10 months ago
145 The news: A nonprofit formed by Mike Schroepfer, Meta’s erstwhile main exertion officer, has spun retired a caller enactment aimed astatine speeding up probe into water alkalinity enhancement—a imaginable mode to usage the seas to suck up and store distant adjacent much c dioxide. The Carbon to Sea Initiative volition get $50 cardinal implicit the adjacent 5 years to prosecute that goal.
How it works: Ocean alkalinity enhancement refers to assorted ways of adding alkaline substances, similar olivine, basalt, oregon lime, into seawater. These basal materials hindrance with dissolved inorganic c dioxide successful the h2o to signifier bicarbonates and carbonates, ions that tin persist for tens of thousands of years successful the ocean. As those CO2-depleted waters scope the surface, they tin propulsion down further c dioxide from the aerial to instrumentality to a authorities of equilibrium.
Why it matters: While specified projects would beryllium challenging to scale, clime modelers are optimistic astir the method’s potential. Read the afloat story.
—James Temple
Elon Musk’s quiet, untweeted China trip
Ever since China lifted astir of its pandemic-era question restrictions successful January, overseas executives person been flocking in—including 1 Elon Musk. He paid a three-day sojourn to China past week to conscionable with high-ranking authorities officials. Unusually for him, helium stayed disconnected Twitter the full time.
However, from the nationalist readouts posted by Chinese authorities websites and sightings of Musk shared connected Chinese societal media, we tin reconstruct his trip. Read the afloat story.
—Zeyi Yang
Zeyi’s communicative is from China Report, his play newsletter giving you the wrong way connected each things tech successful China. Sign up to person it successful your inbox each Tuesday.
The must-reads
I’ve combed the net to find you today’s astir fun/important/scary/fascinating stories astir technology.
1 The US regulator is suing Coinbase, too
Within 24 hours of going aft chap crypto speech Binance. (WSJ $)
+ Retail crypto trading successful the US isn’t looking truthful rosy close now. (Wired $)
2 OpenAI has nary plans to motorboat immoderate much products
CEO Sam Altman says ChatGPT volition beryllium the last. (Insider $)+ The wrong communicative of however ChatGPT was built from the radical who made it. (MIT Technology Review)
3 Headsets are out, goggles are in
Apple is going each successful connected mixed reality—just don’t notation the metaverse. (The Atlantic $)
+ Wearing a machine connected your look is inactive a weird experience. (Wired $)
+ Apple volition request to person developers to physique apps for its headset. (MIT Technology Review)
4 Conservative activists are pressuring disinformation researchers
The unwanted attraction is forcing immoderate researchers retired of the field, conscionable arsenic the 2024 US predetermination approaches. (WP $)
5 The European Union whitethorn prohibition Huawei from 5G infrastructure
The bloc worries that its members haven’t heeded its warnings astir precocious hazard vendors. (FT $)
6 Johnson & Johnson’s covid vaccine has been withdrawn successful the US
A deficiency of request for the jab means there’s nary request to update it. (Ars Technica)
7 A startup placed a encephalon implant connected patients’ skulls for 15 minutes
The flexible devices are overmuch little invasive than accepted electrodes. (Wired $)
+ How your encephalon information could beryllium utilized against you. (MIT Technology Review)
8 How a infirmary staffing startup imploded
CareRev’s CEO openly discussed his cause usage with colleagues, for starters. (The Information $)
9 Finland is raising a procreation of fact-checkers
It’s the planetary golden modular for teaching media literacy to children. (Slate $)
+ How antithetic generations grip misinformation. (MIT Technology Review)
10 We’re yet learning much astir synesthesia 🎨
Scientists present judge it’s intimately linked to however we larn arsenic children. (New Scientist $)
Quote of the day
“People manus retired 5 stars similar it’s candy.”
—Uber operator Donnie Freeman believes passengers are astir over-generous with ratings these days, helium tells the Wall Street Journal.
The large story
The uneasy coexistence of Yandex and the Kremlin
August 2020While Moscow was nether coronavirus lockdown betwixt March and June 2020, the Russian superior emptied out—apart from the streams of cyclists successful the trademark yellowish azygous of Yandex’s nutrient transportation service.
Often referred to successful the West arsenic Russia’s Google, Yandex is truly much similar Google, Amazon, Uber, and possibly a fewer different companies combined. It’s a Russian Silicon Valley unto itself.
But Yandex’s occurrence has travel astatine a price. The Kremlin has agelong viewed the net arsenic a battlefield successful its escalating tensions with the West and has go progressively acrophobic that a institution similar Yandex, with the heaps of information it has connected Russian citizens, could 1 time autumn into overseas hands. Read the afloat story.
