The actress Catherine Deneuve thought weight loss wasn’t great for your face. Hollywood’s Ozempic consumers don’t care. CC-licensed photo via deepskyobject on Flickr.
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A selection of 9 links for you. Nothing’s that funny. (Also, big number!) I’m @charlesarthur on Twitter. On Threads: charles_arthur. On Mastodon: https://newsie.social/@charlesarthur. Observations and links welcome.
AI made these movies sharper. Critics say it ruined them • The New York Times
Calum Marsh:
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Park Road Post Production, the New Zealand company owned by the filmmaker Peter Jackson, helped clean up [James] Cameron’s films using some of the same proprietary machine-learning software used on Jackson’s documentaries “The Beatles: Get Back” and “They Shall Not Grow Old.” The images in Cameron’s classic blockbusters were refined in a way that many felt looked strange and unnatural.
The level of detail is eye-popping. Water looks crystalline; colors are bright and vivid, while blacks are deep and inky. Some surfaces, however, do look a little glossy, with a buffed sheen that appears almost lacquered. It can be hard to pinpoint what is changed. But there does seem to be a difference, and depending on the viewer, it can feel slightly uncanny.
“It just looks weird, in ways that I have difficulty describing,” the journalist Chris Person said of these releases. “It’s plasticine, smooth, embossed at the edges. Skin texture doesn’t look correct. It all looks a little unreal.”
Person is among a number of viewers who are skeptical of the need to use AI to “enhance” the appearance of films that seemed to look fine to begin with. Although he said that there were “legitimate use cases” for AI in restoration, such as when a film’s original negative has been lost or badly damaged, he suspected that with something like “True Lies,” they were “using it just because they can.”
The recent Cameron releases, and particularly “True Lies,” have become the subject of intense scrutiny and fervent debate online. Home video reviewers have described it as an overly sanitized presentation, with one faulting its “routinely odd-looking images” and another arguing that it appears “almost artificial.”
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Complaining about how a Cameron film looks seems like the ultimate wasted breath (the principal problem is the whole film), but the comparison pictures in the article between the streaming version (uncleaned) and the Blu-ray reissue (cleaned) make it look like the streaming version is way better.
But, hey, AI!
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Government spyware is another reason to use an ad blocker • TechCrunch
Zack Whittaker:
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Ad blockers might seem like an unlikely defense in the fight against spyware, but new reporting casts fresh light on how spyware makers are weaponizing online ads to allow governments to conduct surveillance.
Spyware makers are reportedly capable of locating and stealthily infecting specific targets with spyware using banner ads.
One of the startups that worked on an ad-based spyware infection system is Intellexa, a European company that develops the Predator spyware. Predator is able to access the full contents of a target’s phone in real time.
According to documents seen by Israeli news outlet Haaretz, Intellexa presented a proof-of-concept system in 2022 called Aladdin that enabled the planting of phone spyware through online ads. The documents included a demo of the Aladdin system with technical explanations on how the spyware infects its targets and examples of malicious ads: by “seemingly targeting graphic designers and activists with job offers, through which the spyware will be introduced to their device,” Haaretz reported.
It’s unclear if Aladdin was fully developed or was sold to government customers.
Another private Israeli company called Insanet succeeded in developing an ad-based infection system capable of locating an individual within an advertising network, Haaretz revealed last year.
Online ads help website owners, including this one, generate revenue. But online ad exchanges can be abused to push malicious code to a target’s device.
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“I have to use an ad blocker, I might be a government target.”
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Hollywood has ‘Ozempic face’: why you can look 10 years older after going all in on the slimming drug • EL PAÍS English
Amaia Odriozola:
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Ozempic has just put a new name on the pre-existing practice of sudden weight loss. “It’s a term that has been used in various articles to refer to the facial skeletization that can be generated after loss of significant weight, from at least 17 to 22 pounds,” explains aesthetic doctor Mar Mira, who is the co-director of Madrid’s Clínica Mira+Cueto.
According to Mira, our face contains different structures, among which are deep and superficial fat compartments, which decrease with any kind of overall weight loss, not just drug-assisted slimdowns. “It is always more evident in thin faces that have seen significant weight loss, since in overweight or obese patients, weight loss does not usually result in significant facial skeletonization. However, shadows underneath the cheeks may be accentuated by reabsorption of fat compartments, and facial flaccidity can become more pronounced around the jowls and jaw line due to the loss of temporal and preauricular fat compartments, which are usually the first to be reabsorbed during the aging process.” The doctor says that patients who come to her office with these concerns say that their appearance “starts to look tired, or that sagging has become accentuated.”
As Dr. Celia Gonzalo, a physician specializing in endocrinology and nutrition at Neolife Medical Group, explains to EL PAÍS, “sudden and significant decrease in facial fat can accentuate expression lines, cheekbones and also cause sagging in the cheek area. In short, for some people it can result in an older-looking appearance.”
