Tootfinder

A look at Udio, which was founded by four former DeepMind employees in December 2023 and launched a product on April 11 that generates songs from text prompts (Brian Hiatt/Rolling Stone)
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/udi…

AI-Music Arms Race: Meet Udio, the Other ChatGPT for Music
A new Suno rival, Udio, is here, backed by tech and music heavyweights. It has powerful capabilities —  and a whabit of generating Tom Petty's voice

A look at Udio, which was founded by four former DeepMind employees in December 2023 and launched a product on April 11 that generates songs from text prompts (Brian Hiatt/Rolling Stone)
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/udi…

AI-Music Arms Race: Meet Udio, the Other ChatGPT for Music
A new Suno rival, Udio, is here, backed by tech and music heavyweights. It has powerful capabilities —  and a whabit of generating Tom Petty's voice

A look at Udio, which was founded by four former DeepMind employees in December 2023 and launched a product on April 11 that generates songs from text prompts (Brian Hiatt/Rolling Stone)
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/udi…

AI-Music Arms Race: Meet Udio, the Other ChatGPT for Music
A new Suno rival, Udio, is here, backed by tech and music heavyweights. It has powerful capabilities —  and a whabit of generating Tom Petty's voice

Filings: Roku reveals a breach that compromised 15K accounts between December 2023 and February 2024 and tells users hackers didn't get sensitive personal info (Lucas Manfredi/The Wrap)
https://www.thewrap.com/roku-accounts-hacked-data-breach/

Over 15,000 Roku Accounts Compromised in Data Breach - TheWrap
Hackers gained access through login credentials obtained by third party sources and, in a limited number of cases, attempted to purchase streaming subscriptions

They can fire as many commanders as they like but there is nothing Russia can do about the disastrous situation in the Black Sea. They are going to continue losing ships because there is no solution to the drone threat.
From: @…

yes, a half-abandoned Mastodon branch with the revenue of a hot dog stand but the debt of a small country is definitely worth $6 billion

I’ve spoken to quite a few people recently who didn’t know that Adobe actually abandoned the $20 billion Figma acquisition in the end. So, in case you are under the impression that Adobe now owns Figma – that plan came crushing down last December: https://www.theverge.co…

Adobe abandons $20 billion acquisition of Figma
Adobe will no longer acquire Figma after pressure from European regulators made the deal appear unlikely. Figma will receive a $1 billion breakup fee.

A Science4Peace initiative: Alleviating the consequences of sanctions in international scientific cooperation
A. Ali, M. Barone, S. Brentjes, D. Britzger, M. Dittmar, T. Ekel\"of, J. Ellis, S. Fonseca de Souza, A. Glazov, A. V. Gritsan, R. Hoffmann, H. Jung, M. Klein, V. Klyukhin, V. Korbel, P. Kokkas, P. Kostka, U. Langenegger, J. List, N. Raicevic, A. Rostovtsev, A. Sabio Vera, M. Spiro, G. Tonelli, P. van Mechelen, J. Vigen

A Science4Peace initiative: Alleviating the consequences of sanctions in international scientific cooperation
The armed invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation has adversely affected the relations between Russia and Western countries. Among other aspects, it has put scientific cooperation and collaboration into question and changed the scientific landscape significantly. Cooperation between some Western institutions and their Russian and Belarusian partners were put on hold after February 24, 2022. The CERN Council decided at its meeting in December 2023 to terminate cooperation agreements with R…

yes, a half-abandoned Mastodon branch with the revenue of a hot dog stand but the debt of a small country is definitely worth $6 billion

"Spotted softshell turtle release boosts reptile conservation in Vietnam"
#Vietnam #Conservation #Animals

Spotted softshell turtle release boosts reptile conservation in Vietnam
Vietnam’s struggling population of spotted softshell turtles received a helping hand in December 2023 when researchers released 50 captive-bred hatchlings into a freshwater lake in a northern province. Now, new research indicates where further wild releases could result in the most conservation gains for the rare and threatened species, which was only described by scientists […]

Mistral AI launches Mixtral 8x22B, its latest sparse mixture-of-experts model, after releasing Mixtral 8x7B in December 2023 (Shubham Sharma/VentureBeat)
https://venturebeat.com/ai/mistral-ai-drops-new-mixture-of-experts-model-with-a-t…

