Quantum Computers: Solutions for Chemistry Challenges
Marijan Murat/DPA/Alamy
One of the critical questions in the quantum computing sector is whether these advanced machines can solve practical problems in fields like chemistry. Researchers in industrial and medical chemistry are poised to provide insights by 2026.
The complexity of determining the structure, reactivity, and other properties of molecules is inherently a quantum problem, primarily involving electrons. As molecular structures grow increasingly complex, these calculations become challenging, sometimes even surpassing the capabilities of traditional supercomputers.
Quantum computers, being inherently quantum, have a potential advantage in tackling these complex chemical calculations. As these computers develop and become more seamlessly integrated with conventional systems, they are gaining traction in the chemistry sector.
For instance, in 2025, IBM and the Japanese Institute of Scientific Research collaborated, employing quantum computers alongside supercomputers to model various molecules. Google researchers have also been innovating algorithms that unveil molecular structures. Additionally, RIKEN researchers are teaming up with Quantinuum to create efficient workflows, allowing quantum computers to calculate molecular energy with remarkable precision. Notably, the quantum computing software platform Kunova Computing introduced an algorithm that reportedly operates ten times more efficiently than traditional methods for energy calculations.
Progress is expected to expedite by 2026 as quantum computers become more advanced. “Future larger machines will allow us to create enhanced workflows, ultimately solving prevalent quantum chemistry problems,” states David Muñoz Ramo from Quantinuum. While his team currently focuses on hydrogen molecules, they foresee stepping into more intricate structures, such as catalysts for industrial reactions.
Other research entities are making strides in similar areas. In December, Microsoft announced a partnership with Algorithmiq, a quantum software startup, aimed at accelerating the development of quantum algorithms for chemistry. Furthermore, a study by Hyperion Research highlights chemistry as a focal area for advancement and investment in quantum computing, ranking it as one of the most promising applications in annual surveys.
However, meaningful progress in quantum chemical calculations depends on achieving error-free or fault-tolerant quantum computers, which will also unlock other potential applications for these devices. As Philip Schleich and Alan Aspuru-Guzik emphasized in a commentary for Science magazine, the ability of quantum computers to outperform classical computers hinges on the development of fault-tolerant algorithms. Thankfully, achieving fault tolerance is a widely accepted goal among quantum computer manufacturers worldwide.
It’s a narrative straight out of a novel—this heavy-handed tech satire highlights the hypocrisy beneath it all. Yet here we are, digesting The New York Times report that reveals Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, running private schools from their compounds in Palo Alto, California, in breach of urban zoning laws. The school, serving just 14 children—including two of the couple’s three daughters—is located less than a mile from a school they founded in 2016 for low-income families.
Mention “zoning violation” to certain Americans, and it triggers reactions akin to using “cue jumpers” among the British. The real issue here, however, transcends mere permissions. (A spokesperson for Zuckerberg and Chan informed the newspaper that families were unaware of the zoning law and that private schools, or “homeschooner pods,” are relocating elsewhere.) The crux lies in Zuckerberg’s apparent withdrawal from progressive social initiatives, opting instead to realign with the Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), which has slashed funding for diversity programs across numerous charities that support affordable housing and homeless services in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Officially, these adjustments come after CZI spent a decade mastering effective philanthropy, concluding that funding would be better directed towards scientific and medical initiatives. Unofficially, this shift appears to align with a local transformation in Zuckerberg’s worldview—from promoting human potential and equality to the establishment of a “science-first charity.” In essence, it mirrors Metahead’s political maneuverings, echoing feminist t-shirt slogans during the Biden administration while embodying a more “masculine energy” during the Trump era. Trump’s Allies now lurk in the metaverse.
Zuckerberg’s political adaptability mirrors that of other tech leaders, but there may be deeper dynamics at play. Unlike scientific research, philanthropy’s social experiments often reveal uncomfortable truths. Back in 2010, when Zuckerberg donated $100 million to revitalize the Newark Public School System, some educators criticized him for imposing startup ideologies and quick fixes—like charter schools and “parent choices”—on the complex and interconnected issues of the U.S. public school system. Imagining the reactions at headquarters: “We’re trying to help—why the backlash? Why don’t these nobodies behave like billionaires at a dictator’s inauguration?”
Another interesting aspect about billionaires is their rapid loss of interest. Allegedly, one reason Zuckerberg and Chan opted to close charity schools in East Palo Alto is that Chan was reportedly frustrated with the slow progress. Given the intellects involved, that’s not entirely surprising. However, these children seem determined to evade the Ivy League while remaining impoverished. The assumption of limitless adaptability of skills among certain tech leaders is hard to retire. Consider the Bezos Day 1 Academy Fund, where the world’s third-richest man promises to oversee “Montessori-style kindergartens” with zero tuition—a significant portion of taxes directed toward national education funds.
Meanwhile, back in Zuckerberg’s Crescent Park enclave, tensions are palpable. In an area favored by Stanford professors, Zuckerberg acquired 11 properties, transforming them into compounds, complete with pickleball courts and basement excavations, reminiscent of low-rent oligarchs in London’s West End. Following years of noise, construction, and traffic disruptions due to the school, a neighbor was ready to respond when a New York Times reporter called: “I don’t want my neighborhood to be overrun.” He stated that his house is surrounded on three sides by Zuckerberg’s property. “But that’s exactly what they’ve done: they’ve taken over our neighborhood.” Replacing “world” with “neighborhood” succinctly encapsulated the situation.
After years of promising investors that millions of Tesla Robotaxis would soon flood the streets, Elon Musk launched a limited driverless car service in Austin, Texas. The rollout faced significant challenges from the start.
The June 22nd debut was met with a barrage of videos from pro-Tesla influencers, who appeared to celebrate the service and showcased their rides. Musk heralded it as a milestone, and Tesla’s stock shot up nearly 10% the next day.
However, it soon became evident that some of the influencer footage painted a troubling picture of an autonomous vehicle that either broke traffic laws or struggled with basic functions. By Tuesday, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) had launched an investigation into these incidents and sought Tesla’s input.
If, as Musk boasted on X, this limited deployment is the result of over a decade of work, it symbolizes the complex technical choices and fixations embraced by the world’s richest person in pursuit of fully autonomous vehicles.
Musk framed the idea of a driverless car as integral to the company’s future. This year it experienced a severe decline but he vowed to rapidly expand the Robotaxi service. Nonetheless, this week’s rocky launch suggests Tesla grapples with the technical hurdles that have drawn scrutiny from regulators.
The Robotaxi pilot involved around 10 cars navigating a confined area in Austin, with safety drivers present in the front seats. Additional limitations included restrictions during adverse weather and at nighttime. Influencer rides were priced at $4.20 each, mirroring Musk’s penchant for cannabis-related memes.
“Tesla’s autonomous driving can be deployed in approved locations. There’s no need for extensive mapping or specialized equipment,” the official Tesla account tweeted on launch day. “It just works.”
