Jessamyn West used to describe Metafilter as a social network for non-friends, a description belied in part by the tight-knit camaraderie that emerges in an online group of only a few thousand people. West herself is an example: She met her partner on the site. She also describes the Metafilter cohort as “a community of … Read more
Markdown became a core part of how I wrote. The simplicity and flexibility meant I would live the dream of write once, run anywhere. It did lead to some ambiguity, though. Gruber would probably say this is by design. His emphasis throughout the Markdown documentation is on the syntax of Markdown, not—say—the resulting HTML. His … Read more
In R. C. Sherriff’s novel The Hopkins Manuscript, readers are transported to a world 800 years after a cataclysmic event ended Western civilization. In pursuit of clues about a blank spot in their planet’s history, scientists belonging to a new world order discover diary entries in a swamp-infested wasteland formerly known as England. For the … Read more
While companies like Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and others had been upfront about their efforts in AI, for years Apple had been silent. Now, finally, its executives were talking. I got an advance look one day. Eager to shed the the impression that the most innovative of the tech giants was a laggard in this vital … Read more
Meanwhile, in less visible ways, AI is already changing education, commerce, and the workplace. One friend recently told me about a big IT firm he works with. The company had a lengthy and long-established protocol for launching major initiatives that involved designing solutions, coding up the product, and engineering the rollout. Moving from concept to … Read more
“Do you mind if I hug you?” asks Anjan Katta. This is not the usual way to wrap up a product demo, but given the product and its creator, I wasn’t really surprised. Katta, a shaggy-haired, bearded fellow, he’d shown up to the WIRED office in San Francisco dressed like he was embarking on a … Read more
Folks, when dogs talk, we’re talking Biblical disruption. Do you think that future models will do worse on the law exams? If nothing else, this week proves that the rate of AI progress isn’t slowing at all. Just ask the people building these models. “A lot of things have happened—internet, mobile,” says Demis Hassabis, cofounder … Read more
The book currently topping the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list is The Anxious Generation, a jeremiad against social media and its impact on young people. Its thesis is that apps like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok have unleashed an epidemic of mental illness among children, preteens, and teenagers. Immediate and extreme measures are required to … Read more
There was nothing funny about the way Jeff Lawson left Twilio, the startup he cofounded in 2008 and built into a multibillion-dollar public company enabling businesses to communicate with customers via text messages and phone calls. Activist investors had been pushing for management changes and even a sell-off, and Lawson resigned from his CEO post … Read more
The end of TikTok has begun. As the dust settles from a week of shockingly fast legislative action by the US Congress, it’s clear that TikTok next year will look much different from the TikTok we’re using today. When President Joe Biden signed a $95 billion dollar foreign aid package on Wednesday, it brought to … Read more
