue, and in the first half of 2024, that figure increased to 87%. While G42 is backed by major players like Microsoft and Silver Lake, its dependency poses a risk. Even though Cerebras has signed a deal with Saudi Aramco, its reliance on one client may cause concerns as it seeks a $7-8 billion valuation for its IPO.
OpenAI’s record-breaking funding – but with strings attached
OpenAI made the news when it raised $6.6 billion at a $157 billion valuation, becoming the largest investment round in Silicon Valley history. However, the company has urged its investors not to back competitors such as Anthropic and Elon Musk’s xAI—an unusual request in the world of venture capital, where spread betting is common. Critics, including Gary Marcus, have described this approach as “running scared.”
OpenAI’s backers also include “bubble chasers” such as SoftBank and Tiger Global, firms known for investing in companies at their peak, which frequently results in huge losses. With top executives such as CTO Mira Murati departing and predicted losses of $5 billion this year despite rising revenues, OpenAI faces significant challenges.
Meta’s big bet on AI wearables
Meta entered the AI race by unveiling Orion, its augmented reality glasses. The wearables promise to integrate AI into daily life, with Nvidia’s CEO Jensen Huang endorsing the product. However, at a production cost of $10,000 per unit, the price is a major obstacle.
Meta will need to reduce costs and overcome consumer hesitation, as previous attempts at AI-powered wearables—such as Snapchat’s glasses, Google Glass, and the Humane AI pin—have struggled to gain traction.
The road ahead
What’s next for AI? OpenAI must prove it can justify a $157 billion valuation while operating at a loss. Cerebras needs to reassure investors that relying on one client isn’t a dealbreaker. And Meta must convince consumers to adopt a completely new way of interacting with AI
If these companies succeed, this moment could mark a turning point in the AI revolution. However, as tech history shows, high-stakes markets are rarely easy to win.
Texas strategizing plans to enhance mass, active transit statewide
As Texas’ population continues to boom, state transportation leaders are seeking public feedback to help cultivate a vision for mass transit and active transportation initiatives across the Lone Star State.
The Texas Department of Transportation is developing the Texas Statewide Active Transportation Plan (TSATP) and the Texas Statewide Multimodal Transit Plan (TSMTP). The goal is to “lay out a coordinated, unified vision for transit and active transportation priorities through 2050 and beyond,” per TxDOT documents. Officials added both plans are needed to improve mobility and connectivity as well as to support population and economic growth.
#texas #masstransit #transportation
Draft TSATP documents outline more than a dozen challenges facing Texas mobility, including increased traffic congestion, pedestrian and cyclist fatalities, limited available right of way on Texas roads and a “lack of coordination between land use planning and active transportation implementation.”
Findings from a statewide survey conducted also found 77% of respondents don’t feel safe while using active transportation in Texas, while 83% said they want improvements to trail connectivity, 63% supported enhanced roadway crossings and 74% shared support for upgraded sidewalks.
Google beats third-quarter earnings expectations on AI momentum
Google parent Alphabet reported revenues of $88.3 billion for the third quarter
Google parent Alphabet surpassed Wall Street’s expectations, reporting revenues of $88.3 billion for the third quarter.
#google #alphabet #earnings #technology #ai
Consolidated Alphabet revenues grew 15% year over year, the company said, “reflecting strong momentum across the business.” The tech giant reported net income increased 34%, and earnings per share, or EPS, increased 37% to $2.12. Google’s shares were up 1.66% at the market close on Tuesday, and were up 2.25% during after hours trading. The company’s stock has climbed 22.6% so far this year.
“The momentum across the company is extraordinary,” Google chief executive Sundar Pichai said in a statement. “Our commitment to innovation, as well as our long-term focus and investment in AI, are paying off with consumers and partners benefiting from our AI tools.”
Google was expected to report revenues of $86.4 billion and EPS of $1.84 for the third quarter, according to analyst estimates compiled by FactSet.
The company’s Cloud division revenues grew 35% to $11.4 billion due to “accelerated growth in Google Cloud Platform across AI infrastructure, Generative AI Solutions, and core GCP products,” it said.
In mid-October, analysts at Bank of America Global Research said they expected to see search strength in the third quarter “suggesting AI is driving higher monetization,” as well as “positive commentary” from Google on how its AI Overviews feature is “driving higher usage, or new advertising opportunities.”