However, footage from at least 11 rides indicated that the trial did not unfold as flawlessly as Tesla’s promotional materials suggested. In one instance, the Robotaxi failed to make a left turn, veering into oncoming traffic instead, and resolved the issue by driving along a double yellow line. Other clips showed the vehicle allegedly exceeding speed limits.
This footage caught the NHTSA’s attention, with the agency stating they were aware of the incidents and had reached out to Tesla for more details.
Meanwhile, Musk retweeted a pro-Tesla influencer praising the service amidst technical failures and ongoing regulatory inquiries. One tweet shared by Musk featured a video showing a Robotaxi halting for a peacock crossing the road, while another urged followers to “ignore the media.”
“Lidar is lame.”
Musk has long maintained that reliance solely on cameras for autonomous vehicles is the key to true self-driving capabilities. Tesla’s consumer models feature what are termed “Autopilot” and “Fully Autonomous” capabilities, enabling hands-free driving on highways. These systems are supported by numerous external cameras for navigation, maneuvering, and stopping. The Robotaxis use similar software while depending entirely on cameras.
This camera-centric approach starkly contrasts with other self-driving tech firms like Waymo and Zoox, which utilize a combination of cameras and sensors, including radars and lidars. For instance, Waymo’s latest driverless vehicles are equipped with about 40 cameras and sensors, while Tesla’s advanced model for fully autonomous driving employs around 8 cameras. Bloomberg analysis. Lidar and radar are beneficial for detecting obstacles under poor weather and lighting conditions.
Despite lidar’s advantages, Musk argues that Tesla operates without it. “Lidar is lame,” he declared during Tesla’s Autonomy Day in 2019. “Using it in a car is foolish. It’s costly and unnecessary.”
According to Bloomberg, Lidar systems can cost around $12,000 each, whereas cameras are typically much more affordable. Musk contends that camera-only technology mirrors how humans navigate using their vision.
Tesla Faces Lawsuits and Investigations Over Full Self-Driving Mode
Musk’s claims regarding camera-only technology have placed Tesla under scrutiny, particularly following a fatal accident involving drivers using its fully autonomous driving features. The company is currently embroiled in various government investigations and civil lawsuits, asserting that fully autonomous driving suffers from weather-related issues like sun glare, fog, dust, and darkness. There are reports of at least 736 accidents and 17 fatalities linked to this technology. Analysis by the Washington Post.
“Tesla maintains an almost obsessive view of running the system solely on cameras, despite the consensus among experts in the field,” commented Brett Schreiber, a lawyer representing several victims of Tesla’s autopilot failures.
“Anyone following collision avoidance technology since the ’90s understands that radar, lidar, and cameras are the optimal trio.”
Schreiber expressed little surprise at Tesla’s Robotaxi’s shaky development in Austin.
“The real tragedy here is that people continue to be harmed and killed due to this technology,” he said. “And this highlights issues like, ‘Look how cute it is that a car can’t even make a left turn.’
Tesla did not respond to inquiries regarding the ongoing lawsuits, investigations, and crash incidents related to its fully autonomous driving capabilities.
Tesla’s Tactics vs. Waymo’s Approach
The contrast between Waymo’s method of launching commercial autonomous driving services in densely populated cities and Tesla’s approach extends beyond discussions about lidar versus cameras. Waymo is often seen as a frontrunner in the U.S. autonomous vehicle landscape, which has seen its competitors sharply reduced.
There are numerous reasons Waymo has outlasted many of its rivals. Historically, the Google subsidiary dedicated extensive time to mapping urban areas and rigorously testing vehicles prior to launch. For example, in San Francisco, where Waymo first implemented a completely autonomous commercial service, the company had begun mapping and testing as early as 2021.
Initiated as part of Google’s X Research Lab in 2009, Waymo also encountered challenges with self-driving cars despite its cautious, step-by-step city-by-city rollout. Earlier this year, Waymo was compelled to recall over 1,200 vehicles due to software problems causing collisions with roadside objects, gates, and other barriers. Additionally, the NHTSA launched an investigation last year after receiving 22 reports of Waymo vehicles demonstrating erratic behaviors or violating traffic laws.
In contrast, Tesla is still in the trial phase with its service, yet the Robotaxi launch in Austin marks the first time the automaker has deployed its fully autonomous driving technology in real-world conditions. There has been no information disclosed regarding the duration or extent of mapping or testing this technology in Austin.
This launch evokes memories of Uber’s initial attempt at self-driving vehicle ride-sharing services in 2016, which was also conducted without the necessary approval from California regulators. On the very first day of their pilot project in San Francisco, Uber vehicles reportedly ran a red light. They were forced to suspend the service just a week later after the DMV revoked their registration. At the time, an autonomous driving executive at Uber had urged engineers to expedite the process.
Faced with a lawsuit from Waymo regarding its self-driving operations and struggling to stay competitive, Uber sold its autonomous driving division in 2020.
Like Uber, Tesla also did not seek permission to operate its Robotaxi Service in Austin, as Texas has no existing permit process, which is not expected to be established until September.
At this time, it remains uncertain how frequently Tesla plans to deploy its Robotaxi service behind the scenes, but it’s clear that automakers are under pressure to meet deadlines set by Musk.
With the introduction of Robotaxis, Musk has claimed that Teslas will achieve full automation since at least 2016, and he may be approaching the deadlines he has postponed several times over the last decade.
In 2012, when Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg cut a billion-dollar check to buy the photo sharing app Instagram, most people thought he had lost his marble.
“Billion dollars?” I was kidding John Stewart and then The Daily Show host. “For something that would ruin your photos?”
Stewart called the decision “really unfree.” His audience, and much of the world, agreed that Zuckerberg overpaid for an app that highlighted a lot of photo filters.
Two years later, Zuckerberg opened his wallet again. Facebook has agreed to buy WhatsApp for $19 billion. Many Americans had never heard of messaging apps that were popular internationally but less well-known in the US.
No one knew what would happen with these transactions. However, hindsight seems to be 20/20.
The government on Monday in a landmark antitrust trial that both acquisitions are now considered the greatest in Silicon Valley history – is the action of a lawn-protected monopoly. Zuckerberg was set up to argue that his company, renamed Meta, is merely an afterthought in the social media situation, not for these transactions.
However, this incident could lead to the division of one of the most powerful companies in technology, dealing primarily with hypotheses. Neither the government nor Zuckerberg could predict how technology would advance from Instagram’s $1 billion checks or what would happen if regulators didn’t approve the purchase. This makes Meta’s antitrust case one of the slipperyest things in the tech industry, which has long been defined by unpredictability.
“It was a very different time in Silicon Valley,” said Margaret O’Mara, a technical historian at the University of Washington, about the Facebook acquisition. “There was a vibe like, ‘Oh, wow, Facebook is a bunch of kids who really spend their luxury!” “
I happened to have a front row seat for Facebook deals, especially on Instagram. As a reporter for Wired Magazine, my office in San Francisco was next to my Instagram headquarters. We frequently visited the Kimchi Burrito location (a green slice of city) across the street near South Park Commons and ate it on a bench outside our Instagram office.
