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: 11-17 September, 2023

Summary of this week:

• The Russians are still in Ukraine
• Football seasons begin in America
• Apple has an event: iPhone 15 and new Watch
• Thunderbolt 5 standard released
• Tesla extends casting parts to huge assemblies of a car

Monday 11 September 2023

And this is the anniversary of the attacks on America in 2001.

Google gave us transformers a few years ago. Nothing has replace them as the dominant scheme in AI.

This is a good article capturing the state-of-the-practice of conversational AI platforms.

There is some promise here of giving speech to those who have lost that physical ability. This is what we should be doing in tech.

A good glossary of currently used AI terms.

ChatGPT creates better ideas than high-class MBA students. The sample size is to small and the judges are subjective (and often wrong), but this is interesting.

Cyber criminals from Russia wander across the border into Turkey where their skills at stealing $$$ are welcome.

Meta spends some of its money to build a better chatter than OpenAI did. The cost of these things greatly limits who can compete here.

Dozens of quotes about writing from writers. Sit down and write today, and tomorrow, and on and on.

Ten more tips. These focus on the mind of the writer.

Earning money from a blog. It is a business. It may not work for you.

Success as a writer. You define what that is. Tip: make it something you can control. You cannot control if your book is a bestseller. You cannot control if other people will pay you money.

"Earth has just seen its hottest three-month spell on record" Let's see, here we have about 300 years of records. Let's guess the earth is 3 billion years old... that is 0.00001%. Hmmmm, never mind.

Tuesday 12 September 2023

The cost of developing software is falling. The price paid by consumers is rising. Oh well.

Strong rumors of what we will and won't see at the week's event conducted by Apple.

NASA claims success in generating oxygen on Mars from local materials. Will it be enough for people?

Japan launches an unmanned vehicle to the moon. They expect to land there in February.

Meanwhile in California, the legislature wants a safety operator in all driverless trucks. Let's make a boring job really boring.

And in court, the Internet Archive seeks to preserve writings. Some publishers, however, think this violates copyrights. And the lawyers continue to profit.

Real news that isn't news: groups use 100,000 fake Facebook accounts to spread their gossip.

Nvidia claims that its revised software, coming real soon now, will halve the time required to infer over large language models.

This is silly: some believe AI will reduce our belief in political ads. That isn't possible as adults know all political ads are bologna.

Someone wrote a book about Elon Musk. Since release, they have received million$ in free publicity with everyone quoting the entire book.

McDonald's is removing the self-serve drink machines. Look for others to follow. Then in 20 years, someone will bring them back.

Gen Z walks away from college as the cost per reward has dropped significantly.

Wednesday 13 September 2023

Why half of humanity lives in a circle containing India and eastern China. Geography and climate.

I like this piece. It describes AI tools that are free or low price that an do useful things for busy people.

The use of radio waves to "see through" walls has existed for decades. Recent improvements are quite amazing.

Perhaps there will be some use for this... ??? Someone figures out how to "write on water."

A big deposit of Lithium is found on the Nevada-Oregon border. Mine it! Well, some folks don't like the idea.

Predicting the end of Nvidia's dominance in AI hardware. We shall see.

This paints a rosy picture for being able to earn a livable income as a freelance "creator."

Great engineers use basic principles. Talk with other people. Write code that people can read and understand. Do it right(er) the first time.

Apple had a big event with the iPhone 15 and a new watch. Here is one of many summaries on the Internet.

Apple promises to stop using plastic packages and leather accessories. Instead, Apple will use types of recycled materials.

TSMC's efforts to build a plant in Arizona are far behind due to labor and other problems. Their Japan expansion, however, is moving well.

"With the iPhone 15, Apple is launching a new service, Roadside Assistance via satellite" Hooray! Finally! When will other phone makers do the same?

Apple has new cloud storage plans for iCloud. Pay more money, store more stuff.

I like this Seth Godin post on minimum viable product and smallest viable audience.

An FDA medical advisory panel ruled that phenylephrine, a key ingredient in many over-the-counter cold medications just doesn't do anything. Take a spoonful of sugar or honey instead. Same results.

Intel releases the Thunderbolt 5 standard. More speed.

Thursday 14 September 2023

Kids sports then and now. We continue to slide downwards into more competition and less fun exercise.

"The best leaders - regardless of seniority or role - are also tireless investigators of the humans around them."

Some simple things to do each day.

Like fast cars? How about 0 to 60 in less than a second? See video.

Every few generations our government sues one of our most successful companies for anti-trust this or that. Now it is Google's turn.

As usual, trade sanctions caused China to build its own industry and become independent.

Gotta watch this silly video about overly complex software.

How Nvidia is moving into the cloud computing business.

MIT researchers have a new model callee EfficientViT that greatly speeds the identification of objects in images.

