Items I happen to view each day. Science, Technology, Management, Culture, and Writing

    This is my day book for this week. It is a log of things I see on the Internet.

This week: 14-20 March, 2022

Summary of this week:

• The Russian military is still floundering in Ukraine
• Google I/O to be online only in May
• Microsoft announces big updates to Teams and remote work
• Arnold Schwarzenegger makes a 9-minute video plea to the people of Russia
• Google runs a fibre optic undersea cable between Europe and Africa

Monday 14 March 2022

Some deeper thoughts on last week's Apple event and hardware. Predictions of the M2 Apple Silicon.

This is a good philosophical article on artificial intelligence as it is being practiced today. And it shows that I was correct when I wrote my dissertation in the late 1980s. Of source many others were also correct back then. And we were all forgotten.

I'm pointing to this article as in the last few days I have seen more people point to it than ever before pointed pointers pointed to or something.

Big tech has big money and it sponsors research. Surprise (not): research is done that big tech wants. Funny how money drives things like paychecks, food, clothing, and shelter. Some folks are alarmed by this. I am alarmed by adults who are alarmed and surprised by this.

Meanwhile in China (where all this virus started), Foxconn closes manufacturing due to a rise in virus cases.

And we end with the news that Tom Brady has "un-retired."

Thoughts on theme, meaning, and writing "the great novel."

Considering different types of freelance writing.

interesting thought: instead of writing prompts, consider the idea of opening different doors into different rooms.

Try small steps; repeat them; repeat them, and see the results.

The writer and the "digital product." The dream of a continual source of income.

If your livelihood does not depend on being online, try being offline for an hour or day. Remember the prior note about small steps.

Some thoughts on being a professional writer.

Thoughts on percolation and writing. It doesn't just happen 1-2-3.

Is it too late to start writing? Is it too late to start breathing? I think not.

Here are some ideas to start writing a book. My tip: blank sheet of paper, pencil, write, "In the beginning..." Ending the book is just as simple. Gather the same tools and write, "The End." All the stuff in the middle flows pretty well if you are in the right frame of mind.

Tuesday 15 March 2022

Some good thoughts on the transformer and its growing role in machine learning.

A closer look at the 2022 version of Apple's iPhone. Many are bashing this phone, but it is what it is supposed to be: something less expensive.

Foxconn may invest $9Billion in a factory in Saudi Arabia. The kingdom of Saud has struggled to bring in anyone.

The cryptominers who were booted from China went to Kazakhstan. Now they are being booted from there as well.

Microsoft releases DirectStorage, which is supposed to make games on PCs load much faster. This apparently solves some major problem that threatens something.

Regulators wouldn't allow Nvidia to buy Arm. Therefore, Arm will layoff about 1,000 people. Aren't we glad we have regulators?

Meanwhile in America, our Dept of Defense gives excess military gear to local law enforcement who is now giving excess military gear to folks in Ukraine. Of course the American taxpayer bought all this. And why do we buy more than we need? No one seems to be asking that question.

I like computing history. This is a good piece on the DEC PDP-11 minicomputer.

We can buy "smart" watches for less than $100, but we still buy the expensive Apple Watch.

Wednesday 16 March 2022

WOW! Great photo of the International Space Station passing in front of the moon.

Russia already had a small computing sector. Since the invasion of Ukraine, there has been a significant brain drain as programmers are leaving fast.

Wired takes an in-depth look at GitHub's CoPilot: software that is supposed to write software. To date, the results are interesting, but not high-enough quality to matter.

More electric motorcycles and bicycles. The prices make them toys for the rich and impractical for everyone else.

Steam (the game engine) is coming to "some" Chromebooks. This means the most expensive models that are again impractical for the average user.

Next month an updated line of AMD processors will hit the market. More processing power, about the same price.

Intel is investing billion$ in Germany and Ireland for new semiconductor factories. Let's all move out of China as it is an unreliable partner.

The governors of El Salvador wanted BitCoin to be part of their currency. Six months into the experiment...well, it isn't working well.

A look at how technicians in Ukraine are working every day to keep the circuits up so that residents can communicate inside and outside their country. And experts are still scratching their heads about why the Russians are allowing communications to continue.

It appears that our US Senate doesn't have much to do and has lots of spare time on its hands as it passes a bill to make daylight savings time permanent and thereby altering the geography of our planet.

News Flash (not): makers (and profiters) of booster shots say that booster shots are necessary.

Thursday 17 March 2022

Some notes on the international, volunteer hacker army involved in the Russia-Ukraine war.

Tipping point: for the first time, more than half of global smartphone sales are for 5G phones. Apple still rules the market.