“In Search, our new AI features are expanding what people can search for and how they search for it,” Pichai said. “In Cloud, our AI solutions are helping drive deeper product adoption with existing customers, attract new customers and win larger deals.”
AI
Penguin Random House protects its books from AI training use
Penguin Random House (PRH) has taken a significant step in response to rising concerns about the use of intellectual property to train AI systems.
The publisher has introduced a new statement to the copyright pages of both new and reprinted books, stating, “No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner for the purpose of training artificial intelligence technologies or systems.” This change is supplemented by a section that excludes PRH’s works from the European Union’s text and data mining exception, in accordance with applicable copyright laws.
#newsonleo #technology #ai
As one of the first major publishers to address the issue of AI training explicitly, PRH is responding to the broader debate about how tech companies use copyrighted content to train large language models (LLMs), like those used in chatbots and other AI tools. Publishers have become increasingly concerned about the possible misuse of their intellectual property in recent years, especially after reports arose that copyrighted books were utilised by AI firms to enhance these technologies.
PRH’s move to amend its copyright page is an attempt to protect its content ahead of time, even though such comments have no bearing on the legal framework of copyright. The clauses work similarly to a “robots.txt” file, which websites employ to request that their content not be scraped by bots or AI systems. While these notices indicate the publisher’s intent, they are not legally binding, and existing copyright protections apply in the absence of such disclaimers.
PRH’s move also emphasises the ongoing tension between content creators and the AI industry, as more authors, publishers, and other creatives ask for stronger protections. The Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS) has been outspoken in its support for PRH’s actions. ALCS CEO Barbara Hayes expressed approval of the updated copyright language, emphasising the need for publishers to protect their works from unauthorised use in AI training.
However, some contend that simply changing copyright pages may not be enough. The Society of Authors (SoA) applauds PRH’s efforts, but believes more needs to be done to guarantee that authors’ rights are properly protected. SoA CEO Anna Ganley has called on publishers to go beyond these statements and incorporate explicit protections in author contracts, making sure that writers are informed before their work is used in AI-related initiatives.
As AI advances, the debate over its usage of copyrighted content remains far from over. PRH’s action could herald a larger shift in the publishing sector, but how other publishers and the legal system react remains to be seen.
Elon Musk says there's still a decent chance AI could go bad
The xAI founder made the comments during Saudi Arabia's Future Investment Initiative
As he anticipates the growth of his supercomputer, Elon Musk said there’s a chance artificial intelligence could go bad by the end of the decade.
#xai #ai #elonmusk #dystopia
While AI is “most likely going to be great,” Musk said “there’s some chance, which could be, 10 to 20%, that it goes bad,” during an interview with Peter Diamandis at the Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.
Diamandis asked Musk about predictions the billionaire made at the Abundance Summit in March that AI is growing “as fast as 100 times per year,” and that by the end of the decade, AI could become “as capable as 8 billion humans.”
“I certainly feel comfortable saying that it’s getting 10 times better per year, which is, four years from now that would mean 10,000 times better, so maybe 100,000,” Musk said about the pace of AI. “I think it will be able to do anything that any human can do — possibly within the next year or two.”
Three years after that, Musk said, AI could get to the point of doing “what all humans can do, combined.”
Elon Musk says there will be more humanoid robots than people in less than 20 years
Musk's Tesla is helping lead the charge with its Optimus project
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said on Tuesday that he thinks humanoid robots will outnumber humans in less than 20 years. His company is helping to make that future a possibility.
#humanoid #tesla #elonmusk #robots #technology
“I think by 2040, there will probably be more humanoid robots than there are people,” Musk said Tuesday during an appearance at the Future Investment Initiative, an event run by the institute of the same name. The institute was launched in 2017 by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund.
That estimate would put around 10 billion humanoid robots in use around the world. Musk said the price for a “robot that can do anything” would likely cost between $20,000 and $25,000 apiece.
That lines up almost exactly with Musk’s estimates for the cost of Tesla’s Optimus robots, a line of humanoid robots that are being put to limited use by the company. While speaking at the automaker’s “We, Robot” event on Oct. 10, Musk said he expects Optimus to be sold for between $20,000 and $30,000 a piece in the “long term” once production is increased.
Tesla’s history with Optimus is shaky, going back to its infamous 2021 debut that showed off a person dancing in a costume.
At the event earlier this month, the robots performed a range of activities, including handing out gift bags and drinks and playing rock, paper, scissors with attendees. The robots also danced, including to a remix of the song “What is love (Baby Don’t Hurt Me),” and interacted with guests.
