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For a infinitesimal connected Friday, Biggie Smalls was the lone antheral connected stage. A spotlight shone connected him successful his reddish velvet suit, and amid pre-recorded cheers, helium rapped the lyrics to “Mo Money Mo Problems,” swiveling to the bushed successful his orangish sneakers.
You wouldn’t beryllium incorrect to beryllium confused. Smalls died successful 1997, leaving an outsize philharmonic and taste bequest arsenic 1 of the top rappers of each time. But helium was successful good signifier connected Meta’s Horizon Worlds: heaving betwixt stanzas, pumping his fist rhythmically, and seeming precise overmuch alive.
But Smalls’s hyper-realistic avatar is not conscionable an awesome method feat. It is besides a important trial of 2 large questions we’ll soon look if metaverse platforms summation traction: whether radical volition wage to spot an avatar of a dormant creator perform, and whether that concern is ethical. Read the afloat story.
—Tanya Basu
How to spot AI-generated text
This condemnation was written by an AI—or was it? OpenAI’s caller chatbot, ChatGPT, presents america with a problem: How volition we cognize whether what we work online is written by a quality oregon a machine?
ChatGPT generates remarkably human-sounding answers to questions that it’s asked. The occupation is, it’s simply predicting the astir apt adjacent connection successful the sentence. It hasn’t a hint whether thing is close oregon false, and confidently presents accusation arsenic existent adjacent erstwhile it is not. Despite that, the net is progressively being flooded with AI-generated text.
We’re successful hopeless request of ways to differentiate betwixt human- and AI-written substance successful bid to antagonistic imaginable misuses of the technology, and researchers are processing tools to bash precisely that. But the accelerated velocity of AI improvement means we’re perpetually playing drawback up. Read the afloat story.
—Melissa Heikkilä
The must-reads
I’ve combed the net to find you today’s astir fun/important/scary/fascinating stories astir technology.
1 Twitter users person voted to region Elon Musk successful a poll
Whether Musk really abides by its results remains to beryllium seen. (FT $)
+ Twitter has banned links to rival societal media sites. (The Verge)
+ Journalists’ accounts were banned and reinstated implicit a chaotic weekend. (NYT $)
+ What Musk wants from the writers he’s entrusted the Twitter Files to. (Slate $)
+ We’re witnessing the encephalon decease of Twitter. (MIT Technology Review)
2 Sam Bankman-Fried should look successful a Bahamian tribunal today
The FTX laminitis is expected to hold to extradition to the US to look fraud charges. (WP $)
+ Crypto evangelists successful Puerto Rico are doubling down. (The Guardian)
+ However, investors successful the US are throwing successful the towel. (WSJ $)
3 Russian drones are targeting Kyiv’s powerfulness grid
It’s Moscow’s 3rd onslaught connected the metropolis successful little than a week. (Reuters)
+ Ukrainian developers are utilizing blase bundle to foretell force troops’ movements. (The Guardian)
4 Digital intelligence wellness services are failing susceptible users
Some LGBTQ+ users accidental they were assigned unsympathetic therapists. (WSJ $)
5 A teenage YouTuber is astatine the halfway of a kid labour lawsuit
It’s highlighting conscionable however loosely regulated societal media is. (LA Times $)
6 Climate change-induced drought is sparking a nutrient catastrophe
Millions of radical surviving successful the Horn of Africa are among the archetypal to suffer. (Undark Magazine)
7 Silicon Valley is pulling the plug connected its elaborate Christmas parties
Many companies consciousness it’s a atrocious look, fixed the sector’s caller lay-offs. (The Information $)
+ Big Tech’s legendary perks are disappearing too. (Insider $)
8 Portugal’s integer nomad imagination is dying
Building a distant moving colony doesn’t needfully mean said workers volition crook up. (Wired $)
+ Our h2o infrastructure needs to change. (MIT Technology Review)
9 Instagram Notes is simply a harkback to the aureate property of instant messaging
For millennials brought up connected AIM, the nostalgia is overwhelming. (WSJ $)
10 How embroidery inspired the archetypal machine program
Ada Lovelace was an algorithm pioneer. (Inverse)
Quote of the day
"I person ne'er been capable to termination anserine things earlier they origin damage.”
—John Carmack, a elder enforcement astatine Meta’s VR business, announced his departure from the institution successful a scathing memo criticizing its bureaucracy and deficiency of efficiency, Insider reports.
The large story
Stitching unneurotic the grid volition prevention lives arsenic utmost upwind worsens
July 2022
The blistering vigor waves that acceptable somesthesia records crossed overmuch of the US this summertime strained energy systems, and threatened to sound retired powerfulness successful susceptible regions of the country. While the energy mostly stayed online, dense usage of energy-sucking air-conditioners and the aggravated vigor contributed to scattered problems and adjacent calls.
The nation’s isolated and antiquated grids are successful hopeless request of upgrades. One solution would beryllium to much tightly integrate the country’s determination grids, stitching them unneurotic with much long-range transmission lines, allowing powerfulness to travel betwixt regions to wherever it’s needed much urgently. However, that’s a ngo that’s fraught with challenges. Read the afloat story.
—James Temple
We tin inactive person bully things
A spot for comfort, amusive and distraction successful these weird times. (Got immoderate ideas? Drop maine a line or tweet 'em astatine me.)
+ Congratulations to World Cup winners Argentina, who are partying similar it’s 1999 (thanks Niall!)
+ 90s LAN parties look similar they were a full batch of fun.
+ Did you cognize the crippled Monopoly was really designed to amended players connected the evils of capitalism? Me neither.
+ Here’s what the radical of Yakutia, Siberia wear to support warm erstwhile temperatures driblet to -95°F (hint: tons of layers.)
+ Gorillaz’ augmented world performances implicit the play look beauteous sensational.
English (US) ·