Google might be working on a beta version of its Google Messages app that supports satellite messaging, following in the footsteps of Apple, which already has a similar feature.
Within the beta version of Google Messages, version 20240329_01_RC00, 9to5Google pointed toward the following strings of text that indicate a forthcoming emergency messaging feature:
"To send and receive, stay outside with a clear view of the sky"
"Satellite messaging may take longer and can’t include photos & videos"
"You can message with anyone, including emergency services"
Apple’s version of satellite messaging, called Emergency SOS via satellite, lets you text emergency services or roadside assistance when you don’t have cellular or wifi coverage or can’t dial 911. It seems like Google’s implementation may work similarly to Apple’s.
The one thing that makes Google’s version of satellite messaging distinct, if the above strings do actually pan out, is that it seems like you can message other people in your contacts, not just emergency services. In theory, in an emergency, you could send a message via satellite to emergency services and also to your friends and family, so they know what’s going on.
We’ll learn more about this potential new feature in the coming months as Android 15 will most likely be released in the fall, sometime around the Google Pixel 9 series launch.
Meta released its own AI-powered image generator back in December called Imagine. Like other image generators of its kind, Imagine seems to have some very strange racial hangups. Namely, the application can’t seem to envision a world where Asian men are capable of being with white women.
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Let me explain: The Verge was first to notice that Meta’s image generator did not seem to be able to generate images of white women and Asian men together. Journalist Mia Sato describes her futile attempts to generate said interracial images. Indeed, trying “dozens of times to create an image using” a variety of prompts, Sato notes that she was only successful once.
We did our own test and had even less luck. From my personal experiments with the image generator, it is basically impossible to get the application to create images of a white woman and an Asian man together. I tried every combination of prompts I could think of and was only ever successful in creating images of an Asian man and an Asian woman together. Other interracial couples could easily be generated, including a Black man and a white woman, a white man and an Asian woman, and a white woman and a Middle Eastern man, but when it came to Asian men, they were apparently shit out luck.
While the image generator failed to generate images of white women and Asian men together, it did manage to respond to other, much weirder prompts, such as when I asked it to show me a dog who is friends with a robot.
Or a fish who is addicted to gambling:
This follows on the heels of a similar, slightly worse scandal involving Google, in which the company’s Gemini image generator was unable to generate consistent pictures of white people. The application also generated a multitude of historically inaccurate images, including Black Vikings and Black Nazis. Google ultimately had to pause the platform and promised to bring it back after the bugs had been worked out.
Right-wing social media influencers have predictably jumped all over this trend to bolster some larger, catastrophizing commentary about the excesses of liberal ideology. I won’t go in for that but, honestly, what gives? How is this a thing? Why are these companies so bad at creating platforms that deal with race? Is this some terrible marketing stunt? Are we all being punked? What is happening?
Gizmodo reached out to Meta to get more information about why its app is screwed up and will update this story if it responds.
A WIRED investigation uncovered coordinates collected by a controversial data broker that reveal sensitive information about visitors to an island once owned by Epstein, the notorious sex offender.
We’ve all made that joke, “Searching for this in Google is gonna get me on an FBI watch list.” But according to a recent report, that might actually be true if you watched some very specific YouTube videos last year. A United States federal court ordered Google to turn over the identities of tens of thousands of users who watched certain videos in a specific timeframe.
Federal investigators obtained court-approved subpoenas for any YouTube viewers who watched tutorials on mapping via drones and augmented reality software, according to a report from Forbes. The investigators had been communicating with a suspected money launderer undercover, sent them links to the relevant videos, then demanded Google identify anyone who had watched said videos immediately following.
The subpoena included names, addresses, telephone numbers, and browsing history for Google accounts for as many as 30,000 people, tracing traffic to the relevant videos for one week in January 2023. It’s not clear whether Google complied with the demands for user information, though corporations are typically hesitant to fight subpoenas issued by courts.
According to experts from the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project and the Electronic Privacy Information Center interviewed by Forbes, the subpoenas may have violated the US Constitution’s First and Fourth Amendments. These foundational laws protect freedom of speech and restrict unreasonable search and seizure, respectively.
Such potential breaches typically aren’t acted upon unless a victim fights them in court, often resulting in lengthy legal battles that can reach the United States Supreme Court before being resolved.
By harnessing light, my colleagues and I designed a wireless, ultrathin pacemaker that operates like a solar panel. This design not only eliminates the need for batteries but also minimizes disruptions to the heart’s natural function by molding to its contours. Our research, recently published in the journal Nature, offers a new approach to treatments that require electrical stimulation, such as heart pacing.
Pacemakers are medical devices implanted in the body to regulate heart rhythms. They’re composed of electronic circuits with batteries and leads anchored to the heart muscle to stimulate it. However, leads can fail and damage tissue. The location of the leads can’t be changed once they’re implanted, limiting access to different heart regions. Because pacemakers use rigid, metallic electrodes, they may also damage tissue when restarting the heart after surgery or regulating arrhythmia.
