Category Archives: Deep Mind

A.I. could lead to a nuclear-level catastrophe according to a third of researchers, a new Stanford report finds – Yahoo Finance

It was a blockbuster 2022 for artificial intelligence. The technology made waves from Googles DeepMind predicting the structure of almost every known protein in the human body to successful launches of OpenAIs generative A.I. assistant tools DALL-E and ChatGPT. The sector now looks to be on a fast track towards revolutionizing our economy and everyday lives, but many experts remain concerned that changes are happening too fast with potentially disastrous implications for the world.

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Many experts in A.I. and computer science say the technology is likely a watershed moment for human society. But 36% dont mean it as a positive, warning that decisions made by A.I. could lead to nuclear-level catastrophe, according to researchers surveyed in an annual report on the technology by Stanford Universitys Institute for Human-Centered A.I., published earlier this month.

Almost three quarters of researchers in natural language processingthe branch of computer science concerned with developing A.I.say the technology might soon spark revolutionary societal change, according to the report. And while an overwhelming majority of researchers say the future net impact of A.I. and natural language processing will be positive, concerns remain that the technology could soon develop potentially dangerous capabilities, while A.I.s traditional gatekeepers are no longer as powerful as they once were.

As the technical barrier to entry for creating and deploying generative A.I. systems has lowered dramatically, the ethical issues around AI have become more apparent to the general public. Startups and large companies find themselves in a race to deploy and release generative models, and the technology is no longer controlled by a small group of actors, the report said.

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A.I. fears over the past few months have mostly been contained to the technologys disruptive implications for society. Companies including Google and Microsoft are locked in an arms race over generative A.I., systems trained on troves of data that can generate text and images based on simple prompts. But as OpenAIs ChatGPT has already proven, these technologies can quickly wipe out livelihoods. If generative A.I. lives up to its potential, up to 300 million jobs could be at risk in the U.S. and Europe, according to a Goldman Sachs research note last month, with legal and administrative professions the most exposed.

Goldman researchers noted that A.I.s labor market disruption could be undone in the long run by new job creation and improved productivity, but generative A.I. has also sparked fears over the technologys tendency to be inaccurate. Both Microsoft and Googles A.I. offerings have frequently made untrue or misleading statements, with one recent study finding that Googles Bard chatbot can create false narratives in nearly eight out of 10 topics. A.I.s imprecision in addition to a tendency for disturbing conversations when used too long has pushed developers and experts to warn the technology should not be used to make major decisions just yet.

But the fast pace of A.I. development means that companies and individuals who dont take risks with it could be left behind, and the technology could soon advance so much that we may not have a choice.

At its current developmental speed, research is moving on from generative A.I. to creating artificial general intelligence, according to 57% of researchers surveyed by Stanford. Artificial general intelligence, or AGI, is an A.I. system that can accurately mimic or even outperform the capabilities of a human brain. There is very little consensus over when AGI could happen, with different experts claiming it will take 50 years or hundreds, while some researchers even question if true AGI is possible at all.

But if AGI does become reality, it would likely represent a seminal moment of human history and development, with some even fearing it could represent a technological singularity, a hypothetical future moment when humans lose control of technological growth and creations gain above-human intelligence. Around 58% of the Stanford researchers surveyed called AGI an important concern.

The survey found that experts most pressing concerns is that current A.I. research is focusing too much on scaling, hitting goals, and failing to include insights from different research fields. Other experts have raised similar concerns, calling for major developers to slow down the pace of A.I. rollout as ethics research continues. Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak were among the 1,300 signatories of an open letter last month calling for a six-month ban on creating more powerful versions of A.I. as research continues into the technologys larger implications.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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A.I. could lead to a nuclear-level catastrophe according to a third of researchers, a new Stanford report finds - Yahoo Finance

Five mind-blowing beer and train facts – TRAINS Magazine

Mind-blowing beer and train facts

Beer arrived first, but the railroads helped this favorite beverage grow to national prominence. The beer in your glass, however, is not the whole story. Throughout history there are many twists and turns in the relationship between beer and trains. Here are five mind-blowing beer and train facts.

In April 2011, Molson Coors Canada, working with VIA Rail, fielded a real Coors Light Silver Bullet train for an excursion party through the Canadian Rockies. Departing from Edmonton, Alberta, the 100 lucky passengers (contest winners) were treated to great scenery and on-board amenities like an arcade car, a sports car, a cinema car, and the Neon Boxcar, the ultimate Coors Light nightclub on rails.

VIA Rail provided a pair of F40PH-2s for power. The locomotives were graphically wrapped to resemble the animated locomotives seen in Coors Light television commercials.

In January 1850, Friedrich and Maximilian Schaefer moved their prosperous brewery to the corner of Park (Fourth) Avenue and 51st Street, New York. As part of the construction, they excavated a lagering cave 30 feet wide and 250 feet deep. The new cooling facility was to hold a double row of beer casks. By 1871, Schaefer would be the eighth-largest U.S. brewer, rolling out more than 43,000 barrels annually.

The F.&M. Schaefer brewery also enjoyed the services of the New York Central and Harlem River Railroads. The railroad tracks came right up to the west side of the brewery at street level along Park Avenue. Receiving grain and other materials by rail couldnt be more convenient.

In 1871, few blocks south at 42nd Street, the New York Central; New York, New Haven & Hartford; and Harlem River Railroads opened Grand Central Depot. The new station sent passenger traffic in Manhattan on an upward trajectory. It also sent citizens complaining about the number of trains and accidents occurring on Park Avenue.

By the late 1870s, the situation had reached its breaking point. The solution: The tracks had to go. Building up was not an option; going down, however, held promise, so the tracks went underground. Over the next 30 years, several waves of railroad construction radically altered Park Avenue.

Digging this subterranean rail route required several million cubic feet of dirt and rock to be excavated. Although the Park Avenue area was a less-than-desirable section of town, as opposed to its contemporary high-profile status, there were some concerns over existing structures when the steam shovels and cranes pitched in. One of those was the F.&M. Schaefer brewery and its lagering cave. In the construction, Schaefer lost its street-level rail spur. Although there were concerns on both sides about hitting or damaging the lagering cave, little damage was done. The below-street-level, passenger-car holding yard ended right across East 50th Street from the brewery.

