Apple embraces the AI craze with its newly unleashed iPhone 16 lineup

Apple iPhone 16 models are displayed following Apple's "It's Glowtime" event in Cupertino, California, September 9, 2024. (AFP)

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Updated 10 September 2024

September 10, 2024 00:56

Apple embraces the AI craze with its newly unleashed iPhone 16 lineup

Apple’s AI features are designed to turn its often-blundering virtual assistant Siri into a smarter and more versatile sidekick

Updated 10 September 2024

September 10, 2024 00:56

CUPERTINO, California: Apple on Monday charged into the artificial intelligence craze with a new iPhone lineup that marks the company’s latest attempt to latch onto a technology trend and transform it into a cultural phenomenon.
The four different iPhone 16 models will all come equipped with special chips needed to power a suite if AI tools that Apple hopes will make its marquee product even more indispensable and reverse a recent sales slump.
Apple’s AI features are designed to turn its often-blundering virtual assistant Siri into a smarter and more versatile sidekick, automate a wide range of tedious tasks and pull off other crowd-pleasing tricks such as creating customized emojis within seconds.
After receiving a standing ovation for Monday’s event, Apple CEO Tim Cook promised the AI package will unleash “innovations that will make a true difference in people’s lives.”
But the breakthroughs won’t begin as soon as the new iPhones — ranging in price from $800 to $1,200 — hit the stores on September 20.
Most of Apple’s AI functions will roll out as part of a free software updates to iOS 18, the operating system that will power the iPhone 16 rolling out from October through December. US English will be the featured language at launch but an update enabling other languages will come out next year, according to Apple.
It’s all part of a new approach that Apple previewed at a developers conference three months ago to create more anticipation for a next generation of iPhones amid a rare sales slump for the well-known devices.
Since Apple’s June conference, competitors such as Samsung and Google have made greater strides in AI – a technology widely expected to trigger the most dramatic changes in computing since the first iPhone came out 17 years ago.
Just as Apple elevated fledgling smartphones it into a must-have technology in 21st-century society, the Cupertino, California, company is betting it can do something similar with its tardy arrival to artificial intelligence.
In an attempt to set itself apart from the early leaders in AI, the technology being baked into the iPhone 16 is being promoted as “Apple Intelligence.” Despite the unique branding, Apple’s new approach mimics many of the features already available in the Samsung Galaxy S24 released in January and the Google Pixel 9 that came out last month.
“Apple could have waited another year for further development, but initial take up of AI- powered devices from the likes of Samsung has been encouraging, and Apple is keen to capitalize on this market,” said PP Foresight analyst Paolo Pescatore.
As it treads into new territory, Apple is trying to preserve its long-time commitment to privacy by tailoring its AI so that most of its technological tricks can processed on the device itself instead of relying on giant banks of computers located in remote data centers. When a task needs to connect to a data center, Apple promises it will be done in a tightly-controlled way that ensures that no personal data is stored remotely.
While corralling the personal information shared through Apple’s AI tools inherently reduces the chances that the data will be exploited or misused against a user’s wishes, it doesn’t guarantee iron-clad security. A device could still be stolen, for instance, or hacked through digital chicanery.
For users seeking to access even more AI tools than being offered by the iPhone, Apple is teaming up with OpenAI to give users the option of farming out more complicated tasks to the popular ChatGPT chatbot.
Although Apple is releasing a free version of its operating system to propel its on-device AI features, the chip needed to run the technology is only available on the iPhone 16 lineup and the high-end iPhone 15 models that came out a year ago.
That means most consumers who are interested in taking advantage of Apple’s approach to AI will have to buy one of the iPhone 16 models – a twist that investors are counting on will fuel a surge in demand heading into the holiday season.
The anticipated sales boom is the main reason Apple’s stock price has climbed by more than 10 percent, including a slight uptick Monday after the shares initially slipped following the showcase for the latest iPhones.
Besides its latest iPhones, Apple also introduced a new version of its smartwatch that will include a feature to help detect sleep apnea as well the next generation of its wireless headphones, the AirPods Pro, that will be able to function as a hearing aid with an upcoming software update.

