Petervan's Delicacies - Issue #100

The very best

About Intimacy. This is very good. The internet’s quintessential, paradoxical message is “Only Connect.”

About cyberwars: you are the territory. Excellent introduction to the so called "warm" wars going on at this very right moment.

About spacial computing by Robert Scobble: good intro and good resources and embedded links.

About the end of trust. Long (300+ page PDF) on what's wrong about online trust and how to fix it

About some recommendations to Zuck to make "good" software that meets users' needs. This was originally called “Dear Zuck (and Facebook Product Teams)” and is written as a letter to Mark Zuckerberg. But it’s for all designers of social software. A few days ago, you announced that…

A close look at the value liberal arts majors can bring to business.

The patent for "Biometric Authentication of Individuals Utilizing Subcutaneous Biometrics" describes a non-invasive system called "Universal ID".

A daring effort is under way to create the first children whose DNA has been tailored using gene editing.

Fears of designer babies are overblown, and the disease-fighting benefits are too great to ignore.

It's not surprising that governments around the world are taking steps to win the AI arms race. But many of the challenges we are grappling with today will be answered if we take the time to learn from one another.

STEM must be replaced by STEAM.

Some in the Futurist community are focused on technology and ethics. Gerd Leonhard has been particularly vocal on the topic. I’ve dedicated a section of my keynote to what I believe will be a growing dialog. I use this slide to pose a question to the audience: The example provided above comes from Ray Kurzweil,…

It's time for these directors to stand on their feet.

Data and Society

Facebook’s proposed technology would analyze your #wifey tags, shared IP addresses, and photos to predict whom you live with.

Passengers at some European airports will soon be questioned by artificial intelligence-based lie detectors as a trial of the technology is set to begin.

People who like L.L.Bean and Wrangler were more susceptible to Trump’s populist messaging, says whistleblower Chistopher Wylie.

Informing debate by any means necessary

Georg Schmitt, Head of Corporate Affairs, World Economic Forum: Tel.: +41 (0)79 571 8287; Email: gsch@weforum.org

Documents alleged to contain revelations on data and privacy controls that led to Cambridge Analytica scandal

Citizens who lose so-called "social credit" can be blocked from, among other things, ordering plane and train tickets.

Zeitgeist

A new report analyzes the effects of climate change in the US. The Trump administration moved its publish date to Black Friday.

Physicians believe the Woolsey Fire has released nuclear and chemical material.

A mock prison facility in South Korea has been locking up paying “inmates” for brief stays in simple cells since 2013.

The future of battlefield communications is resting comfortably near your back gums.

Tech companies have vowed to do better when it comes to using data ethically, but most ethics initiatives are neither enforced nor enforceable.

Innovation

We may have to soon rename ourselves as Daily Techfin. We have been focusing on the breaking of banks and their resistance to the Fintech avalanche, while Techfins have been slowly but surely capturing the FS world. Lots of numbers coming your way - so be warned. Image Source Money 2020 opened up in China,…

A total of 12 of the largest tech giants come from the United States, while eight hail from China. All other countries combine for zero.

Airtable

The new draft plan for the “smart” waterfront development offers broad proposals for housing, transportation, and energy use. But it’s not that radical.

Amazon's biggest rival in Spain just got a new teammate.

Future of work

There’s more than one way to feel like a fraud. Here’s what it takes to overcome the most common ones.

Most companies have declared a purpose, but how to make it real? The purpose of purpose is to push a business further, not simply to describe its current operations. Purpose should be discomforting…

Internet Culture

Google has begun rolling out its futuristic Duplex feature, which can automatically make voice calls to restaurants and other businesses on a user’s behalf, to a small group of Pixel owners in "select" cities around the US.

Facebook's COO has all the blind spots of a powerful businessperson.

FinTech

Check out the latest innovation labs from from financial institutions like Ally Bank, SunTrust, Wells Fargo, USAA and Navy Federal.

The wunderkind programmer also discussed his recent research and favorite blockchain-based application.

AI, Robots, Algorythms

The dialog surrounding artificial intelligence and ethics is amplifying. As society continues this rapid progression towards an automated future, the role of ethics becomes increasingly important. After painting a picture of several possible futures for an audience, I would ask this question: Is this a society that you want to live in. This discussion was…

Yoshua Bengio wants to stop talk of an AI arms race and make the technology more accessible to the developing world.

Artificial intelligence can learn for itself if we teach it to be curious. New research from the Elon Musk-founded lab OpenAI shows how this concept can help an AI agent play Montezuma’s Revenge, an Atari game that’s long proved to be a challenge for machine learning.

Why do firms like Amazon, Facebook, and Google have such an advantage when it comes to recruiting AI talent and collecting data. Find out in this article.

One of the birthplaces of artificial intelligence, MIT, has announced a bold plan to reshape its academic program around the technology.

There are about as many opinions as there are experts.

HBO's 'The Truth About Killer Robots' examines the legal, economic, psychological, and moral implications of our inevitable, AI-run dystopia.

The race to become the global leader in artificial intelligence (AI) has officially begun.

Generative adversarial networks, or GANs, are fueling creativity—and controversy. Here’s how they work.

Post Capitalism

The core of our troubles in our attachment to the ego. Transforming humans from being ego-centric to eco-centric.

Art related

The Puzzle Ball Theater is a concept by Steven Chilton Architects for a new cultural space in Guangzhou, China. Its design is influenced by Ivory Puzzle Balls.

This spring, the Van Gogh Museum will present 'Hockney - Van Gogh. The Joy of Nature.' This major Hockney exhibition will explore Van Gogh's influence on the artist by showcasing an eclectic collection of over 120 works by Hockney, "one of the most inspirational artists of our time."

MIT CSAIL's new RePaint system aims to faithfully recreate paintings using deep learning and 3-D printing.

As we look at the state of fashion for the year ahead, we see the industry as a whole embracing new opportunities--even as dangers lurk.

Aesthetics

Although colour theory was taught at the Bauhaus it was considered too feminine for architecture, says Michelle Ogundehin as part of our Bauhaus 100 series.

We Are Millions And Millions Are One deals with impossibility of love in impossible times, so dangerously close to the fictional reality of classic dystopian...

To combat the growing e-waste crisis, a massive distributed supercomputing network has replaced the need for personal devices. Implants in people’s wrists al...

Other

An intricate system of dams, levees and tunnels defends the Japan’s capital. Will it be able to cope with climate change?

We all try our best to sound professional in work emails, but sometimes missed deadlines, lack of response and overwhelming projects can put us on edge. One of