Twitter and Zoom faced some algorithmic bias:
Various technologies allow people to have their faces on screen in some way and this can cause some issues with the algorithms that give priority to certain faces in images or videos. This is intended for various conveniences such as focusing on faces to remove blur and tagging. But those things have also caused some issues.
For Zoom, that issue led to a Twitter user sharing an image from a Zoom call with a colleague, and the colleague’s head was removed from the video service. It would appear that the man’s head was removed because he’s black and the service believed a light behind him was a face instead. So it just removed him entirely. This shows a bit of a bias in how the algorithm prioritises certain people over others.
Another issue came from Twitter, in which various users tested out which photo would gain priority when Twitter’s algorithm was forced to choose between multiple faces as its display image. It started out with testing whether the algorithm would prioritise Mitch McConnel or Barack Obama, one of which is white and the other is black, and the algorithm chose to prioritise the white man.
These algorithms are designed by human beings and so while algorithms themselves cannot be racist, because they’re just machines, the prejudice of those who design them can sneak in. This may not even be conscious on the part of the designers, but it’s something to keep an eye on, and it’s something that these companies have stated that they need to keep an eye on.
Nvidia unveiled its new GPUs:
Nvidia went and showed off its new RTX 3090 GPU, an absolute beast that easily overshoots all the prior GPUs Nvidia has put out there. It does come at a nice cost of $1,499 and so it isn’t for just anyone looking to play some games. But of course it will be a far superior GPU, with improved cooling, real-time ray tracing improvements and it brings in some 8k gaming.
The GPU is an absolute beast, and for those looking for the full list of specs check out this Rock, Paper, Shotgun piece on it. It breaks the whole thing down nicely. The future of gaming comes with every year’s new innovations, but this thing looks like a gigantic leap forward. It should be interesting to see what comes next.
The Epic versus Apple saga continues:
The big kerfuffle between Epic and Apple has continued. This past month, Epic decided that it wanted Fortnite back on the App Store during these legal proceedings, but Apple was always unlikely to allow that to happen because it needs to appear strong against Epic. In addition, Apple claimed that this whole thing has just been a way to reinvigorate interest in Fortnite. The tech giant hasn’t been too happy about being challenged.
So because of this, Apple has decided to seek damages over this contract breach, and it claimed that Epic just wants more money and even decided to officially state that: “Epic portrays itself as a modern corporate Robin Hood” despite being a massive, multi-billion dollar company. And Apple has started with some retribution because of this: it decided to remove the convenience of the “sign in with Apple” feature in Fortnite (although it hasn’t implemented this yet, but has suggested that it could at any moment) and it even pulled Fortnite: Save the World from the Mac.
In the meantime, Google, which also has beef with Epic, has officially distanced itself from this whole Apple v. Epic thing. It wants people to see its court case with Epic as something completely separate from Apple’s one.
Streaming services commit to self-regulation:
No company likes to invite regulation into its industry, and the online video streaming industry is no different. You see, in India, these companies are facing the threat of government-mandated regulation. This will entail a whole bunch of legal action and such, and so instead of going through a rigamarole like that, the various streaming giants have instead decided to sign a code created by the Internet and Mobile Association of India, and this code allows them to self-regulate instead.
Various companies, like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+ and others, have committed to this self-regulation. This self-regulation seems like some pretty obvious stuff though. Things like adhering to age ratings, having internal departments for dealing with any issues and having a complaints department. At least none of the companies attempted any strong opposition to voluntary self-regulation. So that’s nice.
Researchers took the first 3,200-megapixel photo:
Researchers at Stanford have created a massive digital camera that will be installed at Stanford’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) (which is in Chile) and it will be used to study things like dark energy, dark matter and such.
According to them, this camera would be able to take a picture so large that it would take 378 ultra-high-definition TV screens to display it at full size. And that the resolution is so high that “you could see a golf ball from about 15 miles away”. So it’s a pretty gnarly photo. And the first photo was taken as a test run before it gets into the real nitty gritty of its work.
This should be a fantastic technological marvel for continuing to study things that are so very small that our disgusting human eyeballs are not able to see. Exciting times and exciting sights are ahead of us.
ByteDance is going to partner with Oracle and Walmart:
The TikTok debacle continues ever on. It all started with ByteDance, the owners of TikTok, coming out swinging by stating that it would not be selling TikTok but would instead partner up with Oracle. That would allow Oracle to handle the U.S user data and would allow TikTok to keep operating under ByteDance without having to give up its algorithm. Then Walmart expressed its interest in having a piece of the pie.
Ultimately, this resulted in Oracle taking 12.5%, Walmart taking 7.5% and the rest going to a ByteDance subsidiary called TiKTok Global (but seeing as 40% of ByteDance is owned by U.S. investors, this equals out to TikTok being majority owned by U.S. companies and individuals).
In the meantime though, this led to Trump trying to block TikTok from being downloaded, but ByteDance contested this and it got dropped. The saga continues!
Nvidia is buying Arm:
Nvidia, the PC hardware heavyweight, has confirmed that it will be buying up Arm, a chip design company, to add to its ever-expanding business. This new acquisition has not yet been finalised but the heads of Nvidia, Arm and SoftBank (the company that currently owns Arm) have agreed on the outline.
This represents Nvidia’s desire to push further into the UK as an engineering location, and so Nvidia will continue to grow. In the meantime, SoftBank will make a lot of money; up to $40 billion. And this is needed for the company after it suffering several large-scale losses over the last few years. This is unlikely to affect the end-user in any meaningful way though, but at least the capitalist machine keeps on a ticking.
China banned a kid’s programming language:
Scratch is a visual programming language developed by the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab and it’s used by about 60 million kids. It’s just there to teach you how to do some basic programming and to get you interested in it. But despite having about 3 million Chinese users, the Chinese government has decided to ban the programming language and has blocked the website from Chinese users.
The software, which is mostly used to make games, animations, stories and other cute little things, was (also) used to make some things that were critical of the Chinese government and so it had to go! Anything that criticises them is a no-no. But other educational programming languages will likely crop up in the country to take Scratch’s place.
Airbus has concepts for hydrogen-powered planes:
Airbus has decided that it needs to do some innovation, especially during a time when a deadly virus has wracked the planet and has left air travel something of a hazardous business to be in. So Airbus decided to set a 2035 deadline for new carbon-free commercial airlines. The company has put out three visual concepts for these zero emission jets thus far.
The concepts involve special hydrogen burning engines instead of the usual jet fuel ones, and some wing alterations. These jets should function the same as other jets but without all those nasty emissions. There are many issues around this though, such as the fact that hydrogen extraction is still rather expensive (although Airbus sees this as a minor hindrance as hydrogen will have to become cheaper as demand goes up) and storing hydrogen also presents a dilemma, but these are problems that will just have to be sorted out.
Scientists have made something that eats plastic:
A study has been published in the Proceedings of the National Sciences, and in it, the scientists discovered further evidence about a bacteria called Ideonella sakaiensis that produces specific enzymes that are able to break down PET, the most common form of plastic. This means that these enzymes, if synthesised, could allow us to get rid of a huge proportion of the plastic waste in the world. A substance that is notorious for being difficult to get rid of. So well done to them!
WailingWolf 