Algae Battery, Sneaky Hiring & Chaos AI 🔋

What’s at stake? 

Oh not much. Just our humanity and civilization. 

Critics warn that AI-generated imagery could increase the amount of misinformation on the internet. Creepy creators can produce harmful material like pornography, hate speech, racism and fake incrimination.

Such an AI in the hands of a morally imbalanced fiend could give him ammunition for chaos. (The Joker smiles)

Moreover, the ease with which people can create fake art and sell them as NFT will push the already struggling artists into a bigger abyss. 

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DALL-E is not the only swanky image AI in town. In fact, it’s just one of several new AI image tools that offer revolutionary promise, and peril, for the art world and beyond.

Recent research from Axios shows that tech workers are migrating to other regions in the U.S., such as Miami, that saw an influx of 30% of workers from the IT sector in 2021.

Signs of a shift in tech demographics:

• The rise in VC activity outside the Bay Area 
• The percentage of investment dollars in the Bay Area dropping below 30% for the first time in 10 years in 2021  

Stack Overflow conducted a research to further break down trends in tech migration. The data includes both the pre-pandemic period (March 2018 to April 2020) and the COVID period (March 2020 to April 2022).

According to their research (Chart below), some of the established tech hubs on the West Coast of the U.S. experienced significant declines with technologists decamping for other locales. Top metro areas, including Seattle, New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, had the highest attrition over the set period. Portland, Oregon, on the other hand, saw an 11% tech growth during the same period. 

There's a computer that has been running on algae for the past 1 year. It functions on just light and water. No electricity. Of course, it isn't a large device. It's the size of a small AA battery. But its survival for such a long time is an unprecedented feat in the sustainable innovation field. 

How it works: 

• The device contains a species of algae called Synechocystis. 
• The algae harvest sunlight using photosynthesis. 
• This generates a small electrical current which powers a microprocessor of the kind used in IoT devices. 
• It performs computations for 45 minutes every hour. 

• On the other hand, algae batteries are recyclable and renewable.
• Since they produce their own power, they don't need to be recharged. 
• The IoT unit can even function in darkness as the algae continues to process its food once the lights are out. 

Want a job at Google? It might actually be pretty easy. 

One condition though. You'll have to take up membership in a religious group (read: cult) in California that believes most people exist in a state of "waking sleep.”

The New York Times reported last week that a group called the Fellowship of Friends, which the NYT reporter referred to as a "cult-like religious sect," holds an illuminati like position at Google. 

This takeover of Google’s hiring has apparently been going on for years. But it only came to light now because a former employee is suing the tech giant. 

What the suit alleges: 

• The Fellowship group ran a hiring agency that placed contractors from the sect in open roles at Google.
• It started hiring more members to fill as many positions as possible to gain power and influence at the tech company.

The NYT reports that the group's founder claimed to have been contacted by "angelic incarnations" of deceased figures including Leonardo da Vinci and Johann Sebastian Bach.

Fed officials had earlier expected to see inflation flattening and beginning to decline by this point. However, consumer prices rose by 8.6% in May, the highest annual rate since 1981.

As a result, in their economic projections, Fed officials now see unemployment rising for the next three years.

But that's not all. 

There’s a vicious cycle at play. Some economists fear that if employment falls too much, consumer spending will go down even further. And with that companies, esp. startups will shed jobs. 

So unemployment triggers less spending and that in turn triggers more layoffs.