Games At Work dot Biz

Published 25 November 2024

e491 with Michael, Andy & Michael — #AI training data from authors & #Foursquare #OpenSourcePlaces, #SamStones, #VR experiences from #Lapz, #MSFlightSimulator, #GOG like #Elite & #StarWarsTheOldRepublic and a whole lot more!

Michael, Andy and Michael start off the show with a discussion on Google Lens’ new image recognition and search functionality to comparison shop on price and availability at nearby stores.  Next up is a brief article on an opportunity for HarperCollins authors to opt into an agreement to license their books for training an AI language learning model.  

Then, staying on the AI training theme, Andy shares his thoughts about the Foursquare Open Source Places data set, replete with the point of interest data from years of Foursquare and Swarm users.  This data set according to a Foursquare blog post contains 100mm+ global places of interest and is available for commercial use under the Apache 2.0 license framework.  Interestingly enough, the very first episode of Games At Work from January 2012 features Foursquare as an example of the intersection of business and social technologies.  Rounding out the geospatial conversation, Michael R shares the example of SamStones, a way to remember Sam Cohn’s love of travel.

Switching gears to VR, the cohosts discuss the beta version of Second Life’s mobile application.  In the show notes below, you’ll find an example from Michael R where he ran a mobile Active Worlds experience from his Treo 750 back in May 2008!  The team then shares a story about Lapz, a Formula 1 racing experience for the Apple Vision Pro.  Then, they take to the skies with the recent launch of the Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024.

Wrapping up this episode are stories about GOG (Good Old Games) work to preserve games, Star Wars the Old Republic celebrating 12 years and Mark Moxon’s work to document the Elite source code for Commodore 64.  It seems like only yesterday when Mark was on the podcast, even though it was four years ago on e292: Elite British Gaming!  

How might you use the Foursquare Open Sources Places dataset?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

The Verge article: Google Lens will now help you decide what to buy in-store

Kayak

The Verge article: HarperCollins is asking authors to license their books for AI training

Foursquare are releasing Foursquare Open Source Places as an open data set, to be updated monthly under the Apache 2.0 license. Pretty big news for the geospatial and location data folks. https://location.foursquare.com/resources/blog/products/foursquare-open-source-places-a-new-foundational-dataset-for-the-geospatial-community/

https://location.foursquare.com/resources/blog/products/foursquare-open-source-places-a-new-foundational-dataset-for-the-geospatial-community/

Foursquare blog post: Foursquare Open Source Places: A new foundational dataset for the geospatial community

Games at Work e1: Wouldn’t You Like to be a Mayor Too?

SamStones.org 

Second Life blog post: Second Life Mobile is here!

The Verge article: Vision Pro’s viral Lapz app put on hold after F1 complaint

lapz.io 

The Verge article: Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 wasn’t prepared for takeoff

My project to document the source code for Commodore 64 Elite just reached 50,000 lines of heavily commented 6502 assembler. It's getting there!

I’m *really* enjoying learning about how the Commodore 64 works. I can’t believe you can expose a whole 64K of RAM in one go! What a beast…

Here’s the source so far: https://github.com/markmoxon/elite-source-code-commodore-64/blob/main/1-source-files/main-sources/elite-source.asm

I hope you like it.

#retrocomputing #retrogaming #commodore #8bit #6502 #c64

GameRant article: GOG’s Game Preservation Program is a Huge Win for Classic Games

Good Old Games About GOG page

PC Gamer article: 12 years on, Star Wars: The Old Republic is still kicking, with revamped graphics and new story content coming soon

Games at Work e52: Swapping your Battery in 90 Seconds

Good Old Games: Knights of the Old Republic search results

@gamesatwork_biz have you seen this ? https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/brickmyworld/brick-my-world-transform-your-world-into-lego-bricks

Kickstarter: Brick My World | Convert real-world objects into LEGO® model

The Verge article: This digital D&D watch lets you roll a fireball from your wrist

Dice by pCalc

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine

Published 18 November 2024

e490 with Michael & Michael — #AI, #AR, #VR, #RR (that’s #RealReality) and a whole lot more!

