All posts tagged: tech

Why Apple’s October Push Into Smart Home Tech Changes Everything

Why Apple’s October Push Into Smart Home Tech Changes Everything

Published by skeptic

Apple’s October event is generating significant anticipation, promising a range of product announcements that could reshape its ecosystem. From innovative smart home devices to advanced MacBooks and iPads, the event is expected to cater to a diverse audience, including casual users and professionals. Apple plans to unveil these updates in two stages: a live presentation […] The post Why Apple’s October Push Into Smart Home Tech Changes Everything appeared first on Geeky Gadgets. Source link

Big Tech and the Limits of the Caveat

Big Tech and the Limits of the Caveat

Published by Jenni Sidey

I knew who Frances Haugen was the moment she blew the whistle on Facebook (now Meta) by leaking tens of thousands of pages of internal documents to a Wall Street Journal reporter. I’m a former movie executive turned developmental psychologist who studies media and teens. The documents she released revealed that Instagram’s own researchers knew that teenage girls felt the platform was harming their body image. That research was highly relevant to my field, so like a well-trained scientist, I went straight to the underlying materials, which had been presented to Facebook executives in the form of a slide deck. After reading it, I felt convinced that the conclusions being drawn went far beyond what the data could establish. Importantly, I had no illusions that Facebook prioritized young people’s well-being in their product design. Yet I also was certain I understood the situation: Haugen thought she was doing the right thing based on a faulty understanding of the research. I was frustrated that the press used her revelation to create a fear-based narrative about Big …

Male AI Bots Get ‘Paid’ More Than Their Female Counterparts

Male AI Bots Get ‘Paid’ More Than Their Female Counterparts

Published by Sam Flores

When can we say that AI has true human-like intelligence, rather than just impressive coding? Is it when large language models (LLMs) feel hunger, pain, or fear? When bots develop a worldview? I’ll be honest – answering that is above my pay grade. Speaking of which, AI agents have gotten closer to people in one regard: they just got their very own wage gap. Yes, you read that right. New research from the University of Limerick has shown that even when the “women” we’re working with aren’t real, we’re still inclined to pay them less than the “men”. Real-life influences seem to map onto AI agents In the new study, researchers asked 189 participants to complete work-related jobs with human-like AI bots in a virtual office. One of these digital agents looked and sounded male (Johan), while another presented as a woman (Johanna). People taking part in the study were given real money, which they were asked to divide between themselves and their on-screen co-worker. This was meant to show what they saw the assistant’s …

Why we’re watching these climate tech companies

Why we’re watching these climate tech companies

Published by skeptic

Our chosen companies tend to reflect several aspects of the current moment. Here are some of the companies we picked and the key themes worth highlighting.  China is the center of the climate and energy tech world Forgive me—I know I’ve made this point before. Feel free to call me Captain Obvious. But I think China’s dominance in energy technology is a global trend that bears repeated mentioning.   China is home to the world’s largest grid, and renewables are coming online more quickly than I can wrap my head around. Contributing to that boom is Envision Energy, a renewables giant appearing on our list for the second time. The company has installed over 100 gigawatts of wind power worldwide, as well as over 50 gigawatt-hours of battery storage. Like many other Chinese companies right now, Envision is looking beyond the crowded Chinese market and setting its sights abroad, with projects in Germany, Brazil, and Australia and upcoming work in Vietnam. China is also leading innovation in key technologies. I’ve been fascinated by the potential for …

Tristan Harris’ Tech Nonprofit Is Laying Off Most Staff and Going ‘Founder-Led’

Tristan Harris’ Tech Nonprofit Is Laying Off Most Staff and Going ‘Founder-Led’

Published by skeptic

The Center for Humane Technology, the online safety group cofounded by former Google product manager Tristan Harris and featured in the hit documentary The Social Dilemma, is laying off about half of its 16 non-founder employees, ex-staffers tell WIRED. The organization is ending its policy research and litigation work to focus instead on what it calls “founder-led” projects. The nine departures, which include executive director Julie Guirado and senior director of strategy Camille Carlton, arrive shortly after the center scored a series of major courtroom victories against social media companies. The lawsuits drew on its research alleging that the platforms were deliberately designed to keep kids glued to their screens. But amid that success, internal debates had been brewing for years over the organization’s direction, according to 16 former workers, most of whom spoke with WIRED earlier this year on the condition of anonymity because they feared professional repercussions. CHT’s board ultimately determined that trying to operate both as an advocacy group fronted by Harris and a think tank producing policy papers had stretched it …