Tesla later confirmed that the robots relied on teleoperation — or remote assistance — repeatedly to make Optimus appear more impressive. About 20 robots were active at all times, according to Tesla’s Optimus lead Milan Kovac, with one incident of a robot falling. The company later put out a less than 90-second video demonstrating an Optimus unit placing batteries in a tray, carrying the roughly 24-pound tray, climbing stairs, and handing out bottled drinks and popcorn to employees.
by humanoid robots does he mean AI human beings. That would be awesome, because with the current advancement going on I wouldn't be surprised if AI becomes sentient or at least immitate that almost perfectly indistinguishably
AI will spark an era of 'rampant creation' for media and streaming companies
Audiences will be major beneficiaries of AI in the media industry, Brightcove CEO Marc DeBevoise says in the latest episode of Quartz AI Factor
Brightcove (BCOV) chief executive Marc DeBevoise doesn’t envision artificial intelligence replacing human creativity anytime soon. Instead, he believes the new technology will help free up resources at media and streaming companies that will open the floodgates for creation.
#media #ai #streaming #content #technology
The streaming technology platform CEO told Quartz that tasks like cutting thumbnail images, following search engine optimization (SEO) best practices, and translating videos will soon be done by AI.
“What that will free up is the resources for those humans to make different decisions that can help optimize,” DeBevoise said in this week’s episode of Quartz AI Factor, a new video interview series filmed on location at the Nasdaq MarketSite (NDAQ).
“I do feel like the tool sets are gonna improve,” DeBevoise said, “and improve on the production and creation side to enable folks to really optimize the content they create for what audiences are looking for.”
Google’s AI Overviews are now available to help a billion people avoid reading full articles
Google is bringing its AI Overviews feature to more than 100 countries around the world, a massive expansion after initially becoming available just in the U.S. and later a half dozen other countries. AI Overviews, which employ Google's Gemini AI models to summarize answers to search queries, will now be available to more than a billion monthly users.
#google #overviews #media #ai
The paragraphs written by the AI Overviews feature are concise and include links to the sources used to compose them, usually articles from publications, business websites, or related sources. Google has claimed since they debuted that AI Overviews have led to increased engagement with diverse sources on the web.
Along with the geographic expansion, Google is also adding new language support to the service. Depending on where you are located and what language you use for Google Search, you'll see AI Overviews in either English, Hindi, Indonesian, Japanese, Portuguese, or Spanish. The wider access based on location and language isn't the only upgrade for AI Overviews. Google has also unveiled a new link display to showcase the websites and content sources used to produce better AI summaries. The AI Overviews also now include right-hand link displays formatted for desktop and mobile devices. In them, you can see related content on websites, augmenting the in-line links within the AI Overview text.
“With AI Overviews in Search, it’s easier than ever for people to find the information they need and discover relevant sites across the web, which opens up more opportunities to connect with publishers, businesses, and creators.,” Google Vice President of Search Quality Srinivasan Venkatachary explained in a blog post. “Since launching in May and expanding beyond the U.S. in August, the feedback we’ve received for AI Overviews has been highly positive. People prefer using Search with AI Overviews, and they find their search results more helpful. So now, in our largest expansion yet, we’re launching AI Overviews in more than 100 countries and making them accessible in more languages — helping you search in a whole new way, no matter what questions are on your mind.”
Global AI Overviews
The global rollout makes it clear that the signs that Google was pulling back on AI Overviews were exaggerated. Though there was some speculation that Google was leery about promoting the feature after reports of incorrect and even dangerous answers, that's clearly no longer the case.
Google has even started testing advertisements within AI Overviews, at least for U.S. mobile users. These ads are labeled to differentiate them from standard search results but are aimed at encouraging users to look at and potentially buy products and services relevant to their search terms. Search is the heart of Google's business and remains so despite judicial battles over whether the company is violating anti-monopoly laws. If Google feels comfortable enough with AI Overviews to make it a global feature, the ads are almost certain to follow in its wake, with multilingual AI-generated links that will be seen by billions.
Midjourney has a new challenger for the best AI image generator but nobody has heard of it before
Midjourney has a new challenger for the title of best AI image generator, and it’s a model nobody has heard of before.