By the time Grand Central Terminal opened on Feb. 2, 1913, Park Avenue was well on its way to being a fashionable residential address. The factories along Park Avenue, including F.&M. Schaefer, had to go. In 1916, the brewery moved its operations to Brooklyn, selling its Manhattan property. One block front became the Ambassador Hotel, the other St. Bartholomews Church. The land sale netted the brewery significant cash for its new plant.

At the dawn of the 20th century, Pabst was clearly a recognized name. When Johann Gottlieb Friedrich Pabst arrived in America, he had not a penny to his name. He grew his brewing empire to one of the largest in the nation, and from its proceeds built a comfortable life for his family and enriched his community. To say that Pabst was well respected is an understatement.

As Christmas 1903 approached, the health of Captain Pabst was beginning to fail. The family gathered to celebrate the holiday with as much festivity as possible. In the week following Christmas Gustave Pabst, the eldest son, and his wife Hilda traveled by train to visit her parents in St. Louis.

As New Years Day approached Captain Pabst took a turn for the worse. With family at his side, he died on Jan. 1, 1904, at 12 p.m.

Word was sent for Gustave and Hilda to return to Milwaukee immediately. A private train was quickly chartered and left St. Louis late in the afternoon on Jan. 1. The grieving couple arrived in Milwaukee at 12:30 a.m., Jan. 2, 1904. The trip was made in near-record time.

Pullman porters and waiters had strict rules detailing the procedure for serving a beer. It was all about good service the same type of service to be expected in a fine restaurant or club. Pullmans 1939 Commissary Instructions, a pocket-sized book issued to all chefs, waiters, busboys, and ground personnel, included a plethora of detailed instructions. Along with rules on how to handle meal checks, proper uniform, cocktail recipes, and how to serve popular menu items, could be found the 12 steps required to serve a beer.

Beer

Adolphus Busch think Budweiser spared no expense when it came to enjoying the finer things available to those with means during the late 1800s and early 1900s. Busch maintained two homes in St. Louis, two more in Pasadena, Calif., a hop farm and retreat outside Cooperstown, N.Y., and two villas around Langenschwalbach, Germany.

To conduct business and visit his properties, Busch owned and traveled aboard a private Pullman car. The car, named Adolphus, was presented to him in the early 1900s by the brewerys board of directors in appreciation for building the brewing empire bearing his name.

Without saying, the Adolphus was appointed with all form of luxuries to ensure comfort while traveling. Busch also had an office aboard the car. It was stocked with records and notes identical to his office at the brewery so that business could be conducted on the road. At the St. Louis brewery, Adolphus was stored inside its own facility. When Busch returned to the brewery aboard his car, a cannon war fired to herald his arrival.

Anheuser-Busch Co. had a second Adolphus in the 1950s. Built by the Wabash at their Decatur, Ill., shops, the car was used by August Busch Jr. until it was sold in 1965.

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Five mind-blowing beer and train facts - TRAINS Magazine

Ross Kemp: Deep Sea Treasure Hunter review soap star swims up to the mark in search of Tudor gems – The Guardian

TV review

Essentially submarine Detectorists, this travelogue has a winningly excitable Kemp ditching violent ganglands to trawl the depths of the Mary Rose

Mon 10 Apr 2023 17.00 EDT

Twelve metres beneath the surface of the Solent, Ross Kemp is excited. Mallory! MALLORY! he yells. Mallory Haas is a maritime archeologist, who I imagine got into this line of work precisely so she didnt have to hear men shouting at her. Mallory, look what Ive found here! Surely deep-sea diving comms come with off-switches these days.

Ross Kemp: Deep Sea Treasure Hunter is essentially submarine Detectorists, despite Kemps puppyish overcompensations: Ive found something. Mallory! Ive found something!

Im not saying the underwater photography is woeful, but to my eyes, the debris Kemp dredges up a piece of pottery could have been anything. Henry VIIIs codpiece, nuclear waste, a vintage ring pull from a 1973 can of Lilt.

Being a trained actor, Kemp swims up to his mark in front of the camera with aplomb, and says: Its like touching hands with a ghost. I cant see inside Rosss helmet but I feel sure one eyebrow is shooting up.

Im very fond of Kemp with his buff embonpoint and shaved head, it seems like his idea of fun would be a fight in an after-hours pub car park. But, behind the masculinist posturing and devotion to well-filled T-shirts is a sensitive soul, eternally calling out to his mum to stop texting and watch him on the swing.

Most likely, he doesnt really want to tour the world interviewing unpleasantly violent men for Ross Kemp on Gangs. Nobody in their right mind does. Nor does he seemingly yearn to add to his already unrelentingly butch roster of docs, such as Ross Kemp in Afghanistan or Ross Kemp in Search of Pirates, or to make documentaries whose titles come with pretentious colons, such as Ross Kemp: Extreme World. But, until someone commissions him to film Ross Kemp on How to Draw Lovely Ponies or Ross Kemp: Flower Arranger, hes stuck like the last timbers of the Mary Rose in the submarine mud of the Solent in a fate he didnt choose, poor chap.

This is a piece of glazed saltware, says Haas indulgently, examining Kemps find. You think that it could be Tudor pottery, do you? says Kemp, breathless, but hopefully not out of tank oxygen.

Kemp is a resourceful actor, but in his diving helmet even he cant convey by facial expression how exciting this is. So instead he makes a drinking gesture with one hand: This could be from a jug that was drunk by Tudor chaps.

Chaps what an inspired word to use at that moment. I imagine the chaps of the Mary Rose on that fateful day of 19 July 1545, observed by Henry VIII from the ramparts of Southsea Castle, raising glazed jugs of Tudor booze to his majestys health before for reasons uncertain the flagship of the English fleet sank, along with most of the 200 sailors and 185 soldiers and 30 gunners aboard.

But then I realise Ive got Haas all wrong. Far from being a submarine wet blanket, she is in her element, as much into this as Kemp. Wow! she exclaims, This is touching history!

And then, Haas finds something else. What have you found, Mallory? MALLORY, what is it?

Its an extremely compact artefact, says Haas. What she has found is a piece of wood but not any old piece of wood. We seem to have hit the jackpot.

Kemp and Haas are running out of oxygen, possibly because theyre hyperventilating. Back on dry land, fellow diving enthusiasts examine their haul. The shoe sole discovered by Haas is indeed a piece of history, but probably more Freeman Hardy & Willis than Tudor. Thats the problem with marine archaeology: the seas are full of rubbish, not all of it Tudor.

