WEBVTT - Tech News: Google's AI Pushes Diversity Too Far 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:12.280 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, 0:00:12.280 --> 0:00:15.520 and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:15.560 --> 0:00:18.639 I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the 0:00:18.760 --> 0:00:21.400 tech are you. It's time for some tech news that 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:24.880 caught my eye this week. We are on February twenty third, 0:00:25.120 --> 0:00:29.400 twenty twenty four. Let's get to it now. Yesterday was 0:00:29.560 --> 0:00:32.360 a bit of a doozy for cellular carriers here in 0:00:32.360 --> 0:00:36.520 the United States. Disruptions and service plagued AT and T customers, 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:40.839 and reportedly some folks who patronize other carriers had similar problems. 0:00:41.080 --> 0:00:44.479 It was a massive outage and it lasted for several hours. 0:00:44.880 --> 0:00:48.160 Those with Wi Fi capable phones could still make calls 0:00:48.159 --> 0:00:51.560 over Wi Fi networks, but once out of the electromagnetic 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:55.280 embrace of the router, they found themselves without servants. Speculation 0:00:55.480 --> 0:00:58.520 range from a technical glitch to a possible cyber attack 0:00:58.560 --> 0:01:01.680 as being the cause of the issue. That last possibility 0:01:01.720 --> 0:01:05.160 got the authorities involved, as more than seventy thousand dollars 0:01:05.240 --> 0:01:09.720 reports flooded in from cities like Houston and Dallas and Texas, 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:13.480 Los Angeles. Out in California, Chicago and Illinois and my 0:01:13.640 --> 0:01:17.040 hometown of Atlanta, Georgia. As for those other carriers, T 0:01:17.240 --> 0:01:20.240 Mobile and Cricket Wireless reported some of their customers had 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:23.959 also mentioned a loss of service, and curiously, it seemed 0:01:23.959 --> 0:01:26.480 to happen after those customers had tried to call AT 0:01:26.560 --> 0:01:29.160 and T customers. I should also add that Cricket Wireless 0:01:29.160 --> 0:01:32.479 actually piggybacks off of AT and t's network, so maybe 0:01:32.480 --> 0:01:34.959 it's not such a big surprise that they had some 0:01:35.160 --> 0:01:39.480 issues with their customers. The Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, 0:01:40.000 --> 0:01:43.640 has launched an investigation into the incident. The US Cybersecurity 0:01:43.640 --> 0:01:46.560 and Infrastructure Security Agency also looked into it, plus the 0:01:46.760 --> 0:01:50.960 Department of Homeland Security started to investigate it. But this morning, 0:01:51.040 --> 0:01:53.600 AT and T says the problem that came down to, quote, 0:01:53.680 --> 0:01:57.400 the application and execution of an incorrect process used as 0:01:57.440 --> 0:02:00.880 we were expanding our network end quote. That's according to 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:03.560 an actual AT and T release. This lines up with 0:02:03.760 --> 0:02:07.680 an earlier analysis from the Cybersecurity Agency. They said that 0:02:07.760 --> 0:02:10.600 the most likely cause of the issue was a fault 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:14.240 in a cloud computing configuration error. While it took hours 0:02:14.280 --> 0:02:16.600 to restore service to all customers, AT and T says 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:19.880 that process is now complete so hopefully if you have 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:22.079 AT and T you don't have any issues right now. 0:02:22.600 --> 0:02:25.920 And now a quick update on Cruise. Not Tom Cruise, 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:29.280 but rather the autonomous taxi company that famously got in 0:02:29.360 --> 0:02:32.320 trouble when one of its vehicles struck and then dragged 0:02:32.360 --> 0:02:35.320 a pedestrian for twenty feet or so while the car 0:02:35.360 --> 0:02:40.040 was pulling over, and then allegedly Cruz was attempting to 0:02:40.160 --> 0:02:43.400 cover up the incident by not sharing their video of 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:47.080 the actual accident. Anyway, the state of California has revoked 0:02:47.120 --> 0:02:50.920 Cruise's license from operating within that state, but the company 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:54.160 is looking at other cities