Michael and Michael start off the show with a discussion on how O2 is employing AI to waste phone scammers time.  Check out the video in the show notes below for how dAIsy, the AI grandma works.  After a quick discussion on Oasis, an AI generated game, the co-hosts then turn to an interview with professor Greg Benson on the future of coding now that natural language processing (NLP) and large language models can interpret user prompts and generate the code required to fulfill the stated need.  Both Michael and Michael agree that there is high value in understanding the underpinnings of coding even where NLP can be a tremendous accelerator, much in the same way that writing algebraic proofs deepen the understanding of algorithms.  

Switching to mixed reality, Michael and Michael touch on the subject of watching movies and TV shows together, prompted by the YouTube feature on Quest.  Michael R expands with another article about the Vision Pro music experience from The Weekend, and shares how intimate the experiences can be when the singer is performing directly for you, up close and personal.  Next up, is a story about “Metaversities” in EU and UK schools that remind the cohosts of the Second Life experiences of a video screen in SL.  This spurs Michael M to share what he learned at a recent UNCSA.edu School of Design and Production lunch.  The ;TLDR is that Gen Z (among others) are craving authentic and real experiences not through a lens or a screen.  Following the trend of *R, Michael calls this Real Reality, and in the context of the global entertainment market, this means live performances, such as the crane dance show in Sentosa, Singapore (see video below).  This reminds Michael R of an interview he saw with Robert D Putnam, focused on the importance of building community and engagement as explained in his book Bowling Alone. 

The pair then turns to the Verge and Engadget stories discussing Amazon’s codename “Amelia” plans to build upon the Echo Frames platform to create augmented reality experiences that can shave seconds off of Amazon delivery drivers’ work.  Wrapping up the episode, Michael R gives a quick overview of Tetris Forever and movie professor and adventurer Indiana Jones’ latest gameplay.

Would you want to ask dAIsy, the AI grandmother call your telemarketers?  What Real Reality (RR) experiences are you craving?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

TechRadar article: Daisy the AI grandma is here to answer calls from scammers and waste their time

Wired article: The First Entirely AI-Generated Video Game Is Insanely Weird and Fun

Oasis Github

Stack Overflow blog post: No code, only natural language: Q&A on prompt engineering with Professor Greg Benson

The Verge article: The YouTube app on Quest will let you co-watch videos with friends in VR

Apple’s SharePlay

9 to 5 Mac article: Apple releasing Vision Pro immersive music experience from The Weeknd this Thursday

Euronews article: Classes in the metaverse? Meta creates digital ‘metaversities’ in EU and UK schools

Victory XR post: What is Digital Twin Metaversity Construction?

UNCSA School of Design and Production

Daily Show podcast episode with Robert D Putnam

Bowling Alone by Robert D Putnam

Games at Work e192: PVP-Y with “I Game Alone” parody of George Thorogood’s song “I Drink Alone”

The Verge article: Amazon reportedly working on Echo Frames for delivery drivers

Engadget article: Amazon reportedly wants drivers to wear AR glasses for improved efficiency until robots can take over

Amazon Echo Frames

The Guardian article: Tetris Forever is the real story of Tetris – and it’s fascinating

The Verge article: Here’s 15 minutes of archaeological action in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine

Published 11 November 2024

e489 with Andy, Michael & Michael — creative music, Star Wars inspired album art, stop motion LEGO video, augmented reality “tracing” and a whole lot more!  Rock on!

Andy, Michael and Michael start off the show with a CURL Jam YouTube video.  The creators used Suno to put the command line tool to music, with metaltastic results.

Then, the team switches to DOS games, courtesy of DOS.Zone.  Here, you can launch Oregon Trail Deluxe, Sim City and dozens of other games.  Games of chance have been around even longer than DOS (shocker, we know!) and Andy shares a Mastodon post about ancient polyhedral dice.

