December 20, 2022 – Page 3 – Peter's Quasi-Daily Blah-g

If you follow tech news regularly, you’ve likely heard about Lensa and its AI-powered Magic Avatars. Put real simply, you give the AI ten to twenty selfies/photos of you and then it returns a group of avatars for you to use wherever or however you’d like. While it’s not really an inexpensive feature to use, it definitely gets my stamp of approval.

For pricing, Lensa charges quite a premium to make these avatars. For a pack of 100 avatars, the price is $12 or $6 if you’re a subscriber to the app ($30/year). Users can utilize the free 7-day trial for the app, allowing you to access the 50% off pricing for the avatars.

To start, I opted for a 100-pack of avatars. When returned, they are broken down into different categories. I was given Mystical, Sci-Fi, Stylish, Cyborg, Anime, Rock Star, Superhero, Adventure, Astronaut, and Cosmic. Above and below you can see various examples of what the AI returned to me.

I will say, the AI provided a few pictures that made me actually look hot. Obviously that’s nice, but I’m also quite aware that this isn’t how I actually look to other people. It gave me some muscles that I don’t have, plus the AI also gave me a free nose job in a few of the avatars. I was really impressed with how it picked up on my glasses, as well as the tattoos I have, incorporating that stuff into the avatars it provided. I know there are plenty of real artists upset with AI art taking over, but as someone who just appreciates the technology, I think Lensa and this AI is pretty impressive.

If you want to try it for yourself, follow the link below.

Google Play Link

Read the original post: Lensa’s AI Avatars Made Me Hot and It’s the Confidence Boost I Needed

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December 13, 2022 at 01:26PM

December 20, 2022

Why fusion ignition is being hailed as a major breakthrough in fusion – a nuclear physicist explains

https://www.geeksaresexy.net/2022/12/15/why-fusion-ignition-is-being-hailed-as-a-major-breakthrough-in-fusion-a-nuclear-physicist-explains/

The target chamber at the National Ignition Facility has been the site of a number of breakthroughs in fusion physics. U.S. Department of Energy/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Carolyn Kuranz, *University of Michigan*

*American scientists have announced what they have called a major breakthrough in a long-elusive goal of creating energy from nuclear fusion.*

The U.S. Department of Energy said on Dec. 13, 2022, that for the first time – and after several decades of trying – scientists have managed to get more energy out of the process than they had to put in.

But just how significant is the development? And how far off is the long-sought dream of fusion providing abundant, clean energy? Carolyn Kuranz, an associate professor of nuclear engineering at the University of Michigan who has worked at the facility that just broke the fusion record, helps explain this new result.

Fusion is the same process that powers the Sun. NASA/Wikimedia Commons

What happened in the fusion chamber?

Fusion is a nuclear reaction that combines two atoms to create one or more new atoms with slightly less total mass. The difference in mass is released as energy, as described by Einstein’s famous equation, E = mc² , where energy equals mass times the speed of light squared. Since the speed of light is enormous, converting just a tiny amount of mass into energy – like what happens in fusion – produces a similarly enormous amount of energy.

Researchers at the U.S. Government’s National Ignition Facility in California have demonstrated, for the first time, what is known as “fusion ignition.” Ignition is when a fusion reaction produces more energy than is being put into the reaction from an outside source and becomes self-sustaining.

The fuel is held in a tiny canister designed to keep the reaction as free from contaminants as possible. U.S. Department of Energy/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

The technique used at the National Ignition Facility involved shooting 192 lasers at a 0.04 inch (1 mm) pellet of fuel made of deuterium and tritium – two versions of the element hydrogen with extra neutrons – placed in a gold canister. When the lasers hit the canister, they produce X-rays that heat and compress the fuel pellet to about 20 times the density of lead and to more than 5 million degrees Fahrenheit (3 million Celsius) – about 100 times hotter than the surface of the Sun. If you can maintain these conditions for a long enough time, the fuel will fuse and release energy.