and is reportedly preparing to 0:02:54.200 --> 0:02:58.200 return to service with actual drivers in the seats as well. 0:02:58.400 --> 0:03:01.880 Spokesman Pat Morrissey said, our goal is to relaunch in 0:03:01.960 --> 0:03:07.120 one city with manually driven vehicles and supervised testing as 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:10.040 soon as possible, once we have taken steps to rebuild 0:03:10.080 --> 0:03:13.040 trust with regulators and the public. End quote. Now. I 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:15.800 would like to think that our trust would require a 0:03:15.840 --> 0:03:18.800 lot of work to rebuild, but I just don't know, 0:03:18.919 --> 0:03:22.280 because some folks just love them sell some technology. But 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:24.880 then again, Cruz has to turn things around if it 0:03:24.960 --> 0:03:27.720 is to remain a viable business. Since that accident, the 0:03:27.760 --> 0:03:31.440 company has had several top leaders jump ship, and it 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:35.280 has also downsized more than twenty percent. So they definitely 0:03:35.280 --> 0:03:37.560 need to make things start to happen, or else there's 0:03:37.560 --> 0:03:40.560 not going to be a company anymore. Google is back 0:03:40.560 --> 0:03:44.280 in the hot seat because it's newly renamed AI, which 0:03:44.320 --> 0:03:47.000 is now known as Gemini, has a tendency to go 0:03:47.080 --> 0:03:49.920 a little overboard for the sake of diversity. Now, I 0:03:49.920 --> 0:03:53.760 think most of us understand that in most contexts, diversity 0:03:54.120 --> 0:03:57.560 is important. It brings fresh perspectives and methods to bear. 0:03:58.040 --> 0:04:02.200 Generally speaking, we all benefit when we concentrate on making 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:07.080 sure we are championing diversity. But if you wanted to 0:04:07.120 --> 0:04:09.680 create a historically accurate portrayal of a group of people, 0:04:09.760 --> 0:04:13.640 such as, oh, I don't know Nazi soldiers, you might 0:04:13.680 --> 0:04:16.840 be shocked if the AI generated image included people of 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:22.680 color dressed in Nazi uniforms. The Nazis famously were not inclusive. 0:04:23.040 --> 0:04:25.280 This sounds a bit like Godwin's law, right, I mean, 0:04:25.279 --> 0:04:27.719 that's the law that says any conversation on the Internet 0:04:27.800 --> 0:04:31.920 will inevitably gravitate toward Hitler as folks disagree with one another. 0:04:32.200 --> 0:04:35.360 But the genesis of the complaints gets a little bit 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:39.120 more murky because they start in the anti diversity crowd, 0:04:39.480 --> 0:04:43.360 or folks who are kind of like white rights people, 0:04:43.520 --> 0:04:46.760 or they just are I guess they would position themselves 0:04:46.800 --> 0:04:49.679 as anti woke. But these were people who are complaining 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:52.279 that if you asked Gemini to create images of like, say, 0:04:52.360 --> 0:04:55.359 an American woman, that it would create some images that 0:04:55.400 --> 0:04:57.640 included people of color, and maybe you'd end up with 0:04:57.680 --> 0:05:00.000 more people of color than white people. Maybe you'd even 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:02.080 end up with a group of people and there's no 0:05:02.640 --> 0:05:06.440 white person represented in that group. This has led to 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:09.760 some of these people arguing that Google is pushing anti 0:05:09.839 --> 0:05:13.560 white propaganda on the public, which, you know, let's be serious. 0:05:13.600 --> 0:05:15.919 I mean, the examples I've looked at at least have 0:05:16.440 --> 0:05:19.760 had white folks in those examples. It's not like they were, 0:05:20.279 --> 0:05:23.440 you know, completely left out. And goodness knows, America has 0:05:23.480 --> 0:05:26.880 a very long history of producing media that studiously ignored 0:05:26.920 --> 0:05:29.400 the fact that people who are not white also live 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:33.120 in America. See also the sitcom Friends. You would think 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:37.600 that New York was almost entirely white based on that show. Anyway, 0:05:38.120 --> 0:05:41.240 the Nazi thing indicates that perhaps Google has been a 0:05:41.240 --> 0:05:46.000 little heavy