The AI image generator in question is called “red_panda” and is currently top of the crowdsourced Artificial Analysis rankings for text-to-image generation. Artificial Analysis’ arena leaderboard is created by giving users the choice between two images and asking them which one they prefer. It’s all down to a matter of taste but as it stands red_panda has a 79% win rate beating out rivals like Black Forest Labs, Ideogram, and Midjourney.
#midjourney #ai #imagegenerator #redpanda
So what is red_panda you ask? Well, no one actually knows but Artificial Analysis can be a great way to test AI models before launching to the general public and this may be the case here. The name of the AI could give us a hint, however, after all, red pandas are found in the eastern Himalayas and southwestern China. Could this AI image generation model be a new contender from a large Chinese company?
And now I'm off to go check that out cause this is the first time I'm hearing about it. 🏃♂️
But wait, is it free?
China Mobile unveils 6G baseband prototype system for Sub7GHz frequency band — advanced capabilities should set the stage for future wireless communication technologies
Having helped pioneered the global rollout of 5G networks with extensive infrastructure investments and technological breakthroughs that enabled the rapid deployment of high-speed, low-latency mobile services, China is now setting its sights on 6G.
China Mobile, in collaboration with Zhongguancun Pan-Institute of Information and Communications Technology, China Information Technology Mobile, and smartphone maker Vivo, has introduced a 6G baseband concept prototype system for the Sub7GHz frequency band.
#china #technology #6g #telecommunications
As the world looks forward to an official launch of 6G in the coming years, China Mobile’s latest demonstration highlights the progress made in this developing field. The prototype system is part of China Mobile’s 6G "synaesthesia, computing, and intelligence fusion technology platform," reflecting a deep integration of sensory, computing, and communications technologies.
Powerful baseband capabilities – a step beyond 5G
China Mobile announced the 6G baseband concept prototype system for the Sub-7 GHz frequency band is a crucial component of its public testing device. This system aims to facilitate the deep integration of inter-sensory computing and intelligence, as well as the integration of terrestrial and celestial networks.
At the core of this new system is a strong baseband capability that is built on a cloud-based heterogeneous hardware architecture, with the system supporting a throughput of up to 100Gbps for container networks. This high throughput is combined with an ultra-short transmission time interval (TTI) processing capability of 125 microseconds (μs), allowing for faster data transmission and enhanced responsiveness.
The system’s architecture allows for a maximum interrupt response delay of less than 10μs, contributing to its flexibility and reconfigurability. It supports eight data streams and 128 digital channels, and the single-carrier bandwidth reaches 400MHz, enabling a real-time baseband throughput of up to 16.5Gbps.
These features position the system at the forefront of 6G development, meeting the stringent requirements for new technologies and service verifications, such as ultra-high-definition video and real-time data processing.
Nvidia GPU owners told to update now to patch a range of serious security flaws
Nvidia has released a new patch for its GPU Display Driver for Windows and Linux to fix a handful of rather serious vulnerabilities.
If exploited, the vulnerabilities mostly lead to code execution, denial of service, escalation of privileges, information disclosure, and data tampering, which means they are rather serious. Among them is CVE‑2024‑0126, which has a severity score of 8.2 (high severity).
#nvidia #gpu #security #technology
Another six vulnerabilities are scored 7.8, while the final one is scored 7.1. Of the total eight flaws, five affect the Windows ecosystem. They are all user mode layer exploits, in which threat actors could initiate out-of-bound reads and thus execute code remotely. One exploit was for both Windows and Linux.
Smash and grab
The details about the vulnerabilities and how they can be exploited can be found on Nvidia’s security bulletin, here. There was no word of in-the-wild abuse, so we’re guessing crooks haven’t abused these bugs just yet.
However, with Nvidia’s popularity and prevalence, it is now only a matter of time before miscreants start looking for vulnerable endpoints to exploit.
I noticed from your threads that you're able to write more. Do I need to build reputation to be able to write more (word count)
The extended count is one of the Leo Premium features.
Oh I'm guessing like X, those with the checkmarks are premium members.
How do I become a premium member? And is it possible to become one without any followers? Do I need to be a verified account?
Google Chrome cookie encryption system can be easily bypassed, experts warn
The cookie encryption system that Google introduced to the Chrome browser a few months ago can easily be bypassed, experts have warned.
In fact, a security researcher has recently published a new tool that does just that.