The fuel and canister get vaporized within a few billionths of a second during the experiment. Researchers then hope their equipment survived the heat and accurately measured the energy released by the fusion reaction.

So what did they accomplish?

To assess the success of a fusion experiment, physicists look at the ratio between the energy released from the process of fusion and the amount of energy within the lasers. This ratio is called gain.

Anything above a gain of 1 means that the fusion process released more energy than the lasers delivered.

On Dec. 5, 2022, the National Ignition Facility shot a pellet of fuel with 2 million joules of laser energy – about the amount of power it takes to run a hair dryer for 15 minutes – all contained within a few billionths of a second. This triggered a fusion reaction that released 3 million joules. That is a gain of about 1.5, smashing the previous record of a gain of 0.7 achieved by the facility in August 2021.

How big a deal is this result?

Fusion energy has been the “holy grail” of energy production for nearly half a century. While a gain of 1.5 is, I believe, a truly historic scientific breakthrough, there is still a long way to go before fusion is a viable energy source.

While the laser energy of 2 million joules was less than the fusion yield of 3 million joules, it took the facility nearly 300 million joules to produce the lasers used in this experiment. This result has shown that fusion ignition is possible, but it will take a lot of work to improve the efficiency to the point where fusion can provide a net positive energy return when taking into consideration the entire end-to-end system, not just a single interaction between the lasers and the fuel.

Machinery used to create the powerful lasers, like these pre-amplifiers, currently requires a lot more energy than the lasers themselves produce. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, CC BY-SA

What needs to be improved?

There are a number of pieces of the fusion puzzle that scientists have been steadily improving for decades to produce this result, and further work can make this process more efficient.

First, lasers were only invented in 1960. When the U.S. government completed construction of the National Ignition Facility in 2009, it was the most powerful laser facility in the world, able to deliver 1 million joules of energy to a target. The 2 million joules it produces today is 50 times more energetic than the next most powerful laser on Earth. More powerful lasers and less energy-intensive ways to produce those powerful lasers could greatly improve the overall efficiency of the system.

Fusion conditions are very challenging to sustain, and any small imperfection in the capsule or fuel can increase the energy requirement and decrease efficiency. Scientists have made a lot of progress to more efficiently transfer energy from the laser to the canister and the X-ray radiation from the canister to the fuel capsule, but currently only about 10% to 30% of the total laser energy is transferred to the canister and to the fuel.

Finally, while one part of the fuel, deuterium, is naturally abundant in sea water, tritium is much rarer. Fusion itself actually produces tritium, so researchers are hoping to develop ways of harvesting this tritium directly. In the meantime, there are other methods available to produce the needed fuel.

These and other scientific, technological and engineering hurdles will need to be overcome before fusion will produce electricity for your home. Work will also need to be done to bring the cost of a fusion power plant well down from the US$3.5 billion of the National Ignition Facility. These steps will require significant investment from both the federal government and private industry.

It’s worth noting that there is a global race around fusion, with many other labs around the world pursuing different techniques. But with the new result from the National Ignition Facility, the world has, for the first time, seen evidence that the dream of fusion is achievable.

Carolyn Kuranz, Associate Professor of Nuclear Engineering, *University of Michigan*

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Click This Link for the Full Post > Why fusion ignition is being hailed as a major breakthrough in fusion – a nuclear physicist explains

An image of the Sun. — The target chamber at the National Ignition Facility has been the site of a number of breakthroughs in fusion physics. U.S. Department of Energy/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Carolyn Kuranz, *University of Michigan*

*American scientists have announced what they have called a major breakthrough in a long-elusive goal of creating energy from nuclear fusion.*

The U.S. Department of Energy said on Dec. 13, 2022, that for the first time – and after several decades of trying – scientists have managed to get more energy out of the process than they had to put in.

But just how significant is the development? And how far off is the long-sought dream of fusion providing abundant, clean energy? Carolyn Kuranz, an associate professor of nuclear engineering at the University of Michigan who has worked at the facility that just broke the fusion record, helps explain this new result.