Kevin Systrom, the 6-foot-5-foot co-founder of Instagram, was 28 years old. He often roamed around the wood and iron swings of South Park Commons, calling employees and speaking about product ideas. Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, who identified as an arts child rather than a technician, played in the same South Park playground and meditated to a friend about the idea that eventually became his social media app.
This was a time when social apps were dismissed as play, in order to post art for lattes and to tell people what they had for breakfast. WhatsApp, which was growing rapidly internationally, was a text messaging app with no business model. And clones of these apps were abundant, including photo sharing colors, Flickr, VSCO, Message Kik, Skype, Viber, and more.
Even Facebook faced questions about whether it was a viable business. Two months after the Silicon Valley Company announced it was buying Instagram, it held one of the most Disastrous early technology revealed Since the late 1990s, it has been on the .com era.
By the time Systrom testified three months later to the California Corporation Bureau of Corporations, a condition that would close its Facebook deal, Facebook’s shares had fallen almost half the price.
However, in Silicon Valley, fortunes rise quickly. Companies move from frivolous fantasies to juggernauts in just a few years. And what might seem like a wise business move by one moment of executives can be ridiculed immediately as a mistake in the next moment. (Half of the aforementioned apps are dead, dying or have been sold as parts for a long time. Also, my favorite Kimchi Burrito locations. It’s not around anymore. )
At the time, Systrom made a positive spin on Instagram trading as the future looked increasingly tough for Facebook.
“I have been taught throughout my life that all open markets have opposites and shortcomings,” he attended the August 2012 Department of California hearing on the sixth floor of the downtown San Francisco division. “I still firmly believe in the long-term value of Facebook.”
He turns out to be right. Today, Instagram and WhatsApp are two of the most important parts of the meta business. Postings, videos and communications on the platform regularly drive global conversations for sports, news, politics and culture. The app has billions of users.
In some respects, antitrust testing is about competitive versions that may have had a history of technology. For example, what would have happened if Zuckerberg lost his Instagram bid? I’m also about to buy a photo sharing app for Twitter? What happens if WhatsApp is sold to Google? I’ll defend a little How to add a messaging app to your own portfolio?
What if other competitors create a great photo sharing app that could thrive if Facebook didn’t use Instagram to crush them? What happens if Facebook has ruined both deals or can’t keep up with competing apps and still fall behind after purchasing Instagram and WhatsApp?
These are unknown and can only be answered by those who have a time machine. Each side claims a version of what would have happened if Meta’s acquisition was not approved.
In the same Daily Show segment in 2012, senior youth correspondent Jessica Williams said that Facebook’s Instagram purchases made perfect sense.
“If you wanted a photo before Instagram that looks like it was taken in the ’60s, you’d have to invent a time machine and go back to 50 years ago,” she said. “Do you know how much it costs to build a time machine?”
Seven years ago, Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg testified for the first time in Congress. After a two-week boot camp by lawyers, he answered questions at three consecutive Buck-to-Buck hearings in two days of baptism by fire to prepare him.
Zuckerberg, 40, has been practicing more since. He made eight appearances before Congress and testified at least twice in court. He defends his company, previously known as Facebook, on issues such as privacy, child safety, and the spread of disinformation.
As early as Monday, Zuckerberg will once again be in a hot seat. This time, as a marquee witness in a landmark federal committee lawsuit accusing Meta of breaking antitrust laws. Regulators sued the US District Court company in the District of Columbia over the acquisition Instagram And WhatsApp says it used “buying and boring strategies” to maintain its monopoly on social media.
Zuckerberg’s turn as a serial witness has become a powerful symbol of Washington’s growing frustration with the power Silicon Valley holds, spurring attempts to curb the tech industry. Under President Trump, the technology chief is welcoming with the administration in hopes of regulators taking softer hands, but his appointees have shown continued scrutiny.
At Capitol Hill, lawmakers have stepped down as Zuckerberg, accusing him of lying and are personally responsible for various social harms. Legal experts said previous tough questions could help him during the expected seven-hour testimony defending Meta in antitrust law.
“He seems to be more aware of the audience he’s talking about compared to his previous years,” said Adam Sterling, Associate Dean at Stanford Law School. “Whether it’s a deposit, a lawsuit, or in front of the Senate, he can actually create a message to that recipient.”
Meta and the FTC declined to comment.
It’s a far cry from Zuckerberg’s start in his Harvard dorm room 21 years ago. After building “Facebook,” he dropped out of school and moved to Silicon Valley to build a social network. His successes and failures were publicly scrutinized.
In 2021, he renamed his efforts to cut some of the company’s packages to Meta. He recently courted Trump. This month he visited the White House to try and persuade the president and his aides to settle the FTC lawsuit.
Government scrutiny and legal challenges did not inflict permanent damage on the company. Meta’s stock price has more than doubled since Zuckerberg first appeared in Congress.
Zuckerberg is likely to face tougher times in the stands in antitrust trials, legal experts said. Congressional hearings feature spectacular features by lawmakers, each limited to a few minutes. The FTC lawyers plan to bake Mr. Zuckerberg for hours. They also have a chunk of his emails and other communications and will ask him to defend documents that prove his company’s maliciousness.
“Trials are another beast as the other counsels are well prepared, ask better questions and keep focused on their cases,” said Nu Wexler, former policymaker for Meta and principal of Four Corners Public Relations.
In 2017, Zuckerberg testified in Dallas in a trial by video game company Zenimax Media about intellectual property theft claims. He also testified in 2023 during an FTC trial in San Jose, California to block the acquisition of Meta’s Virtual Reality Company.
Now, the FTC is asking Judge James E. Boasberg to convict Meta of antitrust violations, which is “exposed to more in danger,” said Katie Harbus, former public policy director for Meta and chief executive of consulting firm Anchor Change.
For the first half of Meta’s history, Zuckerberg has stepped away from the unscripted public appearance. In 2010, he groped through interviews at a technology conference and struggled to answer privacy questions as sweat beads ran through his face.
Most of his public witness experience came before Congress.
Zuckerberg faced a major backlash from Washington State Senators after the 2016 presidential election. Reports have emerged that Facebook has given political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica access to people’s social networking data without consent.
That led to Zuckerberg’s appearance at a packed hearing in Congress in April 2018. His lawyers guided him to calm down when interrupted and to postpone answering harsh questions.
“My team will be back to you,” he said multiple times during the hearings.
The following year, Zuckerberg was faced with questions from the House Financial Services Committee on the security and security of the plans of a cryptocurrency company called Libra.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, interrupted Zuckerberg about misinformation in political ads. He frowned at times, sometimes he struggled to find the answer.
California’s president Maxine Waters, who was then Democratic chairman of the committee, accused Zuckerberg of leading the company’s fate to users.
“You’re going to step into your competitors, women, people of color, even our democracy,” Waters said.
“I don’t think I’m an ideal messenger for this right now,” replied Zuckerberg. “We certainly have the work to do to build trust.”
