1 year ago
124 Back successful September, Jessica Hamzelou, our elder biotech reporter, traveled to Gstaad, a swanky ski-resort municipality successful the Swiss Alps, to be the archetypal in-person Longevity Investors Conference.
Over the two-day event, scientists and biotech founders made the lawsuit for assorted approaches to prolonging the fig of years we mightiness walk successful bully health. The bulk of them were trying to triumph implicit deep-pocketed investors.
As the tract of longevity attempts to specify itself arsenic scientifically sound, plentifulness of “anti-aging treatments” based connected little-to-no quality grounds proceed to participate the market. But tin billions of capitalist money—some of it from ethically dubious sources—ever connection a factual way to evidence-based beingness extension? Read the afloat story.
Read much astir the quest to widen our steadfast years:
+ How scientists privation to marque you young again. Research labs are pursuing exertion to “reprogram” aging bodies backmost to youth. Read the afloat story.
+ Aging clocks purpose to foretell however agelong you’ll live. These clocks committedness to measurement biologic property and assistance place anti-aging drugs, but determination are lingering questions implicit their accuracy. Read the afloat story.
A large colony for 1 Chinese-American idiosyncratic won’t extremity wrongful prosecutions
Last week, our elder investigative newsman Eileen Guo wrote astir a historical colony won by Chinese-American idiosyncratic Sherry Chen, who was wrongly accused of being a Chinese spy.
Her lawsuit illustrates conscionable however hard it is to spell up against a almighty national bureau and clasp it accountable. It’s besides an anomaly—it’s usually incredibly hard to beryllium radical bias successful court, but a wide signifier of misconduct by her accusers was proven definitively.
However, Chen’s triumph doesn’t needfully mean others successful her concern volition person an easier clip getting justice. Read the afloat story.
—Zeyi Yang
Zeyi’s communicative is from China Report, his play newsletter covering everything you request to cognize astir China. Sign up to person it successful your inbox each Tuesday.
Podcast: Farming a warfare zone
Tune into the latest occurrence of our In Machines We Trust podcast, wherever we look astatine however shortages of everything from seeds to fertilizer mightiness accelerate the adoption of technologies that tin assistance supplies spell further successful war-torn Ukraine. Listen to it connected Apple Podcasts, oregon wherever other you usually listen.
The must-reads
I’ve combed the net to find you today’s astir fun/important/scary/fascinating stories astir technology.
1 Donald Trump is going to tally for the presidency again
He’s ignoring the critics, peculiarly those wrong his ain party. (Vox)
+ Republicans aren't thrilled by their midterms performance. (The Atlantic $)
+ His determination to tally hasn’t precisely travel arsenic a surprise. (New Yorker $)
+ Trump and Elon Musk are present societal media rivals, technically. (Insider $)
2 FTX brag Sam Bankman-Fried is hustling for wealth (again)
He’s desperately trying to hole the $8 cardinal spread successful the crypto exchange’s finances. (WSJ $)
+ The Bahamas limb of FTX has filed for bankruptcy, too. (Bloomberg $)
3 Twitter is playing with occurrence successful the EU
The progressively volatile level could autumn foul of its caller rules policing Big Tech. (FT $)
+ Twitter’s Blue Verified work is relaunching connected 29 November. (Reuters)
+ Social media giants could beryllium forced to disclose details astir their algorithms successful the UK. (FT $)
+ Musk has a snarky caller nickname: Elmo. (Insider $)
+ What precisely is Musk reasoning close now? (Vox)
4 NASA’s Artemis 1 ngo has yet taken disconnected 🚀
After months of setbacks, it took formation successful the aboriginal hours. (CNN)
+ The ngo hopes to shed airy connected what abstraction does to our bodies. (Vox)
+ Watch the infinitesimal NASA’s DART spacecraft crashed into an asteroid. (MIT Technology Review)
5 Taylor Swift has exposed conscionable however atrocious Ticketmaster’s strategy is
Buying performance tickets is progressively similar battling a rigged lottery. (WP $)
6 The world’s colonisation has reached 8 cardinal people
But that’s neither a crushed to panic—nor relax. (Economist $)
+ New planetary representation shows populations are increasing faster successful flood-prone areas. (MIT Technology Review)
7 Millions of Indians are relying connected businesses controlled by 1 man
Mukesh Ambani’s conglomerate has made him uber-powerful. (Rest of World)
8 Boston Dynamics is suing a rival implicit its robot dog
It claims Ghost Robotics’ four-legged plan was a spot excessively akin to its own. (The Register)
+ This robot canine conscionable taught itself to walk. (MIT Technology Review)
9 TikTok has emboldened brands to clap backmost astatine customers 👏
Unfortunately, it means they’re much irritating than ever. (Wired $)
+ The level is besides repackaging MTV Cribs for a caller generation. (The Guardian)
10 Your adjacent Tinder lucifer could beryllium AI-generated
For conscionable $19, you excessively could beryllium “the champion you’ve ever looked.” (Motherboard)
+ No 1 knows what’s adjacent for AI copyright. (The Verge)
Quote of the day
“The higher-ups, they mostly played chess and committee games. There was nary partying. They were undersexed, if anything.”
—Dr George Lerner, crypto speech FTX’s in-house show coach, tells the New York Times that reports of hedonistic behaviour astatine the steadfast are wildly overblown.
The large story
The transportation apps reshaping beingness successful India’s megacities
From 7am until good past dusk, 7 days a week, N. Sudhakar sits down the antagonistic of his hole-in-the partition market store successful the southbound Indian metropolis of Bangalore. Packed level to ceiling with everything from 20-kilogram sacks of atom to one-rupee ($.01) shampoo sachets, this one-stop store supplies astir of the regular needs for galore successful the neighborhood. It’s a c transcript of the astir 12 cardinal family-run “kiranas” recovered connected astir each thoroughfare country successful India.
Increasingly, the exertion manufacture is presenting stores similar his with a caller challenge. Across the road, a dependable watercourse of transportation drivers enactment up to drawback groceries from a “dark store”—a mini-warehouse built to alteration ultra-fast deliveries tally by Dunzo, a Bangalore-based startup.
In India’s megacities, the municipality mediate people is gradually getting hooked connected online shopping. These shoppers marque up a fraction of the population, but their spending powerfulness is considerable, and successful much affluent pockets of large cities, the conflict for India’s thoroughfare country is good underway. Read the afloat story.
—Edd Gent
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.)
+ If you enjoyed the publication Fleishman is successful Trouble, a TV adaptation starts streaming connected Hulu tomorrow.
+ John Wick is back, and he’s angrier than ever.
+ If your Birkenstocks are looking a small grubby, don’t worry—someone conscionable paid $218,000 for Steve Jobs’ aged pair (thanks Allison!)
+ I had nary thought Skyfall was precise astir called thing other entirely.
+ Paper peepshows were the 19th century’s reply to virtual reality—and conscionable arsenic cool.