🌴 DRC’s 1 billion trees program makes progress, but hurdles remain
https://news.mongabay.com/2024/04/drcs-1-billion-trees-program-makes-progress-but-hurdles-remain/

DRC’s 1 billion trees program makes progress, but hurdles remain
KINSHASA, Democratic Republic of Congo — Every weekend between January 2022 and December 2023, members of the nongovernmental organization Ferme Don de Dieu (FDD) planted trees on farmland in Yolo and Kinzono, on the outskirts of Mbankana, more than 140 km (87 miles) from Kinshasa. With the help of technicians from the Congolese environment ministry’s […]

In its first TikTok Shop Safety Report, TikTok reports 500K sellers in the US and 15M sellers worldwide in December 2023, adding 6M in H2 2023 (Alex Barinka/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20…

TikTok Shop Tops 500,000 US Sellers After E-Commerce Launch in 2023
TikTok reported that more than 500,000 merchants were selling to US users on its app at the end of 2023, more than double the number from three months earlier, as the video service stepped up its e-commerce effort.

Is 'oligarch' just the Russian word for 'billionaire', or is there some essential difference I'm missing 🤔
https://www.tumblr.com/teledyn/743949218967961600/billionaires-are-building-bunkers-and-buying…

In its first TikTok Shop Safety Report, TikTok reports 500K sellers in the US and 15M sellers worldwide in December 2023, adding 6M in H2 2023 (Alex Barinka/Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20…

TikTok Shop Tops 500,000 US Sellers After E-Commerce Launch in 2023
TikTok reported that more than 500,000 merchants were selling to US users on its app at the end of 2023, more than double the number from three months earlier, as the video service stepped up its e-commerce effort.

HRW sieht Anzeichen für neue russische Kriegsverbrechen
Die Menschenrechtsorganisation Human Rights Watch (HRW) hat Beweise für die Tötung von mindestens 15 ukrainischen Soldaten gesammelt, die sich russischen Einheiten ergeben wollten oder dies bereits getan haben. Dies habe sich seit dem Dezember vergangenen Jahres ereignet.
HRW wertete nach eigenen Angaben dafür Drohnenaufnahmen aus. Zwei Videos…
🔗

Ukraine: Russian Forces Executed Surrendering Ukraine Soldiers
Russian forces appear to have executed at least 15 Ukrainian soldiers as they attempted to surrender, and possibly six more who were surrendering or who had surrendered, since early December 2023, Human Rights Watch said today. These incidents should be investigated as war crimes.

Jade Plant flower, December 2023, Huntington Library, San Marino, California, USA. #flower #flowers #nature

US Treasury says threat to sanction 3rd-country banks has impacted Russian funding flows: https://benborges.xyz/2024/02/26/us-treasury-says.html

ACE Science Workshop Report
Stefania Gori, Nhan Tran, Karri DiPetrillo, Bertrand Echenard, Jeffrey Eldred, Roni Harnik, Pedro Machado, Matthew Toups, Robert Bernstein, Innes Bigaran, Cari Cesarotti, Bhaskar Dutta, Christian Herwig, Sergo Jindariani, Ryan Plestid, Vladimir Shiltsev, Matthew Solt, Alexandre Sousa, Diktys Stratakis, Zahra Tabrizi, Anil Thapa, Jacob Zettlemoyer, Jure Zupan
https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.02422 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2403.02422
arXiv:2403.02422v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: We summarize the Fermilab Accelerator Complex Evolution (ACE) Science Workshop, held on June 14-15, 2023. The workshop presented the strategy for the ACE program in two phases: ACE Main Injector Ramp and Target (MIRT) upgrade and ACE Booster Replacement (BR) upgrade. Four plenary sessions covered the primary experimental physics thrusts: Muon Collider, Neutrinos, Charged Lepton Flavor Violation, and Dark Sectors. Additional physics and technology ideas were presented from the community that could expand or augment the ACE science program. Given the physics framing, a parallel session at the workshop was dedicated to discussing priorities for accelerator R\&D. Finally, physics discussion sessions concluded the workshop where experts from the different experimental physics thrusts were brought together to begin understanding the synergies between the different physics drivers and technologies.
In December of 2023, the P5 report was released setting the physics priorities for the field in the next decade and beyond, and identified ACE as an important component of the future US accelerator-based program. Given the presentations and discussions at the ACE Science Workshop and the findings of the P5 report, we lay out the topics for study to determine the physics priorities and design goals of the Fermilab ACE project in the near-term.

