1. One thing that helps
Will a 5-minute charging time be enough to convince you to switch to EVs? Charging time and charger availability have been the major stumbling block for a lot of potential EV customers. Chinese manufacturer BYD has managed to fix the first one, and are working on the second.
Current supercharging technologies, like Tesla’s, add around 320 kilometers of range with just 15 minutes of charging. If that still feels too long, BYD’s new tech promises to add 470 kilometers of range in just 5 minutes! That’s roughly the same time it takes to fill up a gas tank. They call it ultra-fast charging which sounds fair enough to me.
I've been waiting for the EV world to settle down for a couple of years. I'm now pretty close to jumping in boots and all.
2. One to be wary of
Ever wondered why GPT sometimes gives weird replies? It may well be cognitively deficient.
ChatGPT 4 and 4o, Gemini and Claude were tested for cognitive decline by a team of neurologists. They applied the Montreal Cognitive Assessment to measure memory, spatial skills, and executive function. Google’s Gemini scored the lowest, at 16 points out of 30, which would suggest severe impairment in humans. All models scored poorly on spatial and executive functions. Unsurprisingly, the LLMs showed lack of empathy, a sign of dementia in humans. Older models fared worse than new ones so they are improving.
The next time your chatbot says something odd, it may be a sign that they are developing AI dementia. Make sure you validate the results.
3. One thing to amaze
Back in the 16th edition, I marveled at Noveto’s Sound Beamer which can wirelessly beam music straight to you without others hearing it. Taking the tech further, a team of researchers from Penn State has developed a speaker that will beam sound that is audible only at a specific point, even if it needs to bend and twist along the way.
A regular loudspeaker booms sound in all directions. A focused sound beamer beams it in a specific direction - everyone in it's path will hear the sound. But the researchers created an audible enclave - a specific area - where the sound will be heard.
Using acoustic metasurfaces, the researchers generated two ultrasonic beams that can bend on their own and intersect at a particular point. While travelling, these sound waves are inaudible. When they intersect, they create a new frequency that is audible to humans. This point of intersection, the audible enclave, is the only point where the sound can be heard and nowhere else.
Where we're going, who needs headphones?