For all that, the piece of wood may or may not have once formed part of the bow of the Mary Rose, and, for that reason will be added to the Mary Rose Museums collection of 19,000 artefacts. That collection, Kemp explains, was assembled after most of the wreck was brought to the surface in 1982 437 years after she sank. What remains below is tantalising, or at least so we must suppose if we are to enjoy this show. The bow end of the ship that may or may not have collapsed under the weight of the big guns Henry insisted be installed is still there beneath the waves.

I dont mean to be picky, but 12 metres isnt really deep-sea treasure hunting, nor does diving in the Solent really justify the early parts of this episode in which Kemp learns how to dive at 40 metres. Happily, in future episodes he dives deeper. But if the tease for episode two is anything to go by, he faces some difficulties. Way to ramp up the jeopardy, Ross.

That said, given all the interviews hes done to promote this series, I think we can safely say without any spoilers that he survives and that in years to come he will make Ross Kemp: Minstrel Flautist in Tights. Because, forget about treasure hunting, thats the show I want to see.

Ross Kemp: Deep Sea Treasure Hunter airs on Sky History and is available on NOW.

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Ross Kemp: Deep Sea Treasure Hunter review soap star swims up to the mark in search of Tudor gems - The Guardian

How HR leaders can leverage A.I. to transform workand where they often go wrong – Fortune

Good morning!

HR has become the center of experimentation for leaders thinking about how A.I. will transform the workplace. Perhaps no one knows this better than Ravin Jesuthasan, global leader for transformation services at consulting firm Mercer, who advises some of the corporate worlds top HR executives on the rapid advances and changes in the ways employees perform their jobs everyday. One of his main areas of focus lately is generative A.I. and how it will affect HR practices. He spoke with Fortune about some of the new tech tools hes evaluating, like ChatGPT, and how he believes they will change the role of CHROs.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Fortune: Where do leaders often go wrong when evaluating the latest A.I. tools like ChatGPT?

Ravin Jesuthasan: Not leading with the work and instead leading with the tech. Unfortunately, were seeing a lot of leaders get really enamored with ChatGPT-3, and even more so now, GPT-4, which is incredibly more powerful. But unfortunately, when they lead with the tech they see a binary narrative between the talent performing the work and that particular automation solution.

Alternatively, what we consistently see with companies who lead with the work is they see where highly repetitive rules-based work can get substituted. They see where the creative things that we do might get augmented by tools like A.I. They see where our critical thinking, and our ability to express empathy and concern, might be supercharged by some of these tools and make us even more productive. And they also see something that often goes missed, which is where the presence of these automations can actually create space for new human work or create the demand for new human skills.

Do you think this technology is just another trend, or does it feel like its here to stay?

Oh, its definitely here to stay. And its not unanticipated. You can go back to 2014 when Google bought DeepMind Technologies. DeepMind brought a lot of the advances in neural networks to the publics visibility. We also started to see innovations with IBM Watson making some significant progress with [cancer] diagnoses, although it was very rough.

We always assume that automation is going to come in and substitute what humans do, but in 90% of the cases that automation is too blunt an instrument in its early days. It really needs the human alongside it, both to teach it as well as to apply that judgment to what the algorithm is telling us. I think thats one thing that we have to really understandits much more nuanced than we typically think.

We also often overestimate the near-term impact of emerging technologies and we underestimate the long-term impact of these technologies. But until we understand the nuances, we wont get the full value from them. It goes back to the idea of needing to lead with the work and not with the next bright, shiny object.

How do you see the latest technological innovations enhancing the future of training and reskilling?

Its got massive potential. Particularly with advances in virtual reality, augmented reality, and mixed reality. One of the things weve talked about is as people redesign the work, how do we design in space for learning into the flow of work? There is real potential to compress the learning cycle and to blend it with the doing cycle, if you will.

What do you think these advances mean for the future of the HR department?

It advances HR as a strategic orchestrator of work and the development of the workforce. HR is going to need to orchestrate the perpetual upskilling and reskilling of the workforce and utilize systems and tools like skill taxonomies and skill prices. All of these tools give HR insight into the overall cost structure of the company and where value is being created. And, most importantly, as the demand for work changes, these advances will translate into direct signals for how the talent needs to be upskilled and reskilled so that the talent is ready at a time when you know the work will be in demand.

Amber Burtonamber.burton@fortune.com@amberbburton

The most compelling data, quotes, and insights from the field.

In a conversation last week with human capital research firm i4CP, Pinterests chief people officer Christine Deputy shared some advice for HR leaders navigating uncertain times.

Have perspective. We can get very focused and build energy around whats happening right this minute. We have an opportunity to be the person at the table who steps back a little bit, and says, Lets look at the whole context. Lets look at the opportunities ahead. How do we get better as a result of this experience?

A round-up of the most important HR headlines, studies, podcasts, and long-reads.

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Its been over a year since President Biden signed a $1 trillion infrastructure bill to update roads and bridges around the U.S., but hiring managers say theyre still struggling to find enough skilled construction workers to fill the jobs. NPR

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Chipotles hiring woes. Chipotle has big plans to double its number of restaurants over the next decade, but labor unrest and high employee turnover in the industry has left some investors doubtful. Phil Wahba

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How HR leaders can leverage A.I. to transform workand where they often go wrong - Fortune

Deep in the Heart of Texas, an Uphill Fight for Clean Air for All – Yale Environment 360

Harris County, Texas is the hub of Americas fossil fuel and petrochemical industries. Hundreds of refineries and chemical plants cluster in the county, which includes Houston, and they are responsible for cancer-causing chemical pollution that disproportionately harms communities of color.

At 35, Christian Menefee, a Democrat, is the youngest, and the first Black person, to serve as Harris County Attorney. Since his election in 2020, he has made addressing pollution and its racially disparate impact a top priority. His office, which handles civil cases, has taken legal action on issues from petrochemical emissions to toxic contamination from a rail yard to the impacts of a major highway expansion.

In an interview with Yale Environment 360, Menefee says Texass conservative leadership does everything it can to hobble such efforts. Constrained by limitations the Republican state legislature has imposed on city and county officials and frustrated with a state environment agency that is asleep at the wheel he says his office has to be creative to check industrys abuses.

Menefee notes that he represented oil and gas companies at the start of his career and says that even many residents of neighborhoods suffering pollution appreciate the industrys economic role. I am very careful to never come in and suggest that Im trying to close the plants. Im about fairness, he says. In this country, we hold people accountable for all kinds of things. In Texas, we dont often hold industry accountable for their mistakes.