Topics: Apple iPhone 16 artificial intelligence

‘Russian spy’ whale likely died of infection: Norway police

Updated 04 October 2024

AFP

October 04, 2024 08:28

‘Russian spy’ whale likely died of infection: Norway police

Animal rights’ organizations NOAH and One Whale claimed the whale had been shot dead and filed a police report

Updated 04 October 2024

AFP

October 04, 2024 08:28

OSLO: A beluga whale found dead in Norway in August, suspected by some of being a Russian spy, probably died of an infection and not gunshot wounds, Norwegian police said Friday.
Nicknamed “Hvaldimir” in a pun on the Norwegian word for whale (“hval“) and its purported ties to Moscow, the white beluga first appeared off the coast in Norway’s far-northern Finnmark region in 2019 and quickly became a celebrity in the country.
He was found dead on August 31 in a bay on Norway’s southwestern coast.
Animal rights’ organizations NOAH and One Whale claimed the whale had been shot dead and filed a police report.
The Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted an autopsy and found a 35-centimeter (14-inch) stick lodged in his mouth.
“The report concluded that the probable cause of death was a bacterial infection, possibly a result of wounds in his mouth caused by a stick that got stuck,” police official Amund Preede Revheim said in a statement on Friday.
“The stick may also have made it difficult for Hvaldimir to eat, thereby increasing the risk of infection,” he added.
Police said they had found no trace of bullets and had decided not to open an investigation.
“There is nothing in the examinations that suggests Hvaldimir was killed illegally,” Preede Revheim said.
When Hvaldimir was found in 2019, Norwegian marine biologists removed a man-made harness with a mount suited for an action camera and the words “Equipment St. Petersburg” printed in English on the plastic clasps.
The whale appeared to be accustomed to humans.
Norwegian officials said the whale might have escaped an enclosure and been trained by the Russian navy.
Moscow has never made any official response to claims the whale could be a “Russian spy.”

Topics: Russia whale

Stranded killer whales make their way to sea in Russia

Updated 04 October 2024

Reuters

October 04, 2024 05:35

Stranded killer whales make their way to sea in Russia

Updated 04 October 2024

Reuters

October 04, 2024 05:35

MOSCOW: A family of killer whales who were stranded in a silted estuary in the Russian Far East have made their way to the open sea after researchers directed them into deeper water, Russia’s emergencies ministry said on Friday.
The four animals, two adults and two calves, beached in the estuary on the Kamchatka Peninsula this week and researchers and volunteers had to douse them with water at one point to prevent them from dying.
After one unsuccessful rescue attempt in which they missed the narrow exit during high tide, the orcas managed to leave the estuary on Friday, the ministry said on the Telegram messaging app where it also published videos of the rescue operation.
Orcas, or killer whales, belong to the sub-order of toothed whales but are also the largest member of the dolphin family, according to Whale and Dolphin Conservation.

Topics: Russia whales

Did this happen to me also? Korean adoptees question their past and ask how to find their families

Updated 04 October 2024

October 04, 2024 04:22

Did this happen to me also? Korean adoptees question their past and ask how to find their families

The investigation reported dubious child-gathering practices and fraudulent paperwork involving South Korea’s foreign adoption program