The Camberville E-Bike Lending Library just crossed two years of bike loan-days since October 1st, with 4200 tracked miles on the odometers of the library bikes.
The first loan from the library was a year ago this month, but I didn't get serious about tracking loans until October. Since then, more than 144 different loans have happened... and more than 45 people bought e-bikes after borrowing one!

Sources: French AI startup Mistral AI is nearing a deal to raise ~$600M at a $6B valuation, after raising $500M at a $2B valuation in December 2023 (Wall Street Journal)
https://www.wsj.com/te…

Over 40 years. Must be some kind of record...
Former US ambassador accused of spying for Cuba says he’ll plead guilty to charges | The Hill
https://thehill.com/regulation/national-security/4499068-former-u…

Former US ambassador accused of spying for Cuba says he’ll plead guilty to charges
A former U.S. diplomat accused of spying for Cuba for more than 40 years said he will plead guilty to charges the Department of Justice (DOJ) brought against him in December 2023. Victor Manuel Rocha, 73, told Judge Beth Bloom on Thursday that he would change his plea, indicating he is prepared to plead guilty…

The Raiders Release D.J Fluker https://www.yardbarker.com/nfl/articles/the_raiders_release_dj_fluker/s1_17391_40201873

The Raiders Release D.J Fluker
The Las Vegas Raiders have decided to cut ties with D.J Fluker as they released him on Friday. Fluker joined the Raiders practice squad in December of 2023 and signed on a futures deal in January 2024. Fluker hasn’t played a regular-season game since 2020 when he was with Baltimore. D.J Fluker, a first-round pick in 2013 out of Alabama has played for the Los Angeles Chargers, Miami Dolphins, New York Giants, Seattle Seahawks, Baltimore Ravens, and Las Vegas Raiders. Robert LaMar is a writer …

A design specification for Critical Illness Digital Twins to cure sepsis: responding to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine Report: Foundational Research Gaps and Future Directions for Digital Twins
Gary An, Chase Cockrell
https://arxiv.org/abs/2405.05301

A design specification for Critical Illness Digital Twins to cure sepsis: responding to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine Report: Foundational Research Gaps and Future Directions for Digital Twins
On December 15, 2023, The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) released a report entitled: Foundational Research Gaps and Future Directions for Digital Twins. The ostensible purpose of this report was to bring some structure to the burgeoning field of digital twins by providing a working definition and a series of research challenges that need to be addressed to allow this technology to fulfill its full potential. In the work presented herein we focus on five specifi…

Huge. *The* higher education story to watch - not just in Canada but internationally.
RE: tuition hikes for out-of-province Canadian and international students for the only three English universities in Quebec: 'We are undertaking...legal action because we believe that these measures are illegal and if upheld, will threaten McGill’s mission,' Deep Saini, President and VC @…

McGill launches legal challenge against government measures
Following a unanimous vote at a special Board meeting on February 15, McGill University today launched a legal challenge against two measures announced by the Government of Quebec on December 14, 2023: Tuition increases for Canadian students from outside Quebec studying in undergraduate and professional master’s programs; and Changes to the funding model for international students studying in undergraduate and professional master’s programs. The University is asking the court to issue a sta…

Just discovered I printed 30 copies of the wrong zine because I didn't name my files properly. One of these is for print, one of them is not. : (

Kabinetsreactie op het artikel “Belastingdienst blijft wet overtreden met mogelijke discriminerende algoritmen” van Follow the Money van
18 december 2023.
Interessant om te lezen over hoe Belastingdienst nu met algoritmes omgaat.
https://open.overheid.nl/documenten/fe

#Minecraft #AccountDead
Am 3.9.2011 habe ich bei Mojang Minecraft gekauft.
3 Jahre später kauft Microsoft Mojang für 2,5Milliarden$.
Am 24.8.2019 habe ich es das letzte Mal gespielt.
Is wie gestern: Ich bin Ü50 - für mich läuft Zeit anders.
Heute Abend will ich es mal …

"Italy adds 2,022 MW/3,836 MWh of distributed storage capacity in 2023"
#Italy #Batteries #Energy

Italy adds 2,022 MW/3,836 MWh of distributed storage capacity in 2023
Italy hit 3,367 MW/6,645 MWh of cumulative distributed storage capacity at the end of December. The new figures indicate that lithium-ion technology powers most storage systems, at 516,475 units in total.