The 28 Best Prime Day Tech Deals Will Expire Tonight

The 28 Best Prime Day Tech Deals Will Expire Tonight

Published by skeptic

You won’t find a better cheap monitor than this. That’s always true of the Dell 27 Plus S2725HSM, but it’s especially true at $130, which is the cheapest I’ve ever seen it at. It’s just a basic 1920 x 1080 resolution, but the fully adjustable stand and great image quality gives this a major step up over every comparable monitor I’ve seen. If you’ve got some more cash to spend, I’d also recommend the upgraded 4K model, which is also on sale at a new low price. A tidy, affordable pair of PC speakers, Edifier’s M60 is a bargain at its usual price, so this discount is not to be sniffed at. These speakers produce a surprisingly rich, clear sound that persists when you crank the volume, and there’s a thump of bass. They also come with angled stands, and connect via USB-C, 3.5 mm, or Bluetooth 5.3. Tablets and E-Reader Deals Photograph: Brenda Stolyar Photograph: Brenda Stolyar The best iPad for most people, if you don’t already have the iPad (11th-generation, A16), now is …

When to upgrade your tech – and when to keep it a little longer

When to upgrade your tech – and when to keep it a little longer

Published by Sam Flores

The tech giants’ attempts to persuade people to upgrade to new gadgets every two years are proving less and less effective. According to YouGov polling, Brits are increasingly deciding to stick with the devices they have for longer, and it isn’t altogether surprising. As well as the inherent wastefulness of the bi-annual upgrade cycle, year-on-year improvements are less dramatic than they used to be, and tech prices are sky-rocketing thanks to the growing needs of AI data centres. Inevitably, however, there will come a time when you need to bite the bullet and buy a new model. These are the questions to ask yourself to decide whether that should be today, or whether you can kick the can a little further down the road. How’s the performance? A good place to start is to evaluate how your device functions day-to-day versus the day you bought it. Tech inevitably slows down over time, but the drop isn’t equal among devices: a five-year-old flagship smartphone may still outperform a budget model from last year. If it’s still …

British lawmaker calls for audit after U.S. charges tech executives with concealing company’s Russian ownership

British lawmaker calls for audit after U.S. charges tech executives with concealing company’s Russian ownership

Published by Sam Flores

Alexandria, Virginia —  Editor’s note: this story was translated from two original VOA Russian articles that were combined [article 1, article 2]. A British lawmaker called for an audit of U.K. police forces’ use of Russian-developed software after U.S. authorities filed a criminal complaint accusing two Oxygen Forensics executives of conspiring to conceal the Virginia-based company’s Russian ownership and the Russian development of software sold to U.S. government agencies. The call came after Britain’s Daily Telegraph reported that London’s Metropolitical police paused its use of the company’s software in light of the charges filed by U.S. authorities. “Our Police should not be using equipment developed by Kremlin-linked firms,” Conservative lawmaker Alicia Kearns said Thursday in a post on X. Kearns urged the Home Office, British Department responsible for internal affairs, to order a “full audit of every force’s use of this software.” Lee Reiber, CEO of Oxygen Forensics, which develops digital forensic software used to extract and analyze data from electronic devices, and Oleg Sergeyevich Davydov, a Russian national whom U.S. authorities say is one …

3 myths about tech history to erase from your memory

3 myths about tech history to erase from your memory

Published by Jenni Sidey

There’s an ironic saying in journalism: “That’s too good to fact check.” Some stories are so funny—and so useful when you’re trying to make a point—that people repeat them constantly. Over time these stories are widely believed, at which point you can call them myths.  I’ve written more than a few myth-busting articles for Popular Science, and many of the myths are centuries old. But computers haven’t been around for long, depending on how you define the word “computer”. A lot of the people who defined the history of computing are still around, so you’d think our information about the field would be unclouded. Yeah, about that. Here are a few commonly believed myths about the history of computers.  A moth wasn’t the first bug There’s possibly nothing that better represents “too good to fact check” than the supposed origin of the term “computer bug.” The popular story dates back to 1947, when engineers at Harvard found a moth inside the Mark II computer. Someone at the lab taped the moth into a notebook and …

Autonomous Orange: YMX adds Outrider self-driving tech to its electric yard trucks

Autonomous Orange: YMX adds Outrider self-driving tech to its electric yard trucks

Published by skeptic

The logistics experts at 3PL provider YMX know a thing or three about running an efficient fleet, but even they are feeling the nationwide shortage of qualified yard operators. To help keep the goods moving and the wheels turning, the company is turning to self-driving, zero-emission yard trucks at customer sites as part of a new pilot with AI startup Outrider. Under a new five-year commercial agreement, YMX will operate the autonomous Outrider System on its fleet of all-electric Orange EV yard dogs in large enterprise customer yards starting this year. The updated, self-driving Class 8 heavy trucks promise to deliver safer, more productive supply chain operations to both the 3PL and its customers. “Outrider’s self-driving yard trucks are a strategic addition to our Autonomous Yard Operating System, expanding how we use technology to execute yard operations and create value for our customers,” explains Matt Yearling, CEO of YMX Logistics. “We selected Outrider because of its industry-leading approach to system safety, use of advanced AI capabilities across diverse yard environments, and operational maturity.” Cooking, WITHOUT …