Updated 04 October 2024

October 04, 2024 04:22

SEOUL: Dozens of South Korean adoptees, many in tears, have responded to an investigation led by The Associated Press and documented by Frontline (PBS) last week on Korean adoptions. The investigation reported dubious child-gathering practices and fraudulent paperwork involving South Korea’s foreign adoption program, which peaked in the 1970s and `80s amid huge Western demands for babies.
Here are some of the problems adoptees who responded say they faced, along with tips for finding histories and birth families.
KYLA POSTREL — Adoption paperwork tells multiple stories
Kyla Postrel’s paperwork tells two different stories, neither of which she’s sure is true.
After a DNA test last year, Postrel found a half-brother who was also adopted to the West. Comparing their paperwork made her even more skeptical of the stories they’d been told. But part of her is reluctant to keep looking “for something that may or may not exist and could be absolutely devastating.”
She has been flooded with messages from other adoptees looking for help, and tells them not to be disappointed if they can’t track down their stories.
“I just don’t want any adoptees feeling like their life is a lie,” she says. “Their life is everything that they’ve built since then.”
If her birth mother is still out there, Postrel would want her to know her daughter has had a good life.
CODY DUET — Not enough information in the file
Cody Duet, adopted to rural Louisiana in 1986, requested his full file a decade ago. He got back less than one page, saying his mother was a young factory worker, his father was unknown and there was nothing more they were required to give him.
“It was probably one of the most angry moments in my life,” Duet says. “Who are you to tell me that I don’t get to know who I am?”
He fell into a depression and couldn’t sleep. He struggled with abandonment, like he was easy to get rid of, easy not to love. But now, he wonders, was that story even true?
The AP investigation found that children were systemically listed as abandoned, even though researchers have found that the vast majority had known relatives.
Now Duet wants to resume his search. He wants to find his mother, to tell her he’s reached a point in his life that he’s proud of.
AMY McFADDEN — Some adoptees don’t know what to believe
Amy McFadden always believed what the adoption agency told her parents — that she was abandoned on a staircase at 5 weeks old.
Adopted to the United States in 1975, she’d heard stories about fraudulent adoptions, but always thought of them as one-off problems that had nothing to do with her. She’s grateful for her American life and close to her adoptive parents, and never felt the longing so many other adoptees do to reconnect with their roots.
But when she found out from the AP stories that mothers in South Korea have searched for their missing children for decades, she says, she was in shock for three days. Waves of nausea radiated over her.
She wants to submit her DNA, in case a family has been looking for her.
CALLIE CHAMBERLAIN — Not everyone has a happy ending
For Callie Chamberlain, waiting for word on whether her birth parents wanted to connect felt like standing on the edge of a cliff.
Her original documents said her mother was young, unmarried and uneducated, she says. Her full files from the South Korean agency contained a different story: Her mother was married and she was born of an affair. DNA testing showed both stories were untrue, and identified her mother and father as married both back then and now.
When they connected, her mother said she’d nearly died giving birth. The family was poor. Disoriented from labor and medications, her mother said she only vaguely remembered hospital staff insisting she was very sick and the child deserved a better home. The baby disappeared the next day. She lived with that shame for years, and the entire family searched for Chamberlain.
They have now invited her — and her adoptive family — with open arms. But Chamberlain has met many without such happy endings, and feels a sort of survivor’s guilt. She also questions the belief that reunions will answer all questions and make you whole.
“There is so much grief and there’s so much sorrow,” she says. “There’s this sense of death. And then there’s also so much that gets to be born. It’s an ancestral sorrow that I can feel sometimes, like this wasn’t supposed to happen.”
She has learned of a Korean cultural concept called “han,” an existential and endless grief, born from colonization, war, poverty and the line that cleaves Korea into North and South, splitting families for generations. “That’s something we experience too,” she said. “We are Koreans.”
___
Here are some steps Korean adoptees could take to learn more about their past:
Do birth family searches
Adoptees can first request information from their adoption agencies. If they don’t get results from agencies, they can contact the South Korean government’s National Center for the Rights of the Child as a second step.
Birth searches can take months and aren’t always successful. Less than a fifth of 15,000 adoptees who have asked the government for help with family searches since 2012 have managed to reunite with relatives, according to data obtained by AP. Failures are often caused by inaccurate records or the practice of describing children as abandoned even when they had known parents.
Many adoptees also criticize the consent process for reunions. Adoption agencies and the NCRC can only use traditional mail, and only up to three times, to contact birth parents for their consent to provide personal details to adoptees and meet them. Privacy laws prevent agency and NCRC workers from accessing birth parents’ phone numbers. Still, the Korean-language adoption documents kept by South Korean agencies often have more background information than translated files sent to Western adoptive parents.
When they fail to locate birth parents, NCRC may recommend that adoptees register their DNA with South Korean police or diplomatic offices, or help them publish their stories in South Korean media.
Take a DNA test
Frustrated with search failures and unreliable records, many Korean adoptees in recent years have attempted to reconnect with their birth families through DNA. Adoptees can register their DNA with a South Korean embassy or consulate in the country where they live. They can also register their DNA with a local police station if they travel to South Korea.
DNA testing isn’t common in South Korea, and the process usually depends on whether the birth family had also been trying to find the adoptee through DNA. Once collected at diplomatic or police offices, adoptees’ genetic information is cross-checked with South Korea’s national DNA database for missing persons. When there is a match, the NCRC takes steps to arrange a reunion.
Some adoptees have also found birth relatives through commercial DNA tests popular in the West. The nonprofit group 325 Kamra helps South Korean adoptees and birth families reunite through DNA, by allowing adoptees to upload their commercial test results to a database or providing test kits.
Join adoptee and volunteer groups
There are various Facebook groups — some open, others closed for adoptees only — where adoptees talk about their lives and interactions with adoption agencies.
One of the most active pages is run by Banet, a volunteer group named after the Korean word for newborn baby clothing. The group helps adoptees search for birth families, connects them with government and police, and provides translation during meetings with Korean relatives.
Some websites are tailored to adoptees sharing the same agency, such as Paperslip, which helps adoptees placed through Korea Social Service with birth family searches and adoption document requests.
The Seoul-based nonprofit Global Overseas Adoptees’ Link assists adoptees with birth family searches as well as language education, social events and obtaining visas for employment in South Korea. KoRoot, another Seoul-based civic group, also helps adoptees searching for their families and backgrounds and runs advocacy programs.

