That is these days’s version of The Obtain, our weekday publication that gives a day by day dose of what’s occurring on the planet of generation.
Google’s new AI can pay attention a snippet of track—after which stay on taking part in
A brand new AI device can create natural-sounding speech and track after being induced with a couple of seconds of audio.
AudioLM, evolved via Google researchers, generates audio that matches the manner of the steered, together with advanced seems like piano track, or other people talking, in some way this is virtually indistinguishable from the unique recording. Crucially, it doesn’t require labor-intensive transcription or labeling in contrast to maximum different AI-generated audio. To find out extra, and concentrate to the sounds it created, right here.
—Tammy Xu
I Was once There When: AI mastered chess
I Was once There When is an oral historical past undertaking that’s a part of our award-winning In Machines We Agree with podcast. It options tales of the way breakthroughs and watershed moments in synthetic intelligence and computing came about, as instructed via the individuals who witnessed them.
In the newest episode we meet one of the most international’s largest chess avid gamers, Garry Kasparov, and listen to why his loss in opposition to IBM’s Deep Blue laptop 25 years in the past nonetheless issues these days. Concentrate to it on Apple Podcasts, or anywhere you most often opt for podcasts.
Is a covid and flu “twindemic” coming?
Should you’re feeling a bit of beneath the elements, leisure confident, you’re no longer on my own. For the ones people within the Northern Hemisphere, it’s simply that point of yr. That’s partially why well being government on all sides of the Atlantic are urging other people to get vaccinated—in opposition to each the flu and covid-19.
In fresh months, we’ve heard warnings of a flu and covid “twindemic” at the horizon. Will have to we be apprehensive? Let our senior biomedicine reporter Jessica Hamzelou stroll you during the dangers.
Jess’s tale is from The Checkup, her new weekly publication supplying you with the scoop on all issues well being and tech-related. Enroll to obtain it on your inbox each and every Thursday.
The must-reads
I’ve combed the web to seek out you these days’s most enjoyable/essential/horrifying/interesting tales about generation.
1 That is what lifestyles within the metaverse is like
It could be beautiful amusing—if you’ll manage to pay for it. (NYT $)
+ However Meta workers themselves aren’t satisfied. (The Verge)
2 A iciness covid wave appears most probably
And this time, we’re doing next-to-nothing to prevent it. (Ars Technica)
+ Lengthy covid remains to be disabling tens of millions of American citizens. (Axios)
+ How the Chinese language physician who sounded the alarm over covid spent his ultimate days. (NYT $)
3 Elon Musk has 3 weeks to shop for Twitter
If he doesn’t undergo with it in that time-frame, it’s again to the court docket. (Quartz)
+ What occurs now? (The Mum or dad)
+ Misplaced monitor of the entire twists and turns? Right here’s a to hand timeline. (FT $)
+ Musk says he’ll flip Twitter right into a ‘tremendous app’. Right here’s how those apps paintings. (BBC)
4 Self-driving automobiles nonetheless appear to be at the street to nowhere 
Even after $100 billion has been poured into their construction. (Bloomberg $)
+ Uber remains to be having a bet it may possibly make robotaxis paintings. (The Verge)
+ The large new concept for making self-driving automobiles that may move anyplace. (MIT Era Evaluate)
5 Google has unveiled two text-to-video AI techniques
The movies they produce are spectacular, and vaguely unsettling. (The Verge)
+ That is what the following era of AI looks as if. (MIT Era Evaluate)
6 An influencer is suing TikTok over rip-off commercials that use her movies
This type of fraudulent advertising and marketing is rife on-line—and there’s a rising political consensus in desire of a crackdown. (WP $)
7 Crypto alternate Binance says hackers stole $100 million
That is but any other instance of a ‘bridge’ assault between two blockchains. (WSJ $)
+ Those common hacks show how safety is an afterthought within the crypto business. (MIT Era Evaluate)
8 Boston Dynamics has pledged to not weaponize its robots
Nice, however the following query is: how do they prevent consumers from doing it? (Axios)
9 Because of this you’ll’t tickle your self
Your mind is aware of what’s coming. (Stressed out $)
10 It’s cool to hate on sweet corn on-line
Should you reside in the USA, it’s merely unattainable to keep away from presently of yr. (The Atlantic $)
Quote of the day
“I despatched it to the entire staff. We did that—have a look at that.”
—Elena Adams, the lead engineer for NASA’s asteroid-smashing DART spacecraft, tells the New Yorker what she did with the telescope photographs of the aftermath of the collision remaining week.
The large tale
India’s water disaster is already right here. Local weather trade will compound it.
Critical droughts have tired rivers, reservoirs, and aquifers throughout huge portions of India lately, pushing the country’s leaky, polluted water techniques to the threshold.
Greater than 600 million Indians face acute water shortages. Seventy % of the country’s water provide is infected, inflicting an estimated 200,000 deaths a yr, and a few 21 towns may run out of groundwater as early as subsequent yr.
Local weather trade will certainly make the issue worse. It’s unsure what position upper temperatures have performed in fresh droughts, because the local weather fashions have principally predicted an increasing number of intense Indian monsoons. However the longer-term forecast is that the extremes will grow to be extra excessive, threatening extra common flooding and longer droughts. Learn the entire tale.
—James Temple
We will nonetheless have great issues
A spot for convenience, amusing and distraction in those bizarre instances. (Were given any concepts? Drop me a line or tweet ’em at me.)
+ This record of the arena’s 50 best possible bars is assured to be hotly contested. Just one method to test, I guess… I’d higher pack my luggage!
+ The moustache is formally again in style.
+ Don’t even take into accounts visiting someplace new with out doing a vibe test on Google Maps.
+ Right here’s how lengthy it takes to color a huge (and significantly spectacular) mural.
+ Stephen King—of comedy.
