Mar 25, 2016 - The WAN Show Document

[LinusTech]

 

 

 

Soundcloud Link:

 

 

Main News Topics

Microsoft deletes ‘teen girl’ AI after it became a Hitler-loving sex robot within 24 hours

Source 1: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/03/24/microsofts-teen-girl-ai-turn

Source 2: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/570739-microsoft-ai-shutdown-for-being-racist/

Source 3: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/03/microsoft-terminates-its-tay

• A day after Microsoft introduced an innocent Artificial Intelligence chat robot to Twitter, it had to delete it

• The AI had transformed into an evil Hitler-loving, incestual sex-promoting, ‘Bush did 9/11’-proclaiming robot

• Devs at Microsoft created ‘Tay’, an AI modelled to speak ‘like a teen girl’, in order to improve the customer service on their voice recognition software

• Marketed her as ‘The AI with zero chill’

• To chat with Tay, you can tweet or DM her by finding @tayandyou on Twitter, or add her as a contact on Kik or GroupMe

• She uses millennial slang

• “Went from humans are cool” to full nazi in <24 hrs and I’m not at all concerned about the future of AI” said @geraldmellor on Twitter

Apple announced iPhone SE: a smaller, cheaper smartphone

Source 1: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/mar/21/iphone-se-4in-apple-sm

Source 2: http://www.wired.com/2016/03/iphone-se-smaller-phone/

Source 3: http://www.apple.com/ca/iphone-se/?cid=wwa-ca-g-iphone&cp=iphonese

• Essentially an iPhone 6s stuffed into a 5s case

• Goes on sale March 31st

iOS 9 OS

Specifications

4 inches

640x1136 resolution

A9 processor

16GB or 64GB

12MP rear camera

1.2MP front camera

$399 USD for 16GB

$499 for 64GB

“Up to 13 hour battery life on Wi-Fi with internet use” - COULDN”T FIND BATTERY SIZE

Domino’s Autonomous Delivery Robot

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/567886-dominos-auton OP: Griffscavern

Source 2: http://www.engadget.com/2016/03/18/dominos-autonomous-pizza-delivery-vehicle/

DRU Video (3 Mins Long)

• Robot named DRU (Domino’s Robotic Unit)

  • Autonomous delivery vehicle built in collaboration with Australian tech startup named Marathon Targets

  • Domino’s calls it a “first of its kind”

  • Currently delivering fresh pizza to Queensland, Australia

• Still in prototype stage

• Domino’s working with Queensland Department of Transport and Main Roads to ensure it meets requirements to be set loose on the street

• Uses “LIDAR”

  • Same tech utilized by self-driving cars

  • Built-in GPS tracking technology that syncs with Google Maps

• Vehicle is locked to prevent people from stealing pizza

• When it arrives, customers need to enter a mobile code that opens the insulated storage compartment

• While being tested in Australia, Domino’s working with “global partners” to ensure it will meet requirements elsewhere

• Vehicles to start appearing in Queensland within 6 months, but could take up to 2 years to become a regular thing

iPad Pro 9.7 has lower clocked CPU and only 2GB RAM compared to 4GB for the 12.9 inch model

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/569842-ipad-pro-97-has-lower-cl OP: asim1999

Source 2: http://9to5mac.com/2016/03/22/9-7-inch-ipad-pro-includes-2-gb-ram-slightl

• Superior to the 2015 12-inch iteration in some regards, including better camera and display

• Raw processor is not as identical as Apple implied in its presentation

• While both models have the A9X processor, the 9.7-inch version has half the RAM and slightly lower clock speed GPU

Intel retires “tick-tock” development model, extending the life of each process

Source 1: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/03/intel-retires-tick-tock-de

Chart Depicting This

• New pattern is “Process, Architecture, Optimization”

• Under tick-tock, development was split into “ticks”

  • Existing processor design would be migrated to a new manufacturing process

• “Tocks”

  • New processor design would be released onto an existing process

• Process has been used since Intel first introduced its “Core” branded processors

• Process has come under increasing pressure

  • Took Intel a long time to ramp up production on the 14nm manufacturing process used by Broadwell (tick) and Skylake (tock) processors

• Intel announced last July that it  was breaking the tick-tock pattern on 14nm

  • Skylake was originally going to be replaced with Cannonlake, a tick that would see 14nm shrink to 10nm

• New plan is to introduce a third generation of 14nm processors, called Kaby Lake before shrinking to 10nm in the second half of 2017