Topics: Korea adoption

Crash saves American teenager whose car suddenly sped up to 193 kph

Updated 04 October 2024

October 04, 2024 05:55

Crash saves American teenager whose car suddenly sped up to 193 kph

With his Honda SUV's brake not working and the vehicle accelerating, Sam Dutcher drove into road less traveled while asking for help
A last-ditch plan averted disaster, with a trooper speeding in front of the Honda and telling Dutcher to crash into the rear of his squad

Updated 04 October 2024

October 04, 2024 05:55

Sam Dutcher had just finished running errands when the 18-year-old’s Honda Pilot suddenly began to accelerate, even though his foot wasn’t on the gas pedal. The brake wouldn’t work, he couldn’t shift into neutral, and before long, the runaway SUV was speeding into the western Minnesota countryside with no way to stop.
“I had the brake to the floor,” Dutcher said Thursday, but the SUV kept going faster and faster, eventually reaching 120 mph (193 kpm).
A last-ditch plan averted disaster that September evening — a trooper sped in front of the Honda and Dutcher was told to crash into the rear of his squad car, allowing it to ease safely to a stop moments before reaching a dangerous intersection.
“That was really all I could think of that was going to get him stopped in time,” Minnesota Trooper Zach Gruver said. “We kind of just ran out of time and distance. I really didn’t know of any other way.”
Dutcher, who graduated high school in May and is studying auto mechanics, was driving to the family home near West Fargo, North Dakota, around 7:30 p.m. on Sept. 17 when he realized something was wrong.
“I went to take my foot off the accelerator,” Dutcher recalled. “It wouldn’t slow down.” As the SUV gained speed, Dutcher had two options: Stay on a two-lane road and drive into Minnesota, or hop onto the interstate. Figuring traffic would be lighter, he chose the road less traveled.
Dutcher tried using voice command on his phone to call 911, but it didn’t work. So he called his mom.

Catherine Dutcher was in the drive-thru line at Hardee’s. In her 911 call, she mentioned that the Honda had just been in the shop because the accelerator was apparently getting stuck. Authorities suspect that the SUV’s computer malfunctioned.
The family should take the vehicle in to a dealership for an inspection, a Honda spokeswoman told The Associated Press. The company could not comment further until an inspection was done, she said.
As the Honda sped into Minnesota, Clay County Deputy Zach Johnson reached Dutcher by phone. Dash camera video shows Johnson talking Dutcher through possible solutions. Nothing worked.
Meanwhile, all Catherine Dutcher could do was worry. When she called 911 for an update, she broke.
“They said they’ve got several officers going to him as well as medical,” she recalled. “At that point I kind of lost it because I just imagined him being either seriously injured or dead. I didn’t know how they were going to stop a car that was going that speed.”
Gruver heard what was going on through his radio. His Dodge Charger eventually caught up with the Honda as it was approaching the town of Hitterdal, Minnesota, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) from where the problem began.
Only about 200 people live in Hitterdal, but the highway runs through an area with a couple of stop signs, a railroad crossing and an intersection with another highway.

This photo provided by Catherine Dutcher shows Sam Dutcher with Minnesota State Patrol Trooper Zach Gruver at the Travel Center in Moorhead, Minnesota, on Sept. 25, 2024. (Catherine Dutcher via AP)

Gruver raced ahead to keep traffic at bay. His dashcam video showed the Honda zipping quickly past him through town. Dutcher said the SUV was going about 120 mph (193 kph).
Soon, another worry: Johnson warned Gruver that the highway ended at a T-intersection about four miles (6.4 kilometers) away — a two-minute drive at racing speed.
Law enforcement came up with a plan on the fly: Dutcher should drive into the back of Gruver’s squad car as both vehicles were moving.
“Yes, run into the back of his car,” Johnson urged Dutcher in a conversation captured on dashcam video.
The 2022 Honda’s crash mitigation system kicked in at the point of impact, helping ease the collision, Gruver said. The Honda was going about 50 mph (80 kph) when it struck the trooper’s vehicle. From there, Gruver was able to gradually slow to a stop.
Gruver, a married 30-year-old expecting his first baby, was impressed by the young driver who was able to navigate a runaway vehicle at unimaginable speeds.
“Sam did great,” said Gruver, who has been a trooper for over three years. “I don’t think there’s a whole lot of people that could deal with that pressure.”