Christian Menefee Menefee For Harris County

E360: How has your experience growing up with Houstons pollution shaped your approach as county attorney? Contamination from oil refineries and petrochemical plants is a big issue here, especially for communities of color.

Christian Menefee: Harris County is one of the ground zeros of the environmental justice movement. And its in part because Houston has one of the worlds largest petrochemical complexes, and were the energy capital of the world. Theres not many people here who did not grow up within a short distance of a facility emitting toxic contaminants. So my story is similar to everybody elses. My grandmother raised my father and his siblings in the Fifth Ward, which is one of our uniquely bad environmental justice communities. There are several concrete batch plants, metal recyclers. The air feels nastier than in other parts of the county. The houses and apartments we lived in when I was growing up, every one is a few miles from some chemical plant. My high school was a mile and a half away from a Superfund site. It is just something thats inextricable for most working-class folks here.

After law school, I worked at a firm to pay off my loans. We represented oil and gas companies, and it gave me an interesting perspective. Ive seen the boardrooms. Ive helped prepare executives for trial. My upbringing gave me the one lens. Representing companies gave me the other lens. And now that Im here and were suing these very same companies, it kind of brings you home.

Were in a state that has set every single rule of the road in favor of industry. At times it feels like David and Goliath. Youre up against a very powerful industry that has a lot of support with state officials. But I always try to look through the lens of my grandmother and my aunts and uncles, and the people in these neighborhoods. Were just asking for fairness and compliance and enforcement very basic things in other parts of the country that we dont get here.

E360: Petrochemical production in particular has been growing in this region in recent years. What has that looked and felt like on the ground?

Menefee: Theres a duality to it. For communities like the one I came from, which is incredibly diverse lower-middle class African Americans, Latinos you have the economic side of it. The oil and gas industry is very much a path for many people to a six-figure lifestyle. I have many friends who have worked on oil rigs. But the other side is, if you go out to neighborhoods in east Harris County, you can feel it in your eyes, and it doesnt smell right. Petrochemicals are by far the number one cause of pollution here. And thats just business as usual. Add in the large-scale emissions events, the illegal flaring. Over the past four years weve had plant explosion after plant explosion. Watson Grinding and Manufacturing, that explosion was in 2020. I was on the other side of the city, and I was jolted awake. Its become the norm. In River Oaks [a wealthy area], youre not going to see many industrial facilities. But for lower-income, predominantly Spanish-speaking, African American, immigrant communities, when the smoke is in the air, the chemicals are in the air, these are the communities whose schools get evacuated. Everything stops while they get the benzene levels under control.

E360: What can you do to protect those neighborhoods, given the obstacles you mentioned?

Menefee: Its onerous, sometimes prohibitive. Conservatives love this idea of states rights. Theyre always looking for protection from the federal government. But when your statewide officials have a blatant disregard for communities, who protects the local governments from the state? Its a weird dynamic, where you have these large metropolitan areas whose leaders are more diverse, more forward-thinking, and then you have statewide officials with a very repressive, draconian view of how government is supposed to work.

Residents of Houston's historically Black Fifth Ward who have lost friends or loved ones to cancer. The neighborhood is seeing a high incidence of cancers associated with creosote, a contaminant found in a nearby rail yard. Brett Coomer / Houston Chronicle via AP

Were just constantly at odds. The state legislature sets the rules of the road. And weve seen a very intentional, concerted effort from state government aimed at counties like ours. Several years ago, the then-speaker of the house was recorded saying he wanted the next legislative session to be the worst ever for cities and counties. And thats exactly what happened bill after bill was proposed to tie the hands, not just of local governments, but sometimes this office specifically. For example, they passed a law where if were going to file an enforcement action, we have to give notice to the state of Texas, and they decide if they want to pursue the case. If they do, they take it away from us. And they settle it for pennies on the dollar. Its happened time and time again.

E360: What can you do, given those obstacles? And how has it been going?

Menefee: We fight like hell, and take any opportunity to creatively find solutions. The good news is that the communities are like, Yes, youre fighting for us. But they also expect you to win. And if both arms are tied behind your back and youre kicking, and ultimately the community isnt satisfied with some shin damage, and they wanted a few punches to the face, its something you have to navigate.

The thing Ive been more optimistic about is our ability to find leverage points. A good example is the $10 billion I-45 highway expansion. It was approved at every level of government, and the final review was completed two months into my term. We could have said, Look, this ship has sailed. But we sued. The federal government got involved, and they paused the project. We were never going to stop the highway, but we negotiated with the Texas Department of Transportation, and we got some concessions that put communities in a better place than they were. Another example: With the city of Houston and a nonprofit, we sent Union Pacific a notice of intent to sue over creosote contamination from a rail site in the Fifth Ward, where there are two or three identified cancer clusters. Community members have been beating the drum on this for a long time. Now were negotiating with Union Pacific in hopes of getting some wins for the community. So we have figured out ways to find pressure points. Ultimately the goal is to move the needle for the people who live there. And if the state is continually tying our hands behind our back, this is us using every tool in our toolbox.

E360: You talked about the perspective you got from representing fossil fuel companies. What did you learn from that experience?

Menefee: Firstly, a lot of good people work in the industry. My father works in oil and gas. The average person in that industry feels, I want the environment to be safe. I want people to have clean air. But like other industries, theres a set of biases. For any corporation, shareholder value is top of mind. So there tends to be a view that claims of damage to communities or the environment are exaggerated. And they prioritize economic impact. This industry is making a lot of people a lot of money, including people who had no other way of having access to it. So you view things through the lens of the company.

E360: Does that economic role mean theres resistance to pushing industry too hard?

Menefee: Thats what makes framing so important. I am very careful to never come in and suggest that Im trying to close the plants. Im about fairness. There are rules of the road. If you run a stop sign, and a police officer is around, youre going to get in trouble. We have companies routinely running stop signs in this area, and we have a state regulatory agency that is asleep at the wheel. There are other ways you could frame the argument that would turn people off, because it would be viewed as an attack on their livelihood instead of simply asking for fairness.

Wreckage left by an explosion at Watson Grinding and Manufacturing, January 24, 2020. Godofredo A. Vsquez / Houston Chronicle via AP

E360: You mentioned the state regulator, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). What problems do you see at that agency, and what changes would make it more effective?