#google #chrome #Browser #encryption #cookie
In July 2024, Google released Chrome 127, a new version of the Chrome browser that came with Application-Bound (App-Bound) encryption. The new feature was supposed to serve as a protection mechanism, encrypting cookies using a Windows service running with SYSTEM privileges. The tool was supposed to prevent infostealing malware from grabbing sensitive information stored in the browser, such as login credentials, session cookies, and more.
Higher privileges needded
"Because the App-Bound service is running with system privileges, attackers need to do more than just coax a user into running a malicious app," Google said at the time. "Now, the malware has to gain system privileges, or inject code into Chrome, something that legitimate software shouldn't be doing."
But the success of the new feature was short-lived. In late September, we reported that multiple infostealers were already able to work around the feature, including Lumma Stealer, StealC, and many others.
Google responded by saying that it was expected, and added that it was happy the changed forced a shift in attacker behavior.
"This matches the new behavior we have seen. We continue to work with OS and AV vendors to try and more reliably detect these new types of attacks, as well as continuing to iterate on hardening defenses to improve protection against infostealers for our users."
Spot Bitcoin ETFs on track to overtak Satoshi Nakamoto’s BTC holdings by year-end
The Bitcoin ETFs have recorded around $4 billion worth of inflows during their last 12 trading days.
Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas predicted that by December, US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) BTC holdings could eclipse those of Satoshi Nakamoto.
Balchunas suggested that at their current accumulation pace — roughly 17,000 BTC weekly — the ETFs may surpass 1 million BTC next week. This puts them on track to outpace Nakamoto’s holdings, estimated to be around 1.1 million BTC, as early as December.
#bitcoin #crypto #etf #wallstreet
The recent inflow into spot BTC ETFs adds weight to this forecast. Over the past 12 trading days, these ETFs have attracted close to $4 billion, with BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT) alone pulling in around $2.6 billion.
Bitwarden clarifies open source commitment amid user concerns
Some users worried the password management platform could be moving to a more restrictive licensing scheme
Bitwarden has sought to calm user backlash in the wake of source code changes that had raised concerns among users.
#bitwarden #sourcecode
Phoronix readers recently flagged concerns about the company's apparent shift away from an open source model. The password manager platform has traditionally operated on a ‘freemium’ model, providing some code as open source.
But a pull request earlier in October 2024 raised eyebrows due to the fact the Bitwarden client introduced a “bitwarden/sdk-internal” dependence to the desktop client.
“A passion can become something greater, a true love. Time is king, it can transform many things, including our hearts.”
#freecompliments #phrases
“Always do things for the best outcome. Having this commitment and this focus on accomplishing will bring you good fruits, you can bet that yes”
#freecompliments #phrases
hi i am jatin, i am a computer science student, i'm from india, also i like to draw, and sketch people and anime characters.
#introduceyourself @ahmadmanga
Welcome :) !BBH !DOOK
@bradleyarrow likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(10/100)@jatinchy2222! to your account on behalf of @bradleyarrow.
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Hello Jatin! Welcome aboard!
welcome to INLEO
Hi and welcome :)
Welcome and have fun here 😀
Ooh, would love to see some of your sketches.
Welcome to INLEO!!
Buenos días ☕🍀, ayer tuve un día súper agotador pero compré muchas cosas que me van a beneficiar para la creación de contenido 🤩🤩🤩 vamos con más 🏁🏎️💨
#inleo #threads #life #spanish #leo
Feliz día amiga, eso suena muy bien 😎
holaaa buen día, muchas gracias por darte un paseíto por aqui, y si cariño muy bien, ando muy feliz
Genial 🍺
I just has to share it because its so true! So time to get to work Lions 🦁🦁
https://inleo.io/threads/view/sapphirecrypto/re-anderssinho-28tpwe8it
I am to fucking lazy....
That's the way to get lucky 😆
lmfao :) !BBH !DOOK
@bradleyarrow likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(17/100)@caspermoeller89! to your account on behalf of @bradleyarrow.
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Hi, @caspermoeller89,
This post has been voted on by @darkcloaks because you are an active member of the Darkcloaks gaming community.
Get started with Darkcloaks today, and follow us on Inleo for the latest updates.
Bom dia familia.
Bora que bora para mais um dia.
Bom dia mano! Tudo de boas?
Bom dia mestre,
bao, graças a Deus e voce?
Só de boa aqui também mano, tudo tranquilo graças a Deus. Bora pra mais um dia meu rei!
Bora que bora, que as contas ta chegando e nois nao pode parar.
kkkk isso aí
BOm dia!
