KC DEBRIEF WEEK 50, FRIDAY 2023/12/15
DIGITAL TITANS
_Elon Musk's new Optimus robots are coming for your eggs. In huge news for supporters of the android apocalypse, Elon Musk has officially unveiled Tesla’s new humanoid robot, Optimus ‘Gen 2’. The tech billionaire made the announcement today (December 13), with an ominous video posted to X. Watch below.The robot can reportedly walk 30 per cent faster and comes in 10 kilograms lighter than the first iteration that shambled about onstage at Tesla’s AI Day in 2022. In the video, we see it stroll past a line of Cybertrucks, show off its “improved balance” by performing a few squats, and bob around to EDM like a particularly lifeless NPC. “Is that all?” you might be thinking. But no. It can also pick up an egg.
_Legendary Entertainment and Activision are bringing the “Dune: Part Two”. Rivals played by Timothée Chalamet and Austin Butler into the Call of Duty universe. The characters played by the two actors are featured in new bundles for Activision’s “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III” first-person shooter and “Call of Duty: Warzone” battle royale game. The first bundle features Paul Atreides (portrayed by Chalamet) and is available now. The second will be released Dec. 16 and will feature Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, as played by Butler in the film. Both bundles will be available via the Call of Duty in-game store.In a video released by Activision, Chalamet and Butler got an early look at their in-game characters — and compete in a one-on-one, knives-only death match on Call of Duty’s classic Rust map.
_Epic Games, maker of Fortnite, has prevailed in an antitrust trial over Alphabet’s Google Play app marketplace, Epic’s chief executive said on Monday, hours after the federal jury took up the case.“ Victory over Google! After 4 weeks of detailed court testimony, the California jury found against the Google Play monopoly on all counts. The Court’s work on remedies will start in January,” Tim Sweeney wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.Jurors found for Epic on all counts, a court filing showed. The court will begin work in January on what remedies to implement.Google said it would appeal. “We will continue to defend the Android business model and remain deeply committed to our users, partners, and the broader Android ecosystem,” Wilson White, vice-president of government affairs and public policy at Google, said in an emailed statement.Lawyers for the two companies made their final arguments on Monday morning, after more than a month of trial in Epic’s lawsuit, which accused Google of taking action to quash competitors and charging unduly high fees of up to 30% to app developers.
_Instagram introduces GenAI powered background editing tool. Instagram introduced its generative AI-powered background editing tool to U.S.-based users Wednesday. Meta’s lead for generative AI, Ahmad Al-Dahle, posted on Threads saying that the tool will let users change the background to their images through prompts for Stories. When users tap on the background editor icon on an image they will get ready prompts like “On a red carpet,” “Being chased by dinosaurs” and “Surrounded by puppies.” Users can write their own prompts to change the background as well.
_Twitch revamps rules on sexual content. Adult content such as nude drawings and sculptures are now permitted on streaming site Twitch - as long as it is deemed artistic. Creators can now also stream video highlighting their "breasts, buttocks or pelvic region" the Amazon-owned site has announced. Twitch - which is popular with gamers - says it is part of a revamp of its "confusing" rules on sexual content. A blanket ban on pornographic material remains in place. "We have received consistent feedback from streamers... that it can be difficult to know how their content will be interpreted," Twitch vice president of customer trust Angela Hession said in a blog post. "We want streamers to feel confident they understand our rules and viewers to feel confident they will get the experience they expect." Under its old rules, most explicit content was banned, which was problematic because while Twitch is known for being a place to go to watch others play video games, it has also become popular for other types of creative expression.
_Netflix reveals viewing data across entire catalogue for the first time. Co-CEO Ted Sarandos said the move is aimed at ending an ‘environment of mistrust’. Netflix, the streaming service that has been long criticised for a lack of transparency about how shows and films perform on its platform, will begin publishing a “comprehensive deep dive” into what its subscribers are watching twice a year. Its first report, released on Tuesday, provided viewer data on more than 18,000 titles, representing a total of nearly 100bn hours viewed, Netflix said. The Night Agent, a political thriller, was the most watched show on Netflix globally in the first half of 2023, with 812mn hours. Ted Sarandos, Netflix co-chief executive, acknowledged on Tuesday that the company’s “lack of data and lack of transparency” had created an “environment of mistrust” in Hollywood. Transparency on streaming services was a central issue during this year’s Hollywood strikes. Writers and actors demanded better royalties when their shows performed well on streaming services, just as they had done on traditional television networks. But success-based payments required more information about streaming services’ performance measures. Talent agents and Hollywood unions said Netflix kept that information closely guarded — in contrast with the public releases of Nielsen ratings for traditional TV. Sarandos said the new data releases were not driven by the strikes but should create “a better environment for the [Hollywood] guilds, for the producers, for creators and for the press”. He added that the information being released “is the data that we use to run the business — this is the exact same pool of data that we’re sharing”. Jeremy Zimmer, chief executive of the talent agency UTA, had long argued that Netflix and other streamers would have to become more transparent, and that this would be better for writers, actors and producers. “Netflix has waited to release this data until the benefit was greater than the liability,” Zimmer told the Financial Times. “Nonetheless, it’s great to have it available for our clients and it will allow us to create more value on their behalf.” Last year Netflix launched an advertising-based version of its streaming service, although the data release is not aimed at helping advertisers target audiences. “We use third-party reporting because that is the traditional way advertisers verify viewing for payment,” Sarandos said.