Menefee: This is the result of legislative session after legislative session of far-right legislators continuing to weaken the TCEQ. It no longer views itself as a regulatory body or enforcing authority. I think they view their role as a facilitator: We are facilitating you getting your permits. We are facilitating you polluting the air. As opposed to, We are reviewing your application to see if youre going to harm communities. We are doing routine checks. We are enforcing the laws. It would take a fundamental change from top to bottom, and viewing itself as the agency that holds industry accountable. And it would take legislative changes. In this country, we hold people accountable for all kinds of things. In Texas, we dont often hold industry accountable for their mistakes.

E360: With climate change causing more intense and frequent storms, how worried are you about the vulnerability of Harris Countys industrial infrastructure?

Menefee: Hugely concerned. Its just unique, being in Houston, which has all these floods, all these hurricanes, and then being the worlds petrochemical and energy capital at the same time. Weve had like seven once-in-500-year floods in the past few years. These things make you very nervous when you live close to this many chemical facilities. Obviously we want the facilities to be as resilient as possible. There are two issues for us. One is that each storm causes chemical releases. The second is the risk of a storm whose eye goes right through the Houston Ship Channel, where all these chemical plants are, and just tears into them. It could be catastrophic, unlike anything weve seen in modern history in this country, and I dont even know how we would begin to deal with that.

Thats why were so focused on the reinstatement of the federal chemical disaster rule. The Obama administration created a standard for reporting, for mitigation, for understanding exactly whats at each facility. And Trump rolled it back. The rule is coming back now. It increases reporting requirements for the facilities. It increases information sharing. We have like 1,200 chemical facilities, so for communities and first responders to have information to deal with these disasters is a very big deal. When theres some unknown chemical coming out of a facility because of an explosion, it is a terrifying event.

E360: What can other communities living with heavy industries learn from your experience?

Menefee: Well, I hope theyre not dealing with the same restraints. But there are some lessons about not being afraid to think outside the box, not being afraid that industrys going to come running after you. If you signed up to be an advocate for people and to fight these fights, you need to fight these fights. In every case, were starting with the outcome that we want, and were working backwards. So the lesson learned is that you probably have a better situation than us, so use the creativity and make the most of it.

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

Reporting for this interview was supported by the McGraw Fellowship for Business Journalism at the City University of New Yorks Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism.

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Deep in the Heart of Texas, an Uphill Fight for Clean Air for All - Yale Environment 360

Train Your Mind For Effective Sleep With These Steps | Metropolis … – Metropolis Healthcare

Sleep is essential throughout someones life to maintain overall health and well-being. How good or bad someones sleep is or what happens when one is sleeping influences how a person feels while he is fully awake. A persons body works during sleep which, in turn, promotes healthy brain function and physical health.

Also, sleep helps children and adolescents grow and develop. Inadequate sleep can increase the risk of chronic health problems over time. This could also have an impact on the way a person thinks, responds, operates, understands and interacts with others.

The biological clock functions while sleeping as well as during wakefulness throughout the day. The circadian rhythm refers to this 24-hour sleep-wake cycle. The internal clock is housed in the hypothalamus, a region of the brain. It reacts to external cues that tell the body that it is indeed time to sleep.

Circadian rhythm disruption can occur as a result of the following factors:

Fortunately, there are steps you can take to improve your sleeping habits and reset your circadian rhythm.

When one is anxious or stressed, the body produces more cortisol, the stress hormone. The higher someones cortisol level, the more alert one will feel. Making a relaxing bedtime routine can help to reduce stress and its negative effects on sleep.

Concentrate on relaxing activities such as yoga, stretching, meditation, journaling and deep breathing and consume caffeine-free tea.

Planning light exposure is one of the most effective ways to improve the sleep schedule. When exposed to light, the brain produces less melatonin, the sleep hormone. This keeps us awake and alert. Darkness signals the brain to produce more melatonin, making people sleepier.

Exposing yourself to light in the morning can help you towake up. Consider opening the drapes, taking a walk or sitting on the porch. Turn off or dim bright lights at night to prepare yourself for sleep. Youshould also avoid glowing electronic screens such as those found on computers, smartphones, and televisions because they can stimulate your brain for several hours.

The biological clock is linked to the majority of the tissues, including skeletal muscle. As a result, when someone exercises, the muscles respond by aligning their circadian rhythm. Exercise also improves sleep by increasing melatonin production. Thirty minutes of moderate aerobic exercise at night may improve sleep quality. However, regular exercise will yield the best results.

Avoid taking naps during the day if your sleep schedule is out of control at times. Taking a nap can make it challenging to fall asleep again at night.Long naps may also result in drowsiness, which is caused by waking up from a deep sleep.If you have to nap, limit yourself to no more than 30 minutes. It also is best to nap before 3 pm to avoid disrupting your night-time sleep.

In conclusion, avoid bright lights and heavy meals before going to bed. Make the sleeping environment as comfortable, quiet and cool as possible. Stay active during the day and avoid naps to improve your sleep cycle.

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The AIs Tractor Moment And Why AI Hardware Will Become the X … – Tekedia

Artificial intelligence (AI) will create more opportunities, similar to what happened more than a century ago, when tractors moved into farms, displacing some farm workers, but making farming a better business. As those farms became mechanized, the number of people employed in agriculture dropped, but farm outputs and productivity accelerated. The old Rev Malthusian postulation that man (and woman) would run out of food due to food production accelerating in arithmetic progression in a world growing in population geometrically, was evidently punted for good.

Today, in the European Union, less than 5% of the working population are employed in agriculture, and yet, they produce enough to eat and export. In Africa, we hover in the excess of 65%, producing poverty where farmers need help with food!

The AI race is opening another phase of that massive labour translation where most people in some of the things we do would be displaced and dislocated. The invention of AI and the new species of AI systems were experiencing will have consequential impacts in the natures and forms of work.

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As ChatGPT blasts its scientific magics, Google is putting Mind into Brain: Google Brain and DeepMindthe companys two main AI units, which have long operated separatelywould work together more closely on efforts to build large algorithms. I expect a lot more, stronger collaboration, because some of these efforts will be more compute-intensive, so it makes sense to do it at a certain scale together, Google CEO Sundar Pichai.

As that happens, a new basis of competition has been opened by Google: Google published details about its AI supercomputer on Wednesday, saying it is faster and more efficient than competing Nvidia systems. While Nvidia dominates the market for AI model training and deployment, with over 90%, Google has been designing and deploying a chip, called Tensor Processing Unit, for artificial intelligence since 2016, partially for internal use.

