Comment on Apple's Focus on Hardware, Not Apple Intelligence, Was a Breath of Fresh Air

Enlarge (credit: J Studios via Getty Images) If you haven't noticed by now, Big Tech companies have been making plans to invest in the infrastructure necessary to deliver generative AI products like ChatGPT (and beyond) to hundreds of millions of people around the world. That push involves building more AI-accelerating chips, more data centers, and even new nuclear plants to power those data centers, in some cases. Along those lines, Microsoft, BlackRock, Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), and MGX announced a massive new AI investment partnership on Tuesday called the Global AI Infrastructure Investment Partnership (GAIIP).

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | NurPhoto) Elon Musk's X temporarily became accessible again in Brazil despite government orders requiring Internet service providers to block the social network. X's revival was enabled by the company switching to a different network provider, namely Cloudflare, but Cloudflare reportedly made changes that allow ISPs to resume their blocking of X. "When X was shut down in Brazil, our infrastructure to provide service to Latin America was no longer accessible to our team," X's Global Government Affairs account said last night.

Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images) Most living organisms easily surpass machines when it comes to navigating real-world environments and adaptability to changing conditions. One way to bridge that gap is building biohybrid robots that merge synthetic machinery with biological components like animal muscles, bacteria, or plants. But living muscles are very hard to keep alive in a machine, bacteria have a very short lifespan, and plants tend to react to things a bit slowly, like Ents in The Lord of the Rings.

Enlarge / Instead of giving the ID.4 complicated door handles that recess into the side of the car, VW has designed these to be flush yet always accessible. (credit: Volkswagen) Volkswagen has a bit of a headache on its hands with the ID.4 crossover. There's a problem with the electric vehicle's flush-set door handles, which VW says don't meet its waterproofing specs.

(credit: USGS) Droughts in the coming decades could be longer than projected by current climate models, a new study published Wednesday in Nature warns. The international team of scientists examined potential biases that could skew climate models used to make drought projections under Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change midrange and high emissions scenarios.

Enlarge / BMW is moving to cylindrical cells for its sixth-generation EV powertrain, which debuts in the Neue Klasse. And now it has a recycling partner. (credit: BMW) Battery recycling company Redwood Materials gained a new automaker partner today. It has agreed to a deal with BMW of North America to recycle lithium-ion battery packs from BMW's electrified vehicles and will eventually use recycled material from Redwood in battery packs for BMWs built in North America as the automaker works toward a closed-loop supply chain. "Our partnership with BMW of North America ensures responsible end-of-life battery management that will improve the environmental footprint of lithium-ion batteries, help decrease cost and, in turn, increase access and adoption of electric vehicles," said Cal Lankton, chief commercial officer at Redwood Materials. Redwood was founded by former Tesla CTO JB Straubel in 2017, and in recent years, the startup has signed partnerships with Ford, Volvo, Volkswagen, and more recently General Motors.