AI Is Becoming a Band-Aid over Bad, Broken Tech Industry Design Choices

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October 17, 2023

Lately, it seems like every tech company has been bragging about its adoption of artificial intelligence tools. But in many cases, this week's lead story argues, those tools are being used to cover up bad design decisions. These bloated designs have made some technology products much harder to use—and slapping an AI interface on top does nothing to fix the underlying problems.

Sophie Bushwick, Associate Editor, Technology @sophiebushwick

Artificial Intelligence AI Is Becoming a Band-Aid over Bad, Broken Tech Industry Design Choices After decades of messy, thoughtless design choices, corporations are using artificial intelligence to sell basic usability back to consumers By Ed Zitron

Energy The AI Boom Could Use a Shocking Amount of Electricity Powering artificial intelligence models takes a lot of energy. A new analysis demonstrates just how big the problem could become By Lauren Leffer

Aerospace How I Grow Crystals in Space What it takes to manufacture crystals in space and build materials that work on Venus By Debbie G. Senesky

Anthropology AI Reads Ancient Scroll Charred by Mount Vesuvius in Tech First For the first time, a machine learning technique has revealed Greek words in CT scans of fragile rolled-up papyrus By Jo Marchant,Nature magazine

Defense This Code Breaking Quaker Poet Hunted Nazis How Elizebeth Smith Friedman went from scouring Shakespeare for secret codes to taking down a Nazi spy ring By Katie Hafner,Carol Sutton Lewis,The Lost Women of Science Initiative

Artificial Intelligence AI Designs Little Robots in 30 Seconds and They Keep Sprouting Legs An AI used to build artificial neural networks can also create autonomous robot bodies with remarkable speed  By Stephanie Pappas

Engineering New Glasses Can Transcribe Speech in Real Time Glasses that provide subtitles for conversations could be a boon to people with hearing loss By Timmy Broderick

Artificial Intelligence As Arctic Sea Ice Breaks Up, AI Is Starting to Predict Where the Ice Will Go Sea ice is changing fast. Are forecasts, created by artificial intelligence, the best way to keep up with the pace of a warming climate in the far north? By Emily Schwing | 07:59

Renewable Energy Wind Power Will Expand with Larger Turbines but Could Face Pushback With the expansion of wind power—and the growth of turbines—comes challenges in areas that are unaccustomed to whirring blades By John Fialka,E&E News

QUOTE OF THE DAY "In its latest environmental report, Microsoft disclosed that its global water consumption spiked 34% from 2021 to 2022 (to nearly 1.7 billion gallons, or more than 2,500 Olympic-sized swimming pools), a sharp increase compared to previous years that outside researchers tie to its AI research." Matt O'Brien and Hannah Fingerhut, AP News

FROM THE ARCHIVE Safeguarding AI Is Up to Everyone The use of artificial intelligence is so varied and industry-specific, no one federal agency can manage it alone By The Editors | September 2023

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