Yes, the hardware will create a separation. Apple won the mobile world by creating proprietary hardware that powers exclusive software. Google understands that redesign and is going for an x-factor. Indeed, for the AI systems to advance at the software level, the hardware which crunches the bits and bytes must evolve. If you control that evolution in machines, you win the race. Every software is limited by the hardware which runs it; expanding that nexus will provide massive opportunities. That explains why Apple will play a role because it knows how to make great chips especially for consumer markets.

Hardware will advance and AI systems will accelerate in performance, and what happened in farms more than a century ago will begin to take place at scale in companies. But as that happens, AI will make the European labour laws go global as technology redesign causes dislocations in markets. Yes, you cannot just fire workers and governments will demand that as adoption begins to transform industries.

After announcing the largest rounds of layoffs in their history, US big tech companies are now learning how difficult it is to reduce headcount in Europe.

In the US, companies can announce widespread job cuts and let go of hundreds if not thousands of workers within months and many have. Meanwhile, in Europe, mass layoffs among tech companies have stalled because of labor protections that make it virtually impossible to dismiss people in some countries without prior consultations with employee interest groups.

This has left thousands of tech workers in limbo, unsure about whether theyll be affected by negotiations that can drag on indefinitely.

Comment 1: Hey Ndubuisi, great post! I definitely agree with your point about the importance of AI hardware in the development and adoption of AI-powered solutions. Its not just about the software or algorithms, but also about the hardware that can efficiently and effectively run those algorithms.

The AI tractor example you mentioned is a perfect illustration of this. By developing hardware specifically designed for AI-powered farming equipment, John Deere was able to significantly improve the performance and capabilities of their tractors. And as you mentioned, this is just the tip of the iceberg there are so many other industries and applications where AI hardware can make a huge difference.

Overall, I think its exciting to see how AI hardware is evolving and becoming more specialized. It opens up new possibilities for innovation and could really transform the way we live and work. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this topic!

Comment 2: Its getting more interesting.The AI supercomputers will incorporate specialized hardware acceleration technologies, such as graphics processing units (GPUs), tensor processing units (TPUs), or field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), which are optimized for AI workloads.These specialized hardware accelerators can significantly speed up AI computations, making AI supercomputers more efficient and capable of delivering higher performance compared to general-purpose computing systems.

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ASU research expands artificial intelligence knowledge – Full Circle

As artificial intelligence research evolves, new advances and technologies regularly make national headlines. In the School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence, part of the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University, many faculty members are among the AI experts and thought leaders broadening this field.

Our schools exceptional faculty members are constantly striving to innovate in the AI field with dynamic research, says Ross Maciejewski, director of the School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence and a professor of computer science. Their passion has positioned our school as a national leader in AI and allows us to witness critical advancement in this area firsthand.

YooJung Choi, an assistant professor of computer science, is one of these researchers. Her work focuses on probabilistic modeling, an essential component of AI that explores uncertainty in models knowledge by explicitly representing it as a probability distribution. Acknowledging uncertainty in these models helps humans build trust in AI technologies.

For our research, we introduce discrimination patterns, or examples of when AI algorithms show bias, Choi says. We show that a large number of these patterns may exist in a probabilistic model and then propose efficient, exact and approximate discrimination pattern miners to find and remove them from probabilistic circuits.

Her research aims to provide efficient and easy-to-understand auditing of AI models to help reinforce their fairness or lack of bias. She and her team are then able to suggest better algorithms for removing these discrimination patterns to create fairer models.

Choi hopes this research will be used to identify and eliminate discrimination patterns early in the development of probabilistic AI models, allowing researchers to create fairer models from the start.

The School of Computing and Augmented Intelligence is also exploring action language, specifically, a new language named mA* that is under development by Chitta Baral, a professor of computer science. Action languages in AI describe commands and instructions for machines and analyze how they can perform requests.

Were working to develop a foundation for reasoning about actions in a multi-agent scenario, where an agent may perform actions not just to achieve an objective, but also to deceive other agents, Baral says.

He and his research team are investigating how their mA* action language can bridge the capabilities of a multi-agent domain, which allows for multiple decision-making opportunities at once rather than a single decision at one time.

The teams goal in developing this language is to take a first step toward creating scalable and efficient automated reasoning and planning systems in multi-agent domains.

In addition to faculty, ASU students are also key contributors in leading AI research. Computer science graduate students Kaize Ding and Yancheng Wang are working closely with Yingzhen Yang, an assistant professor of computer science, and Huan Liu, a Regents Professor of computer science, to conduct research on graph contrastive learning, or GCL, a technique for learning generalizable graph representations through contrasting the augmented views of the input graph. In computer science, a graph is a group of data points linked together in complex ways

This technique is used to improve the performance of self-supervised representation learning of graph neural networks, or GNNs, which are a family of deep learning models designed for graph-structured data.

The team is developing a framework called Simple Neural Networks with Structural and Semantic Contrastive Learning, or S3-CL to address the limitations in unsupervised GCL, which helps better capture global knowledge within a graph. The new framework has proven it can outperform other unsupervised GCL methods.

Ivan Zvonkov, an incoming doctoral student who will join computer science Assistant Professor Hannah Kerners lab in the fall, also leads research using machine learning and remote sensing data to form predicted maps of geographic regions. His work with Kerner also extends into a project with NASA Harvest, in which this mapping is used to inform indigenous farmers in Maui County, Hawaii to help combat local food insecurity.

One of the forums for sharing innovative research in the AI field is the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, or AAAI, conference, which fosters discussion between researchers, practitioners, scientists, students and engineers spanning an array of AI disciplines.

The 2023 AAAI conference took place in Washington, D.C., and included presentations from all the aforementioned faculty members and students showcasing the School of Computing and Augmented Intelligences research.

Subbarao Kambhampati, a professor of computer science and global AI thought leader, spoke at the conferences Bridge: AI and Law program. There, he discussed the need for explainability and transparency in AI technologies.

Additionally, Kambhampati co-chaired the New Faculty Highlights program, which spotlights promising AI professionals early in their careers such as Choi, who was recognized in the session.

In addition to his involvement, Kambhampatis students also presented four research papers at the Representation Learning for Responsible Human-Centric AI workshop and one at the Artificial Intelligence for Cyber Security workshop.

Paulo Shakarian, an associate professor of computer science, collaborated with Baral in creating a half-day tutorial session. The researchers showcased advances in neuro-symbolic reasoning, or NSR, an emerging field of AI that combines ideas from computational logic and deep learning.