handed when trying to force diversity into image generation. Right, Like, 0:05:46.040 --> 0:05:49.560 there are different ways to have diversity work its way 0:05:49.600 --> 0:05:53.760 into your product, and brute force is not necessarily the 0:05:53.800 --> 0:05:57.200 best way. You can almost imagine that the algorithm has 0:05:57.240 --> 0:05:59.640 a little like switch at the end of the sequence, 0:05:59.760 --> 0:06:02.800 as is the group of people that you've created diverse 0:06:02.920 --> 0:06:06.400 if not insert people of color. Now, obviously that is 0:06:06.440 --> 0:06:09.960 not appropriate in every context, and honestly it points out 0:06:10.080 --> 0:06:13.400 that true diversity and fairness is really hard to achieve, 0:06:13.720 --> 0:06:17.160 even if we're just talking virtually. That doesn't mean that 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:19.800 we shouldn't bust our butts to try and achieve it. 0:06:20.200 --> 0:06:23.240 And I would recommend Adam Robertson's article on the Verge 0:06:23.279 --> 0:06:28.200 titled Google apologizes for missing the mark after Gemini generated 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:31.640 racially diverse Nazis. If you'd like to read more, it's 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:35.280 a very good article. In other Google Gemini news, Google 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:39.440 incorporated an AI writing generator into Google Chrome this week. 0:06:39.760 --> 0:06:42.840 Now to use this, you actually first must enable it. 0:06:43.080 --> 0:06:44.919 You have to go into settings to do this, and 0:06:44.960 --> 0:06:47.400 I did that this morning, but I haven't really had 0:06:47.400 --> 0:06:49.520 a chance to take this out for a spin to 0:06:49.560 --> 0:06:51.800 see what it's like. I'll be sure to report back 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:54.240 once I've had some time with it. I did try 0:06:54.600 --> 0:06:58.000 the tab organizer option. There's an option that's supposed to 0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:01.719 reorganize your tab so that they make sense, but I 0:07:01.760 --> 0:07:05.080 had already kind of grouped my tabs into relevant research. 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:08.479 So I guess there just wasn't anything left for Gemini 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:11.920 to organize because nothing happened. But you know, it's either 0:07:11.920 --> 0:07:14.679 that or it just didn't work anyway. You can also 0:07:14.720 --> 0:07:17.880 do things like you can click within a text field online. 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:21.200 Let's say you found an online form, like maybe you're 0:07:21.280 --> 0:07:24.520 leaving a review for a product, and you can choose 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:28.960 help me write by right clicking, you know, write write. 0:07:29.520 --> 0:07:33.239 That will get Gemini to either write or rewrite your stuff. 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:36.520 So maybe you want to sound particularly educated while you're 0:07:36.560 --> 0:07:39.000 writing your next review about a pair of sneakers or whatever, 0:07:39.240 --> 0:07:42.160 you can use this option. I have not tried this yet, 0:07:42.200 --> 0:07:45.800 so I don't know what it's like, but it's good 0:07:45.800 --> 0:07:47.760 to note that if you do use this feature, Google 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:51.480 will collect some data about the whole process, like what 0:07:51.640 --> 0:07:55.160 site you're on and what you wrote or had Gemini 0:07:55.280 --> 0:07:59.400 write for you, and further this then could be reviewed 0:07:59.400 --> 0:08:02.800 by human beings further along the chain, as a way 0:08:02.840 --> 0:08:04.680 to make sure that Gemini is on track and is 0:08:04.720 --> 0:08:07.880 improving over time, So there could be human review added 0:08:07.920 --> 0:08:11.040 into this, So for the privacy minded, you might want 0:08:11.080 --> 0:08:14.600 to think twice before you activate this feature, you know, 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:18.800 and otherwise the things you write are possibly going to 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:21.559 be reviewed by human beings, and if you're writing stuff 0:08:21.560 --> 0:08:24.360 that you'd rather human beings not actually see, which I 0:08:24.400 --> 0:08:26.080 don't know why you'd be writing on the internet if 0:08:26.080 --> 0:08:29.040 that's the