Zuckerberg has been better with the next two appearances, said a legal expert and former employee, showing that he will control more Poland and his answers. He and the chiefs of Apple, Amazon, and Google were summoned in 2020 during the pandemic when the House Judiciary Committee was summoned for a hearing on the power of big technology. In 2021, Zuckerberg, who joined the CEOs of Twitter and Google, spoke to a House committee about disinformation.
Last year, Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley requested at a child safety hearing that Zuckerberg would apologize to parents who lost their children due to bullying and other harms accused of refueling Instagram.
“I’m sorry for everything you’ve gone through,” Zuckerberg told parents in attendance. “No one should experience your family suffering.”
Holy said it is important to keep Meta and Zuckerberg accountable.
“This was my whole goal of enforcing a moment of truth,” Holy said in an interview. “But the truth is that he will continue to sail first and do so until there is a real outcome in Congress and in court next week.”
Meta’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg approached President Trump and his aides to resolve the federal antitrust laws against his company, which will be on trial on April 14th.
Zuckerberg has been on several trips to the White House and Mar-a-Lago to discuss the issue along with other issues, said two people who are not authorized to reveal private conversations. Most recently he visited the White House on Wednesday morning.
The Federal Trade Commission sued Meta during Trump’s first term in 2020, blaming the competition for stifling competition by buying young startups like Instagram and WhatsApp, preventing them from suffocating. Mehta was able to settle the lawsuit with a settlement. It is unclear whether Zuckerberg’s efforts have led the Trump administration to consider a solution.
Andy Stone, a spokesman for Meta, also owned by Facebook, said “we meet regularly with policymakers to discuss issues that affect competitiveness, national security and economic growth.”
The White House immediately had no comment, and the FTC declined to comment. That’s what the details of the meeting were It has been reported Previously by the Wall Street Journal.
In its lawsuit, the FTC alleged that Meta violated antitrust laws by buying up its younger rival and stealing consumers from alternative social media platforms. The FTC argued that Meta bought the 2012 photo sharing site Instagram for $1 billion and that the 2014 deal for messaging app WhatsApp should not be approved for $19 billion.
The company “sought to buy or bury an innovator threatening to beat Facebook in a new mobile environment,” the FTC said in a complaint.
Meta refuses to kill the competition between Instagram and WhatsApp and says it is investing heavily in developing app innovation. Meta also says he continues to face tough competition from rivals such as Tiktok, YouTube, Snap and Imessage.
The acquisition of Instagram and WhatsApp has proven to be foresightful. Instagram has become a central part of Meta’s business, bringing billions of revenues per year. WhatsApp has quadrupled in size to 2 billion users and has begun to generate significant revenue for META.
The federal judge neglected the antitrust case in 2021, but quickly revived after the FTC added more evidence and analysis to support its claims.
Now the exam will start within two weeks. The trial could feature testimonies from well-known meta executives, including Zuckerberg. Sheryl Sandberg, former Chief Operating Officer. Kevin Systrom, co-founder of Instagram.
Meta executives have worked closely with outside lawyers when called to testify, and have been fiercely preparing for trial for several months, the two people said.
Zuckerberg’s White House visit is part of an effort to improve Meta and the government, particularly with Trump, which has clashed in the past. In December, Meta announced that it had donated $1 million to Trump’s first fund. And Zuckerberg promoted longtime Republican meta-executive Joel Kaplan, who became the head of the company’s global public policy and deepened his ties with the Trump administration.
A group of authors claimed that Mark Zuckerberg authorized Meta to use “pirated copies” of his copyrighted books to train the company’s artificial intelligence models. This claim was made in a filing in US court.
According to the filing, internal meta-communications revealed that the social network company’s CEO warned that the data set used was “known to be pirated” within the company’s AI executive team. The filing also mentioned support for the use of the LibGen dataset, an extensive online archive of books.
The authors suing Meta for copyright infringement, including Ta-Nehisi Coates and Sarah Silverman, made these accusations in a filing in California federal court. They alleged that Meta misused their books to train Llama, a large-scale language model powering chatbots.
The use of copyrighted content in training AI models has become a legal issue in the development of generative AI tools like chatbots. Authors and publishers have been warned that their work may be used without permission, putting their livelihood at risk.
The filing referenced a memo with Mark Zuckerberg’s approval for Meta’s AI team to use LibGen. However, discussions about accessing and reviewing LibGen data internally at Meta raised concerns about the legality of using pirated content.
Last year, a US District Judge ruled that Meta’s AI model infringed an author’s copyright by using copyrighted text. Despite rejecting claims of depriving the author’s name and copyright holder, the plaintiff was granted permission to amend its claims.
The authors argued this week that the evidence supports their infringement claims and justifies reinstating the CMI case and adding new computer fraud claims.
During Thursday’s hearing, Judge Chhabria expressed skepticism about the fraud and the validity of CMI claims but allowed the writers to file an amended complaint.
SSocial media has always served as an entertainment mirror for society as a whole. The algorithms and amplification of our always-on online presence have highlighted the worst parts of our lives while obscuring the best parts. This is part of why we are so polarized today, with two tribes screaming at each other on social media and plunging into a gaping chasm of despair.
This is what makes a statement released by one of the tech giants this week so alarming. Let those who enter give up hope. With less than two weeks until Donald Trump returns to the White House for the second runoff of the US presidential election, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and Threads, is making major changes to its content moderation. added. In doing so, it appears consistent with the president-elect's views.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in a bizarre video message posted to his Facebook page on Tuesday that the platform would be eliminating fact checkers. Instead of them? mob rules.
Zuckerberg said the platform: Over 3 billion people The company, which around the world logs on to its app every day, plans to adopt an Elon Musk-style community note format to police what is and isn't acceptable speech on its platform. . Starting in the United States, the company plans to dramatically shift the Overton window to those who can shout it loudest.
Meta's CEO largely acknowledged that the move was politically motivated. “It's time to go back to our roots around freedom of expression,” he said, adding that “restrictions on topics like immigration and gender… […] It deviates from mainstream discourse. ” He acknowledged past “censorship mistakes,” by which he likely meant the past four years of suppressing political speech during the Democratic president's tenure, and added that he “worked with President Trump to ensure that U.S. companies We will prevent foreign governments from attacking the United States.” Please check more. ”
The most dog-whistle comment was that Meta's remaining trust and safety and content moderation teams would be relocated from liberal California, and that its U.S. content moderation arm would now be based in solidly Republican Texas. It was a throwaway line. The only thing missing from the video was Zuckerberg wearing a MAGA hat and carrying a shotgun.
Let me be clear: all businessmen make smart decisions based on political circumstances. And few storms are as violent as Hurricane Trump as it approaches the United States. But few people's decisions are as important as Mark Zuckerberg's.
Over the past 21 years, Meta CEO has found himself a central figure in society. Initially, he oversaw a website used by college students. Now billions of people from all walks of life use it. In the early 2000s, the eccentric pursuit of online fun was nowde facto public town squareIn the words of Elon Musk. Where the meta goes, the world follows, online and offline. And Meta just decided to do a dramatic handbrake right turn.