Let's think about this one. "Industrialists" in this third decade of the 21st century have the technical controls to stop a nation from acting in a war. These industrialists can do this. Right? Wrong? Or is it simply too much power in the hands of one person. I recall that Musk was seen as some sort of hero for sending lots of satellite terminals to Ukraine to help them defend themselves. Then Ukraine depended on the communications system. Then Musk turned them off at a critical moment. It is one thing to receive aid. It is another to depend on aid. And it is something new when the aid can be "turned off" from anywhere on the planet. Take care folks. Take care. Oh, by the way, the new Apple iPhones can access satellites for emergency contact. Who controls the iPhones? Who controls the satellites?

The story of Julia Allison who invented the "influencer" a decade before it was recognized. Stricken from history for being too far ahead of her time.

Some kids make million$ online. Is this all a violation of 19th-century child labor laws?

RETFound is an AI-based system that provides early detection of several maladies based on retinal scans. This is what we should be doing with all this technology.

CEOs of companies who have already made it want regulation that will prevent startups from having any chance at making it. Nothing new here.

Is AI generating text from text or just plain copying it word for word? In this case, it is just copying.

Microsoft is making AR/VR goggles for our Army. They seem to be progressing as they pass another round of tests in the development.

Friday 15 September 2023

Meanwhile in Texas, everything is booming. People move in for jobs. Native-born Texans stay. Highest population growth in the country. California will soon be passed by Texas in the Electoral College.

Researchers show non-human bodies to legislators in Mexico.

Here is a "do duh" moment. The governors of China ban US-made phones at work. Retaliation or coincidence. And some people claim to be adults.

Meanwhile in Sweden, they are bringing books and handwriting back into schools.

Good alternatives to the standard three questions for the daily stand up.

Ways to use ChatGPT as a writer other than, "write an essay for me."

Agility is not speed; it is the ability to change direction. Someone forgot that in the past 20 years. Doom exists now.

Rumors that Google is building an AI model called Gemini AI that will crush GPT-4.

A look at GPT Trainer. This is the type of tool we should see in the next couple of years.

Strong rumors that TSMC is delaying purchases of chipmaking equipment. This is a leading indicator that demand for chips is slowing.

Arm has its initial public offering and sees the value of its stock rise 25% on the first day.

Microsoft and Oracle work closer together in cloud services.

HP shows a foldable portable computer with a 17-inch screen. $4,999.

The return of the union brings the return of the strike. The UAW walks off the job at several companies.

Honda brings back the Motocompacto. $995 gets an electric two-wheel vehicle that looks cute and goes 15 mile at 12 mph.

Google promises software updates for Chromebooks for ten years. This makes them much more attractive to schools.

Tesla has perfected a method of building cars that casts large parts of the car in one step. One part instead of 400 parts that must be assembled. This technique could halve the cost of building a car.

Saturday 16 September 2023

This is a tale of a single freelancer working alone did a massive four-year project.

One person's experience in finding a job at a research station on Antarctica and living there.

In an effort to boost ratings, companies build their sites to please marginal users, i.e., folks who use a site a little every now and then. This hurts the user who uses the site everyday.

Meanwhile in California, where Google provides tens of thousands of jobs, the governors extract $93Million from Google. What about those states that don't have many Google jobs? Here come the lawyers.

Meanwhile in Federal court, our lawyers allege that Google trained its employees in what words to use and not use. As a former Federal employee, I know our government has the same training. Right for us, wrong for Google. Ok?

Dire economic predictions for the last quarter of 2023 in America.

This article is strongly in favor of business migrating all computing to "the cloud." Okay, someone else gets the money.

Taking AI beyond chatting to doing things by calling other software and people and giving them tasks. Such software already exists, but is called "automation" instead of AI.

Researchers build a rocket thruster the size of a fingernail that uses water as fuel. It can move little CubeSats around in their orbits.

All these moon landings and rocket developments are highlighting one thing: there are very few folks who have experience working in these endeavors.

The moon has temperature swings of 300° and 400°. Man-made objects left there expand and contract during these swings. Those reactions cause tremors or moon quakes.

It appears that teachers are using these chattering bots to create lesson plans and the like (and then not allowing students to do similar).

Sunday 17 September 2023

Meanwhile in China, the machine learning industry runs on low- or no-pay student interns who label things for the computer.

Meanwhile in Vietnam, there aren't enough engineers to work at the chip-making factories.

Testing software that is supposed to detect images created by software. The sample size is too small for any conclusions.

A couple of robots sit and cheer at an NFL game. Its a movie promotion stunt.

Where the money is, the North Korean hacking army continues to steal money to feed the Kim dynasty.

Meanwhile in Kyrgyzstan, (pause a moment to find this on the map next to China) "D Billions" is making a fortune with kids' YouTube videos. The world is a different place.

Meanwhile in Munich, students run an electric vehicle 1,599 miles on a single charge. You can't take the family for a drive in the vehicle, but it sounds like a fun student project.

Research shows, the governors of China are increasing efforts to make up bad news about America. I hope we didn't spend much money on that research.

How long does it take to mount a rescue or other emergency space launch? We just set a new record at 27 hours. We hope that this can be reduced significantly.

This is very early, but research shows a possibility of a vaccine that can reverse autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis and type 1 diabetes.