case, but maybe don't use this. The website 0:08:29.080 --> 0:08:31.120 Reddit is about to go public, so it's about to 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:34.240 hold its initial public offering, as in, you know, become 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:37.400 a publicly traded company. This is a really big deal 0:08:37.440 --> 0:08:40.600 for several reasons. Reddit the site that lets users create 0:08:40.640 --> 0:08:43.480 and manage pages called subreddit. It's about pretty much any 0:08:43.520 --> 0:08:46.400 topic you can imagine, and probably a few you can't. 0:08:47.000 --> 0:08:50.160 It has served as a sort of gathering ground for 0:08:50.280 --> 0:08:52.920 interesting links to all sorts of stuff online, and it's 0:08:52.920 --> 0:08:55.880 been around for years, but it has never turned a profit. 0:08:56.360 --> 0:09:00.200 In fact, it lost more than ninety million dollars last year. However, 0:09:00.240 --> 0:09:02.720 it did post a twenty one percent growth in revenue 0:09:02.840 --> 0:09:05.800 year over year, so it made more money, which meant 0:09:05.840 --> 0:09:11.120 it lost less money overall. It also recently went through 0:09:11.120 --> 0:09:14.240 a really rocky situation where the company changed its Application 0:09:14.320 --> 0:09:18.080 Programmer Interface policy or API policy, and in the process 0:09:18.120 --> 0:09:21.719 it alienated a whole bunch of its user base. You know, 0:09:21.800 --> 0:09:25.920 Reddit saw users deliberately sabotaged several popular subreddits as a 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:28.720 result of that, and the experience left many Reddit users 0:09:28.840 --> 0:09:31.439 sour on the site. Now that being said, Reddit has 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:34.200 offered something of an olive branch, at least to the 0:09:34.240 --> 0:09:37.120 most prolific Reddit users. They will have the chance to 0:09:37.120 --> 0:09:39.680 purchase shares and Reddit before it goes active on the 0:09:39.679 --> 0:09:43.400 stock market. That means you can potentially buy shares at 0:09:43.440 --> 0:09:45.560 a lower price than what it will be when it 0:09:45.760 --> 0:09:49.280 is trading on the stock market, though that's not a guarantee. 0:09:49.480 --> 0:09:53.800 They can be pretty exclusive, as you know insiders in 0:09:53.880 --> 0:09:57.280 this case. So there might be some prolific redditors out 0:09:57.280 --> 0:09:59.480 there who still hold a grudge against Reddit for those 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:02.680 changes the API. But I have seen people really fall 0:10:02.760 --> 0:10:04.480 over themselves for the chance to be part of an 0:10:04.480 --> 0:10:07.440 exclusive group, even if that group isn't really impressive. So 0:10:07.720 --> 0:10:09.840 I'm guessing a lot of the folks who have the 0:10:09.920 --> 0:10:13.280 opportunity to make those purchases will in the interest of 0:10:13.280 --> 0:10:16.840 full disclosure, I'm definitively not one of those people. I 0:10:16.920 --> 0:10:19.480 use Reddit for research, but I do so pretty much 0:10:19.720 --> 0:10:23.040 only as a lurker. I think I may have posted 0:10:23.040 --> 0:10:26.520 on Reddit perhaps half a dozen times total across my 0:10:26.760 --> 0:10:29.640 entire history with the site, and it's almost always as 0:10:29.640 --> 0:10:32.800 a comment to an existing thread. But in other interesting news, 0:10:32.840 --> 0:10:37.160 Open Ai co founder and former CEO and then reinstated CEO, 0:10:37.559 --> 0:10:41.000 Sam Altman is one of the top shareholders on Reddit. 0:10:41.240 --> 0:10:43.600 He boasts an eight point seven percent share in the 0:10:43.600 --> 0:10:46.800 company that's more than twice as much as CEO Steve 0:10:46.880 --> 0:10:50.840 Huffman possesses of his own company. This means that Altman 0:10:50.920 --> 0:10:55.560 can actually outvote the CEO on shareholder matters. Altman's shares 0:10:55.640 --> 0:11:00.400 means he's the third largest shareholder overall. The company's Advance Publications, 0:11:00.440 --> 0:11:03.439 which owns Conde Nast among other things, and the Chinese 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:07.040 company ten Cent, which owns pretty much everything, are ahead 0:11:07.040 --> 0:11:10.480 of him. Also probably not related, but Reddit has started 0:11:10.520 --> 0:11:13.439 to negotiate with AI companies to allow them to use 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:16.680 Reddit to help train AI in return for paying a 0:11:16.679 --> 0:11:19.520 hefty amount