While it is easy to engage the Games at Work cohosts on LEGO, it was the stop motion animation in the LEGO Instagram post on the new Endurance set that got everyone really excited.  Check out the embedded post in the show notes below to check out the creativity of this video.   

Next up, architecture, avatars and album art.  After reviewing some remarkable home designs, the team takes a look at Universal Relightable morphing avatars.  Then the team checks out several Star Wars inspired remakes of classic album art.  So creative! 

The creativity continues with the Da Vinci Eye application providing an AR version of tracing.  Michael R wraps up the show with an expansive addition to the Vision Pro 2.2 beta, providing new wide and ultra wide visualizations.

What theme would you want to use to reimagine album art?  Should the team use GenAI to make a country & western (both kinds of music) version of the CURL instructions?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

Suno

Hackaday article: Floss Weekly Episode 808: CURL – Gotta Download ‘Em All

Github curl

Games at Work e460: AskEmilyPost: AI etiquette

Playing some cozy original Sim City for DOS tonight. It's free here:

https://dos.zone/sim-city-1989/

DOS Zone

Lynx Browser

Oregon Trail Deluxe on DOS Zone

Sim City on DOS Zone

The Verge article: Civilization 7 launches in February

Video Games on SI.com article: Civilization 7 is the gaming poster child for Apple’s new iMac

Gizmodo article: Trump’s Proposed Tariffs Will Hit Gamers Hard

Dice go way back. Some of these appear to meet today’s standards for precision and fairness (all dice should have opposite sides add up to 1+sides. The d6’s sides add to 7). The Greek stone d20 may be 2200 years old.

Learn more #DnD

Libris Arcana article: A Brief History of Polyhedral Dice

Officially revealed #Lego Icons 10335 The Endurance (269.99€)
29 november

A post shared by LEGO (@lego)

LEGO The Endurance

The Times article: The real grand designs: the 13 best modern homes in the world

Wikipedia article: Home (2020 TV Series)

URAvatar: Universal Relightable Gaussian Codec Avatars

Pleated Jeans article: Artist Reimagines Iconic Album Covers With Star Wars Characters (45 Pics)

Six Colors article: M4 Mac mini Review: Phenomenal cosmic power, itty-bitty form factor

Da Vinci Eye apps for artists

Boy Genius Report article: One new Apple Vision Pro feature can finally unlock its true potential

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine

Published 4 November 2024

e488 with Andy & Michael M — video game emulation, AI chat with gardens & articles, watch-based translation, an Oregon Trail movie and a whole lot more!

Michael M and Andy start off the show with a couple of stories dealing with the recent ruling by the US Copyright Office to deny an exemption to the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) to allow video game archivists to share scholarly access to games over the internet.  See the show notes for links to the arguments and make your decision.  

One of the reasons why such access to games is that some of these games are no longer commercially available, and the impact games have on society is enormous.   An article in The Guardian picks up on the importance of playing games and justifies them simply because games “are an invitation to break free from the tyranny of efficiency.”  Andy and Michael were hard pressed to attempt to disagree.  Spoiler alert – they did not disagree. The co-hosts also note the reference in the article to Jane McGonigal’s book Reality is Broken. Check out a short video of her explanation for why games matter in the show notes below.

Moving right along to AI and spatial collaboration, the co-hosts pick up an article discussing the recently wrapped WebexOne conference from Cisco, taking a closer look at the AI and spatial computing enhancements included in Cisco’s web conferencing software. 

Turning from conversing with people, next up is a conversation with a garden.  Andy and Michael consider a Small Garden Model (vs a Large Language Model), which will be included in the Chelsea Flower Show in 2025.  This AI enhanced garden will allow the visitor to interact with the plants and a myriad of sensors in the garden in an entirely new way.  Coming back to interacting with people, Andy shares a bit about his upcoming trip to Japan, and how he might use the translation app on his Apple Watch.  One of the features of this application is the ability to download languages to the watch in case he does not have an internet connection when he needs the real-time translation functionality.  

