Pathways to reskilling. Non-engineering obstacles to quantum computing. The Watch is Apple's future. Facebook's downward spiral. Fake porn, AI imagination & zombies.

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DEPT OF THE NEAR FUTURE

🤹   Reskilling: the WEF’s report on how we need to reskill the workforce in the face of automation is excellent. Key highlights:

• The average US worker will have more than 20 job transition options with the same our higher compensation;

• The need for new roles will affect women more than men, the net impact of women’s wages should be significantly positive;

• “for all workers, continuous learning will not only be key to securing employment but also to building stable, fulfilling careers and seizing rewarding job transition opportunities.”

🌀  How far does quantum computing really have to go? Some of the hurdles are not just engineering ones, argues Philip Ball.

⌚  The Apple Watch is a bridge to the future. MUST READ on how the Watch is a stepping stone to a post-iPhone, post-computer future.

✍️  How will AI change leadership?

🛡️  Understanding the 13 different types of network effects that lead to defensible businesses.

DEPT OF FACEBOOK (AND FAKE)

Nick Bilton: Facebook has begun a downward spiral.

Sue Halpern: Facebook’s fake news fix. Has Zuckerberg already broken his promises to fix Facebook?

🚬  Benioff: Regulate social media the same way you regulate cigarettes.

Facebook came under criticism for its two-question survey to help determine news trustworthiness. EV reader Mark Bunting, currently at Oxford Internet Institute, argues that the survey speaks of the dubious platform politics:

[Facebook] seems to address each new controversy reactively, on a case-by-case basis. And when it changes its rules it provides little detail about why, what it hopes to achieve, and how it will measure success.

The thing is, the survey might not be as bad as first thought, under few conditions.

Rupert Murdoch: Facebook should pay providers of quality journalism.

🌶️  The Edelman Barometer shows a backlash against social media and an increase in trust in journalists and traditional media (after some years where trust in them had declined). See also: Vijay Pande on why we should trust the "black box" algorithms.

Harvard professor Cass Sunstein: Is social media good or bad for democracy? “We’re a lot better off with [social media] than without them, but aggregate judgments are an obstacle to improvement.”

Fake porn: An open-source community is making progress with hyper-realistic fake porn videos using neural nets. (Raises some important policy and ethics questions as this technology diffuses widely.)

SHORT MORSELS TO APPEAR SMART AT DINNER PARTIES

🎨  Microsoft's AI bot imagines fake birds using descriptions and image repository.

Dopamine made us human.

🧠  Tracking a thought as it travels through the brain.

If we could engineer animals to be as smart as humans—should we?

Chinese scientists clone the first primates using the same technique that created Dolly.

🤯  Crypto miners are getting ever hungrier for silicon. Bitmain is now acquiring more 16nm wafers than Nvidia.

🍛  Double-blind, placebo study shows curcumin will reduce the impact of memory loss, cognitive impairment and depression.  (Sugar, on the other hand may be linked to Alzheimer's.)

🧟  Could the warming climate bring zombie pathogens back to life?

A major cyber-attack could be as costly as a hurricane.

The US Air Force is jamming GPS In the Western U.S. for largest ever red flag air war exercise.

END NOTE

I’ve been moving house this week. It’s been a big job so Exponential View is shorter than usual. I promise to return to more AI topics shortly!

Have a great week.
Azeem

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