Some people think that NSR is going to be an important part of achieving artificial general intelligence, says Shakarian, who presented the mini course with colleagues from Argentinas Universidad Nacional del Sur and the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, in addition to Baral.

The tutorial session aimed to educate researchers looking to understand the current landscape of NSR research and attract those looking to apply NSR research in areas such as natural language processing and verification.

Participants explored an overview of the frameworks of NSR, neuro-symbolic approaches for deduction, combining NSR with logic and applications, challenges and opportunities that this field faces.

AAAI is one of the top, if not the top, scientific conference in AI, Shakarian says, so it was quite an honor to hold a session to present our tutorial there.

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Interpreting the impact of AI large language models on chemistry – Chemistry World

Is AI on the brink of something massive? Thats been the buzz over the past several months, thanks to the release of improved large language models (LLMs) such as OpenAIs GPT-4, the successor to ChatGPT. Developed as tools for language processing, these algorithms respond so fluently and naturally that some users become convinced they are conversing with a genuine intelligence. Some researchers have suggested that LLMs go beyond traditional deep-learning AI methods by displaying emergent features of the human mind, such as a theory of mind that attributes other agents with autonomy and motives. Others argue that, for all their impressive capabilities, LLMs remain exercises in finding correlations and are devoid not just of sentience but also of any kind of semantic understanding of the world they purport to be talking about as revealed, for example, in the way LLMs can still make absurd or illogical mistakes or invent false facts. The dangers were illustrated when Bings search chatbot Sydney, which incorporated ChatGPT, threatened to kill an Australian researcher and tried to break up the marriage of a New York-based journalist after professing its love.

AI and complexity experts Melanie Mitchell and David Krakauer of the Santa Fe Institute, US, meanwhile, suggest a third possibility: that LLMs do possess a genuine kind of understanding, but one that we dont yet understand ourselves and which is quite distinct from that of the human mind.1

Despite their name, LLMs are not only useful for language. Like other types of deep-learning methods, such as those behind DeepMinds protein-structure algorithm AlphaFold, they mine vast data sets for correlations between variables that, after a period of training, enable them to provide reliable responses to new input prompts. The difference is that LLMs use a neural-network architecture called a transformer, in which the neurons attend more to some of its connections than to others. This feature enhances the ability of LLMs to generate naturalistic text, but it also makes them potentially better able to cope with inputs outside the training set because, some claim, the algorithms deduce some of the underlying conceptual principles and so dont need to be told as much in training.

The inner workings of these networks are largely opaque

Melanie Mitchell and David Krakauer, Santa Fe Institute

This suggests that LLMs might also do better than conventional deep learning when applied to scientific problems. Thats the implication of a recent paper that applied a LLM to the AlphaFold problem of deducing protein structure purely from sequence.2(Im reluctant to call it the protein-folding problem, because thats a little different.) Alphafolds capabilities have been rightly lauded, and theres even some reason to think it can infer some of the features of the underlying energy landscape. But Alexander Rives at Meta AI in New York and his colleagues say that their family of transformer protein language models collectively called ESM-2, and a model called ESMFold derived from it, do even better. The language models are faster by up to two orders of magnitude, need less training data, and dont rely on collections of so-called multiple sequence alignments: sequences closely related to the target structure. The researchers ran the model on around 617 million protein sequences in the MGnify90 database curated by the European Bioinformatics Institute. More than a third of these yield high-confidence predictions, including some that have no precedent in experimentally determined structures.

The authors claim that these improvements in performance are indeed because such LLMs have better conceptual understanding of the problem. As they put it the language model internalises evolutionary patterns linked to structure which means that it potentially opens up a deep view into the natural diversity of proteins. With around 15 billion parameters in the model, it is not yet easy to extract with any certainty what the internal representations are that feed the improvements in performance. But such a claim, if well supported, makes LLMs much more exciting for doing science, because they might work with or even help reveal the underlying physical principles involved.

The authors claim that these improvements in performance are indeed because such LLMs have better conceptual understanding of the problem. As they put it the language model internalises evolutionary patterns linked to structure which means that it potentially opens up a deep view into the natural diversity of proteins. With around 15 billion parameters in the model, it is not yet easy to extract with any certainty what the internal representations are that feed the improvements in performance: The inner workings of these networks are largely opaque, say Mitchell and Krakauer. But such a claim, if well supported, makes LLMs much more exciting for doing science, because they might work with or even help reveal the underlying physical principles involved.

There may yet be a way to go, however. When chemists Cayque Monteiro Castro Nascimento and Andr Silva Pimentel of the Pontifcia Universidade Catlica do Rio de Janeiro in Brazil set ChatGPT some basic chemical challenges, such as converting compound names into Smiles chemical representations, the outcomes were mixed. The algorithm correctly identified the symmetry point groups of six out of ten simple molecules and did a fair job of predicting the water solubility of 11 different polymers. But it did not seem to know the difference between alkanes and alkenes, or benzene and cyclohexene. As with language applications, getting good results here might depend partly on posing the right questions: there is now an emerging field of prompt engineering to do this. Then again, asking the right question is surely one of the most important tasks for doing any kind of science.

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What CEOs talked about in Q1/2023: Economic uncertainty, layoffs … – IoT Analytics

In short

In Q1 2023, economic uncertainty was at the forefront of CEOs minds globally and across the board. In 2023, 61% of all earnings calls discussed inflation, 23% talked about recession, and 38% mentioned interest rates. Even though inflation (-6% decline in mentions compared to Q4/2022) and recession (-25%) were less prevalent than in the last quarter of 2022, economic uncertainty was still the elephant in the room.

AI was discussed by 17% of CEOs (+ 41%). The interest in AI and machine learning was sparked by the release of ChatGPT and the discussions around potential use cases. ChatGPT was mentioned by 2.7% of companies in earnings calls in Q1/2023 (compared to no mentions in the previous quarter).

The labor market continues to rise in importance on CEOs list of topics. Layoffs were discussed in 6% of all earnings calls (+84% compared to Q4/2022), and 18% discussed wages (+8% from Q4/2022).

Another key upcoming theme in Q1/2023 is Industry 4.0 and related topics. Industrial automation was discussed in 0.6% of all earnings calls(+57% compared to Q4/2022). However, the strongest increase in this group was registered for the keyword predictive maintenance, which increased by +136%.