Switching to another app, Andy shares his experience in beta testing Particle.news, an AI powered news aggregator that writes an overview of multiple articles on a topic.  Particle also allows you to “chat” with the articles and even have it create an “opposite side” summary.  As an example for the episode, one of the stories surfaced via Particle deals with an upcoming comedy movie based on the 1970s computer game, the Oregon Trail.  Another historic game surfaces in the conversation – Speedball.

The team wraps up the episode with the planned spin down of botsin-space, which has been the home of the Games at Work fediverse bot.  Michael M shares that he will be on an AI panel for the Business of Healthcare conference next Friday at the University of North Carolina.

Should the US Copyright Office allow internet accessible video game software emulation?  How would you hold your wrist to have a translation conversation with your watch and another person?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

Ars Technica article: Video game libraries lose legal appeal to emulate physical game collections online

Engadget article: The Video Game History Foundation’s fight for game preservation isn’t over

Video Game History statement: STATEMENT ON THE DMCA 2024 TRIENNIAL REVIEW RULING

The Guardian article: The big idea: how games can change your life

Games at Work e272: Serenity Meow

ZD Net article: WebexOne 2024: Cisco’s vision for the future of immersive collaboration

WebexOne

The Guardian article: Talk to your plants? Now the first AI-powered garden will allow them to talk back

RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2025

ZD Net article: Apple Watch lets you translate your conversations in real time. Here’s how

Particle News

Particle News: Apple to Develop ‘Oregon Trail’ Action-Comedy Film

The Hollywood Reporter article: ‘Oregon Trail’ Action-Comedy Movie In Development at Apple (Exclusive)

Wikipedia article: The Oregon Trail (series)

Games at Work e282: Machine in the Machine

PC Gamer article: Rebellion’s just surprise rebooted a ’90s classic and released it on Steam

Muffinlabs post: RIP botsin.space

2024 UNC Business of Healthcare Conference: Strategic Healthcare Workforce of the Future

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine

Photo by Joshua Rawson-Harris on Unsplash

This week Andy, Michael, and Michael have a location based show, with discussion on FourSquare, data Privacy, and fast moving robots. Now that Four Square has announced they are shutting down their FourSquare Places site, the team discusses their prior use and how it has tapered off over the years. The guys then pivot from the identification of places/points of interests, using location data, to how companies are using location based data for tracking individuals.

This week Krebs on Security, 404 Media, and others break the story of how global surveillance has become pervasive with mobile ad data. While the examples given our primarily driving by US law and the variety of different data privacy laws by state, there are groups in other countries also looking at data privacy considerations, such as the Open Rights Group. The second order impacts of data privacy for people not in the IT industry, only makes it harder for most people to understand. We also briefly discuss the First Amendment and Amazon’s union busting tactics.

Leaving the legal portion of the show we look at some cool tech: Fast walking robots in China are wearing sneakers, Lego is showcasing the x-men Marvel 97 set, and Coperni shows off gel-based 3D printing!

Farewell to FourSquare Places – https://techcrunch.com/2024/10/22/farewell-to-foursquares-app/ 

Krebs on Global Data Free for All – https://krebsonsecurity.com/2024/10/the-global-surveillance-free-for-all-in-mobile-ad-data/

Amazon 1st Amendment Claims – https://www.404media.co/amazon-says-it-has-a-first-amendment-right-to-union-bust/ 

Cool Tech –

7’30”/mi. Article didn’t name the sneakers though.

Chinese scientists build fastest #humanoid #robot in the world — it can run at 8 mph | Live Science https://www.livescience.com/technology/robotics/chinese-scientists-build-fastest-humanoid-robot-in-the-world-watch-it-run-across-the-gobi-desert

#running #tech

Chinese robot is fastest with sneakers – https://www.livescience.com/technology/robotics/chinese-scientists-build-fastest-humanoid-robot-in-the-world-watch-it-run-across-the-gobi-desert

Disney and Lego Release x-men 97 set – https://kotaku.com/lego-x-men-marvel-97-disney-beast-gambit-release-date-1851675348 

Coperni Prints Gel Bag – https://3dprintingindustry.com/news/coperni-showcases-3d-printed-gel-bag-using-mits-rapid-liquid-printing-233380/

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Published 21 October 2024

e486 with Andy, Michael and Michael — proper AI engagement etiquette, OpenAI’s GPT Store, invisible unicode prompt injection, disappearing Chief Metaverse Officers, ingesting everything for digital twin world creation and a whole lot more!