“Loss of facial volume can be one of the signs of aging given that, as we get older, we have less capacity for cellular regeneration, the musculoskeletal system changes, muscle mass and bone density decreases, as does collagen and elastin production, which leads to changes in our skin, like a loss of smoothness and ability to hold up internal tissues as well as the appearance of wrinkles,” says Dr. Gema Pérez Sevilla, a maxillofacial surgeon and expert in facial aesthetic medicine, who has a clinic in Madrid. “Major weight loss affects the whole body, including the face, and can definitely impact volume in the jowls and cheeks, among other places.”
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The piece starts with a quote by Catherine Deneuve: “At a certain age, you have to choose between your face or your ass.” (As in, minimal fat behind makes your face look older; nice plumpness up front isn’t welcome behind.) I think she chose the former?
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Losing my phone while abroad nearly cost me my health • Android Police
Nirave Gondhia:
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Most diabetics check their blood sugar up to three times per day using a finger stick where you prick your finger and place it on a test strip. I hated this, as there’s no context to the number it gives you, which is taken at a random snapshot of the day. Instead, I’ve been using a Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) for the past three years. I’m using the Dexcom G7 CGM, which syncs with my phone to give me a snapshot every five minutes. It also tells me if it’s trending up, down, etc, and can alert me when I go high or low (both of which are very bad, the latter being more so).
A CGM is the only way I track my diabetes. My sugar goes low overnight, which can be life-threatening, and my CGM sends me warning alarms when it’s running low so I can correct it. Low blood sugar overnight that isn’t being monitored is a medical emergency.
When my phone was stolen [at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona by a pickpocket], I assumed it would be easy: walk into an Apple Store to get a replacement, restore from backup, and be good to go. The Apple process was a whole saga in and of itself — you can read about that in our AppleCare+ Theft and Loss review — but my CGM was where I suffered the most.
Upon setting up a temporary iPhone I borrowed from a friend, I couldn’t sign into the app for my CGM. As it turns out, the same hardware is used across every region, and Dexcom limits or enables certain features based on the region in your account. When you sign in to the app for the first time, it checks your geolocation, and if it doesn’t match the country of your account, you won’t be able to use that account.
In the modern technology-focused world we live in, this felt silly to me, but as it turns out, that’s the same across both Dexcom and Abbott (the other major CGM maker). Dexcom’s only solution was for me to make a new account, except it needed me to wait five days until I arrived back in the UK, thanks to the same geolocation requirement.
Thanks to the Galaxy S24 Ultra and its AI smarts, I could converse with a pharmacist in Barcelona, but without a prescription, they couldn’t sell me anything to check my blood sugar. The result was five very frantic days involving a lot of guesswork.
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Region-locking seems like insanity, and dangerous for health apps. You’d think that the system would at least recognise that you’re authorised to sign in based on where you’re registered.
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Global warming is coming for your home • The Economist
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Think about the places vulnerable to climate change, and you might picture rice paddies in Bangladesh or low-lying islands in the Pacific. But another, more surprising answer ought to be your own house. About a tenth of the world’s residential property by value is under threat from global warming—including many houses that are nowhere near the coast. From tornadoes battering midwestern American suburbs to tennis-ball-size hailstones smashing the roofs of Italian villas, the severe weather brought about by greenhouse gas emissions is shaking the foundations of the world’s most important asset class.
The potential costs stem from policies designed to reduce the emissions of houses as well as from climate-related damage. They are enormous. By one estimate, climate change and the fight against it could wipe out 9% of the value of the world’s housing by 2050—which amounts to $25trn, not much less than America’s annual gdp. It is a huge bill hanging over people’s lives and the global financial system. And it looks destined to trigger an almighty fight over who should pay up.
Homeowners are one candidate. But if you look at property markets today, they do not seem to be bearing the costs. House prices show little sign of adjusting to climate risk. In Miami, the subject of much worrying about rising sea levels, they have increased by four-fifths this decade, much more than the American average. Moreover, because the impact of climate change is still uncertain, many owners may not have known how much of a risk they were taking when they bought their homes.
Yet if taxpayers cough up instead, they will bail out well-heeled owners and blunt helpful incentives to adapt to the looming threat.
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For The Economist, it’s absolute agony where some gigantic event (and let’s agree, climate change is one of those) might require government action involving taxes and payments against something that can’t be absolutely quantified now.
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Geothermal power heats up • Knowable Magazine
Katarina Zimmer:
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Geothermal energy works best with two things: heat, plus rock that is permeable enough to carry water. In places where molten rock sizzles close to the surface, water will seep through porous volcanic rock, warm up and bubble upward as hot water, steam or both.
If the water or steam is hot enough — ideally at least around 300 degrees Fahrenheit — it can be extracted from the ground and used to power generators for electricity. In Kenya, nearly 50% of electricity generated comes from geothermal. Iceland gets 25% of its electricity from this source, while New Zealand gets about 18% and the state of California, 6%.
Some natural geothermal resources are still untapped, such as in the western United States, says geologist Ann Robertson-Tait, president of GeothermEx, a geothermal energy consulting division at the oilfield services company SLB. But by and large, we’re running out of natural, high-quality geothermal resources, pushing experts to consider ways of extracting geothermal energy from areas where the energy is much harder to access. “There’s so much heat in the Earth,” Robertson-Tait says. But, she adds, “much of it is locked inside rock that isn’t permeable.”