Acho que hoje a noite vou ter um tempo pra trocarmos aquela ideia kkk
Fechado mestre.
Bora, que bora, que coisas legais estão por vir.
I have decided to do a small book, based on real events but with twists that make it fiction.
The chapters will be posted as long form posts on here and will be subscriber-only.
I have a question in regards of this.
Will the subscriber only posts be curated by @leo.voter? 🤔
No. At least that was what khal said on one of the AMAs. I'm not 100% sure if there was any change in that regard
That's a shame, but it makes sense as the potential subscribers also give some "rewards"
Hi, @caspermoeller89,
This post has been voted on by @darkcloaks because you are an active member of the Darkcloaks gaming community.
Get started with Darkcloaks today, and follow us on Inleo for the latest updates.
Greetings INLEO family. 🦁
Grateful for a bright and new day
Hope you have a less stressful and a productive day.
#freecompliments #cent #positivity #gratitude
As it turns out, getting what turned out to be covid at the beginning of an all-week out-of-town conference is not a good combination.
Sure glad that's over with
Oh hope you feel better now
Appreciate it. Mostly 🤧
Oh no, sorry about that friend. It must have been challenging for you. Take care of yourself and I wish you quick recovery.
#freecompliments
🙏
Glad it's over for you too.
I hope you recover and are 100% healthy.
Appreciate that. Currently closer to 60% LOL. But I'm getting there
Then Covid hit you hard. But 60% is better than 50% LOL.
May you have a great recovery.
Thanks friend
too many things going on right now. Bitcoin got me excited, heard my friend passed away and cried in between work breaks. So awkward I don’t have a whole afternoon to give him.
Now I have to get back to translation. I want to spend more time mourning or writing or playing guitar but I can’t right now 😵💫. Oh well life is still beautiful in all its awkwardness.
sorry for your loss
OH OH
A recent study has suggested having a cat could potentially double a person's risk of developing schizophrenia-related disorders.
Australian researchers conducted an analysis of 17 studies published during the last 44 years and found a link between owning a cat and developing disorders related to schizophrenia.
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/health/other/scientists-discover-mysterious-link-between-cats-and-schizophrenia/ar-BB1lwi3m?ocid=entnewsntp&pc=LCTS&cvid=8287746f0fd049a78c0b94abfbbf5644&ei=10
👀
They can be maddenng at times. 🤣
lmfao !INDEED
!BBH !DOOK
@bradleyarrow likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(14/100)@monkmasters! to your account on behalf of @bradleyarrow.
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"a cat" You have two. :) !BBH !DIY !DOOK
Maybe those cats are aliens !INDEED. 🤔🐱👽
Maybe they should own a frog instead. 🤔🐸😎 !DIY
Maybe? Considering ALF gets along with cats. They must be aliens. 🐱👽
Maybe?? They should definitely own a frog! !DIY !DOOK !BBH
I wonder which types of frogs you would recommend for pet owners. 🤔🐸😏 !DIY
Cartoon meme frogs.🐸 !BBH !DIY !DOOK
I thought you would recommend physical frogs which humans could !HUG. 🤔🤯😅 !DIY
You can query your personal balance by
@savvytester just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @pepetoken! Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:!DIYSTATS@pepetoken likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(4/100)@savvytester! to your account on behalf of @pepetoken.
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You can query your personal balance by
@pepetoken just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @savvytester! Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:!DIYSTATSYou can query your personal balance by
@savvytester just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @pepetoken! Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:!DIYSTATSHi, @pepetoken,
This post has been voted on by @darkcloaks because you are an active member of the Darkcloaks gaming community.
Get started with Darkcloaks today, and follow us on Inleo for the latest updates.
@pepetoken likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(7/50)@savvytester! to your account on behalf of @pepetoken.
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You can query your personal balance by
@pepetoken just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @savvytester! Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:!DIYSTATSYou can query your personal balance by
@savvytester just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @pepetoken! Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:!DIYSTATS@pepetoken likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(28/50)@bradleyarrow! to your account on behalf of @pepetoken.
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You can query your personal balance by
@pepetoken just sent you a DIY token as a little appreciation for your comment dear @bradleyarrow! Feel free to multiply it by sending someone else !DIY in a comment :) You can do that x times a day depending on your balance so:!DIYSTATSThis one is not that bad... right #hive?
Wow this looks dope .!!
In my latest post, I dive into how platforms like #InLeo, Hive, and Threadcast are making waves in the crypto world.
