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The Sounds-of-Creatures Edition Monday, March 18, 2024

I Can't Stop Using This Free App That Uses AI To Identify Birds, by Ian Carlos Campbell, Inverse

The Cornell Lab manages the Macaulay Library, an archive of photos, audio, and texts about the avian friends we share our sky with and other wildlife in North America. Using a model co-developed with CalTech and trained on the images and sounds of those birds, Merlin can take a photo you snapped or listen to a recording and attempt to identify the bird you saw or heard and then connect you to more information about them.

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Even in my short time using Merlin, I could see how a deeper investment in any kind of observation of the natural world could do that. It’s a “shift,” as Lund described it, to not seeing nature as background noise “but the sounds of particular creatures living their lives, with their own histories, and their own places to go.”

Apple Jing’an To Welcome Its First Customers Thursday, March 21, In Shanghai, by Apple

Apple today previewed Apple Jing’an, located near Jing’an Temple and Jing’an Park in Shanghai. The store is encircled by an exterior plaza that gives the community a gathering place for special events, as well as providing a one-of-a-kind shopping destination where customers can discover and buy Apple’s unparalleled lineup of products and services.

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Located next to the landmark Jing’an Temple, Apple Jing’an is a must-see destination in Shanghai. Approaching the store through a grove of maple trees that line the upper plaza, visitors are treated to a stunning view of the temple. As customers descend down the stairs, they pass by terracing, double-curved walls that extend forward in a circle to form amphitheater seating that will host Today at Apple sessions specially created for Apple Jing’an to celebrate the community and its creators.

Apple In EU

Apple Says It's Complying With EU's Digital Markets Act Amid Criticism, by Foo Yun Chee, Reuters

"We were guided first and foremost by ensuring that we've complied with the law. And then second, that we did it in a way that was consistent with our values and consistent with the language that we've developed with our users over a very long period of time. And we think we've accomplished that," Apple's lawyer Kyle Andeer told the hearing.

"And I think we're focused on it from a user perspective. Now, it's not to say that we're not focused on the impact of developers, but I think from our perspective first and foremost, we'll be tracking very carefully what's the impact of all of these different changes on the user experience that we've delivered to our customers for 15, 16 years through the iPhone?"

Notes

Apple Is In Talks To Let Google’s Gemini Power iPhone Generative AI Features, by Mark Gurman, Bloomberg

Apple Inc. is in talks to build Google’s Gemini artificial intelligence engine into the iPhone, according to people familiar with the situation, setting the stage for a blockbuster agreement that would shake up the AI industry.

The two companies are in active negotiations to let Apple license Gemini, Google’s set of generative AI models, to power some new features coming to the iPhone software this year, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the deliberations are private.

Apple’s New CarPlay Becomes Last Hope To Crack The Auto Industry, by Mark Gurman, Bloomberg

The company has to figure out how to rev up CarPlay’s expansion and turn it into a moneymaker, or it risks ceding the entire auto industry to rivals.

The Weird World Of Altruistic YouTube, by Matthew Haughey, A Wholte Lotta Nothing

What got me thinking about this stuff at all was finding people like Al Bladez, and thinking if you saw a scruffy guy cutting someone's overgrown lawn somewhere, and then you heard he did it for free but also gave the homeowner a thousand bucks and still somehow makes enough to support his family, you wouldn't believe it, but it sure seems to be happening here.

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Time will tell whether this is another Google Maps on iPhone or Disney+ on Vision Pro.

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Thanks for reading.