of money. So Google recently forked over sixty 0:11:19.559 --> 0:11:22.840 million dollars and have agreed to do that per year 0:11:23.240 --> 0:11:25.840 for the privilege of using Reddit to train AI. Which 0:11:25.880 --> 0:11:29.040 is interesting that Sam Altman has such a prominent place 0:11:29.080 --> 0:11:32.120 in the shareholders and Reddit is taking money from Google, 0:11:32.320 --> 0:11:35.360 a competitor to open Ai, for this training privilege. I 0:11:35.440 --> 0:11:37.440 really wonder if open ai will have to cough up 0:11:37.480 --> 0:11:40.640 money to do the same thing. I guess we'll find out. Okay, 0:11:40.679 --> 0:11:42.800 we're going to take a quick break to thank our sponsors. 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:55.320 We'll be back with more news after this. Okay, we're back. 0:11:55.640 --> 0:11:58.240 So Yahoo is shaking things up over at in gadget. 0:11:58.440 --> 0:11:59.920 If you're not familiar with the inn gadget, that's a 0:11:59.920 --> 0:12:03.000 site that reports on tech topics and offers up stuff 0:12:03.080 --> 0:12:06.640 like product reviews. The company laid off ten people in 0:12:06.679 --> 0:12:10.920 the editorial department, including top leadership positions like the editor 0:12:10.960 --> 0:12:14.120 in chief, and it also split the editorial department into 0:12:14.200 --> 0:12:17.600 two groups, so one group will focus exclusively on news 0:12:17.640 --> 0:12:21.040 and features and the other one on reviews. Reportedly, this 0:12:21.120 --> 0:12:23.559 is to realign the editorial staff in an effort to 0:12:23.679 --> 0:12:26.560 drive more traffic to the site, because more traffic means 0:12:26.679 --> 0:12:29.920 more advertising revenue. And Gadget's general manager issued a memo 0:12:29.960 --> 0:12:33.720 that said the changes will quote increase our velocity in 0:12:33.760 --> 0:12:37.600 the quote that raises huge red flags for me as 0:12:37.600 --> 0:12:40.760 someone who used to write articles for a website. Increase 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:44.400 our velocity sounds a lot like making deadlines much tighter, 0:12:44.880 --> 0:12:49.439 requiring writers to write far more pieces per given amount 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.040 of time, and giving writers less time to research and 0:12:52.120 --> 0:12:54.680 understand a topic, which makes it harder to write something 0:12:54.720 --> 0:12:57.280 that isn't just a regurgitated press release. And that doesn't 0:12:57.320 --> 0:13:01.400 really help anybody. Now. I don't have any attachment to Engadget. 0:13:01.400 --> 0:13:03.320 I don't know any people who work there or used 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:06.079 to work there, but I really hope everyone find it, finds, 0:13:06.120 --> 0:13:08.480 you know, gainful employment. They end up in a good place, 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:10.439 because it's a rough time to be out of work 0:13:10.600 --> 0:13:13.199 as a web based writer. Now I probably should have 0:13:13.240 --> 0:13:15.960 put this next story after the cruise story, but here 0:13:15.960 --> 0:13:18.559 we are. So. The State of California has put Alphabet's 0:13:18.559 --> 0:13:22.360 application to expand Robotaxi services in the San Francisco and 0:13:22.400 --> 0:13:27.680 Los Angeles areas until June nineteenth. The California Public Utilities 0:13:27.679 --> 0:13:32.280 Commission states that the application is suspended for further staff review. Now, 0:13:32.320 --> 0:13:35.120 this is a standard procedure if the agency does not 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:38.439 approve an application within thirty days of it having been submitted. 0:13:38.800 --> 0:13:41.840 So it's not like this is totally unusual. It's not 0:13:41.920 --> 0:13:45.560 like it. It's definitely an indication that California is pushing 0:13:45.600 --> 0:13:48.760 back against alphabet and WEIMO. My guess is that the 0:13:48.800 --> 0:13:53.240 state of California is reevaluating their stance on autonomous vehicle 0:13:53.280 --> 0:13:56.120 operation in the wake of the cruise incident as well 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:59.400 as other accidents involving autonomous vehicles, and that it might 0:13:59.440 --> 0:14:02.000 be a wild for it issues any approvals to expand 0:14:02.040 --> 0:14:06.319 service until the state legislation decides upon suitable rules and regulations. 