J.J. Abrams: Proposed $50 Home Movie Service “Beneficial” to Movie Theaters

Source 1: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/jj-abrams-proposed-50-home-875583

• Abrams among other high-profile directors and producers supporting Sean Parker’s plan to make new films available in the home

• Spoke to The Hollywood Reporter at SXSW

• “I responded to that system mostly because it actually is beneficial to the exhibitors”

• They plan to give theater owners $20 of every $50 spent to rent a film for 48 hours via an encrypted set top box costing $150

 

Rapid Fire

Pebble fires 25% of its staff

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/570434-pebble-fires-25- OP: GoodBytes

Source 2: http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/23/11292742/pebble-laying-off-25-percent-of-staff

• Laying off 40 employees

• Pebble CEO Eric Migicovsky suggested cuts because of a lack of funds

• Tech Insider says that Pebble raised $26 million of the last eight months

  • Pebble sold $20 million worth of smartwatches during a Kickstarter campaign at the beginning of 2015

• Migicovsky suggest that the future Pebble products could shift focus towards health and fitness features

• Migicovsky commented on the layoffs saying “we want to be careful”

Oculus Rift Pre-Orders Start Shipping Out of Customers

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/571361-oculus-rift-pre-orders OP: Master Disaster

Source 2: http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/24/11301864/oculus-vr-rift-virtual-reality-head

• CEO Brendan Iribe tweeted that it has shipped

• Deliveries begin Monday, March 28th

• If you pre-order now, you won’t be able to get one until July

Android Pay Coming to the UK

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/570468-android-pay-f OP: g1ngernator

Source 2: http://officialandroid.blogspot.com/2016/03/tap-pay-uk.html

• Will be able to use Android Pay everywhere contactless payments are accepted

• Will support MasterCard and Visa credit and debit cards for many of UK’s major financial institutions

• Coming ‘in the next few months’

How Valve got passable VR running on a four-year-old graphics card

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/569756-valve-release-dynam OP: Humbug

Source 2: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/03/how-valve-got-passable-vr-running-on-a-four

Adaptive Quality Example Chart

• Valve Graphics Programmer Alex Vlachos detailed how a number of adaptive quality programming tricks let him run Valve’s Aperture Science VR demo

  • Done with an Nvidia GTX 680

• Showcased at a GDC talk

• Adaptive quality adjustment

  • System monitors processing time for each rendered frame, lowers or raises the quality based on how much headroom is available

  • Goal is to use 70 to 90 percent of the GPU’s power at all times

• Fixed foveated rendering

  • Engine can lower the resolution in a ring around edge of each eye’s circular VR view

  • Radial density masking similarly skips rendering alternate pixels near the edge of a player's vision

    • Creates a 10 to 25 percent performance increase on their own

• Lowering the VR bar

  • Able to set a number of quality levels for Valve’s Aperture Science demo

  • High end, demo can run at 140 percent of the default resolution and at enhanced 8x MSAA

  • Low end, resolution drops to 65%, MSAA scales back to 4x, and Radial Density Masking is turned on

• Valve will be making the ‘adaptive quality scaling’ for its own Source 2 engine

• Available as a free Unity Engine rendering plug-in in the next few weeks

 

AMOLED Displays now Cheaper to Produce than LCD Displays

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/570986-amoled-displays-n OP: Technicolors

Source 2: http://www.androidauthority.com/amoled-displays-now-cheaper-than-lcd-682080/

Source 3: https://technology.ihs.com/

• Has taken 24 months for AMOLED production costs to fall below LCD

  • According to data from IHS Technology

• Production costs in the first quarter for a 5-inch full HD smartphone displays are $14.30 for AMOLED, $14.60 for LCD

• In the fourth quarter of last year, figures were $17.10 for AMOLED and $15.70 for LCD

Facebook ends its app support for Blackberry BB10 Operating System

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/569715-facebook-ends-its-a OP: Nick Paviour

Source 2: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-35871141

• Blackberry “extremely disappointed” with Facebook’s decision to discontinue support for its app

• Blackberry users will have to use the mobile version of the website to use Facebook

• Not clear when this will take effect

• Facebook owned Whatsapp support for BB10 OS is slated to end at the end of 2016

Foxconn to reduce offer for SHARP by around $900 million

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/554603-update-foxconn-ju OP: zMeul

Source 2: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-sharp-hon-hai-idUSKCN0WN0C4