Please don't believe it. Trust the watchdog. “Today’s Meta announcement is a retreat from a healthy and safe approach to content moderation.” The Real Facebook Oversight Committeesaid in a statement that he is an independent person who sees himself as the arbiter of Meta's movements.
They say that because if there's one thing we've learned from social media polarization over the past decade, it's that the angriest person wins the argument. Anger and lies can spread on social media, and are only partially contained by the platforms' ability to intervene if things get out of hand. (Recall that exactly four years ago, Meta suspended Donald Trump from Facebook and Instagram for two years for inciting the violence that stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021.)
Social networks have always struggled with controlling speech on their platforms. Regardless of the outcome of the debate, what they are sure to do is annoy 50% of the population. These platforms are chronically underinvested in growing their businesses at all costs. Platforms have long argued that effective moderation is a problem of scale, and this is the problem they have created by pursuing scale at all costs.
To be sure, policing online speech is difficult, and the level of content moderation that companies like Meta are trying to operate at doesn't work. But abandoning it completely in favor of community notes is not the answer. Suggesting that it is a rational, evidence-based decision masks the reality. It’s a politically expedient move for someone who this week supported the resignation of self-proclaimed “radical” centrist Nick Clegg as head of global policy. A person who leans toward the Republican Party. He appointed Dana White, CEO of Ultimate Fighting Championship and a close Trump ally, to Meta's board of directors.
In many ways, you can't blame Zuckerberg for bending the knee to Donald Trump. The problem is that his decisions have a huge impact.
This is an extinction event for the idea of objective truth on social media. The creature was already on life support, but one of the reasons it's hanging on is that Meta has decided to fund an independent fact-checking organization to try to keep some elements of social media afloat. This is because he was ambitious. Authenticity and freedom from political bias. Night is day. The top is the bottom. Meta is X. Mark Zuckerberg is Elon Musk. Live out four tumultuous, bitter and unfounded years online.
LLots of great stuff, date them all! It started as a joke. Envisioning a game in which a lonely remote worker starts chatting to furniture, Final Fantasy voice actors Ray Chase and Robbie Daymond immediately fell in love with the concept. What would happen if it really happened? It was A game where you can date literally anything?
A bizarre game of banging home appliances that boasts over 70,000 lines of dialogue and 100 dateable inanimate objects has become a reality. Working with Team 17 and fellow voice actress and producer Amanda Hufford, they brought their ridiculous concept to life, resulting in a game they describe as wholesome, frivolous, and fun.
You may be wondering how this works. Now, when players don Dateviators (VR glasses that turn inanimate household objects into talkable, dateable beings), inanimate furniture and appliances suddenly become very chatty, and within seconds I'm talking about a dishwasher and Start flirting.
“We knew we wanted to make sure it felt wholesome, that it was sexy, but in no way vulgar,” says Robbie Daymond. “Our mantra is that we want to create something that people won't feel embarrassed about if they come in. We're playing around with that.”
From tables and microwaves to fireplaces and televisions, there are “characters” you can write dates on, and each potential lover is brought to life by a different voice actor. Every appliance is decidedly and endearingly weird, from a surprisingly liberating microwave that makes you think you're fighting an interdimensional war to a gushing frat-boy fireplace dubbed “The Art of the Pick-Up Line.” is.
No need to be shy…date everything! Photo: Sassy Chap Games
They're also taking a different approach to paying actors fairly. “One of the superpowers we have is that we know a lot of people in the industry,” Daymond says. “We have a good relationship with [actors union] SAG and we were able to work out a deal that would give back the balance to the actors who worked on it. Thanks to a combination of clever scripting by TV writer Logan Burdick and great voice acting throughout, even my short demo gives me the following endearing freedom to see what happens next. I felt I had to meet a new appliance.
Although it sounds like a product of the pandemic, the premise of Date Everything was actually born in 2018 when Draymond wondered if anyone could empathize with the boredom and social deprivation of remote work. . “I’m really excited that something so surreal exists,” Burdick reflects. “I think it’s unbelievable that everyone got a chance.”
“I was a little skeptical when I started working with the team,” exclaims Jack, the game's quiet programmer. “But I was really impressed when I actually played it and saw how much care and attention was put into each character. A lot of games do primarily the same thing in slightly different ways. It's not a typical game, and that's very important today.”
Crystals within a Martian meteorite suggest Mars may have had abundant hydrothermal water when the rock formed 4.45 billion years ago.
The rock, called Black Beauty, was blown into space by an impact on Mars' surface and eventually crashed into the Sahara desert.
We already know a lot about Mars from the study of a meteorite discovered in Morocco in 2011, officially known as Northwest Africa 7034.
aaron cabosy Researchers at Curtin University in Perth, Australia, have been studying the tiny fragments, which contain zircon crystals 50 micrometers in diameter, for years.
Kavosie describes Black Beauty as “a rock that looks like a trash can.” Because it was formed by hundreds of pieces smashed together. “This is a great buffet of Martian history, with a mix of very old and very young rocks,” he says. “But much of the debris it contains belongs to some of the oldest rocks on Mars.”
The fragments studied by Kavosy and his team had crystallized in magma beneath Mars' surface. When they tested the zircons, they also found, unusually, that the elements iron, aluminum, and sodium were arranged in thin, onion-like layers.
“We wondered where else could we find elements like this in zircon crystals,” Kabosie says. The answer, he says, lies in South Australia's gold ore deposits. The zircon crystals there were nearly identical to those from Mars, including the same unusual combination of additional elements.
“This type of zircon is known to form only in places where hydrothermal processes or hydrothermal systems are active during igneous activity,” Kabosie says. “The hot water facilitates the transport of iron, aluminum, and sodium into the crystals as they grow layer by layer.”
Zircon has been exposed to multiple large-scale traumas, including the impact of an ancient collision and then another meteorite that hit the surface of Mars 5 to 10 million years ago and blasted Black Beauty into space have experienced. Despite these violent events, the rock's crystal structure is still intact at the atomic scale.
The lack of radiation damage means the extra elements were part of the crystal from the beginning, rather than being contaminated later, Kavosy said.
Eva Scherer Researchers at Stanford University in California believe that if this rock really formed in the presence of hydrothermal fluid and magma beneath the surface of Mars, water vapor entered the Martian atmosphere before rivers and lakes formed. This suggests that it may have been released.
“We're at a very old time, 4.5 billion years, when Mars was formed,” Scherrer said. “So this would be the earliest evidence of water behavior on Mars.”
Seven billion years ago, the universe’s star formation boom began to slow. What did our Milky Way galaxy look like at that time? Astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have discovered a clue in the form of a cosmic question mark, the result of an unusual alignment in space spanning several light-years.
