Wednesday, March 22, 2023

A look at Balaji Srinivasan's proposed $1M bitcoin bet, predicting one BTC will be worth $1M+ in 90 days, which makes little sense besides attracting attention (Matt Levine/Bloomberg)

Matt Levine / Bloomberg:
A look at Balaji Srinivasan's proposed $1M bitcoin bet, predicting one BTC will be worth $1M+ in 90 days, which makes little sense besides attracting attention  —  Credit Suisse  —  It is sometimes useful to think that the shareholders of a bank are not its owners; they are just renting it from its creditors.



Inside TSMC's facilities in Taiwan, where Fab 18 makes a quintillion transistors for Apple every six months, and an interview with Chairman Mark Liu (Virginia Heffernan/Wired)

Virginia Heffernan / Wired:
Inside TSMC's facilities in Taiwan, where Fab 18 makes a quintillion transistors for Apple every six months, and an interview with Chairman Mark Liu  —  As the US boosts production of silicon chips, an American journalist goes inside TSMC, the mysterious Taiwanese company at the center of the global industry.



Okcoin suspended trading of NYCCoin and MiamiCoin, developed by CityCoins on the Stacks protocol, citing low liquidity; both coins received mayoral endorsements (Carly Wanna/Bloomberg)

Carly Wanna / Bloomberg:
Okcoin suspended trading of NYCCoin and MiamiCoin, developed by CityCoins on the Stacks protocol, citing low liquidity; both coins received mayoral endorsements  —  A crypto exchange has suspended trading of cryptocurrencies dedicated to New York City and Miami, citing limited liquidity for the tokens.



Sources: facing a US ban, TikTok recently sought to reassure its advertisers and play down the threat of an outright ban, hoping brands would continue to spend (Wall Street Journal)

Wall Street Journal:
Sources: facing a US ban, TikTok recently sought to reassure its advertisers and play down the threat of an outright ban, hoping brands would continue to spend  —  Advertisers take wait-and-see approach after Biden administration demands that video app's Chinese owners sell stakes



Tuesday, March 21, 2023

How Elon Musk acquiring and running Twitter, adding to SpaceX and Tesla, became a headache for the Biden administration, which worries over foreign influence (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
How Elon Musk acquiring and running Twitter, adding to SpaceX and Tesla, became a headache for the Biden administration, which worries over foreign influence  —  Argentina was headed toward its thrilling victory over France at the World Cup in Qatar, and Elon Musk, the Tesla Inc. CEO and Twitter owner …



Two of Uranus' Moons may have active oceans: NASA study

One or two of Uranus' 27 moons -- Ariel and/or Miranda -- likely have oceans beneath their icy surfaces and are actively spewing material into the space environment, according to a study by NASA. https://ift.tt/vdQmEzP

Tech industry group NetChoice, founded by Google and Meta, launches a litigation center to combat state laws and local lawsuits, modeled on Chamber of Commerce (Cat Zakrzewski/Washington Post)

Cat Zakrzewski / Washington Post:
Tech industry group NetChoice, founded by Google and Meta, launches a litigation center to combat state laws and local lawsuits, modeled on Chamber of Commerce  —  NetChoice's new center is designed to respond to the threat of state laws and local lawsuits  —  NetChoice, a tech industry group funded …



When ChatGPT failed one of the India's biggest competitive test

OpenAI's chatbot ChatGPT has reportedly failed one of India's biggest competitive exams, the Indian Civil Services Examination. According to a report, ChatGPT failed to clear the examination with questions ranging from topics such as Geography, Economy, History, Ecology, General Science and current affairs. Bengaluru-based Analytics India Magazine, subjected it to clear the examination with questions ranging from topics such as Geography, Economy, History, Ecology, General Science and current affairs. https://ift.tt/Clpa4nw

Sources: Apple lobbied for changes to India's labor law in the Tamil Nadu state, where Foxconn has its largest iPhone plant, to help expand local production (Sankalp Phartiyal/Bloomberg)

Sankalp Phartiyal / Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple lobbied for changes to India's labor law in the Tamil Nadu state, where Foxconn has its largest iPhone plant, to help expand local production  —  Apple Inc. is seeking changes in India's labor laws as part of its effort to expand local production, and regional governments …



Monday, March 20, 2023

Taiwan's Ministry of Finance data: chip exports to China and Hong Kong fell 31.3% YoY in February, the worst decline since 2009 and above January's 27.1% fall (Yoshihiro Sato/Bloomberg)

Yoshihiro Sato / Bloomberg:
Taiwan's Ministry of Finance data: chip exports to China and Hong Kong fell 31.3% YoY in February, the worst decline since 2009 and above January's 27.1% fall  —  Taiwan's exports of integrated circuit chips to China and Hong Kong fell for a fourth month in February as Washington-Beijing tensions simmer …



Learning social skills next target for AI: Study

Siri and Google Assistant may be able to schedule meetings on request, but so far they don't have the social understanding to independently prioritise the appointments. https://ift.tt/FYJUoBZ

Samsung to invest in smart manufacturing capability, research and development in India

"We will continue our investment to bring the optimised and or smart factory to the Noida facilities. We will continue our investment there. I believe this our investment for the smart factory will bring competitiveness in the production," Roh said. https://ift.tt/nGJpSP0

An interview with Sam Altman on OpenAI's GPT-4, how "people should be happy" that OpenAI is a "little bit scared of" its tools, misinformation, rivals, and more (ABC News)

ABC News:
An interview with Sam Altman on OpenAI's GPT-4, how “people should be happy” that OpenAI is a “little bit scared of” its tools, misinformation, rivals, and more  —  “This will be the greatest technology humanity has yet developed,” he said.  —  OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speaks with ABC News, Mar. 15, 2023.



How open source intelligence, or OSINT, researchers are using public data to untangle the mystery of the Nord Stream pipeline sabotage, helping debunk claims (Matt Burgess/Wired)

Matt Burgess / Wired:
How open source intelligence, or OSINT, researchers are using public data to untangle the mystery of the Nord Stream pipeline sabotage, helping debunk claims  —  Open source intelligence researchers are verifying and debunking opaque claims about who ruptured the gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea.



China's anti-graft watchdog begins to investigate ex-Tsinghua Unigroup Chairman Zhao Weiguo, the latest executive to be ensnared in its chip corruption dragnet (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
China's anti-graft watchdog begins to investigate ex-Tsinghua Unigroup Chairman Zhao Weiguo, the latest executive to be ensnared in its chip corruption dragnet  —  China's top anti-graft watchdog has begun an investigation of former Tsinghua Unigroup Chairman Zhao Weiguo …



Alibaba's DAMO Academy releases RynnBrain, an open-source foundation model to help robots perform real-world tasks like navigating rooms, trained on Qwen3-VL (Saritha Rai/Bloomberg)

Saritha Rai / Bloomberg : Alibaba's DAMO Academy releases RynnBrain, an open-source foundation model to help robots perform real-worl...