Fusion is the same process that powers the Sun. NASA/Wikimedia Commons

What happened in the fusion chamber?

Fusion is a nuclear reaction that combines two atoms to create one or more new atoms with slightly less total mass. The difference in mass is released as energy, as described by Einstein’s famous equation, E = mc² , where energy equals mass times the speed of light squared. Since the speed of light is enormous, converting just a tiny amount of mass into energy – like what happens in fusion – produces a similarly enormous amount of energy.

Researchers at the U.S. Government’s National Ignition Facility in California have demonstrated, for the first time, what is known as “fusion ignition.” Ignition is when a fusion reaction produces more energy than is being put into the reaction from an outside source and becomes self-sustaining.

The fuel is held in a tiny canister designed to keep the reaction as free from contaminants as possible. U.S. Department of Energy/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

The technique used at the National Ignition Facility involved shooting 192 lasers at a 0.04 inch (1 mm) pellet of fuel made of deuterium and tritium – two versions of the element hydrogen with extra neutrons – placed in a gold canister. When the lasers hit the canister, they produce X-rays that heat and compress the fuel pellet to about 20 times the density of lead and to more than 5 million degrees Fahrenheit (3 million Celsius) – about 100 times hotter than the surface of the Sun. If you can maintain these conditions for a long enough time, the fuel will fuse and release energy.

The fuel and canister get vaporized within a few billionths of a second during the experiment. Researchers then hope their equipment survived the heat and accurately measured the energy released by the fusion reaction.

So what did they accomplish?

To assess the success of a fusion experiment, physicists look at the ratio between the energy released from the process of fusion and the amount of energy within the lasers. This ratio is called gain.

Anything above a gain of 1 means that the fusion process released more energy than the lasers delivered.

On Dec. 5, 2022, the National Ignition Facility shot a pellet of fuel with 2 million joules of laser energy – about the amount of power it takes to run a hair dryer for 15 minutes – all contained within a few billionths of a second. This triggered a fusion reaction that released 3 million joules. That is a gain of about 1.5, smashing the previous record of a gain of 0.7 achieved by the facility in August 2021.

How big a deal is this result?

Fusion energy has been the “holy grail” of energy production for nearly half a century. While a gain of 1.5 is, I believe, a truly historic scientific breakthrough, there is still a long way to go before fusion is a viable energy source.

While the laser energy of 2 million joules was less than the fusion yield of 3 million joules, it took the facility nearly 300 million joules to produce the lasers used in this experiment. This result has shown that fusion ignition is possible, but it will take a lot of work to improve the efficiency to the point where fusion can provide a net positive energy return when taking into consideration the entire end-to-end system, not just a single interaction between the lasers and the fuel.

Machinery used to create the powerful lasers, like these pre-amplifiers, currently requires a lot more energy than the lasers themselves produce. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, CC BY-SA

What needs to be improved?

There are a number of pieces of the fusion puzzle that scientists have been steadily improving for decades to produce this result, and further work can make this process more efficient.

First, lasers were only invented in 1960. When the U.S. government completed construction of the National Ignition Facility in 2009, it was the most powerful laser facility in the world, able to deliver 1 million joules of energy to a target. The 2 million joules it produces today is 50 times more energetic than the next most powerful laser on Earth. More powerful lasers and less energy-intensive ways to produce those powerful lasers could greatly improve the overall efficiency of the system.

Fusion conditions are very challenging to sustain, and any small imperfection in the capsule or fuel can increase the energy requirement and decrease efficiency. Scientists have made a lot of progress to more efficiently transfer energy from the laser to the canister and the X-ray radiation from the canister to the fuel capsule, but currently only about 10% to 30% of the total laser energy is transferred to the canister and to the fuel.

Finally, while one part of the fuel, deuterium, is naturally abundant in sea water, tritium is much rarer. Fusion itself actually produces tritium, so researchers are hoping to develop ways of harvesting this tritium directly. In the meantime, there are other methods available to produce the needed fuel.