181,000 units of farm machinery and equipment damaged About 181,000 units of agricultural machinery and equipment were partially or completely damaged. This was reported by the Centre for Food and Lan Source : https://uacrisis.org/en/znyshheno-181-

The Browser Company debuts Arc on Windows, after testing began in December 2023, and says the Windows app has 150K users; the macOS app shipped in July 2023 (Ivan Mehta/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/30/the-browser-company-releases-arc-…

The Browser Company releases Arc for Windows | TechCrunch
The Browser Company, makers of the Arc web browser, released its Windows version today. The company started testing the Windows client in December, and it

Climate policy in Scotland, changes?
Compare to "Scotland's climate 'changing faster than expected'
Published 19 December 2023
➡️ https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-67752167

Beeston Lock, December 2023.
#photography #ukphotographer #newtopography #documentingplaces

This https://arxiv.org/abs/2402.10326 has been replaced.
initial toot: https://mastoxiv.page/@arXiv_mat…

Mathematical Opportunities in Digital Twins (MATH-DT)
The report describes the discussions from the Workshop on Mathematical Opportunities in Digital Twins (MATH-DT) from December 11-13, 2023, George Mason University. It illustrates that foundational Mathematical advances are required for Digital Twins (DTs) that are different from traditional approaches. A traditional model, in biology, physics, engineering or medicine, starts with a generic physical law (e.g., equations) and is often a simplification of reality. A DT starts with a specific eco…

Latvia to become first EU country to ban imports of grain from Russia, Belarus: https://benborges.xyz/2024/02/22/latvia-to-become.html

PEN America: 4,349 books were removed from US schools across 23 states from July 2023 to December 2023, up from 3,362 books in the entire previous academic year (Alexandra Alter/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/16/books/book-bans-public-school…

Book Bans Continue to Surge in Public Schools
More books were removed during the first half of this academic year than in the entire previous one.

Sources: the US SEC sent a subpoena to OpenAI in December 2023, seeking internal records, following the board's decision in November to fire Sam Altman as CEO (Deepa Seetharaman/Wall Street Journal)
https://www.wsj.com/tech/sec-investigating…

Latvia to become first EU country to ban imports of grain from Russia, Belarus: https://benborges.xyz/2024/02/22/latvia-to-become.html

"Greece’s 2023 PV additions hit 1.59 GW"
#Greece #Solar #SolarPower #Renewables

Greece’s 2023 PV additions hit 1.59 GW
Greece installed 1.59 GW of solar in 2023, bringing the country's cumulative PV capacity to 7.1 GW by the end of December.

Sources: the US SEC sent a subpoena to OpenAI in December 2023, seeking internal records, following the board's decision in November to fire Sam Altman as CEO (Deepa Seetharaman/Wall Street Journal)
https://www.wsj.com/tech/sec-investigating…

Measurement of muon flux variations with scintillators in Mexico City and their correlation to solar activity
Diego Mart\'inez Montiel, Leonid Serkin, Guy Paic, Miguel Enrique Pati\~no Salazar, Jaime Octavio Guerra Pulido, Carlos Rafael V\'azquez Villamar
https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.13978

Measurement of muon flux variations with scintillators in Mexico City and their correlation to solar activity
In this work we report the variations of the atmospheric muons flux in Mexico City. The measurements were performed from September to December 2023 at at the Institute of Nuclear Sciences of UNAM, located at coordinates 19.32$^{\circ}$N 99.18$^{\circ}$W, with an altitude of 2274 meters above see level and a cutoff rigidity of 8.24 GV. The experimental setup consists of a pair of scintillators, with dimensions of 50cm x 1m. To compensate for fluctuations in air pressure, we calculate the baromet…

An interview with NYT's head of audio Paula Szuchman about its subscription-only NYT Audio app, which had 1M downloads between its May launch and December 2023 (Bron Maher/Press Gazette)
https://pressgazette.co.uk/podcasts/nyt-audio-new-york-times-po…

'Not a podcast app': New York Times Audio exceeds one million downloads
The New York Times' NYT Audio app received more than a million downloads in the seven months between its launch in May and the end of 2023.