Back once more to full co-host power, Andy, Michael and Michael start off the show with a callback to the last episode – a reimagining of the Nintendo N64 that will run with the old cartridges.  

Next up is an article from the Wall Street Journal dealing with proper etiquette in interactions with chatbots.  Some interesting research from Japan referenced in the show notes below, finds that impolite prompts may lead to a deterioration in model performance, including increased bias, incorrect answers or refusal of answers.  Then the team turns their attention to the use of unicode tags for prompt injection from an Ars Technica article.  This concept of invisible characters reminded the cohosts of a discussion from August 2023 dealing with white characters on a white page, while invisible to the human eye are picked up by the AI model.  Continuing with the AI theme, the team considers the Wired article on the OpenAI GPT store and a generative AI use case with TruGolf creating color commentary on the player’s golf swing.

Switching to augmented reality, the cohosts discuss where have all the Chief Metaverse Officers  gone, prompted by another Wired article.  Then they have a spirited conversation about the idea of ingesting all the available data to construct a digital twin world, using the WorldsNQ concept as a starting point.  This reminds the team of the NVIDIA Omniverse.  

The team wraps up the episode with an article about preserving the Earth’s biodiversity to store cells from endangered animals on the Moon.  This reminds Andy of the Star Trek episode Space Seed, and Michael M of the Svalbard seed vault in the arctic.  Michael R rounds out this week’s episode with a remembrance of Ward Christensen.

Have you always been polite to your chatbots and robots?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

Games at Work e485: Barbarians at the Rhubarb Bar

Analogue 3D

Wall Street Journal article: Should You Be Nice to Your Chatbot?

ARXIV published paper: Should We Respect LLMs? A Cross-Lingual Study on the Influence of Prompt Politeness on LLM Performance

Ars Technica article: Invisible text that AI chatbots understand and humans can’t? Yep, it’s a thing.

Games at Work e427: DeepBarbie Fakery

Wired article: OpenAI’s GPT Store Has Left Some Developers in the Lurch

Roger Premo’s LinkedIn post on TruGolf’s use of generative AI

Wikipedia article: Jones Angell, the voice of the Tar Heels

Wired article: Where Have All the Chief Metaverse Officers Gone?

Dallas Innovates article: Dallas-Based Worlds’ Pioneering ‘Large World Model’ Platform Could Be the Next Leap Forward in AI’s Evolution

worlds.io press release: Worlds Unveils WorldsNQ: A Large World Model (LWM) Platform that Accelerates AI Training 1000X over Current Systems 

NVIDIA Omniverse

Games at Work e345: Icelandverse

BBC article: Scientists want to send endangered animals to the Moon… sort of!

Wikipedia article: Space Seed, the 22nd episode of Star Trek

Wikipedia article: Svalbard Global Seed Vault

Honestly we should have stopped after BBSes

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/10/ward-christensen-bbs-inventor-and-architect-of-our-online-age-dies-at-age-78/

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine

Published 14 October 2024

e485 with Michael and Michael — flow, focus & distraction, waking up with Nintendo’s Alarmo, Wartke & Fischer’s song about Barbara, her rhubarb bar and the barbarians, the disappearing .io domain suffix and a whole lot more!

Co-hosts Michael and Michael start off the show with the retirement of Apple executive Dan Riccio, who headed up the Vision Products Group.  This spurs a lively discussion about the advantages that the VisionPro brings to reduce distractions and foster concentration on the task at hand, and how other visual computing solutions from Magic Leap, Meta and others are more additive in nature, providing additional contextual information to the user through their augmented reality experiences.

