The Daily Index — Thursday, December 7, 2023 · TLDR Index

Across today’s newsletters

Today’s Index

TLDR

GOOGLE LAUNCHES GEMINI—A POWERFUL AI MODEL IT SAYS CAN SURPASS GPT-4

Google's Gemini is a multimodal AI model that the company says will power a new era in computing. The largest version of the model exceeds current state-of-the-art results on 30 of the 32 widely used academic benchmarks used in large language model research and development. A specially tuned English version of the mid-level model is available now in 170 countries as part of Google's Bard chatbot. The smallest version of the model is designed to run locally on consumer devices.

arstechnica.com · 6 min

TLDR AI

GOOGLE GEMINI

Google's flagship model Gemini is natively multimodal with text capabilities matching GPT4 while also being able to operate on many other data sequences. It also trained Alpha Code 2, which is an 85th percentile coder on code forces. Alpha Code 2 will be available in Google’s API after December 13th.

blog.google · 12 min

TLDR Web Dev

PRINTING PERFECTION, A DEVELOPER’S JOURNEY WITH REACT-TO-PRINT

This post details the process of implementing a custom way to print pages in a commercial application using the "react-to-print" library. The post discusses the limitations of the browser's default print API and why react-to-print was chosen. The journey includes a proof of concept phase, addressing challenges in documentation and implementation, handling specific requirements like hiding elements on print, and debugging issues related to state management and browser interactions.

buaiscia.github.io · 6 min

TLDR Crypto

PRO-BLOCKCHAIN BILL CLEARS HURDLE IN U.S. HOUSE

A US House of Representatives committee has unanimously approved a bill directing the Department of Commerce to support blockchain tech. Despite the bill passing through committee, approval by the House remains uncertain. Its best chance may be integration with other larger, must-pass legislation.

coindesk.com · 2 min

TLDR Design

VISUAL ELECTRIC LAUNCHES AN AI-POWERED IMAGE GENERATOR WITH A DESIGNER WORKFLOW FOCUS

Visual Electric has launched an AI-based image generation tool designed specifically for designers. The tool focuses on non-linear creative workflows and offers features like mood selection, iterative design, and a community-sharing model, with plans to differentiate itself in a crowded market of generative AI tools.

techcrunch.com · 3 min

TLDR

YEAR ON TIKTOK 2023: SCROLL BACK WITH OUR COMMUNITY

The Year on TikTok 2023 honors some of the standout moments that have happened on the platform this year. It peeks at the stories that have inspired, entertained, and educated over 1 billion people around the world. This page contains links to this year's biggest TikTok videos, trends, songs, stars, and more. It shows trends from around the world, but it has a section for US-specific trends for every topic.

newsroom.tiktok.com · 24 min

TLDR

PILOTLESS FEDEX, RELIABLE ROBOTICS PLANE COMPLETES FLIGHT

Reliable Robotics Corp. has flown a small cargo plane without a human on board. The 12-minute flight, made with a plane on loan from FedEx, was Reliable Robotics' second automated flight. The startup is working to gain full approval from the FAA. Its system will restrict remote pilots to only supervising one aircraft at a time rather than managing multiple autonomous flights. Remote piloting will boost efficiency and allow planes to be repositioned more easily to match where demand is strongest.

ttnews.com · 5 min

TLDR

GENERATING POWER ON EARTH FROM THE COLDNESS OF DEEP SPACE

The coldness of space is a largely untapped thermodynamic resource. Advances in technology could soon result in solar panels that work at night as well as day. Scientists have already demonstrated that it is possible to chill water to cool buildings by as much as 5 degrees Celsius during the day directly using power generated by the cold universe. This article looks at some current ideas and prototypes in the field.

spectrum.ieee.org · 13 min

TLDR

ENABLING NEXT-GENERATION AI WORKLOADS: ANNOUNCING TPU V5P AND AI HYPERCOMPUTER

Google has announced Cloud TPU v5p, its most powerful, scalable, and flexible AI accelerator yet. TPUs are used for training and serving AI-powered products. Google has also announced AI Hypercomputer from Google Cloud, a supercomputer architecture that uses an integrated system of performance-optimized hardware, open software, leading ML frameworks, and flexible consumption models. AI Hypercomputer employs systems-level co-design to boost efficiency and productivity across AI training, tuning, and serving.

cloud.google.com · 7 min