• Taiwan’s Foxconn likely to reduce capital injection into SHARP

• Last month SHARP said it would issue around $4.4 billion of new shares to give Foxconn a two-thirds stake

• Foxconn put takeover bid on hold at last minute

  • Reviewing the bid given concerns about future losses as well as deterioration in SHARP’s earnings in the financial year to March 31st

• Foxconn lowering the purchase price of new share offers from SHARP

  • Will retain a 2/3rd ownership of the company

• SHARP aims to hold a board meeting to decide on new deal by the end of month

 

Facebook’s ad platform now guesses at your race based on your behaviour

Source 1: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/03/facebooks-ad-platf
Source 2:

• Company profiles users so it can sell against your “ethnic affinity”

• Three different versions of the marketing campaign for the N.W.A biopic ‘Straight Outta Compton’ appeared on Facebook

  • One for white audiences, one for black audiences, and one for hispanic audiences

  • Trailers all completely different

  • One depicts the movie as a gangster movie, emphasizing violence

  • One depicts the movie as a biography, talking about their music being “protest art”

  • Facebook describes ethnicity as “affinities, a similarity of characteristics”

(Rumor) Sony Looking into PS4.5

Source 1: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/567590-now-its-a-good-ide OP: themodernagenb

Source 2: http://kotaku.com/sources-sony-is-working-on-a-ps4-5-1765723053

• Planning a new version of the PS4

  • Increased graphical power and games running at a 4k resolution

  • “Developer sources” tell Kotaku

• Not sure if current PS4 owners will be able to upgrade or if they’ll have to buy an entirely new device

• Unclear if ‘PS4.5’ is an official name or just a nickname

 

 

[givingtnt]

wooooooooooooo

wan show time !

[Kaiorga]

I believe they asked for this in the stream

[Master Disaster]

I managed to watch it live which is rare, thank god for time changes

[RedRound2]

Wow, you guys don't do your research before the show and bias runs strong

 

For the record I only saw the iPad Pro and the intel tick-tock part. Since Linus wasn't there I was pretty sure Luke's going to hate on Apple, which he did by first hating on a 16GB and 36GB model which doesn't exist (Its 32,128 and 256).

And isn't it obvious why Apple downgraded the CPU and RAM. Because it's priced lower than the iPad Pro 12.9" and they need a differentiating factor. Moreover iOS being RAM efficient most people wouldn't need anything more than 2GB as opposed to the 4GB on 12.9" which are exclusively targeted at professionals

 

Completely forgot about the iPhone SE which is a pretty compelling phone given its flagship specs for pretty cheap.

 

Oh yeah and Luke's brother, This was a small Apple event and the big ones come in June and September which continue to impress the audience (unless you take a look at the haters who would go on all lengths to say it's the same thing). 

 

I expect a better coverage next week when Linus is back

[Master Disaster]

@Slick https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/katvr/kat-walk-a-new-virtual-reality-locomotion-device

[Dchil]

My Photoshop skills are weak.

 

[907rider]

As far as the "Car Tech" go's you guys should check out the 2016 Tacoma's they have pretty good size and quality touch screen in them, they feature wireless charging for phones that support that feature, also as far as iphones go they integrate very very seamlessly, the hands free calling has some of the best noise cancellation I have ever seen, even better than the stuff on 2016 Mercedes's.  Being a 23 year old male the tech stuff was actually pretty important to me.  Another neat thing it does is that it automatically records 20min of whatever radio station you are listening to, then allows you to pause, rewind, or fast-forward.  Also if you receive a call it automatically pauses the radio for the duration of the call then picks back up where you were when the call came in.

[NickTheMajin]

Incase anyone's interested, this is the Broscience YouTube channel Luke mentioned around the 20 minute mark. 

 

 

 

[alexlol]

This is the o̶b̶v̶i̶o̶u̶s̶l̶y̶ ̶e̶d̶i̶t̶e̶d̶  video that Luke's brother was talking about about the wall. Yes it's fake, just what the Tay AI thing said.

http://www.snopes.com/trump-canadian-wall/

 

Guys please don't fall for the sensationalist headline and propaganda.

 

Cheers.

[xnamkcor]

The last truly theater unique movie I was was the 70mm showing of Hateful Eight. And even then I could barely tell it from a normal high quality production. I look forward to the 4k Blu ray.

 

I also saw Only Yesterday, which was made in 1991 and I enjoyed it almost as much.

 

Edit: Is Luke's brother a Bear?

Edited March 28, 2016 by xnamkcor