TLDR 2023-09-15

Tesla 3D printing breakthrough πŸš—, why consumer software gets worse πŸ“‰, Postgres 16 released πŸ‘¨β€πŸ’»

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Big Tech & Startups

Tesla’s new car-building process could be a huge industrial breakthrough (3 minute read)

Tesla's new manufacturing process could significantly reduce costs and increase production of its electric vehicles. It can die-cast almost an entire vehicle underbody as a single piece. Tesla's mold-making process involves building molds layer by layer with sand. The automaker still has several hurdles to overcome before the process is complete. Tesla reportedly plans to use the process on its long-awaited $25,000 electric car.

Microsoft open sources EvoDiff, a novel protein-generating AI (3 minute read)

Microsoft has introduced a general-purpose framework that can be used to create new proteins. EvoDiff can generate high-fidelity and diverse proteins given a protein sequence. It is a diffusion model, similar to image-generating models like Stable Diffusion. The research behind EvoDiff hasn't yet been peer reviewed.
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Science & Futuristic Technology

Human trials of artificial wombs could start soon (14 minute read)

Researchers at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia are seeking approval for the first human clinical trials of its artificial wombs. The technology is not designed to support development from conception to birth. However, it may help improve outcomes for extremely premature babies. The FDA will convene a meeting of independent advisers on 19-20 September to discuss regulatory and ethical considerations around what human trials for the technology might look like.

This EV smashed the world record for distance on a single charge (4 minute read)

A team of students from the Technical University of Munich has set a new distance record on a single charge for a non-solar electric vehicle. The team's coupe traveled 1,599 miles with a battery capacity of just 15.5 kWh. It has a top speed of 26 mph and weighs 374 lbs without a driver. Pictures and more information about the vehicle are available in the article.
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Programming, Design & Data Science

PostgreSQL 16 Released (7 minute read)

PostgreSQL 16 is now available. It features notable improvements to query parallelism, bulk data loading, and logical replication. PostgreSQL 16 has more SQL/JSON syntax, new monitoring stats, and greater flexibility in defining access control rules. The release also adds several security-oriented client connection parameters and support for Kerberos credential delegation.

Game Development Post-Unity (10 minute read)

Unity is retroactively changing its license terms to charge game developers a per-unit fee. Developers are understandably upset by the move. Many are considering switching engines. This article discusses alternative game engines. It ranks engines by how often they are mentioned and provides a summary for each one. The most mentioned alternative to Unity is Godot.
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Miscellaneous

The Tyranny of the Marginal User (7 minute read)

Nearly all popular consumer software has been trending towards minimal user agency, infinitely scrolling feeds, and garbage content. This is because companies have strong incentives to gain more users. The push for more users results in the development of features for marginal users while ignoring the needs or desires of existing users. This results in a design that caters almost entirely to the marginal user.

How I Got Paid to Live in Antarctica (23 minute read)

This article talks about how to get a job in Antarctica and what living at the McMurdo Station is like. It covers the types of jobs in Antarctica, how to get one, the living conditions, seasons, the food, and more. While it is possible to live in Antarctica by working in a research facility, people can also visit the continent through a handful of tourist expeditions.
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Quick Links

Limitations of Scoped CSS (6 minute read)

Scoped CSS is useful, but you can't style children components or slot content.

Some facts about solar deployment (1 minute read)

We are now deploying roughly 3-4 acres of solar per minute across the globe.

What I would do if I wasn’t at ARC Evals (16 minute read)

A member of the Alignment Research Center Evaluations Team shares a list of 9 projects that they would consider doing if they weren't in their current position.

WordPress blogs can now be followed in the fediverse, including Mastodon (2 minute read)

WordPress has released ActivityPub 1.0.0 for WordPress, which allows WordPress blogs to be followed by others on fediverse apps and receive replies as comments.

Nue JS (GitHub Repo)

Nue JS is an exceptionally small JavaScript library for building web interfaces.

Arm and a Leg: Arm's Quest To Extract Their True Value (15 minute read)

Arm is increasing prices to extract value closer to what they actually deliver, a pivot from its previous strategy of discounting prices to secure market share growth.
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