From community engagement to earning rewards, it's all about building value and connections.
1/ 🧵#outreach #crypto #threadstorm
So, how does engaging in the #crypto space lead to real rewards? 🌟 It’s all about community, consistency, and understanding what each platform offers.
Every comment, thread, and post has potential! 💬📈 It’s like building your own digital empire, one interaction at a time.
Wondering how these steps can help you too?
2/ 🧵
Ready to dive deeper and start leveling up your crypto game? 🌐🔑
Check out the full post on InLeo to get all the details and tips! 🔥⬇️
https://inleo.io/@anonymous02/leveling-up-my-crypto-game-inleo-hive-and-threadcast-7b5
#outreach #threadstorm #cryptoadvantage
3/ 🧵
Suddenly, DeBank is no longer accessible in my country, hmmm 🤔🤔🤔
#defitracker
Come to the UK CJ and you will find so many things geo blocked relating to crypto!
As far as I've heard, the UK is insane in this regard 🤯
Haha, no thank you, Tito Ed😅
Haha, no thank you, Tito Ed😅
haha ok
Hehe, I'd love to move countries but can't yet (until my parents get well). Hope your day is going awesomely :)
Oh yes wishing them speedy recoveries CJ. About time for bed, have a great Wednesday :)
True motivation comes from working on things we care about #freecompliments #liotes #bbh #cent
🌟 *1inch collaborates with the Bruce Lee Foundation for a campaign celebrating the philosophy and legacy of the legendary martial artist, Bruce Lee.
#btc #crypto #inleo#bbh #cent
Price $HIVE #hive #threads #cent #freecompliments
#leoai is going to be one of the most versatile feature added to Leo.
We are the ones who are laying the foundation for what it is capable of. Feeding in a lot of data, covering a wide variety of topics, is crucial.
Would you like LeoAI to be your tour guide? Then make sure there is a lot of travel and geography information in there.
Indeed, people can put a lot of info in the travel threadcast to that effect!
Without a doubt. The more that we get into the vector database, the more of this type of functionality into Leo.
It all starts with the data.
I have been trying to add AI content to threadcast buy it seems to not give room to a massive word span. I get that 'minus figures' beneath and it refuses to post.
Break it up into a "threadstorm".
Post the first 1,000 characters (or whatever), then copy the next section as a reply to that.
The database will still establish the connections.
Cool idea. Gonna push @bannersandborder to add more content.
Cool, feel free to add to the Travel Threadcast I post every other day too. I mentioned to bannersandborder that there may be some good cross-over with Geography
Good, keep poking him. Not sure he has understood threadcasts yet :)
Its hard to onboard people 😅
Oh and some quality cat time. First time this happened.
Oh this is absolutely adorable
Thank yo so much :) !BBH !DOOK
@bradleyarrow likes your content! so I just sent 1 BBH(3/100)@weone! to your account on behalf of @bradleyarrow.
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Patience is key in life
#cryptocurrency #memes #blockchain
(technically is 7 years but who's counting)
1/🧵 Life's Big Question: Unraveling The Mystery Of Purpose
Sometimes, I find thoughts about life and our purposes too complex to talk about but in real sense, they are simple and need only personal decisions to find them out. #outreach #threadstorm #hivelearners
2/🧵
Purposes differ from one person to another, only those who take their time to connect deeply and think hard on what they really want from life and give back to life, are able to find their purposes.
3/🧵
Read more about the post here #gosh
https://inleo.io/@merit.ahama/lifes-big-question-unraveling-the-mystery-of-purpose-7x3
Thanks :)Sorry for the 'cold call' message here. But I am looking for support for my Witness :) @thebbhproject. If you have a spare vote or think I am worthy, support would be awesome.
That's right. I love such topics and I will do well to check it out.
Thanks for sharing and have a great day Merit.
Thanks Winny!
If you water the plants more than they need, you lose them.
The lesson here is that, when you give people, you have to give within reason.
~Nadia Al Zuubi
#quotes #freecompliments
Just been watching some movies of Ken Block RALLY... from 2 years ago... and damn... this reminded me what #blockchain #rally is for me! Dope @peakd team 😎
KB43ver!
@lightsplasher by @actifit My Actifit Report Card: October 27 2024 #actifit #smartphonephotography #palnet #sportstalk #gosh
what kinda of white animal is eating your mushrooms?
Wow!! Lion's Mane. Looks tasty.