😱 Real-life laser spying ⋆ 🤖 AI of the week ⋆ Reusable rockets 🚀 in record time

From lasers that turn objects into microphones, to the latest advancements in AI and the race to create a fully reusable rocket. Dig in.

Thing 1 - Spying with a laser

You might've seen this in Splinter Cell - the Tactical Audio Kit (T.A.K.) - but it's real!

Marcus Hutchins built a laser that can turn random objects into microphones.

It works by shining a beam of light on an object and detecting the vibrations caused by sound waves hitting the object.

The laser can pick up sounds from a distance and without any physical contact, making it a potential tool for spying or eavesdropping.

Demo (short) video of the setup Marcus built

Thing 2 - AI of the week

• DALL·E 3 entered research preview and will be available to ChatGPT Plus and Enterprise customers in October

DALL·E 3 is built natively on ChatGPT, which lets you use ChatGPT as a brainstorming partner and refiner of your prompts. Just ask ChatGPT what you want to see in anything from a simple sentence to a detailed paragraph.

This video is all you need to know about DALL·E 3

• v0 by Vercel Labs
  lets you create user interface components with simple text prompts and copy the code to use in your projects
• OpenAI enables fine-tuning existing fine-tuned models
• Microsoft announced DeepSpeed4Science Initiative
  enables large-scale scientific discovery through sophisticated AI system technologies
• Google launched Bard Extensions
  allows Bard to connect to various Google apps and services and show you relevant information within the conversation
• AIWaves Agents - open-source library/framework for building autonomous language agents

• ChatGPT has a new knowledge cutoff date of January 2022

• Tesla Bot update!

Showing off the latest capabilities (1 min 17 sec)

Thing 3 - Building a 100% Reusable Rocket in Record Time!

Stoke Space just nailed a test flight in Moses Lake, Washington! Their bucket hopper rocket took off, reached 30 feet, and landed - all in 15 seconds. 🎉

This wraps up the first phase of their Hopper program, proving they've got what it takes to make reusable rockets.

They've hit some other big things:

• First to test a second stage with differential throttling.
• First to fly a reentry vehicle with a regeneratively cooled heat shield that uses fuel to lower its temperature
• Quickest to go from getting funded to showing off a reusable first stage.

This is just a step to building a reusable rocket that can fly again in just a day.

Progress seems to be speeding up, doesn't it?

Cheers, Zvonimir