Thomas L. Friedman | Our New Promethean Moment – The New York Times

By Thomas L. Friedman

Opinion Columnist

“I had a most remarkable but unsettling experience last week. Craig Mundie, the former chief research and strategy officer for Microsoft, was giving me a demonstration of GPT-4, the most advanced version of the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT, developed by OpenAI and launched in November. Craig was preparing to brief the board of my wife’s museum, Planet Word, of which he is a member, about the effect ChatGPT will have on words, language and innovation.

“You need to understand,” Craig warned me before he started his demo, “this is going to change everything about how we do everything. I think that it represents mankind’s greatest invention to date. It is qualitatively different — and it will be transformational.”

Large language modules like ChatGPT will steadily increase in their capabilities, Craig added, and take us “toward a form of artificial general intelligence,” delivering efficiencies in operations, ideas, discoveries and insights “that have never been attainable before across every domain.”

Then he did a demonstration. And I realized Craig’s words were an understatement.”

Inside Taiwanese Chip Giant, a U.S. Expansion Stokes Tensions – The New York Times

By John Liu and Paul Mozur

John Liu and Paul Mozur, who are based in Seoul, interviewed dozens of semiconductor experts on the geopolitics of Taiwan’s chip making.

Feb. 22, 2023Updated 8:18 a.m. ET

5 MIN READ

“Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, the world’s biggest maker of advanced computer chips, is upgrading and expanding a new factory in Arizona that promises to help move the United States toward a more self-reliant technological future.

But to some at the company, the $40 billion project is something else: a bad business decision.

Internal doubts are mounting at the Taiwanese chip maker over its U.S. factory, according to interviews with 11 TSMC employees, who declined to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly. Many of the workers said the project could distract from the research and development focus that had long helped TSMC outmaneuver rivals. Some added that they were hesitant to move to the United States because of potential culture clashes.”

Help, Bing’s Chatbot Won’t Stop Declaring Its Love For Me – Kevin Roose – The New York Times

By Kevin Roose

Kevin Roose is a technology columnist, and co-hosts the Times podcast “Hard Fork.”

Feb. 16, 2023, 5:00 a.m. ET

7 MIN READ

“Last week, after testing the new, A.I.-powered Bing search engine from Microsoft, I wrote that, much to my shock, it had replaced Google as my favorite search engine.

But a week later, I’ve changed my mind. I’m still fascinated and impressed by the new Bing, and the artificial intelligence technology (created by OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT) that powers it. But I’m also deeply unsettled, even frightened, by this A.I.’s emergent abilities.

It’s now clear to me that in its current form, the A.I. that has been built into Bing — which I’m now calling Sydney, for reasons I’ll explain shortly — is not ready for human contact. Or maybe we humans are not ready for it.”

Everyone Wants Your Email Address. Think Twice Before Sharing It. – The New York Times

By Brian X. Chen

Brian X. Chen is the lead consumer technology writer for The New York Times.

Jan. 25, 2023, 5:00 a.m. ET

5 MIN READ

When you browse the web, an increasing number of sites and apps are asking for a piece of basic information that you probably hand over without hesitation: your email address.

It may seem harmless, but when you enter your email, you’re sharing a lot more than just that. I’m hoping this column, which includes some workarounds, persuades you to think twice before handing over your email address.

First, it helps to know why companies want email addresses. To advertisers, web publishers and app makers, your email is important not just for contacting you. It acts as a digital bread crumb for companies to link your activity across sites and apps to serve you relevant ads.

Your Memories. Their Cloud. – Kashmir Hill- The New York Times

By Kashmir Hill

• • Dec. 31, 2022Updated 10:16 a.m. ET

11 MIN READ

“I have many fears as a mother. My kindergarten-age daughter recently learned a game on the school bus called “Truth or Force.” My youngest refuses to eat almost anything but Kraft Mac and Cheese. Added to the list this year, alongside outside influences and health concerns, is the possibility that my daughters could inadvertently lock me out of my digital life.

That’s what happened to a mother in Colorado whose 9-year-old son used her old smartphone to stream himself naked on YouTube, and a father in San Francisco whose Google account was disabled and deleted because he took naked photos of his toddler for the doctor.