_Meta launches web-based AI image generator trained on your instagram pics. Generative AI is everywhere, with updates rolling out regularly on chatbots like ChatGPT and Bard. Today it's Meta's turn; the company has new AI tools across its services and on the web, including a powerful image generator trained on Instagram photos.Meta has already been testing text-to-image generation inside apps like WhatsApp, and it's become "one of Meta AI’s most commonly used features across our messaging apps," the company says. Now that image generation is expanding beyond chats to the web.
_Axel Springer, the publisher of Business Insider and Politico, said on Wednesday it was partnering with OpenAI, which will pay the German media group to allow ChatGPT to summarize current articles in responses generated by the chatbot. “ChatGPT users around the world will receive summaries of selected global news content from Axel Springer’s media brands,” which also includes the German tabloid Bild, the two companies said in a statement.The chatbot’s answers will include material otherwise kept behind a paywall and offer “links to the full articles for transparency and further information”, they said. Axel Springer will be paid for making its content available to the US artificial intelligence firm, a spokesman for the media group told AFP. The deal is valid for several years and does not commit either side to exclusivity, leaving them free to sign new agreements, the spokesman said without giving more detail.
PEOPLE, MEDIA, CULTURE
_Music is said to be a language that transcends all others. But traditional instruments are not always as inclusive as they could be. Now, another instrument is about to open up the music scene like no other as it is officially recognised by the classical music world. Alessandro Vazzana, 26, has been playing music since he was five years old. First the piano, then guitar and drums. Disabled since birth, he uses an electric wheelchair and has seen a decline in his ability to use his hands. He has Fragile X syndrome resulting in a learning disability which can impact communication, but not his love for music. When playing his instruments became too physically challenging, he was introduced to the Clarion - an entirely digital instrument which made music accessible once again.
_ From New Nostalgia to Calming Rhythms: Adobe predicts creative trends for 2024For the seventh year in a row, Adobe released its Creative Trends Report. For 2024, the company believes calming rhythms, wonder and joy, dynamic dimensions, and the new nostalgia are the emerging global creative trends set to make the biggest impact in the coming year.This creative trend will be powered by generative AI, which is “ushering in a new era of creativity for everyone, opening up even more opportunities for consumers to experiment, play, and reimagine how creativity comes to life,” says the report.
_Digital fragrance venture, GABAR, offers a metaverse-based experience where users encounter visual representations of scent molecules as floating orbs in their virtual store. These orbs, designed to enhance the user's focus on the virtual environment, accompany the digital display of GABAR's fragrances, candles, and face and body oils. The GABAR NEW WORLD space also includes a high-frequency sound for bodily calming and re-tuning, aiming to create a multi-sensory experience. While GABAR plans to open physical stores, they view the metaverse store as complementary, enhancing the sensory experience of scent with digital and gamified elements. The founders, Hnin and Aye, anticipate the development of "smell-o-vision" and other VR technologies that engage all senses, potentially redefining human experiences.
_A 2023 Look-back: the internet dies, etc.
_2023: The year of the girl . From Barbie to the Eras Tour to girl dinner, girliness and girly aesthetics have dominated pop culture this year – but why? Girldom has dominated pop culture this year. The tomato girl, rat girl, strawberry girl, feral girl, clean girl, have all had their moment in the spotlight on TikTok, while even the most mundane aspects of our lives have become girlified too. Perhaps you’ve been on a ‘hot girl walk’ or considered packing in your corporate career for a ‘lazy girl job’, danced to ‘It Girl’, done some ‘girl math’ to justify your Black Friday purchases, or tucked into a ‘girl dinner’. Girliness isn’t exclusive to girls either (young, female-identifying): everyone and anyone can be a girlie.We reached peak girl this year in July, when a hot pink tsunami descended to see Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, turning the film into a billion-dollar blockbuster within weeks of its premiere and earning Gerwig the title of the highest-grossing female director of all time. Meanwhile, Taylor Swift crashed Ticketmaster for her sold-out world tour, smashed box office records with the Eras Tour film, and became the first ever artist to earn $1 billion from a single tour. Named Time’s Person of the Year, Swift has been a pivotal figure in this resurgence of girlhood, encouraging other women to reflect on the “woods we’ve wandered” by re-recording her albums from her (and our) youth.
