GauGAN: Changing Sketches Into Photorealistic Masterpieces In Seconds
A deep learning model developed by NVIDIA Research turns rough doodles into highly realistic scenes using generative adversarial networks (GANs). Dubbed GauGAN, the tool is like a smart paintbrush, converting segmentation maps into lifelike images.
Reversing Ageing: New Studies Show It Can Be Done
The Horvath clock is extremely accurate at predicting how old you are and can even predict when you’ll die. The clock itself is part of the aging mechanism, hence physically being able to dial back the hands of the clock could mean becoming physically younger.
Iceland Is Growing New Forests For The First Time In 1,000 Years
The landscape of Iceland has changed a lot in a thousand years. When the Vikings first arrived in the ninth century, the land was covered in 25 to 40 percent forest.
How All Our Tech Heroes Turned Into Tech Villains
Tech giants and their leaders have come to dominate public discourse in a way that few other industries have. They’ve unleashed products that are basically indispensable in modern life. Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Elizabeth Holmes all promised game-changing improvements on American life. What happened?
Dubai: Expectation vs Reality
Dubai – perhaps the best-known city of the United Arab Emirates, with a reputation for attracting the glamorous and the wealthy. Less than 5% of its GDP comes from oil, but it essentially has made its success through diversifying into property real estate, aviation, trade, banking and finance. But what’s going on beneath the surface?
How Big Tech Plans To Profit From The Pandemic
As the coronavirus continues to kill thousands each day, tech companies are seizing the opportunity to extend their reach and power. Towards a future in which, for the privileged, almost everything is home delivered, either virtually via streaming and cloud technology, or physically via driverless vehicle or drone.
The $15BN Island That Will Make Or Break Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka has reclaimed two square kilometers of land from the Indian Ocean to double the size of its capital and retain talent, but will the investment pay off?
MIT’s Color-Changing Ink Lets You Jazz Up Your Art, Clothes, Car Every Day
If you’ve ever purchased two articles of the same clothing because you couldn’t decide on a color, here’s a game-changer: color-changing ink. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has developed a “reprogrammable ink” that lets you change the color of objects whenever you wish by exposing them to light of various wavelengths.
You’re Tracked Everywhere You Go Online. Use This Guide to Fight Back.
I recently did an online privacy checkup: Google was sharing my creditworthiness with third parties. If you would like Hearst, the publishing giant, to stop sharing your physical mailing address with third parties, you have to mail a physical letter with your request to the company’s lawyers.
The Oldest Tattooing Family In The World
Wasim Razzouk is a tattoo artist in Jerusalem’s Old City. Ink runs deep in his family. The Razzouks have been tattooing visitors to the Holy Land for 500 years (and in Egypt for 200 years before that). Christian pilgrims flock to Razzouk Tattoo to get a cross tattoo based on one of the designs on wooden stamps that have been in the Razzouk family for generations.
Skinny Home In Toronto As Prototype For Parking-Space Homes?
When Cyril Borovsky bought a 16-foot-wide strip of land in Toronto sandwiched between two bungalows, he knew the only way to fit more than one bedroom on the tiny footprint was to think cubically. Using a steel frame and performing much of the work himself- with just a boom lift and makeshift pulley-, he went up four floors.
Japan’s Yakuza: Inside The Syndicate
With at least 50,000 members, Japan’s Yakuza gangs form one of the world’s largest criminal networks. Anton Kusters, a Belgian photographer, was allowed a rare glimpse inside a Yakuza family in early 2009. He documented the family for two years.
The Man Who Drove McDonald’s Out Of Iceland
Tómas Tómasson’s all-American burger joint is so legendary in Iceland, it ousted McDonald’s from the country. It all began back in 1981 when the good folk of Reykjavík, Iceland still thought fish and chips was exotic foreign food. Along came Tommi and taught them to worship a new kind of sustenance: the mighty burger.
How The Far-Right Helped To Create The Most Powerful Facial Recognition Technology
Clearview is the most powerful form of facial recognition technology ever created, according to the New York Times. With more than 3 billion photos scraped surreptitiously from social media profiles and websites, its image database is almost seven times the size of the FBI’s.
The Story Behind An Identify Theft
Lurking behind a simple email in our inbox is a network of fake websites, letterbox companies and more than 100 victims around the world. We untangled a web of fake accounts and followed the digital breadcrumbs back to two Danish fraudsters. This is how we tracked them down, step by step.
The Future Of Airliners?
One that could shake up the duopoly of Boeing and Airbus to force competition and new designs? Take a look at the D8, nicknamed the Double Bubble, developed by Aurura, MIT and with the help of NASA.
The Key To Good Luck Is An Open Mind
What do these people have that the rest of us don’t? It turns out “ability” is the key word here. Beyond their level of privilege or the circumstances they were born into, the luckiest people may have a specific set of skills that bring chance opportunities their way.
The Last Ship To St. Helena, A Remote Island In The Atlantic
Every third week, a British Royal Mail ship begins its journey from Cape Town to Saint Helena, the remote island in the Atlantic where Napoleon was once in exile. Five days, with a northwesterly course, and only then do the sheer black cliffs appear in front of RMS St. Helena.
The Secret History Of Facial Recognition
Sixty years ago, a sharecropper’s son invented a technology to identify faces. Then the record of his role all but vanished. He died on October 4, 1995. His obituary in the Austin American-Statesman made no mention of his work on facial recognition. Who was Woody Bledsoe, and who was he working for?
Can Computers Ever Replace The Classroom?
Derek Haoyang Li is the founder of Squirrel AI, an education company that offers tutoring delivered in part by humans, but mostly by smart machines, which he says will transform education as we know it. Other entrepreneurs are making similarly extravagant claims about the power of online learning.
Iceland’s Big Bitcoin Heist
With its cheap geothermal energy and low crime rate, Iceland has become the world’s leading miner of digital currency. Then the crypto-crooks showed up. The thieves weren’t robbing banks. They were stealing the presses that print digital money.