Longtime listeners will know that Andy, who was away at OggCamp, Michael and Michael all have an affinity for the German language.  While the work of Bodo Wartke and Marti Fischer was more well known on the eastern side of the Atlantic Ocean, it was new to Michael and Michael, who each enjoyed listening to the musical styles of Wartke and Fischer.  They shared through rhyme how a woman named Barbara got to know some barbarians, their barber, and others through a shared love for rhubarb.  Have a listen to the videos below.  They are wirklich ausgezeichnet.

Switching (see what we did there) to a more nostalgic set of topics, the co-hosts discuss the just released Nintendo Alarmo alarm clock.  The Alarmo has a sensor that recognizes when you move, and reacts to those movements, such as when you stretch or roll over.  One the user is out of bed, the alarm automatically ceases.  Can you imagine a scenario for Nintendo gamifying waking up like Pokemon Go did for walking around?  Earning digital Nintendo currency for getting up or getting sufficient rest perhaps?  After a story about Green Day re-releasing their dookie album on diverse hardware such as a Game Boy cartridge or Teddy Ruxpin, the co-hosts   discuss a post pointing to the Furby source code on archive.org.  

Michael and Michael wrap up the episode with an article from every.to on how geopolitical changes have an impact on the digital world with the example of the British government transferring sovereignty of the British Indian Ocean Territory of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius.  

What German rhymes have you been listening to (or creating)?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

The Verge article: Apple’s Vision Pro leader, Dan Riccio, is retiring

Games at Work e486: Future Frames

Submerged

OggCamp 2024 in Manchester, UK

The Guardian article: ‘Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungs-aufgabenübertragungsgesetz’: how viral tongue-twisters lightened up German language

Bodo Wartke (auf Englisch)

Nintendo Sound Clock Alarmo

acquired.fm season 12, episode 3 Nintendo’s Origins

acquired.fm season 12, episode 4 Nintendo: The Console Wars

Dookie Demastered

A post shared by UNC Bands Alumni Association (@uncbaa)

just in case someone needs it, the internet archive has the source code for furbies https://archive.org/details/furby-source

Ars Technica article: archive.org, a repository of the history of the Internet, has a data breach

Wired article: Tim Walz Rally Goes Live on World of Warcraft Twitch Stream

PC Gamer article: Duake lets you play Quake as the Doomguy

Tom’s Hardware article: Deckintosh has Apple’s latest macOS Sequoia running on the Steam Deck

Every.to article: The Disappearance of an Internet Domain

earth.org article: Tuvalu’s Sinking Reality: How Climate Change Is Threatening the Small Island Nation

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine

Published 7 October 2024

Co-hosts Andy, Michael and Michael start off the show with a follow on discussion from last week’s episode on the future of work and AR glasses.  This theme is not new at all to the Games at Work crew – many examples of the future of augmented reality coming through glasses can be found in the back catalogue – and some from more than a decade ago are included in the show notes.  Michael M brings up a recent interview with Mark Zuckerberg by the Acquired.FM team where the Meta CEO contrasts an open technology ecosystem vs a closed system operated by competitors that hinder innovation and speed.  Michael M further postulates that at some point, there will be a cultural norm of taking glasses off, just like cellphones face down, to signal that people are really in the moment with one another, without technology helping/interfering with how people communicate. 

One of the superb use cases for AR the Games at Work co-hosts have discussed many times is the ability to recollect name of the person you are looking at and details of previous interactions.  Michael R brings up a timely Apple Intelligence television advertisement dealing with this topic – see the show notes for the video.  A couple of articles put the focus on how this may go awry, with facial recognition quickly identifying a person, allowing a nefarious actor to feign and exploit a non-existent relationship.  These stories include examples of how one may opt out of facial recognition databases, however, new databases will crop up every day to replace them.  In a similar vein, the advances in AI photographic and video editing can provide an opportunity to trick people into alter memories.