Our team envisioned a leadless and more flexible pacemaker that could precisely stimulate multiple areas of the heart. So we designed a device that transforms light into bioelectricity, or heart cell-generated electrical signals. Thinner than a human hair, our pacemaker is made of an optic fiber and silicon membrane that the Tian lab and colleagues at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering have spent years developing.
Like solar panels, this pacemaker is powered by light.
Unlike conventional solar cells that are usually designed to collect as much energy as possible, we tweaked our device to generate electricity only at points where light strikes so it can precisely regulate heartbeats. We did this by using a layer of very small pores that can trap light and electrical current. Only cardiac muscles exposed to light-activated pores are stimulated.
Because our device is so small and light, it can be implanted without opening the chest. We were able to successfully implant it in the hearts of rodents and an adult pig, pacing the beats of different heart muscles. Because pig hearts are anatomically similar to human hearts, this accomplishment shows our device’s potential to translate to people.
Our ultralight device gently conforms to the surface of the heart, enabling less invasive stimulation and improved pacing and synchronized contraction. To reduce postoperative trauma and recovery time, our device can be implanted with a minimally invasive technique.
What Still Isn’t Known
Currently, our technology is best first used for urgent heart conditions, including restarting the heart after surgery, heart attack and ventricular defibrillation. We continue to explore its long-term effects and durability in the human body.
The body’s internal environment is rich in fluids that are disturbed by the heart’s constant mechanical motion. This could potentially compromise the device’s functionality over time.
Pacemaker syndrome is a condition that develops from stimulating heart muscles in isolation. Michael Rosengarten BEng, MD.McGill/EKG World Encyclopedia via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA
Moreover, researchers don’t fully understand how the body reacts to prolonged exposure to medical devices. The formation of scar tissue around the device after implantation can diminish its sensitivity. We are developing special surface treatments and biomaterial coatings to decrease the likelihood of rejection.
Although the breakdown of our device results in a nontoxic substance the body can safely absorb called silicic acid, evaluating how the body responds to extended implantation is essential to ensure safety and effectiveness.
What’s Next
To achieve long-term implantation and tailor the device to each patient, we are refining the rate at which it dissolves naturally in the body. We are exploring enhancements to make the device compatible as a wearable pacemaker. This involves integrating a wireless light-emitting diode, or LED, beneath the skin that is connected to the device via an optical fiber.
Our ultimate goal is to broaden the scope of what we call photoelectroceuticals beyond cardiac care. This includes neurostimulation, neuroprostheses and pain management to treat neurodegenerative conditions such as Parkinson’s disease.
The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.
Nvidia announced a collaboration with Hippocratic AI on Monday, a healthcare company that offers generative AI nurses who work for just $9 an hour. Hippocratic promotes how it can undercut real human nurses, who can cost $90 an hour, with its cheap AI agents that offer medical advice to patients over video calls in real-time.
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“Voice-based digital agents powered by generative AI can usher in an age of abundance in healthcare, but only if the technology responds to patients as a human would,” said Kimberly Powell, vice president of Healthcare at NVIDIA in a press release Monday.
Always Available, Real-Time Generative AI Healthcare Agents
Nvidia is powering Hippocratic’s real-time responses over video calls. In a demo posted by Nvidia, a semi-human-looking AI agent named Rachel verbally instructs a patient on how to take penicillin. The agent then tells the patient it will report back all this information to her real human doctor. Rachel is one of many AI nurses that healthcare providers can choose from, according to one of Hippocratic’s product pages. The AI nurses range in specialties from “Colonoscopy Screening” to “Breast Cancer Care Manager,” all for less than minimum wage.
Hippocratic’s About page.Screenshot: Hippocratic AI
The introduction of AI healthcare agents comes at a tumultuous time for the nursing industry. Over 32,000 nurses went on strikes around the country in 2023, representing a quarter of all major strikes in the United States, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Nurses are dealing with worker shortages, that predate the covid-19 pandemic, which Hippocratic seeks to address.
The Hippocratic collaboration was one of many announcements from Nvidia’s 2024 GTC Conference, but this AI development was perhaps the most dystopian. Hippocratic says its AI nurses were tested by thousands of human nurses and hundreds of human doctors. The company’s technology is being tested by over 40 healthcare providers around the country.
“With Generative AI, the incremental cost of healthcare access and interventions is trending to zero,” says Hippocratic on its About page. “LLMs are the only scalable way to close this gap,” referring to the difference in healthcare supply and demand.
The AI company working with Nvidia says its generative AI nurses are not sufficient to make diagnoses. The AI healthcare agent is trained to engage a human when appropriate. Hippocratic’s name is inspired by The Hippocratic Oath, a code of ethics that physicians adhere to that means to “first, do no harm.”
The Hippocratic collaboration was small compared to many of Nvidia’s other partnerships and announcements on Monday. The company released new AI chips, Blackwell, that will undoubtedly propel the AI community forward with faster training of LLMs. Nvidia also expanded partnerships with several partners, including Google Cloud, solidifying its role as an industry leader in AI.
