Read time : 2 mins
Level : Intermediate
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Disgruntled X users are again flocking to Bluesky, a newer social media platform that grew out of the former Twitter before billionaire Elon Musk took it over in 2022. While it remains small compared to established online spaces such as X, it has emerged as an alternative for those looking for a different mood, lighter and friendlier and less influenced by Musk. Continue reading
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By ANCA GURZU, Cipher News undefined
PETRILA, Romania (AP) — For many years, Sebastian Tirinticǎ worked in a coal mine, just like his father and grandfather before him.
These days, Tirinticǎ, now 38, is largely surrounded by solar panels and wind turbines as he travels across Romania to train former coal workers and others for jobs in renewable energies.
It’s been a huge professional shift for a worker from one of the main coal regions of this formerly Communist Eastern European country.
“It’s hard to unglue yourself from something you did your entire life,” said Tirinticǎ, who has a short beard sprinkled with grey hair. “It’s hard to start again from zero, and not everyone has the strength and courage to do it.” Continue reading
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By PAUL WISEMAN AP Economics Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) — Imagine a customer-service center that speaks your language, no matter what it is.
Alorica, a company in Irvine, California, that runs customer-service centers around the world, has introduced an artificial intelligence translation tool that lets its representatives talk with customers who speak 200 different languages and 75 dialects.
So an Alorica representative who speaks, say, only Spanish can field a complaint about a balky printer or an incorrect bank statement from a Cantonese speaker in Hong Kong. Alorica wouldn’t need to hire a rep who speaks Cantonese.
Such is the power of AI. And, potentially, the threat: Perhaps companies won’t need as many employees — and will slash some jobs — if chatbots can handle the workload instead. But the thing is, Alorica isn’t cutting jobs. It’s still hiring aggressively. Continue reading
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By JAIMIE DING and ANDREW DALTON Associated Press
LOS ANGELES (AP) — It’s Los Angeles’ turn for the torch. Mayor Karen Bass accepted the Olympic flag at the Paris closing ceremony Sunday, before handing it off to a key representative of LA’s local business — Tom Cruise — who in a pre-recorded trek via motorcycle, plane and parachute kicked off the countdown to 2028.
The city will become the third in the world to host the games three times as it adds to the storied years of 1932 and 1984. Here’s a look forward and back in time at the Olympics in LA. Continue reading
Read time : 2 mins
Level : Advanced
By Emese Maczko
A 2023 study by the University of Technology, Sydney found green roofs when combined with solar panels, not only increased biodiversity and solar output by 107% but also reduced temperatures by a significant 8° C (46° F).
Green roofs are experiencing a resurgence in interest since a new study published in January 2024 demonstrated that volcanic ash in green roofs stabilizes temperatures, keeps weeds away, is resilient to extreme weather, drains water efficiently, and is low maintenance. Continue reading
Read time : 2 mins
Level : Advanced
By JAMES BROOKS Associated Press
KRIEGERS FLAK OFFSHORE WIND FARM, Denmark (AP) — In a small boat bobbing in the waves between towering offshore wind turbines, researchers in Europe’s Baltic Sea reach into the frigid water and remove long lines stretched between the pylons onto which mussels and seaweed are growing.
It’s part of efforts to explore multiple uses for remote wind parks far out at sea, such as fresh seafood production.
Run by the Swedish state-owned power firm Vattenfall and Denmark’s Aarhus University, the four-year project started in 2023 off the Danish east coast at Scandinavia’s largest wind farm, Kriegers Flak. With its first harvest just 18 months later, it’s already showing signs of early success. Continue reading
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By KEN SWEET AP Business Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — It’s like Sephora or Starbucks now offered a checking account.
After years of closing or mostly neglecting physical bank branches across the U.S., the nation’s largest banks are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on refurbishing old locations or building new ones, and in the process changing the look, feel and purpose of the local bank branch.
Many of these branches are larger, airier, and meant to feel more comfortable for those walking in with difficult financial questions. Others are being designed as “third spaces” to allow local nonprofits or community representatives to hold workshops or seminars for customers or neighbors. They are a contrast to the marble-clad temples to finance built 50 or 75 years ago and the stale cookie-cutter branches that more recently cluttered suburban malls. Continue reading
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Intermediate
By JAMES BROOKS Associated Press
COPENHAGEN (AP) — Ever since humans have journeyed to space, their meals there have proved to be, well, nothing to write home about.
But that could change after a Michelin-starred chef teamed up with the Florida-based startup Space Perspective to take fine-dining to our upper atmosphere in late 2025.
Six guests are set to ascend aboard Spaceship Neptune to the stratosphere, where they will enjoy an immersive dining experience served up by Danish Michelin-starred chef Rasmus Munk.
Munk, 33, will travel with the guests and serve the meal himself, from a small kitchen. He says his menu will be inspired by the impact of space innovation.
“We want to tell stories through the food,” Munk says. “We … want to talk and highlight some of the research that’s been done through the last 60 years.” Continue reading
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By MATT O’BRIEN AP Technology Writer
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The voice Alexis “Lexi” Bogan had before last summer was exuberant.
She loved to belt out Taylor Swift and Zach Bryan ballads in the car. She laughed all the time — even while corralling misbehaving preschoolers or debating politics with friends over a backyard fire pit. In high school, she was a soprano in the chorus.
Then that voice was gone.
Doctors in August removed a life-threatening tumor lodged near the back of her brain. When the breathing tube came out a month later, Bogan had trouble swallowing and strained to say “hi” to her parents. Months of rehabilitation aided her recovery, but her speech is still impaired. Friends, strangers and her own family members struggle to understand what she is trying to tell them.
In April, the 21-year-old got her old voice back. Not the real one, but a voice clone generated by artificial intelligence that she can summon from a phone app. Trained on a 15-second time capsule of her teenage voice — sourced from a cooking demonstration video she recorded for a high school project — her synthetic but remarkably real-sounding AI voice can now say almost anything she wants. Continue reading
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By MATT O’BRIEN AP Technology Writer
Aidan Gomez can take some credit for the ‘T’ at the end of ChatGPT. He was part of a group of Google engineers who first introduced a new artificial intelligence model called a transformer.
That helped set a foundation for today’s generative AI boom that ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and others built upon. Gomez, one of eight co-authors of Google’s 2017 paper, was a 20-year-old intern at the time.
He’s now the CEO and co-founder of Cohere, a Toronto-based startup competing with other leading AI companies in supplying large language models and the chatbots they power to big businesses and organizations.
Gomez spoke about the future of generative AI with The Associated Press. The interview has been edited for length and clarity. Continue reading