With supply chains slowly improving and supply shortages easing, discussions around shortages in general (-21%) and chip shortages (-35%) more specifically decreased strongly in Q1/2023.

Another theme that reduced in importance in Q1/2023 was the metaverse. The metaverse as a keyword declined by -64% in Q1/2023. Related technologies, such as virtual reality (-24%) and augmented reality (-12%), also declined.

The analysis highlighted in this article presents the results of IoT Analytics research involving the Q1/2023 earnings calls of ~3,000 US-listed companies. The resulting visualization is an indication of the digital and related topics that CEOs prioritized in Q1/2023. The chart visualizes keyword importance and growth.

X-axis:Keyword importance (i.e., how many companies mentioned the keyword in earnings calls in Q2)the further out the keyword falls on the x-axis, the more often the topic was mentioned.

Y-axis:Keyword growth (i.e., the increase or decrease in mentions from Q4/2022 to Q1/2023)a higher number on the y-axis indicated that the topic had gained importance, while a negative number indicated decreased importance.

Read our Q4/2022 analysishere.

Three technological themes of interest in Q1/2023 are highlighted in this article in greater depth: AI & ChatGPT, Industry 4.0, and the metaverse.

ChatGPT was released on 30 November 2022. The chatbot, which is built on a large language model by OpenAI, went viral and set records as thefastest-growingconsumer application in history, reaching 100 million active users within two months of its launch. ChatGPT sparked discussions around potential use cases of AI in general. 17% of all earnings calls mentioned AI, which constitutes a strong increase of +41% in Q1/2023. More specifically, generative AI was discussed by 2.7% of all earnings calls (an increase of nearly 1,600%) and conversational AI was mentioned in 0.5% of earnings calls.

ChatGPT was mentioned in 2.7% of all earnings calls, up from zero mentions in the last quarter. The CEO of IBM highlights the release of ChatGPT as one of the three key moments for AI in the last decade (after IBM Watson winning Jeopardy and DeepMind winning GO competitions). So far, most discussions that mention ChatGPT occur within earnings calls of technology companies that talk about how they want to market the new technology. Most applications have not reached large-scale adoption by enterprise end-users. But the potential is tremendous, including use cases of generative AI for IoT.

Were excited about ChatGPT being built on Azure and having the traction it has. So, we look to both. There is an investment part to it and there is a commercial partnership. But fundamentally, its going to be something thats going to drive, I think, innovation and competitive differentiation in every one of the Microsoft solutions by leading in AI.

AI has become a big topic of conversation this year [] If I think about it, over the last decade, I think there were three moments you can talk about, [] One, when IBM won Jeopardy with Watson, [] Second, when deep mind from Google or Alphabet started winning competitions around, for example, GO [] and now with OpenAI and ChatGPT.

Generative AI is an extremely exciting new area with so many applications, and one of my goals for Meta is to build on our research to become a leader in generative AI in addition to our leading work in recommendation AI.

If you think about it, early days of AI or training models and things like that, that needed access to big data sets. But I think as time goes on, big data sets have to be very real time to make decisions that are relevant in the moment.

And sometimes, they need to be kept at the edge because you have a lot of video data, for example, at the edge, to make good decisions on consumer behavior or inventory, [] all these new applications that are coming.

As this analysis clearly shows, many companies discuss how to fight rising inflation, labor costs, and general cost pressure. Many business leaders come to the result that more, not less, investment into digitization is the solution. Therefore, even during times of economic uncertainty, spending on enterprise IoT is expected to stay strong prior to 2027.

This expectation is also reflected in boardroom discussions: predictive maintenance (+136%), remote monitoring (+62%), and industrial automation (+57%) were discussed much more than in Q4 2022. Vendors and end users emphasize cost cutting through IoT-connected solutions. For example, machine vision enables many Industry 4.0-related use cases, such as flaw detection and operation optimization.

Note: The IoT Analytics team will be at the worlds largest industrial fair, Hannover Messe 2023, in mid-April 2023 to discuss industrial transformation and Industry 4.0. Make sure to reach out!

The market is still in the early stages of adopting machine vision. Most companies are still highly reliant on labor, and very few warehouses globally are realizing the full potential of automation.

[] We saw that in our cost of maintenance last year, our ability to run our equipment at, well, really flat maintenance costs in the face of very, very strong inflationary pressure. So thats a credit to that team and the work theyve done from a predictive maintenance standpoint.

Ive talked about how inflation has an impact on our cost, but conversely, it can also have a benefit in terms of our business and our value proposition. This is because our monitoring solutions reduce the personnel costs, travel time, emissions, and overall environmental impact required to maintain industrial equipment and critical systems. Therefore, as our customers costs increase, the return on investment of our services to them also improves. [] Remote monitoring will always be a significantly less expensive alternative than physical inspection, particularly with higher personnel and fuel costs.

Mentions of the metaverse decreased by 64%. The keyword was mentioned in 0.4% of all earnings calls in Q1 2023. That constitutes a steep decline since its peak in Q1/2022 when a couple of companies jumped on the hype train and announced their own (industrial) metaverse projects, including Microsoft, Siemens, Disney, Nvidia, and Meta. In Q1/2022, about 2% of all earnings calls discussed the metaverse. However, in the last quarter, a lot of related layoffs and announcements show that the trend might be over for now. Microsoft laid off its Metaverse core team of roughly 100 employees in February 2023, and Google announced the end of its Google Glass Enterprise Edition. Some consumer-focused companies, such as Disney, have ended their metaverse projects for now.

While the keyword metaverse might lose steam, related technologies are likely to stick around. The CEO of T-Mobile, Mike Sievert, said the following during an earnings call in October 2022: No matter what you believe about how the metaverse might or might not unfold, clearly more immersive 3D experiences are on their way.

Expected key product announcements from some leading tech companies are likely to set the tone for the market in the coming years and will play a role in whether the industrial metaverse becomes a reality. For example, in late March 2023, Nvidia and Microsoft announced a partnership to bring industrial metaverse applications to the cloud.

And as we continue to lead in gaming and the metaverse, we launched an innovative collaboration with Fortnite, targeted to next-gen consumers with additional exciting partnerships to come for spring and fall 23.

Metaverse-related developments are early in the lifecycle but overall remain an attractive opportunity for us potentially.

IoT Analytics is a leading global provider of market insights and strategic business intelligence for the Internet of Things (IoT), AI, Cloud, Edge, and Industry 4.0.

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