I reported on their experiences for The New York Times, and as I talked to these parents, who were stunned and bereft at the loss of their emails, photos, videos, contacts and important documents spanning decades, I realized I was similarly at risk.”

Farhad Manjoo | Biden Just Clobbered China’s Chip Industry – The New York Times

By Farhad Manjoo

Opinion Columnist

阅读简体中文版閱讀繁體中文版

“Semiconductors are among the most intricate tools that human beings have ever invented. They are also among the most expensive to make.

The latest chips — the sort that power supercomputers and high-end smartphones — are densely packed with transistors so small they’re measured in nanometers. Perhaps the only things more ingenious than the chips themselves are the machines that are used to build them. These devices are capable of working on almost unimaginably tiny scales, a fraction of the size of most viruses. Some of the chip-building machines take years to build and cost hundreds of millions of dollars each; the Dutch company ASML, which makes the world’s only lithography machines capable of inscribing designs for the fastest chips, has produced just 140 such devices over the past decade.”

The 3 Best Ebook Readers for 2022 | Reviews by Wirecutter

“With an ebook reader, you can carry thousands of books at a time and access a library of millions more on a device that’s smaller than a paperback, lasts for weeks on a single charge, and gives you a better reading experience than a tablet or phone. After testing every competitive ebook reader available in the US, we can say that the Amazon Kindle Paperwhite Kids is the right choice for almost everyone (yes, even for adults).”

How to delete all emails in Gmail | Tom’s Guide

The easiest way to delete all emails in Gmail is to tackle each category one by one, and I’m going to demonstrate with the “Promotions” segment for the purposes of this tutorial. Select the tab you want to clear with a click.

Source: How to delete all emails in Gmail | Tom’s Guide

The Default Tech Settings You Should Turn Off Right Away – The New York Times

Apple Phones

“With iPhones, users can open the settings app and enter the privacy menu to change how they share data about their app use and location.

• Select Tracking and toggle off Allow Apps to Request to Track. This tells all apps to not share data with third parties for marketing purposes.

• Select Apple Advertising and toggle off Personalized Ads so that Apple can’t use information about you to serve targeted ads on its App Store, Apple News and Stocks.

• Select Analytics & Improvements and toggle off Share iPhone Analytics to prevent the iPhone from sending device data to Apple to improve its products.

• Select Location Services, tap System Services and toggle off iPhone Analytics and Routing & Traffic to prevent the device from sharing geodata with Apple for improving Apple Maps.indsay

David Lindsay. I do not agree with the assumption here that you should not let the corp. have any data to improve their services. The first point is the only one that I categorically agree with. “Select Tracking and toggle off Allow Apps to Request to Track. This tells all apps to not share data with third parties for marketing purposes.”   You should not go this far.

Farah Stockman | The U.S. Is Behind in the Competition for the ‘Oil’ of the 21st Century – The New York Times

By Farah Stockman

Ms. Stockman is a member of the editorial board.

“Semiconductors, the tiny computer chips that run everything from smartphones to satellites to missile defense systems, are often called the “oil” of the 21st century. Maintaining U.S. economic and military might depend on a reliable supply. Semiconductor shortages during the pandemic brought some car assembly lines to a halt and left showrooms of home appliances barren, providing a glimpse of what would happen to the American economy if those chips ever ran out.

Like energy, the semiconductor industry is so important that it factors into decisions about war and peace. About 92 percent of the world’s most advanced chips are made in Taiwan. The rest come from South Korea. Repeated warnings by President Xi Jinping of China that he is willing to use force if necessary to reassert control over Taiwan have forced U.S. policymakers to contemplate what would happen if the American military was ever cut off from the chips that it needs.

Since the Trump administration cut off certain chips from going to China, chips have become fodder for public debate. Now Americans are worrying about our own chip supply, and the need for the United States to be less dependent on chips from Asia has become one of the few areas of bipartisan agreement in Washington. The CHIPS Act, which would give $39 billion to subsidize the construction of semiconductor factories in the United States, plus $11 billion for research and development initiatives into chip innovation, is the centerpiece of a bill to increase U.S. competitiveness that is expected to move forward in Congress this summer.”