Next up, the team takes on the thorny topics of OpenAI changing to a for profit business, and 23 and Me about to sell the company.  Both of these topics bring with them the notion of how the data accumulated by these entities may be used in the future.  And with such future use, what are the appropriate protections that individuals may take in the meantime.

Wrapping up the episode this week is a series of technological and supply chain stories stemming from the ongoing challenges stemming from hurricane Helene’s damaging wind and water across the southeast United States.  The team focuses in particular on the impacts to western North Carolina, where the rainfall and subsequent flooding have caused immense damage to people, homes, businesses, hospitals, schools, universities and so much more.  The team discusses stories of exacerbating these challenges by malicious actors operating across social media, extolling conspiracy theories and deliberate misinformation, hampering rescue and recovery efforts.  Andy brings into the conversation how changes in how stories and news are prioritized contributes to these problems. 

It is clear that the world is a small, small place, and the lives of people are interconnected in ways that we can clearly see and so many ways that are not immediately visible, yet just as vital.

Will you be taking action with PimEyes or 23 and Me?  What cultural norms do you expect to emerge from AR technological advances?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

Six Colors blog post: Meta and Apple: Same game, different rules

Games at Work e81: One Step Beyond

Games at Work e87: Squeezing out some value

Games at Work e180: Augmented Beer Goggles

Games at Work e190: Crazy to the Macs

acquired.fm The Mark Zuckerberg Interview

The Verge article: Microsoft to end its Android apps on Windows 11 subsystem in 2025

Ars Technica article: Meta smart glasses can be used to dox anyone in seconds, study finds

The Verge article: College students used Meta’s smart glasses to dox people in real time

PimEyes 

PimEyes opt out process

New MIT research has found that AI-edited photos can reliably induce false memories of events personally experienced.

The scientists called them "synthetic human memories."

https://machinesociety.ai/p/new-ai-trick-synthetic-human-memories

Machine | Society blog post: New AI trick: ‘synthetic human memories’

Vox article: OpenAI as we knew it is dead

The Atlantic: Remember That DNA You Gave 23andMe?

23andMe

23andMe: Downloading & deleting your 23andMe data

Ars Technica article: Helene takes ultrapure quartz mines offline, threatens tech supply chains

@mpesce turned up this Wired article from 2018 about the quartz in Spruce Pine https://www.wired.com/story/book-excerpt-science-of-ultra-pure-silicon/

Wired article: The Ultra-Pure, Super-Secret Sand That Makes Your Phone Possible

North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality: Gold of NC

NPR article: Politically charged rumors and conspiracy theories about Helene flourish on X

Hikari’s blog: the algorithm is killing twitter and it’s driving me insane

@hikari thank you for writing that and I’m sorry you have been through that emotional journey. I had a similar but different one (see https://buttondown.com/andypiper/archive/andys-discoveries-and-musings-issue-8-advocate/ and https://buttondown.com/andypiper/archive/andys-discoveries-and-musings-issue-9-from-there/ and https://andypiper.co.uk/2023/07/31/goodbye-to-my-life-on-twitter-2007-2023/)

I completely agree with your conclusions; but, it is and was Musk and everything he brought about, that killed Twitter.

WUNC article: To combat misinformation, start with connection, not correction

Washington Post article: Helene response hampered by misinformation, conspiracy theories

CBS News article: In Finland, classes in recognizing fake news, disinformation

Wikipedia article: Subliminal stimuli

Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own.

Michael Martine

Published 30 September 2024

Co-hosts Andy, Michael and Michael are reunited and start things off with thorough discussion on the “Clark Kent-esque” Meta Orion augmented reality glasses.  The Verge article on this subject brings several perspectives into focus from the cohosts.  One observation drew attention to the “neural wristband” used to capture gestures like fingers pinching to represent a click.  Another saw the puck as another object to keep track of, when in theory a phone may serve the same purpose to deliver the off-glasses compute power.  The team drew comparisons to the Ray-Ban Meta discussed on previous episodes, and used by Andy while recording this show.  While the Ray-Ban edition does not have the augmented reality capabilities, it does provide an on-the-go connection with an AI agent to ask questions.  Harkening back to prior episodes, this kind of human augmentation will most certainly have societal and behavioral changes in how people interact with one another.  Check out e192 from 2018 for one such example.  Interestingly enough, the point of Zuckerberg and Alex Heath using the Orion glasses to play an Augmented Reality version of Pong was not mentioned on this Games at Work episode!  Check out e400 for another story on AR Pong in the show notes!