0:14:06.800 --> 0:14:08.400 Go back just a couple of years, and a lot 0:14:08.400 --> 0:14:11.240 of car manufacturers boasted of plans to switch over to 0:14:11.360 --> 0:14:14.520 only making electric vehicles in the near future. Mercedes Benz, 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:16.800 for example, said the plan was to go all EV 0:14:17.000 --> 0:14:19.440 by the year twenty thirty, but now the company is 0:14:19.520 --> 0:14:22.040 backing out of that promise. So the problem you see 0:14:22.240 --> 0:14:24.760 is that folks are not buying as many evs as 0:14:24.800 --> 0:14:27.840 the companies thought they would, and so the companies are 0:14:27.880 --> 0:14:32.000 scared that going all EV will just devastate their industry, 0:14:32.320 --> 0:14:34.520 and so companies are starting to change their tune, saying 0:14:34.560 --> 0:14:37.440 that they won't be quite as aggressive in pushing evs 0:14:37.440 --> 0:14:40.040 to the market, and that they will continue to produce 0:14:40.160 --> 0:14:43.960 gas and hybrid vehicles instead. That's a blow to environmentalists 0:14:44.000 --> 0:14:46.520 who are really hoping to see consumer transportation make a 0:14:46.560 --> 0:14:49.800 really big change. But the market dictates where these companies 0:14:49.800 --> 0:14:52.080 are going to go, and it's hard to argue that 0:14:52.120 --> 0:14:55.320 a company should produce itself out of business. That doesn't 0:14:55.360 --> 0:14:58.280 do really anyone any good. Now, one could argue that 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:01.880 issues like vehicle costs and charging station availability are really 0:15:01.880 --> 0:15:04.880 having an impact, but in fact it's a really complex 0:15:05.000 --> 0:15:07.480 challenge and maybe it's just too complex to follow through 0:15:07.480 --> 0:15:09.800 on promises that were made just a few years ago. 0:15:09.960 --> 0:15:13.400 Blue Sky, one of the federated social platform alternatives to 0:15:13.640 --> 0:15:16.360 x slash Twitter, made a really big move this week. 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:19.400 The company will now allow you to choose who hosts 0:15:19.440 --> 0:15:23.479 your data. So by default, blue Sky hosts all your information, 0:15:23.600 --> 0:15:25.680 but you can designate another party to host all of 0:15:25.760 --> 0:15:28.040 your data, and that includes stuff like all the stuff 0:15:28.080 --> 0:15:30.560 you post, all of your likes, all of your follows, etc. 0:15:31.160 --> 0:15:34.320 And that even includes yourself. If you want to store 0:15:34.400 --> 0:15:37.040 your data on your own server, you can do that 0:15:37.480 --> 0:15:39.800 and it doesn't have to be forever. Blue Sky structure 0:15:39.800 --> 0:15:42.640 allows you to port data from host to host, so 0:15:42.760 --> 0:15:44.960 if you change your mind, you can move your stuff. 0:15:45.120 --> 0:15:47.840 Now this is huge since most social platforms require you 0:15:47.920 --> 0:15:50.520 to host all of your information on their own servers 0:15:50.640 --> 0:15:54.000 because your data is valuable and the platform wants to 0:15:54.080 --> 0:15:56.720 leverage it. Being able to choose where it all goes 0:15:56.800 --> 0:15:59.240 gives more power to the user, and if the user 0:15:59.280 --> 0:16:02.080 determines that they're the current host is doing something shady 0:16:02.360 --> 0:16:05.360 or it's a poor steward of their information, they can 0:16:05.440 --> 0:16:07.560 change where it's stored. If you want to read more, 0:16:07.640 --> 0:16:10.560 there's a post on blue Sky. It is titled blue 0:16:10.560 --> 0:16:13.920 Sky an Open Social Web and it has all the details. 0:16:14.240 --> 0:16:16.480 Our next story is cool because it suggests we can 0:16:16.520 --> 0:16:20.480 achieve incredible boosts and processing power without having to fight 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:23.640 against the laws of quantum mechanics to do it. A 0:16:23.720 --> 0:16:28.040 UC Riverside Associate professor named Hungwai Seng has published a 0:16:28.120 --> 0:16:33.480 paper titled Simultaneous and Heterogeneous multi Threading and it explains 0:16:33.520 --> 0:16:37.600 this concept. So basically saying points out that modern computers 0:16:37.600 --> 0:16:41.280 typically have multiple processors. You know, you might have a 0:16:41.320 --> 0:16:45.640 CPU and a GPU, you might have hardware accelerators for 0:16:45.680 --> 0:16:48.560 stuff like machine learning or AI, and all of these 0:16:48.600 --> 0:16:51.400 handle information separately, kind of like as if they are 0:16:51.440 --> 0:16:54.560 in a silo, and then information can travel from processor 0:16:54.600 --> 0:16:58.720 to processor. But this means the overall process is inefficient. 