For the last several years, the Delivering the Future event has showcased the latest technologies powering Amazon operations. Seattle’s 2023 event showcased updates to the company’s pharmacy offerings and drone deliveries. This year in Nashville, Amazon discussed AI updates to its shopping experiences and how the company is using computer …
Read More »‘Chat control’: The EU’s controversial CSAM-scanning legal proposal explained
The European Union has a longstanding reputation for strong privacy laws. But a legislative plan to combat child abuse — which the bloc formally presented back in May 2022 — is threatening to downgrade the privacy and security of hundreds of millions of regional messaging app users. The European Commission, …
Read More »The most interesting unicorns to come out of Japan
Japan’s startup sector, despite being one of the biggest in the world, has lagged behind other regions like the U.S., China, and the U.K., in terms of the number of unicorns and the scale of venture capital investment. For years, an aging population, overall economic deflation, and salarymen’s inclination to …
Read More »‘Where we are today in biology AI is similar to GPT in 2020’: An interview with the CEO of Africa’s biggest AI startup
In January last year, German biotech company BioNTech acquired African AI startup Instadeep for over $550 million, a deal finalized in July of the same year. Instadeep, whose exit is currently the largest from Africa, has been operating under the German pharma umbrella for just over a year. Now is …
Read More »Meta’s Yann LeCun says worries about A.I.’s existential threat are ‘complete B.S.’
AI pioneer Yann LeCun doesn’t think artificial intelligence is actually on the verge of becoming intelligent. LeCun — a professor at New York University, senior researcher at Meta, and winner of the prestigious A.M. Turning Award — has been open about his skepticism before, for example tweeting that before we …
Read More »In latest move against WP Engine, WordPress takes control of ACF plugin
The dispute between WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg and hosting provider WP Engine continues, with Mullenweg announcing that WordPress is “forking” a plugin developed by WP Engine. Specifically, Advanced Custom Fields — a plugin making it easier for WordPress users to customize their edit screens — is being taken out of …
Read More »Tesla’s Cybercab robotaxi is here — and it could cost less than $30K
Welcome back to Week in Review. This week, we’re taking a closer look at Tesla’s Cybercab and Robovan reveals, the “complete disarray” at Fisker HQ, and a horrifying side effect of living in our modern world: AI summaries of your breakup texts. Let’s do this. Tesla finally revealed its Cybercab …
Read More »TikTok’s research reportedly acknowledges negative effects on teens
Court documents suggest that TikTok executives are aware of the app’s potential harm to teenagers, according to reporting by NPR and Kentucky Public Radio. Fourteen U.S. attorneys general sued TikTok earlier this week, claiming that the app harms children’s mental health. Much of the material in those suits was redacted, …
Read More »SpaceX will attempt historic catch of returning Starship booster on Sunday
Starship is ready to fly again — and for the first time, SpaceX is going to try to bring the booster back to the launch site to catch it with a pair of oversized “chopsticks.” SpaceX will launch the mammoth Starship on Sunday in a launch window that opens at …
Read More »Pig Butchering Scams Are Going High Tech
As digital scamming explodes in Southeast Asia, including so called “pig butchering” investment scams, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) issued a comprehensive report this week with a dire warning about the rapid growth of this criminal ecosystem. Many digital scams have traditionally relied on social engineering, …
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