Blaize, which designs AI chips for edge devices and data centers, raised $106M; the company announced in December 2023 plans to go public via a SPAC merger (Maria Deutscher/SiliconANGLE)
https://siliconangle.com/2024/04/29/ai-chip-startup-blaize…

AI chip startup Blaize nabs $106M in fresh funding - SiliconANGLE
AI chip startup Blaize nabs $106M in fresh funding - SiliconANGLE

Great interview with #Columbia #Barnard faculty member on #encampment for #Palestine

Storm Over Columbia | Nadia Abu El-Haj
On December 24, 2023, the NYR Online published an essay by Nadia Abu El-Haj about the crackdown on pro-Palestinian speech at Columbia University and

Luhansk leader poisoned, Russia accuses US and Ukraine of violating Chemical Weapons Convention: https://benborges.xyz/2024/02/19/luhansk-leader-poisoned.html

Inside LAION-5B, an AI training dataset of 5B images that has been unavailable for download after researchers found 3,000 instances of CSAM in December 2023 (Knowing Machines)
https://knowingmachines.org/models-all-the-way

Beeston Lock, December 2023.
#photography #ukphotographer #newtopography #documentingplaces

Luhansk leader poisoned, Russia accuses US and Ukraine of violating Chemical Weapons Convention: https://benborges.xyz/2024/02/19/luhansk-leader-poisoned.html

"Dutch PV additions hit 4.82 GW in 2023"
#Netherlands #Dutch #Solar #SolarPower

Dutch PV additions hit 4.82 GW in 2023
The Netherlands deployed 4.82 GW of new solar capacity in 2023. The country's cumulative installed PV capacity hit 24.4 GW at the end of December.

The NHTSA closes a 2021 investigation into Tesla's Autopilot and opens a new one to evaluate whether a December 2023 Autopilot recall fix is effective enough (Sean O'Kane/TechCrunch)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/26/tesla-nhtsa-…

Tesla Autopilot investigation closed after feds find 13 fatal crashes related to misuse | TechCrunch
The agency opened the probe in 2021, and reviewed hundreds of crashes that involved Autopilot. It says there's a "critical safety gap."

Legal news service Law360 lays off 10% of its newsroom, per impacted journalists; the outlet's parent company LexisNexis saw record profits in 2023 (Natalie Korach/The Wrap)
https://www.thewrap.com/law360-layoffs-10-percent-newsroom-lexis-nexis/<…

Law360 Lays Off 10% of Newsroom Staff
Unionized editorial staffers held a one-day strike in opposition of unfair labor practices by parent company LexisNexis in December

"Spain’s installations of new PV systems hits 5.59 GW in 2023"
#Spain #Solar #SolarPower #Renewables

Spain’s installations of new PV systems hits 5.59 GW in 2023
Spain's cumulative installed PV capacity surpassed 25.54 GW at the end of December 2023, on 5.59 GW of new solar installations for the full year.

Beeston Lock, December 2023.
#photography #ukphotographer #newtopography #documentingplaces

Filing: Samsung sold 1.58M ASML shares, or 0.4% of ASML, worth ~$930M in September 2023, reducing its stake to zero, as Samsung looks to new areas of chipmaking (Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024…

Samsung Sells Down Entire ASML Stake to Expand in New Arenas
Samsung Electronics Co. sold its entire remaining stake in ASML Holding NV in the December quarter as part of its push to expand into new areas of chipmaking.

Great interview with #Columbia #Barnard faculty member on #encampment for #Palestine

Storm Over Columbia | Nadia Abu El-Haj
On December 24, 2023, the NYR Online published an essay by Nadia Abu El-Haj about the crackdown on pro-Palestinian speech at Columbia University and

Sources: Mistral plans to raise €500M at an over €5B valuation from multiple VCs and wealth funds, after raising ~€400M at a €2B valuation in December 2023 (Financial Times)
https://t.co/aldaMDD3Jz

Filings: Reddit cancelled Steve Huffman's pay awards in December 2023 that were tied to hitting a $25B valuation, signalling reduced hopes of a blockbuster IPO (Financial Times)
https://t.co/Jq7xQMM4jO

River Trent near Beeston, December 2023.
#photographer #ukphotographer #newtopography #documentingplaces

River Trent at Beeston Weir, December 2023.
#photography #ukphotographer #beeston #beestonnottingham

Beeston Canal, The Rylands, December 2023.
#photography #ukphotographer #beeston #beestonnottingham

Beeston Canal, The Rylands, Beeston (Nottingham), December 2023.
#photography #ukphotographer #beeston #beestonnottingham