Galaxy cluster MACS-J0417.5-1154 is so massive that it warps the fabric of space-time and distorts the appearance of galaxies behind it. This phenomenon is known as gravitational lensing. This natural phenomenon magnifies distant galaxies, sometimes causing them to appear multiple times in the image, as Webb saw here. Two distant interacting galaxies (a spiral galaxy seen face-on and a dusty red galaxy seen edge-on) appear multiple times, tracing a familiar shape across the sky. Active star formation and the remarkably perfect spiral shape of the galaxy seen face-on indicate that these galaxies are just beginning to interact. Image credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/V. Estrada-Carpenter, Saint Mary’s University.
“There are only three or four known examples of similar gravitational lensing configurations in the observable universe, so this discovery is exciting as it demonstrates the power of Webb and suggests that we may find more like it in the future,” said Dr Guillaume Despres, from St Mary’s University.
The region has previously been observed by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, but Webb was the first to spot the dusty red galaxy forming an intriguing question mark shape.
This is because the wavelengths of light that Hubble detects are trapped in space dust, while longer wavelengths of infrared light pass through Webb’s instruments and can be detected.
Astronomers used both telescopes to observe the galaxy cluster. MACS-J0417.5-1154The cluster is so large that it distorts the fabric of space-time, acting like a magnifying glass.
This will allow astronomers to see clearer details of the much more distant galaxies behind the cluster.
But the same gravitational effects that expand galaxies also cause distortions, which can result in galaxies appearing spread out in an arc across the sky, or appearing multiple times.
This optical illusion in space is called gravitational lensing.
The red galaxy Webb uncovered, along with the spiral galaxy it interacts with, previously detected by Hubble, is magnified and distorted in an unusual way that requires a special and rare alignment between the distant galaxy, the lens, and the observer — something astronomers call hyperbolic umbilical gravitational lensing.
This explains five images of the galaxy pair seen in the Webb image, four of which trace the top of the question mark.
The question mark points are, from our perspective, unrelated galaxies that happen to be in the right place and spacetime.
In addition to developing a case study for Webb, Niris Noting the ability of their infrared imaging device and slitless spectrometer to detect star formation locations in galaxies billions of light years away, the research team also couldn’t help but notice the shape of the question mark.
“This is really cool. I got interested in astronomy when I was younger because I saw amazing images like this,” said Dr Marcin Sawicki, also from Saint Mary’s University.
“Knowing when, where and how star formation occurs in galaxies is crucial to understanding how galaxies have evolved throughout the history of the universe,” said Dr Vicente Estrada Carpenter from Saint Mary’s University.
“The results show that star formation is widespread in both. The spectral data also confirm that the newly discovered dusty galaxy is located at the same distance as the frontal spiral galaxy, suggesting that the two are probably starting to interact.”
“Both galaxies in the question mark pair show several dense regions of active star formation, likely the result of the gas in the two galaxies colliding.”
“But neither galaxy seems particularly disturbed, so perhaps we are seeing the beginning of an interaction.”
“These galaxies, seen billions of years ago when star formation was at its peak, are similar in mass to the Milky Way at that time,” Dr Sawicki said.
“Thanks to Webb, we can now study what our galaxy was like in its teenage years.”
Team paper Published in Monthly Bulletin of the Royal Astronomical Society.
_____
Vicente Estrada Carpenter others2024. CANUCS JWST/NIRISS We will use grism spectroscopy to investigate when, where and how star formation occurs in a pair of galaxies at cosmic noon. MNRAS 532 (1): 577-591; doi: 10.1093/mnras/stae1368
This article is based on a press release provided by NASA.
Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has alleged that he came under pressure from the US government to censor coronavirus posts on Facebook and Instagram during the pandemic, and said he regrets giving in to it.
Zuckerberg said White House officials under Joe Biden\’s administration “repeatedly pressured” Facebook and Instagram\’s parent company, Meta, throughout the pandemic to “censor certain coronavirus-related content.”
“Over the course of 2021, Biden Administration officials, including from the White House, repeatedly pressured us for months to censor certain COVID-19-related content, including humor and satire, and expressed significant frustration to our team when we did not comply,” the letter to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan said in a statement. “We believe the administration\’s pressure was misguided.”
During the pandemic, Facebook began showing misinformation warnings to users when they commented on or liked posts it deemed contained false information about the coronavirus.
The company also removed posts criticizing COVID-19 vaccines and suggesting the virus was developed in a Chinese lab.
During the 2020 US presidential election campaign, Biden accused social media platforms such as Facebook of “killing people” by allowing the posting of misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines.
“With hindsight and new information, I think we would have made choices that we wouldn\’t have made now,” Zuckerberg said. “I regret not being more vocal about it.”
“As I told my team then, I feel strongly that our content standards should not be compromised due to pressure from the Administration, and we are ready to fight back if something like this happens again.”
Zuckerberg also said Facebook had “temporarily downgraded” a story about the contents of a laptop owned by the president\’s son, Hunter Biden, after the FBI warned that Russia was preparing a disinformation campaign against Biden.
Zuckerberg wrote that it was later revealed that the article was not false, and that “in retrospect, we should not have downgraded this article.”
The White House defended its actions during the pandemic, saying it encouraged “responsible behavior to protect public health and safety.”
“Our position has been clear and consistent,” the company said. “We believe that tech companies and other private actors should consider the impact of their actions on the American people and make their own choices about the information they provide.”
This false-color image of Polaris taken by the CHARA array in April 2021 reveals large bright and dark spots on the star's surface. Image credit: Evans others., doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad5e7a.
PolarisCepheid variable, also known as Polaris, Polaris, Alpha Ursa Minoris, HR 424 or HD 8890, is a type of star known as Cepheid variables.
Astronomers use these stars as “standard luminaries” because their true brightness is determined by their pulsation period: brighter stars pulsate more slowly than fainter stars.
How bright a star appears in the sky depends on the star's actual brightness and its distance.
Because astronomers know a Cepheid star's true brightness based on its pulsation period, they can use it to measure the star's distance to its host galaxy and infer the universe's expansion rate.
Dr. Nancy Evans of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and her colleagues observed Polaris using the six-telescope CHARA Optical Interferometer Array on Mount Wilson in California.
Their goal was to map the orbit of a nearby, faint companion star that orbits the North Star every 30 years.
“Binary systems are extremely difficult to resolve at their closest approach due to the small distance between the two stars and the large difference in brightness,” Dr Evans said.
The researchers were able to track the orbit of Polaris's nearby companion star and measure its change in size as Polaris pulsates.
From its orbital motion, we know that Polaris has five times the mass of the Sun.
Images of Polaris reveal that its diameter is 46 times that of the Sun.
CHARA's observations also revealed for the first time what the surfaces of Cepheid variables look like.
“CHARA images revealed large bright and dark spots on Polaris' surface that change over time,” said Dr. Gail Schaefer, director of the CHARA array.
“The presence of sunspots and the rotation of the star could be related to the 120-day variation in the measured speed.”
“We plan to continue photographing the North Star,” said University of Michigan professor John Monnier.