The co-hosts discuss the repairability of the newest iPhone, the Halide and Panels apps before rounding out the episode with a conversation on how touchscreen kiosks have changed the nature of fast food ordering in some unexpected ways.

How do you expect new instances of AI and AR hardware to change how people interact with one another?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

The Verge article: Meta’s Big Tease

@viticci yep. Also Meta admitting that they tried to make this a product but it's "years" away… is strikingly similar to Gurman's reports about Apple doing the same thing. Apple just doesn't show its prototypes.

It does make me think this is happening sooner than I expected, though.

Games At Work e192: PVP-Y with Mr. Mumbles

Meta Quest 3S

Games at Work e400: Quadringenti (for AR Pong)

ZD Net article: The iPhone 16 is the most-repairable iPhone yet, according to iFixit

Hackaday article: Hands-On With New iPhone’s Electrically-Released Adhesive

Ebay: Travel case for the 27” iMac

9 to 5 Mac article: Halide rejected from the App Store because it doesn’t explain why the camera takes photos

The latest Halide update was rejected because, after seven years, a random reviewer decided our permission prompt wasn't descriptive enough.

I don't know how to explain why a camera app needs camera permissions.

The Verge article: Marques Brownlee says ‘I hear you’ after fans criticize his new wallpaper app

Time Flies by Koen van Gilst

The Lost Outpost blog post: The Web, made by Humans

The Lost Outpost blog post: I love the Web

CNN article: McDonald’s touchscreen kiosks were feared as job killers. Instead, something surprising happened

Michael Martine

Published 23 September 2024

Co-hosts Michael and Michael start things off with several Apple software updates, beginning with visionOS 2.  The referenced article in the show notes below gives you the visual experience enhancements that the Apple software developers have incorporated into the update.  Michael R shares his experiences with visionOS 2, and his assessment of all of the usability and functionality improvements.  

Michael and Michael then turn their attention to the software updates for the AirPods Pro, which will allow these devices to act as hearing aids given the H2 chip and microphones.  The co-hosts have a spirited discussion about the social norm implications of people wearing their AirPods more, and how people will interact with one another if the assumption is that the wearer is listening to their AirPods.

After several articles dealing with the challenges posed by the Starlink and other satellites in Earth orbit, Michael and Michael touch on the new version of Flappy Bird.  Check out the show notes below for a hardware instantiation of Flappy Bird from e468.  

Rounding out the episode with, you guessed it, a Doom game contained in a keyboard keycap and a walking coffee table, reminiscent of the strandbeest kinetic sculptures from Theo Jansen.

What other furniture should be able to walk around?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @[email protected] (our home for now) and let us know! 

These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.

MacStories.net article: visionOS 2: The MacStories Review

ZDnet article: Apple says the iPhone 16 is a lot easier to repair than its predecessor. Here’s how

9 to 5 Mac article: AirPods Pro hearing aid upgrade hits stocks of major brands

Apple AirPods Pro 2

Astron.NL article: Second-Generation Starlink Satellites Leak 30 Times More Radio Interference, Threatening Astronomical Observations

futurism.com article: Researchers Say They Can Detect Stealth Aircraft Using Starlink Satellites

BBC article: Musk’s satellites ‘blocking’ view of the universe

Engadget article: Flappy Bird’s creator wants you to know he’s got nothing to do with the new version

Games at Work e468: Andy’s Fun Time

hackster.io article: Keyboard Warriors

Hackaday article: Mobile Coffee Table Uses Legs to Get Around

Michael Martine