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:02.080 So Saying In his team demonstrated that by multi threading 0:17:02.120 --> 0:17:05.520 processes across all of these different types of units, he 0:17:05.560 --> 0:17:10.359 could speed things up considerably. He nearly doubled processing speed 0:17:10.600 --> 0:17:13.000 while at the same time almost cutting the amount of 0:17:13.080 --> 0:17:17.080 energy needed to complete those processes by half. So not 0:17:17.160 --> 0:17:19.919 only does it boost computational speeds, does so in a 0:17:20.040 --> 0:17:23.280 really energy efficient way. It's pretty insane that he could 0:17:23.280 --> 0:17:26.240 get nearly double the output just by using multi threading 0:17:26.240 --> 0:17:29.720 across processors without having to do a single hardware upgrade. 0:17:29.920 --> 0:17:33.399 And this has the potential to create enormous benefits. So 0:17:33.480 --> 0:17:37.000 imagine that you were able to double the output and 0:17:37.200 --> 0:17:40.880 half the energy requirements of a data server farm for example. 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:43.200 Like that would mean that you would need less water 0:17:43.320 --> 0:17:45.880 to cool the data farm, you would be using less 0:17:46.000 --> 0:17:48.400 energy to run it, so it'd be more cost efficient. 0:17:48.600 --> 0:17:51.359 You'd be able to double the output. That's incredible. Of course, 0:17:51.760 --> 0:17:54.560 we could probably just screw that up by doubling the 0:17:54.640 --> 0:17:57.520 number of servers we're storing in that server farm, and 0:17:57.560 --> 0:17:59.879 then we're right back to where we started. But you know, 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:02.879 you get the point. Satan himself is actually cautioned that 0:18:03.040 --> 0:18:04.639 a lot more work has to be done to figure 0:18:04.640 --> 0:18:09.040 out when this methodology will be practical and applicable, because 0:18:09.080 --> 0:18:12.119 it might be that for some applications it's ideal, but 0:18:12.200 --> 0:18:15.199 for others we might see far less impressive gains and 0:18:15.240 --> 0:18:18.199 that it wouldn't make sense to implement it. So it 0:18:18.280 --> 0:18:20.200 is good to keep that in mind. But still pretty 0:18:20.280 --> 0:18:22.760 darn cool. Now, before I sign off, I do have 0:18:22.800 --> 0:18:24.720 an article i'd like to recommend to y'all, and this 0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:27.520 one is from Wired. It's by Lauren Good and it's 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:31.119 titled tech Job interviews are out of Control. So the 0:18:31.119 --> 0:18:33.600 piece explores how the culture in the tech sector has 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:36.280 changed dramatically over the last couple of years. You know, 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:39.960 once upon a time, developers and engineers found themselves courted 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:43.520 by headhunters and they were constantly being lured to greener 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:47.639 pastures on a regular basis with bigger compensation packages and benefits. 0:18:47.880 --> 0:18:50.879 But now an interview process might require proving your worth 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:53.880 by working on a project without you know, actually being 0:18:53.880 --> 0:18:57.600 an employee. So there you are doing real work for 0:18:57.680 --> 0:19:00.359 free in order to prove that you're worth high hiring, 0:19:00.480 --> 0:19:02.720 and meanwhile you're taking up time and energy you could 0:19:02.800 --> 0:19:06.000 be using to actually land a gig, which is pretty 0:19:06.040 --> 0:19:08.120 crazy stuff. But the full article goes into way more 0:19:08.160 --> 0:19:11.199 detailed it's well worth reading. As always, I have no 0:19:11.200 --> 0:19:13.879 connection to Wired or to Lauren Good. It's just a 0:19:13.920 --> 0:19:15.920 good article and I think you should check it out. 0:19:16.359 --> 0:19:20.040 That's it for the tech News for February twenty third, 0:19:20.160 --> 0:19:22.760 twenty twenty four. I hope you are all well. I'll 0:19:22.760 --> 0:19:32.080 talk to you again really soon. Tech Stuff is an 0:19:32.080 --> 0:19:37.600 iHeartRadio production. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, 0:19:37.760 --> 0:19:44.800 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.