“We hope to better understand the mechanisms that produce the spots on Polaris' surface.”
JAmes Muldoon is a lecturer in management at the University of Essex, Mark Graham is a professor at the Oxford Internet Institute and Callum Cantt is a senior lecturer at the Essex Business School. They Fair Worka project to evaluate working conditions in the digital workplace, of which they are co-authors. Feeding the Machine: The Hidden Human Labor that Powers AI.
Why did you write that book?
James Muldoon: The idea for the book came from field research that we did in Kenya and Uganda about the data annotation industry. We spoke to a lot of data annotators, and the working conditions were just horrible. And we thought this was a story that everyone needed to hear: people working for less than $2 an hour on precarious contracts, and work that’s largely outsourced to countries in the global south because of how hard and dangerous the work is.
Why East Africa?
Mark Graham: I started my research in East Africa in 2009, working on the first of many undersea fiber optic cables that would connect East Africa with the rest of the world. The focus of my research was what this new connectivity would mean for the lives of workers in East Africa.
How did you gain access to these workplaces?
Mark Graham: The basic idea of Fair Work is to establish fair labor principles and then rate companies on those principles. We give companies a score out of 10. Companies in Nairobi and Uganda opened up to us because we were trying to give them a score and they wanted a better score. We went to them with a zero out of 10 and said, “Here’s what we need to do to improve.”
Will the company accommodate me? Will they dispute your low score?
Mark Graham: We get a variety of responses. Some people will argue that what we’re asking for is simply not possible. They’ll say, “It’s not our responsibility to do these things,” and so on. The nice thing about the score is that we can point out other companies that are doing the same thing. We can say, “Look, this company is doing it. What’s wrong with your company? Why can’t you offer these terms to your employees?”
Can you talk about the reverberations of colonialism that you found in this data work?
Mark Graham: The East African Railway once ran from Uganda to the port of Mombasa. It was funded by the British government and was basically used to extract resources from East Africa. What’s interesting about the East African fiber optic connection is that it runs along a very similar route to the old railway, and again, it’s an extractive technology.
Could you please explain the concept of the “extractor”?
Callum Cant: When we look at AI products, we tend to think of them as something that is relatively organically created, and we don’t think about the human effort, the resource requirements, and all the other things that go on behind the scenes.
For us, the extractor is a metaphor that invites us to think more deeply about whose labor, whose resources, whose energy, whose time went into the process. This book is an attempt to look beyond the superficial appearance of sleek webpages and images of neural networks to really see the embodied reality of what AI looks like in the workplace and how it interacts with people.
James Muldoon: I think a lot of people would be surprised to know that 80% of the work behind AI products is actually data annotation, not machine learning engineering. If you take self-driving cars as an example, one hour of video data requires 800 hours of human data annotation. So it’s a very intensive form of work.
How does this concept differ from Shoshana Zuboff’s idea of surveillance capitalism?
James Muldoon: Surveillance capitalism best describes companies like Google and Facebook, which make their money primarily through targeted advertising. It’s an apt description of the data-to-ads pipeline, but it doesn’t really capture the broader infrastructural role that Big Tech now plays. The Extraction Machine is an idea we came up with to talk more broadly about how Big Tech profits from the physical and intellectual labor of humans, whether they’re Amazon employees, creatives, data annotators, or content moderators. It’s a much more visceral, political, and global concept of how all of our labor is exploited and extracted by these companies.
A lot of the concerns about AI have been about existential risks, or whether the technology could reinforce inequalities or biases that exist in the data it was trained on, but are you arguing that just introducing AI into the economy will create a whole range of other inequalities?
Callum Cant: You can see this very clearly in a workplace like Amazon. Amazon’s AI systems, the technology that orchestrates its supply chain, automate thought processes, and what humans have to do in Amazon’s warehouses is grueling, repetitive, high-stress labor processes. You get technology that is meant to automate menial tasks and create freedom and time, but in reality, the introduction of algorithmic management systems in the workplace means people are forced into more routine, boring, low-skilled jobs.
Callum Kant of Fair Work argues that Amazon’s system creates a “repetitive and burdensome” work process for employees. Photo: Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto via Getty Images
In one chapter of the book, Irish actress Chloe discovers that someone is using an AI copy of her voice, similar to the recent dispute between Scarlett Johansson and OpenAI: She has the platform and the funds to challenge this situation, whereas most people do not.
Callum Cant: Many of the solutions actually rely on collective power, not individual power, because, like anyone else, we have no power to tell OpenAI what to do. OpenAI doesn’t care if some authors think they’re running an information extraction regime. These companies are funded by billions of pounds and shouldn’t care what we think about them.
But we have identified some ways that, collectively, we can begin to resist and try to change the way this technology is being deployed, because I think we all recognize that there is a potential for liberation here. But getting to it is going to require a huge amount of collaboration and conflict in a lot of places. Because while there are people who are getting enormously wealthy from this technology, the decisions made by a very small number of people in Silicon Valley are making all of us worse off. And I don’t think a better form of technology is going to come out of that unless we force them to change the way they do things.
Is there anything you would like to say to our readers? What actions can they take?
Callum Cant: It’s hard to give one universal piece of advice because people are all in very different positions. If you work in an Amazon warehouse, organize your coworkers and exert influence over your boss. If you work as a voice actor, you need to organize with other voice actors. But everyone has to deal with this in their own situation, so it’s impossible to make a diagnosis.
We are all customers of large tech companies: should we boycott Amazon, for example?
Callum Cant: I think organizing in the workplace is more powerful, but there is also a role for organizing as consumers. If there are clear differences and opportunities where you can make better use of consumption, especially if the workers involved are calling for it, then by all means, do so. For example, if Amazon workers call for a boycott on Black Friday, we would encourage people to listen. Absolutely. But no matter where people take action and what actions they take, they need a set of principles to guide them. One of the key principles is that collective action is the primary path forward.
debtMark Aitken has been working on a photo series in Lapland for the past two years. The Presence of Absence“The work explores the delicate, sometimes eerie, boundary between life and death experienced by people living in this extreme climate and landscape,” he says.
Aitken, who was born in New Zealand, grew up in South Africa and has lived in London for many years, took the photo on a sheep farm this spring. “Kukkola is a small village on the Finnish-Lapland border on the Tornio River close to Sweden. The farm has been running for 20 years and this lamb is one of around 100 born in March and April,” Aitken says.
The lamb doesn’t have a name, but the inquisitive collie does: “He’s a lively young male called Possu, which means piglet. I saw the two animals interacting when I went into the barn to find Jaana, one of the farm owners, and arrange a time to take her portrait.”
Aitken usually shoots on 35mm film and likes to take his time preparing to take a photograph, especially when working with people. “When the right atmosphere, light and mood is achieved, I press the shutter. I like this discipline. This process also applies to printing in the darkroom. Only then does the memory of that moment become associated with the photograph.”
That day, he didn’t have his camera with him, but he did have his iPhone SE, and before his eyes the theme of his series was playing out in a whole new way: “I was amazed and intrigued by the inter-species relationships. The possu were trying to herd the lambs, but they were failing. The lambs hadn’t yet learned fear.”