We now have the technology to turn a live sports event into a cartoon. I suppose this solves some problem of which I know nothing. A good use of technology? I don't think so.

The CEOs of Intel and Micron will appear before our Congress with empty hands extended. Yes, having semiconductor manufacturing in America is a national good. But do the taxpayers have to fund it?

Facebook doubles the video of its Ray-Ban Stories to 60 seconds.

An in-depth review of this years iPad Air. It is a middle-of-the-line iPad and fills that role nicely.

Microsoft updates its camera for the Surface Hub system. The entire system is good for telecommuting and meetings and all that. The idea is old, the execution is better.

Microsoft updates Teams and Outlook and such for better hybrid and remote working.

Google announces its I/O event for May 11-12. It will be online only.

Stanford University's Institute for Human-Centered AI releases its annual AI Index Report.

Something to try: Apple's Universal Control.

Of course this is silly, but so is year round daylight savings time.

News Flash (not): Calculus in college weeds out many, many aspiring STEM persons. The solution? Remove the M from STEM. Or maybe teach better or maybe just tell some folks about real life.

Friday 18 March 2022

An in-depth review of Apple's new Mac Studio.

And a similar review of Apple's new Studio Display.

Google releases the Android 13 developer preview.

The Russians may be removed or may remove themselves from the Internet. That is bad news for all of us as it would be the beginning of the "spinter-net." The ease with which everyone communicates with everyone on the planet will end. That would be a big boost for censorship.

An AI system pumps out 40,000 toxic chemical formulas in six hours. These could all be used as chemical weapons. Toxicity is quite simple.

PayPal makes some changes so that it is easy to send money to Ukraine.

Lest we forget, Ukraine is a modern country with research institutes where researchers are trying to carry on in a loud and dirty environment.

We find yet another early sign of dementia. No cure, no treatment, just another sign.

The Russians have been blocked from using cloud storage services in the west. They will run out of storage space. Hence, we are pushing the Russians away from American cloud companies to the hands of Chinese cloud companies. We often do the opposite of what we wish.

One computer programmer in Ukraine tells his story.

Saturday 19 March 2022

This is good, practical advice for working at large and not-so-large companies. Seek a salary, not perks. Be recognized. Keep yourself portable.

Some robotics advances at MIT's CSAIL.

Big trouble in China as the governors there force Alibaba and Tencent to layoff 50,000 persons.

Arnold Schwarzenegger makes a 9-minute video plea to the people of Russia. Powerful. Well done. Let's hope the message makes it through the filters.

One report from the first SxSW in three years. Big money is pushing the metaverse and such. Nothing really to see here.

For those with impaired vision, Microsoft's Edge browser generates descriptions of images on web pages. Excellent use of technology.

Yet another favorable review of the new Apple Mac Studio. They did one right this time.

Google successfully hits some milestones in running undersea fibre optic cables from Europe to Africa.

Earlier this week, our Senate passed a bill for permanent daylight savings time. It appears that none of the Senators were aware of this. Perhaps they will correct themselves in a rare move of humility.

This is a good essay on how criminals clean the money they steal. It touches more of us than we know.

Sitting here in Starbucks, two parents are thumbing through their smartphones and never saying a single word to their teenage son across the table from them. Family time? Please folks, converse with your kids at every opportunity.

Sunday 20 March 2022

Artificial Intelligence (recognizing patterns) is being applied to recognize noises (speech) of animals and learn how they communicate. People who live around animals have recognized calls and grunts and understand which ones are welcoming and which are warning.

It appears that Elon Musk did a good one by sending StarLink terminals to Ukraine. These provide Internet connection and communication via satellite. The Russians haven't learned how to knock out these things, yet.

A crypto mining facility moves into rural Tennessee and the locals hate it. Too much noise.

I am happy to report that little by little people are starting to sit in Starbucks and talk again. Enough is enough, let's be neighborly again.

Yet another article on how to play Wordle.

"Expertise is about learning new ways to notice."---Seth Godin

A basic analog electrical circuit "learns" better than computer simulations of networks. This is all basic stuff. It is a shame that many practitioners today don't know history and don't realize what it is they are doing.

This is how things usually work in Hollywood---it took 17 years for Microsoft's Halo to become a show.

Benchmarks show that Apple's latest silicon is not as good at graphics-heavy work as Nvidia's top GPUs. To expect such would be silly.

Yet another study claiming that self-driving trucks will replace 90% of current drivers. This study does have some common sense in it about transfer stations that use humans to drive the complicated start and finish of routes and use self-driving to do the mundane long haul portion.