Just what i find

I'm skeptical about the true market for bike sharing. I can see the perceived benefits, and when i lived closer in to central London I used to use Boris Bikes more often, i've recently tried to rent "dockless" bikes from several of the companies around London and although they never seem to be available nearby Continue reading →

A new alloy promises sensors in temperatures of up to around 980°C – high enough to instrument engine blocks in cars, or drill heads in industrial machinery. As it's also conductive, it could be used to make solid state high current switching gear too. https://www.asme.org/engineering-topics/articles/manufacturing-design/superalloy-rescues-mems-sensors null Continue reading →

The Very Large Telescope has been used to capture the birth of a planet around a star for the first time. Astronomers have long thought that planets grow through accretion of dust collected around stars – and this series of photographs shows this in action, giving us further evidence of the way our own solar Continue reading →

We are trying to put accessibility at the core of everything we do, and it's hard – often people see "designing for accessibility" as expensive or time consuming. But it doesn't have to be. For a start, it's much cheaper to implement from the beginning than to try to retrofit, and accessible applications are easier Continue reading →

Chinese Tech Titan Alibaba has introduced a new feature to help sellers write compelling and useful copy for adverts with a few clicks of the neural network. Producing millions of suggestions each day, the "AI Copywriter" aims to reduce the "repetitive, low-value work" activities associated with creating multiple formats of an advert for different media. Continue reading →

Self driving cars always seem to be "tomorrow's promise". One major reason is the way that machine learning struggles with "generalising" from more specific data. A child doesn't need to be shown every possible type of chair to learn what a chair is – but throw a few pixels out and your CNN is likely Continue reading →

This discussion about automation in the luxury goods market (https://www.ft.com/content/dfb9088a-7079-11e8-92d3-6c13e5c92914) reminded me of the chapters in The Man In the High Castle (https://smile.amazon.co.uk/dp/0241246105) where it's suggested that some hand crafted items are so beautiful that they possess a factor, wu, that makes them desirable, and one of the character's acquaintances wishes to clone them as Continue reading →

As AI becomes closer than ever to creating digital artifacts which are indistinguishable from those generated in real life, I'm left wondering how we manage the risks to our understanding of law and justice – think perhaps of a generated "CCTV recording" of a political opponent committing a crime being submitted as evidence in court, Continue reading →

We make a lot of use of our Alexa at home, and i'm interested to see how it can help in hotels. Being able to order important but not time-critical services ("alexa, have someone pick up my laundry"), or get information ("alexa, what floor is the gym on") come to mind. But is it going Continue reading →

I've long found the sustainability Oracle's business model questionable – and their latest move to hide (lack of?) cloud revenue growth in their financials further reinforces my view that they are a company on the way down. https://www.ft.com/content/a4fc61c6-740f-11e8-aa31-31da4279a601 Shares slide as analyst worries it may be ‘obfuscating weakness’ Continue reading →