Mark Zuckerberg has faced accusations of being irresponsible in his approach to artificial intelligence after working to develop AI systems as powerful as human intelligence. The Facebook founder has also raised the possibility of making it available to the public for free.
Meta’s CEO announced that the company intends to build an artificial general intelligence (AGI) system and plans to open source it, making it accessible to outside developers. He emphasized that the system should be “responsibly made as widely available as possible.”
In a Facebook post, Zuckerberg stated that the next generation of technology services requires the creation of complete general-purpose intelligence.
Although the term AGI is not strictly defined, it generally refers to a theoretical AI system capable of performing a range of tasks at a level of intelligence equal to or exceeding that of humans. The potential emergence of AGI has raised concerns among experts and politicians worldwide that such a system, or a combination of multiple AGI systems, could evade human control and pose a threat to humanity.
Zuckerberg expressed that Meta would consider open sourcing its AGI or making it freely available for developers and the public to use and adapt, similar to the company’s Llama 2 AI model.
Dame Wendy Hall, a professor of computer science at the University of Southampton and a member of the United Nations advisory body on AI, expressed concern about the potential for open source AGI, calling it “really, very scary” and labeling Zuckerberg’s approach as irresponsible.
According to Mr. Hall, “Thankfully, I think it will still be many years before those aspirations become a reality.” She stressed the need to establish a regulatory system for AGI to ensure public safety.
Last year, Meta participated in the Global AI Safety Summit in the UK and committed to help governments scrutinize artificial intelligence tools before and after their release.
Another UK-based expert emphasized that decisions about open sourcing AGI systems should not be made by technology companies alone but should involve international consensus.
In an interview with tech news website The Verge, Zuckerberg indicated that Meta would lean toward open sourcing AGI as long as it is safe and responsible.
Meta’s decision to open source Llama 2 last year drew criticism, with some experts likening it to “giving people a template to build a nuclear bomb.”
OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, defines AGI as “an AI system that is generally smarter than humans.” Meanwhile, Google DeepMind’s head, Demis Hassabis, suggested that AGI may be further out than some predict.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman warned at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that further advances in AI will be impossible without energy supply breakthroughs, such as nuclear fusion.
Zuckerberg pointed out that Meta has built an “absolutely huge amount of infrastructure” to develop the new AI system, but did not specify the development timeline. He also mentioned that a sequel to Rama 2 is in the works.
Jagat, a social network designed to help you get out more with friends instead of mindlessly scrolling on your phone, has over 10 million users worldwide. Launched in March earlier this year, this location-based social network wants to help people focus on real-life connections and make friends.
The app is basically a social map that shows you your friends and nearby activities. Jagat features an interactive map interface that lets you stay in touch with friends and discover new people and activities around you in real time. Jagat is a bit similar to Zenly, the social mapping app owned by Snap that went out of service last year.
The startup is based in Singapore and Indonesia and was founded by Jagat president Barry Beagen and CEO Loy Xing Zhe. The two met in December 2021, when Biegen was advising the Indonesian government on digital economy policy and Zee was working on GameFi products focused on Web3, social, and gaming. Biegen said both he and Zee had the idea of building a social network.
“We had the same vision of taking on big tech and really building something that could take on the world from Southeast Asia,” Begen told TechCrunch. “We were also fed up with mainstream social apps that were becoming more passive, and we were also fed up with mainstream social apps that were becoming more passive, and more spontaneous ways to explore the world and places and meet new friends, such as hiking, local concerts, and friend-picking.” We were both really excited about finding ways to do things differently, whether it was playing a basketball game or just going for a long walk.”
The two decided to build a social network where users could create their own spaces and interact virtually with avatars.
The social map is what you see when you open Jagat and shows you the location of your friends in real time. It’s also where you can track where you’ve been and tap your friends’ avatars to send them messages, stickers, and updates. Jagat sees maps as the primary interface for discovering activities and people around you. See your friends’ status updates in real time and know what they’re up to.
Image credits: Jagat
The startup is currently building features aimed at competing with Facebook Groups by allowing users to organize local events and find people with similar interests. We’re also building the ability to explore beyond your local community by enabling you to discover a global community.
“We want to bring social back to social apps, focusing on social networking rather than media,” Biegen said. “We want to care about people, not posts. We want to be close friends, discover new friends, and connect with people in real life instead of scrolling through for entertainment.” It’s built to help you get more. We’re excited to see that other new social apps are also taking on this challenge. Mainstream social media is no longer about making friends and making connections; is passive consumption of entertainment. That’s why we’re focusing on features that allow users to share real-time, unsophisticated updates in a fun way.”
Biegen said most active users check the app three to four times a day, and most people want to know where their closest friends and loved ones are after school or work. . Instead of sending a text message to see if a friend is nearby and wants to grab dinner, the app lets you see where they are.
Approximately 85% of Jagat users are Gen Z. Since its release, the app has topped the charts in Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam, Spain, France, and Singapore. Biegen said the app’s appeal is universal and the startup will continue to develop it into the next generation.
The company closed a Series A funding round in October with participation from Southeast Asian investors, but declined to disclose the amount raised.
Looking to the future, Biegen said the startup wants to build “the next generation of default apps.” “We believe social apps should create real, authentic connections and deliver on the promise of connecting people in real life. In the meantime, we’re building new and exciting features and are committed to helping our community We’re focused on continuing to build, and that what we’re building – expanding social experiences on maps – is empowering a new generation of creators and businesses around the world. I believe we can do it.”
Mark Zuckerberg tore one of his anterior cruciate ligaments (ACL) while training for the match.
The mixed martial arts (MMA) enthusiast posted a photo on Instagram of himself in a hospital bed with his left leg raised high and heavily bandaged.
According to the NHS, the ACL is a ligament on the inside of the knee that “gives stability to the knee joint.”
“I tore my anterior cruciate ligament while sparring and just had surgery to replace it,” said the Facebook co-founder, 39.
“I was training for a mixed martial arts fight early next year, but it got delayed a little bit.
“I am grateful to the doctors and team who treated me.”
Zuckerberg said he was “still looking forward” to competing in MMA “after he recovers”, adding: “Thank you to everyone for your love and support.”
In May, he completed his first Jiu-Jitsu tournament.
A few weeks ago, he shared a close-up photo of his face with bruises on the bridge of his nose and under his eyes.
The sparring “got a little out of hand,” he said.
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image: Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk were going to fight
In August, Zuckerberg criticized Elon Musk. Not serious about pairs having cage fightsand said it was time to “move on” from the story.
The CEO of Meta Platforms said his tech billionaire was unwilling to go through with the much-anticipated clash after they couldn’t even agree on a date.
After months of back and forth between the two after Musk proposed the idea, only Zuckerberg said: Unexpectedly, he answered that he was ready to fight his rival.
But Tesla’s CEO said surgery may have been necessary before the fight occurred.
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