_The verdict is in—it has been unanimously agreed upon that regardless of race, religion, creed, color, or gender, dating in the digital age is horrible. Many of us lament this fact at every chance we get, gathering around our various social campfires, regaling one another with cautionary tales and familiar horror stories. Where crushes once sparked a kaleidoscope of stomach-fluttering butterflies, now, with game playing on expert mode, crafting each text message becomes a fight to the death to see who can appear the “chillest” and least invested. You can bring your kinks to dinner and lay them on the table before your entrée comes, but monogamy has become a clandestine yearning—a humiliating secret best kept tucked under your hoop skirt, lest you drive away potential admirers. We avoid emotional investment like the plague, and the risk of wounding or being wounded often leads to the preemptive pre-wound (i.e., cutting a growing relationship off before anything has a chance to bloom). Most often, whether newly single or a long-standing veteran, the quest for companionship feels like an impossible journey through a world on fire. We seem to identify the cause of this problem as a pathological, deeply rooted issue with “everyone else”—presumably, the unhealed, morally bankrupt masses rising from the second circle of hell to torture those in honest, faithful pursuit of a relationship, both mentally and spiritually, for not but their own amusement. While this very well may be true, it seems more likely that we have collectively created this scourge of disconnection—stuck in the cycle of criticizing behaviors we cannot help but perpetuate ourselves.
_Praxis wants to build the city of cryptoThe Future. The secretive startup Praxis has wild ambitions to build a city in Silicon Valley’s image somewhere along the Mediterranean Sea, raising millions of dollars (and eyebrows) in its pursuit. While Praxis is likely little more than a whole lot of hype and runaway ego, the even more secretive “California Forever” project and the new infrastructure-focused a16z fund show that there’s an appetite for futuristic cities.
_Pew: Many teens use social media "almost constantly". Survey of 1,453 U.S. teens ages 13 to 17 conducted Sept. 26 to Oct. 23, 2023. Stacked bar chart showing the amount teens say they use apps and websites by service. Overall, 71% of teens say they visit YouTube at least once a day, followed by TikTok at 58%.
_Help in hand. Good news for teens who need to talk: As part of a broader effort to address rising mental health concerns since the start of the pandemic, New York City has launched a program that will provide free online therapy. The initiative, called NYC Teenspace, enables New Yorkers ages 13 to 17 to text, call and video chat with licensed therapists via the online platform Talkspace. Though live sessions are limited to one per month, texting is unlimited — and valuable. “We have learned that when people face something stressful, messaging is a powerful tool at their fingertips,” said Talkspace CEO Jon Cohen.
BRANDS
_This is a collaboration between digital fashion startup Rtfkt (owned by Nike) and luxury fragrance brand Byredo. The project, Alphameta, introduces innovative concepts like wearable digital "auras," personalized digital and physical scents, and NFT-linked NFC tags on perfume bottles. In partnership with Paris-based art directors M/M, it visually interprets 26 ingredients symbolizing various emotions as digital collectibles. These collectibles are available in limited quantities and can be worn within Rtfkt's "avatar ecosystem," including its CloneX avatars.
_Tesla is recalling more than two million cars after the US regulator found its driver assistance system, Autopilot, was partly defective. It follows a two-year investigation into crashes which occurred when the tech was in use. The recall applies to almost every Tesla sold in the US since the Autopilot feature was launched in 2015
MMM OF THE WEEK
Inspired by Spotify’s year-end wrap-up, singles are compiling their dating recaps into presentations with statistics and pie-charts / WSJ
OFF TOPIC
_Frasier Still Wants to Look Rich. Does He? An amusing NYT piece on the rebooted version of hit 1990s show Frasier, now featuring a subtly modified wardrobe for Dr. Frasier Crane that accords with a different set of status signals in clothing choices, and a more relaxed look. Inevitably, some excessive voices on social media are struggling to process the change in how high-status seekers signify. Amusing, though, and our fashion-forward members may appreciate the changes and what they say. A popular sitcom from the ’90s has returned with an updated wardrobe that reflects shifts in American elitism.