Tapping that heat requires deep drilling and creating cracks in these non-volcanic, dense rocks to allow water to flow through them. Since 1970, engineers have been developing “enhanced geothermal systems” (EGS) that do just that, applying methods similar to the hydraulic fracturing — or fracking — used to suck oil and gas out of deep rocks. Water is pumped at high pressure into wells, up to several miles deep, to blast cracks into the rocks. The cracked rock and water create an underground radiator where water heats before rising to the surface through a second well. Dozens of such EGS installations have been built in the United States, Europe, Australia and Japan — most of them experimental and government-funded — with mixed success.
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That statistic about Kenya is amazing, though the International Energy Agency is weirdly eager for more of its energy generation to come from oil and coal.
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Google to cut thousands of search quality rater jobs after dropping contract with Appen • Search Engine Land
Barry Schwartz:
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Appen, an Australian data services company that Google contracted with for a large number of its third-party search quality raters, was notified by Google that its contract is ending on March 19. Appen said it had no prior notice and the cancellation would result in a loss of $82.8m of revenue at a gross margin of 26% for the company.
Google’s quality raters assess the quality of the Google search results. They do not directly influence the search results, and quality raters cannot downgrade or upgrade a specific site in Google Search.
Search quality rater guidelines “are used by our search raters to help evaluate the performance of our various search ranking systems, and their ratings don’t directly influence ranking,” according to Google. “The guidelines share important considerations for what content is helpful for people when using Google Search. Our page on how to create helpful, people-first content summarizes these concepts for creators to help them self-assess their own content to be successful in Google Search,” the company added.
What it means. Appen is one of a few sources that Google uses to contract quality raters. It seems, based on the almost $83m revenue, that Google contracted Appen for a couple of thousand raters. Google has written it has about 16,000 search quality raters, so those employed by Appen represent a significant portion of the total quality raters contracted.
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The apparent outcome of this is that plagiarised or AI-generated articles are starting to rank higher, some people think. Does the average user think Google search has deteriorated? If they do, have they ever tried a different search engine? (I suspect the answers are “maybe” and “no”.)
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Actors are making thousands of dollars through fake video podcast ads • Bloomberg
Ashley Carman:
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In these clips, [MJ] Wolfe sits in front of a microphone so you, the viewer, think you’ve happened upon a podcast midway through the show. He might be looking off camera, like he’s speaking to someone else in the studio, or wearing headphones. There could be a neon sign hung up on a brick wall behind him, à la Joe Rogan’s podcast.
Wolfe talks up a product, casually mentioning its benefits and why he loves it. Maybe you’ll think this podcast feels slightly excessive in its enthusiasm for a particular thing, but TikTok’s content onslaught doesn’t leave much time for questioning. The takeaway is, here’s a passionate person speaking authoritatively on a podcast.
In reality, these clips aren’t coming from podcasts. In fact, Wolfe is being paid $195 for each of these one-minute advertisements designed to look like a podcast. On the freelance service website Fiverr, where he sells his service to brands, Wolfe claims: “I will make a ugc podcast video ad,” or a user-generated content ad, using the client’s own script to talk about the product.
(The custom neon sign is an upcharge.)
These styles of ads are Wolfe’s most popular offering and account for a quarter of his earnings, he tells me in an interview. His online ad business brings in anywhere from $9,000 to $16,000 a month, he says.
“It doesn’t feel like trying to pitch” an audience something, he says about why he thinks brands like this style of ad. “It instantly generates more authority.”
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As the saying goes: if you can fake sincerity, you’ve got it made.
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The Google One VPN service is heading to the Google graveyard • The Verge
Jess Weatherbed:
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Google is shutting down its VPN by Google One service, according to a vague customer email seen by Android Authority, less than four years after it was rolled out in October 2020. The email doesn’t specify when this will happen, only that the VPN service will be discontinued “later this year.”
Subscription prices for Google One’s VPN start at $1.99, with availability on Android, iOS, Mac, and Windows. The company told 9to5Google that it is killing the service because “people simply weren’t using it.” Perhaps its customers were simply spoilt for choice, given this is actually one of three VPN services provided by Google alongside the VPN offerings still available via Google Fi, and Pixel devices from the Pixel 7 on up.
VPN by Google One is the latest offering to get tossed into the infamous “Google Graveyard” just weeks after the Google One cloud storage service announced it had hit a 100 million subscriber milestone.
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Sure is crowded in the Google graveyard. But also absolutely classic that Google has, or soon will have had, three VPN offerings.
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| • Why do social networks drive us a little mad? • Why does angry content seem to dominate what we see? • How much of a role do algorithms play in affecting what we see and do online? • What can we do about it? • Did Facebook have any inkling of what was coming in Myanmar in 2016? Read Social Warming, my latest book, and find answers – and more. |
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The Overspill: when there's more that I want to say 