Technology

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Tech in 2020: Standing on the shoulders of giants

If you’re interested in technology and where it’s headed next, there’s no way around Benedict Evans. Every year, he does a big presentation on the state of technology. The focus of the latest one: What’s the next big thing after the smartphone revolution?

From Weekly Filet #287, in March 2020.

The Secretive Company That Might End Privacy as We Know It

This is one of those tools that take the «magic» out of Arthur Clarke’s famous quote: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from…dystopia? Here’s what Clearview.ai does: It can analyse a face (let’s say: your face) from a photograph or surveillance feed and instantly connect it to other publicly available images of you. And since some of those other images are connected to your name (say, a profile image on Facebook or Linkedin), it knows who you are. It claims to have 3000 million faces in its database already. The New York Times has all the details.

From Weekly Filet #286, in March 2020.

Style Is an Algorithm

«I imagine a future in which our clothes, music, film, art, books come with stickers like organic farmstand produce: Algorithm Free.» (full disclosure: as I’m writing this, I’m listening to music Spotify thinks I’ll like)

From Weekly Filet #272, in May 2018.

Palantir Knows Everything About You

A close look at the spying company that has been much better than Cambridge Analytica at staying in the shadows and that is arguably a lot more powerful. «An intelligence platform designed for the global War on Terror was weaponized against ordinary people at home.»

From Weekly Filet #271, in April 2018.

Palantir and Cambridge Analytica: what do we know?

I really like this Wikipedia approach to news: An explainer piece you can contribute to, both by asking the right questions and by providing answers. This one on Palantir’s links to Cambridge Analytica is far from comprehensive, but I’m pretty sure some among could contribute to make that happen.

From Weekly Filet #268, in March 2018.

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