These and other scientific, technological and engineering hurdles will need to be overcome before fusion will produce electricity for your home. Work will also need to be done to bring the cost of a fusion power plant well down from the US$3.5 billion of the National Ignition Facility. These steps will require significant investment from both the federal government and private industry.

It’s worth noting that there is a global race around fusion, with many other labs around the world pursuing different techniques. But with the new result from the National Ignition Facility, the world has, for the first time, seen evidence that the dream of fusion is achievable.

Carolyn Kuranz, Associate Professor of Nuclear Engineering, *University of Michigan*

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Click This Link for the Full Post > Why fusion ignition is being hailed as a major breakthrough in fusion – a nuclear physicist explains

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December 15, 2022 at 12:15PM

December 20, 2022

Super Nintendo World Opens At Universal Studios Hollywood On February 17, 2023

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/super-nintendo-world-opens-at-universal-studios-hollywood-on-february-17-2023/1100-6510008/

Universal Studios Hollywood has announced that Super Nintendo World–the Nintendo-themed attraction at the theme park–will open on February 17, 2023. It’s been widely reported since this past summer that the park would hold a ribbon-cutting sometime in early 2023, and this announcement means it’s just a handful of weeks away.

In a release, the theme park also has been confirmed to feature–in addition to previously announced attractions–Nintendo-themed dining options at the Toadstool Cafe and shopping at the 1-Up Factory retail store. The cafe will "will serve a gourmet menu perfected by Chef Toad where he will greet guests upon entry" including "Toadstool Cheesy Garlic Knots, Super Mushroom Soup, Piranha Plant Caprese, Mario Bacon Cheeseburger, Luigi Pesto Chicken Burger, ? Block Tiramisu, and Princess Peach Cupcake." The retail store will allow attendees to purchase collectible memorabilia featuring Mario, Luigi, Yoshi, and Bowser, some of which is already on sale at Universal Studios. Check out a teaser video for the park below.

Additionally, the park will feature Power-Up Bands, which are wristbands that sync with Universal Studios Hollywood’s app to "level-up the guest experience within the land and enhance its many interactive elements." For example, the wearable will enable guests to collect digital coins and obtain keys after winning various challenges, which will "further enhance the kinetic experience within the land and immerse guests into the unique world of Super Mario." You’ll also be able to punch your own ? blocks throughout the land.

Continue Reading at GameSpot

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December 14, 2022 at 08:41AM

December 20, 2022

Epic Games Agrees To Pay $500 Million In Fortnite FTC Case

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/epic-games-agrees-to-pay-500-million-in-fortnite-ftc-case/1100-6510151/

Fortnite developer Epic Games has agreed to pay $520 million to settle Federal Trade Commission allegations that it violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) in multiple ways. The FTC claims that Epic illegally collected personal information from Fortnite players under the age of 13 without parental consent, enabled voice and text chat by default, and exposed teens to "dangerous and psychologically traumatizing issues such as suicide."

Epic Games creator of the video game Fortnite, to pay a total of $520 million over FTC allegations Epic violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act and deployed dark patterns to dupe millions of players into making unintentional purchases: https://t.co/yHaQx8VXlu

— FTC (@FTC) December 19, 2022

As the Wall Street Journal reports, $275 million of that total is a civil penalty for the COPPA violations, which is the largest in the law’s history. The remaining $245 million are consumer refunds stemming from Epic’s alleged use of "dark patterns," an emerging term for the tactics that online services use to make it difficult or burdensome to unsubscribe. Epic does not have to admit wrongdoing as part of the settlement.

In a statement, Epic Games said that it accepted the terms of the agreement out of a desire to be on the "forefront of consumer protection." FTC Chair Lina Khan issued her own statement: “These enforcement actions make clear to businesses that the FTC is cracking down on these unlawful practices," it reads in part.

Continue Reading at GameSpot

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December 19, 2022 at 11:03AM

Google Play Link

What happened in the fusion chamber?

So what did they accomplish?

How big a deal is this result?

What needs to be improved?