About: blatcho

Jon Porter / The Verge: Samsung responds to the controversy over moon photography on Galaxy devices, explaining its “Scene Optimizer” feature, “AI deep learning model”, and more  —  The post’s content isn’t exactly new — it appears to be a lightly edited translation of an article posted …

A robot that mimics the motion of snakes can undulate in S-shaped bends or roll in spirals

It’s easier than ever to view maps of any place you’d like to go — by car, that is. By foot is another matter. Most cities and towns in the U.S. do not have sidewalk maps, and pedestrians are usually left to fend for themselves: Can you walk from your hotel to the restaurants on […]

A new version of the AI system that powers the popular chatbot has better language skills, but is still biased, prone to fabrication, and can be abused.

Georgia Gee / Slate: A list of over a dozen US stadiums using facial recognition for testing, security, entry, analyzing fans’ feelings, ticketing, concessions, or other use cases  —  “Your face is your ticket,” goes the motto of A.I. startup Wicket.  “Your face is your credential,” says Alcatraz AI, another vendor.

Bloomberg: Sources: TikTok’s leadership is considering the option of divesting itself from ByteDance as a last resort if its existing proposal with CFIUS is rejected  —  TikTok’s leadership is discussing the possibility of separating from ByteDance Ltd., its Chinese parent company, to help address concerns about national security risks.

Aisha Malik / TechCrunch: Duolingo debuts a Max subscription for $30 per month or $168 per year, offering GPT-4 features for English speakers taking Spanish and French courses on iOS  —  Duolingo is introducing a new subscription tier with features powered by OpenAI’s new GPT-4 technology, the company announced on Tuesday.

An update to the AI behind ChatGPT has been released by OpenAI. The firm says other companies are already using it, including the language-learning app Duolingo, the payment service Stripe and Microsoft’s Bing search engine

In 2018, the Economist published an in-depth piece on the programming language Python. “In the past 12 months,” the article said, “Google users in America have searched for Python more often than for Kim Kardashian.” Reality TV stars, be wary.  The high-level language has earned its popularity, too, with legions of users flocking daily to […]

During the chilly last weekend of February, families around Cambridge, Massachusetts, enjoyed a fun-filled day in the Kendall/MIT Open Space. Winter Family Day included a range of family-friendly activities for attendees of all ages. With an estimated 1,500 attendees, the event was MIT Open Space Programming’s largest program to date. Collaborators across the Institute and […]

The MIT School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (SHASS) has announced that former Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf PhD ’81 has been recognized with the 2023 Robert A. Muh Alumni Award. The biennial Muh Alumni Award recognizes the tremendous achievements of MIT degree holders who are leaders in one of the Institute’s humanities, arts, or […]

Sponsor content from Embold Health.

More users means more data for algorithms to make better predictions.

A conversation with Wharton’s Ethan Mollick on the potential for a great productivity leap.

WIRED soars across the San Francisco Bay in this $390K, Polestar-powered, all-electric hydrofoil that wants to be more like a plane.

Digital traces including social posts and search queries like “How many tank squadrons?” capture a population’s struggle to survive war.

Darren Aronofsky’s film, which turns 25 this year, injected the mathematical constant into pop culture’s consciousness in a whole new way.

Bloomberg: Source: US prosecutors are looking at Telegram group chats between employees at Jump, Jane Street, and Alameda in May 2023 over the collapse of TerraUSD  —  US prosecutors are scrutinizing chat-group conversations among prominent trading firms including Jump Trading Group and Jane Street Group …

David Enrich / New York Times: Signature’s and SVB’s collapse was aided by GOP-led Dodd-Frank reforms that raised the “stress test” threshold from $50B to $250B, pushed for by SVB executives  —  Officials with Signature and Silicon Valley banks, which regulators seized in recent days, called for looser financial requirements for midsize banks.

Tom Warren / The Verge: Microsoft plans to make 3D avatars available to all Teams users in May 2023, after announcing the feature in 2021 and testing them privately in recent months  —  Microsoft originally announced the avatars feature in 2021 and has been testing it privately in recent months.

Brain organoids grown in a lab can be used to perform basic computation tasks, but there are big unanswered questions about how far this approach should be taken

When astronauts begin to build a permanent base on the moon, as NASA plans to do in the coming years, they’ll need help. Robots could potentially do the heavy lifting by laying cables, deploying solar panels, erecting communications towers, and building habitats. But if each robot is designed for a specific action or task, a […]

The US lender filled a niche for European tech companies that no one else could, or would.

The bank was popular among Indian founders who needed US accounts. But many have struggled to get their money out.

Workers who handle violent and offensive content often face low wages and insecure contracts. Now they want the ability to organize.