Topics: Honda Pilot Minnesota

Carpe diem: the Costa Rican women turning fish into fashion

Updated 03 October 2024

AFP

October 03, 2024 05:28

Carpe diem: the Costa Rican women turning fish into fashion

On a beach in Costa Rica, as fishermen land the day’s catch, two women are hard at work on a slimy sea bass skin, rubbing, scraping, washing and tanning the hide to turn it into leather

Updated 03 October 2024

AFP

October 03, 2024 05:28

COSTA DE PAJAROS: On a beach in Costa Rica, as fishermen land the day’s catch, two women are hard at work on a slimy sea bass skin, rubbing, scraping, washing and tanning the hide to turn it into leather.
Two years ago, both Mauren Castro, 41, and Marta Sosa, 70, were stay-at-home mums dependent on their fishermen husbands to provide for their families of four and six, respectively.
Today, they are part of the all-female Piel Marina (Marine Skin) cooperative, which turns fish skins that used to be discarded at sea into sustainable fashion.
For generations, fishing was the economic mainstay in Costa de Pajaros, a village situated about 62 miles (100 kilometers) west of the capital San Jose.
But fishermen say that regulations aimed at making stocks more sustainable, which this year included a complete ban on fishing between May and July, have made it harder to live off the sea.
Enter the NGO MarViva, which helped train 15 women to establish themselves as seafront tanners two years ago.
The women were skeptical at first about the sartorial possibilities of fish skins.
“We said ‘how can a skin, which is something that gets smelly, which is waste, be the raw material for women to be able to get ahead’“? Castro, 41, told AFP.
But over time they honed their trade and are helping supplementing their families’ meagre incomes.
Wearing blue rubber gloves and white t-shirts bearing the words Piel Marina, Sosa and Castro show how a skin rescued from a filleted sea bass can become a pair of earrings, a necklace or even a handbag.
First they rub the skin gently between their fingers to remove the scales and any remaining flesh.
“Then we take it and wash it with soap, as if we were washing clothes. Then we dye it with glycerin and alcohol and natural dye, and then we dry it,” Sosa explained.
The dyeing process takes four days, with another four needed for the leather to dry in the sun to produce a fabric that is soft and pliable but strong.
Crucially, it no longer smells of fish and has the advantage of being waterproof.
The women are not only tanners, but have also become jewelry designers who sell colorful earrings and necklaces on Instagram and Facebook.
A pair of earrings in the shape of a butterfly costs the equivalent of about seven dollars.
The women also sell some of the leather to small-scale textile producers in Puntarenas, the main port on Costa Rica’s Pacific coast.

Costa Rica is just the latest country to catch onto the potential of fish tanning, an age-old practice among Indigenous peoples from Alaska to Scandanavia to Asia.
While salmon skins were traditionally used by the Ainu people in Japan and the Inuit in northern Canada to make boots and clothes, and on the shores of Lake Victoria in Kenya they now use the local tilapia delicacy to make handbags.
Brazilian company Nova Kaeru meanwhile offers leather made from the discarded scales of the giant pirarucu fish, which is native to the Amazon.
On the Internet, fish leather bags sell for hundreds of dollars.
One of the first big-name fashion designers to get hooked on the skins was former Dior creative director John Galliano, who sported an Atlantic salmon skin jacket and fish leather bag in his 2002 collections.
For the moment, the women of the Piel Marina cooperative are glad to have a job that gets them away from domestic chores and provides them with a small income.
But they dream of the day when the leather they make by hand on the beach struts the global stage.
Castro’s eyes shine at the prospect.
“I would like it to be seen in Hollywood, in Canada or on the great catwalks in Paris!“

Topics: Costa Rica

Apple embraces the AI craze with its newly unleashed iPhone 16 lineup

Apple embraces the AI craze with its newly unleashed iPhone 16 lineup

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The iPhone 12 emits too much radiation and Apple must take it off the market, French agency says

‘Russian spy’ whale likely died of infection: Norway police

‘Russian spy’ whale likely died of infection: Norway police

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Stranded killer whales make their way to sea in Russia

Stranded killer whales make their way to sea in Russia

Vietnam condemns China for assault on its fishermen in the disputed South China Sea

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Did this happen to me also? Korean adoptees question their past and ask how to find their families

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Apple embraces the AI craze with its newly unleashed iPhone 16 lineup

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