Preetika Rana / Wall Street Journal: A California appeals court reverses a lower court ruling that found Prop 22 illegal, preserving the independent contractor model of companies like Uber and Lyft  —  Ruling upholds Proposition 22, which preserves gig-economy business model  —  Uber Technologies Inc., UBER -0.93%decrease …

Bloomberg: Sources: Chinese autonomous driving startup WeRide has filed confidentially for a US IPO and aims to raise $500M; WeRide was valued at ~$4.4B in March 2022  —  Chinese driverless technology startup Guangzhou WeRide Technology Co. has filed confidentially for an initial public offering in the US …

Alexander Osipovich / Wall Street Journal: Sources: the US DOJ is investigating the May 2022 collapse of the TerraUSD stablecoin; the SEC filed a suit against Terraform Labs and Do Kwon last month  —  FBI and New York officials have questioned former Terraform Labs team members  —  The Justice Department is investigating …

The world’s best Go-playing AIs can beat the best humans at the game, but their introduction has also helped human players improve their skills

Swift and significant gains against climate change require the creation of novel, environmentally benign, and energy-efficient materials. One of the richest veins researchers hope to tap in creating such useful compounds is a vast chemical space where molecular combinations that offer remarkable optical, conductive, magnetic, and heat transfer properties await discovery. But finding these new […]

Rett syndrome is a devastating developmental disorder, principally occurring in girls, caused by mutations in the gene MECP2 that leads to severe cognitive, motor, and other symptoms. As such, the March 10 approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration of the first-ever treatment for the disorder, a drug called Trofinetide based on the natural […]

Hashing is a core operation in most online databases, like a library catalogue or an e-commerce website. A hash function generates codes that directly determine the location where data would be stored. So, using these codes, it is easier to find and retrieve the data. However, because traditional hash functions generate codes randomly, sometimes two […]

Sponsor content from Motus.

The technology will change what content is produced, how it’s produced, and who it’s shown to.

Researchers interviewed professionals in the U.S. and Canada about their experiences in a variety of industries.

Everyone needs to drink more water. This perfect bottle has two drink spouts and fun colors to help keep thirst at bay.

Whether SVB is rescued by regulators or snapped up by a competitor, the tech industry’s finance needs are still specific enough that not just anyone can meet them.

A new experiment pulled off the most precise measurement of an electron’s self-generated magnetic field—and the universe’s subatomic model is at stake.

Vishal Chawla / The Block: Lending protocol Euler Finance lost $197M in a flash-loan attack, including $136M in stETH and $34M in USDC; Euler raised $32M in June 2022; EUL drops 45%+  —  – Euler Finance was hit by a flash-loan attack that resulted in a loss of $197 million, according to security analysts.

MacKenzie Sigalos / CNBC: Sources: long before its collapse, SVB remained technologically stagnant, including failing to integrate Stripe’s tech and biometric authentication on mobile  —  – SVB’s problems extended beyond its risk profile and a challenging economy.  — An ex-manager and several clients …

Ezra Klein / New York Times: As AI explodes, humanity must accelerate its adaptation or reach a collective, enforceable decision to slow the development of these technologies  —  In 2018, Sundar Pichai, the chief executive of Google — and not one of the tech executives known for overstatement — said …

How fresh are your data? For drones searching a disaster zone or robots inspecting a building, working with the freshest data is key to locating a survivor or reporting a potential hazard. But when multiple robots simultaneously relay time-sensitive information over a wireless network, a traffic jam of data can ensue. Any information that gets […]

Hashing is a core operation in most online databases, like a library catalogue or an e-commerce website. A hash function generates codes that replace data inputs. Since these codes are shorter than the actual data, and usually a fixed length, this makes it easier to find and retrieve the original information. However, because traditional hash […]

Get more joy from your java. These conical-burr, flat-burr, and bladed machines let you enjoy freshly ground beans in every cup.

Keep your iPhone, Apple Watch, and AirPods topped up with these WIRED-tested docking systems.

Even with no actual Yakuza in it, the latest installment in the franchise is excellent, and a credit to its historic setting.

Simon Willison / Simon Willison’s Weblog: A developer runs Meta’s 13B LLaMA model, considered to be competitive with GPT-3, on his laptop, showing local language models are feasible on consumer hardware  —  The open release of the Stable Diffusion image generation model back in August 2022 was a key moment.

CNBC: New York shuts down Signature Bank as US regulators cite a “systemic risk exception” like for SVB, announcing all of Signature’s depositors will be “made whole”  —  U.S. regulators said Sunday it shut down New York-based Signature Bank, a second financial institution …

U.S. Department of the Treasury: The US Treasury, Federal Reserve, and the FDIC: all Silicon Valley Bank depositors will be “fully” protected, and their money will be available on March 13  —  WASHINGTON, DC — The following statement was released by Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen …

A computer game being developed by Amazon, called Alexa Arena, is designed to harvest information on how humans interact with robots so the firm can train the machines on how best to go about their duties in offices and homes