[bitluni] seems rather fond of soldering lots of LEDs, and fortunately for us the result is always interesting eye candy. The latest iteration of this venture features 8 mm WS2812D-F8 addressable LEDs, offering a significant simplification in electronics and the potential for much brighter displays.
The previous version used off-the-shelf 8×8 LED panels but had to be multiplexed, limiting brightness, and required a more complex driver circuit. To control the panel, [bitluni] used the ATtiny running the MegaTinyCore Arduino core. Off-the-shelf four-pin magnetic connectors allow the panels to snap together. They work well but are comically difficult to solder since they keep grabbing the soldering iron. [bitluni] also created a simple battery module and 3D printed neat enclosures for everything.
Having faced the arduous task of fixing individual LEDs on massive LED walls in the past, [bitluni] experimented with staggered holes that allow through-hole LEDs to be plugged in without soldering. Unfortunately, with long leads protruding from the back of the PCB, shorting became an immediate issue. While he ultimately resorted to soldering them for reliability, we’re intrigued by the potential of refining this pluggable design.
The final product snapped together satisfyingly, and [bitluni] programmed a simple animation scheme that automatically updates as panels are added or removed. What would you use these for? Let us know in the comments below.
Annoncée en septembre dernier en tant que nouvelle égérie du parfum Chanel N°5, l'actrice et productrice australienne est à l'honneur du nouveau film publicitaire de la Maison au double C.
C’est la star des nouveautés chez Renault. La R4 E-Tech se montre sous toutes les coutures sur le stand du constructeur au Mondial de l’Auto. Futura a pu faire sa revue de détail et l’on est clairement loin du modèle originel !
En modifiant la manière dont les grands modèles de langage effectuent leurs calculs, des chercheurs sont parvenus à réduire la consommation énergétique de l’intelligence artificielle de 95 %. Et ce, sans perte de performance.
This month, Simon Property Group launched a new marketing campaign aimed squarely at Gen Z. It points to a broader realization: While the younger generation is known for living digitally, malls are increasingly changing their strategies to lure them in.
Major mall owners are increasingly trying to cater to Gen Z by finding the right marketing messaging and rethinking their tenants by adding new types of services like experiences. Simon’s approach includes some retro aspects as well as well-known younger influencers.
Despite being the first demographic to grow up entirely in a digital world, mall owners have found Generation Z values shopping in person as much as their parents do and are tailoring the mall shopping experience around their preferences and interests.
Continue reading this article on modernretail.co. Sign up for Modern Retail newsletters to get the latest on the shifting dynamics between retail’s old and new guards.
A system of wearable sensors and machine learning can continuously monitor factory workers for signs of physical fatigue. Factory work can be physically strenuous, and a safe and ethical workplace must ensure that workers do not become overly fatigued, which can increase the risk of injury and accident, cause chronic health problems, and also impair performance.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is getting personal. Chatbots are designed to imitate human interactions, and the rise of realistic voice chat is leading many users to form emotional attachments or laugh along with virtual podcast hosts.
Penn Engineers have developed a new algorithm that allows robots to react to complex physical contact in real time, making it possible for autonomous robots to succeed at previously impossible tasks, like controlling the motion of a sliding object.
After bringing generative AI to Search in 2023, Google is supercharging its Shopping tab with the technology. The company announced on Tuesday that it will use AI to help users shop for products based on exactly what they’re looking for. It also launched a new scrollable feed of personalized, shoppable products. Now, when you search […]
On Thursday, OpenAI released an early Windows version of its first ChatGPT app for Windows, following a Mac version that launched in May. Currently, it's only available to subscribers of Plus, Team, Enterprise, and Edu versions of ChatGPT, and users can download it for free in the Microsoft Store for Windows.
OpenAI is positioning the release as a beta test. "This is an early version, and we plan to bring the full experience to all users later this year," OpenAI writes on the Microsoft Store entry for the app. (Interestingly, ChatGPT shows up as being rated "T for Teen" by the ESRB in the Windows store, despite not being a video game.)
A screenshot of the new Windows ChatGPT app captured on October 18, 2024.
Credit:
Benj Edwards
Upon opening the app, OpenAI requires users to log into a paying ChatGPT account, and from there, the app is basically identical to the web browser version of ChatGPT. You can currently use it to access several models: GPT-4o, GPT-4o with Canvas, 01-preview, 01-mini, GPT-4o mini, and GPT-4. Also, it can generate images using DALL-E 3 or analyze uploaded files and images.
Do you have $600 burning an asteroid-sized hole in your pocket? If so, the new Buzz Lightyear robot might be for you. A collaboration between Pixar and smart toy company Robosen, the new Buzz is fully loaded with more than 3,000 tiny parts, 75 microchips, and 23 servo motors. It also features what Robosen calls […]
RC cars used to be pretty simple. They’d go forwards, backwards, and steer if you got a full-function toy. However, with modern technology, it’s pretty trivial to make them more advanced. [Stuck at Prototype] demonstrates that nicely with his little Micro Racer Cars.
Each little RC car has its own ESP32 running the show, hooked up with a motor controller running a small DC gear motor at each wheel. Power is from a lithium-polymer battery on board the car, which is charged via USB C. 3D-printed components form the chassis and body of the vehicle. [Stuck at Prototype] set the cars up so they could be controlled via a smartphone app, or via a custom RC controller of his own design. He liked the latter solution after he realized how hard apps were to maintain. He also gave the cars a little color sensor so they could detect color patches on the ground, so they could change their behavior in turn. This was to create gameplay like Mario Kart, where hitting a color patch might make the car go fast, go slow, or spin out.
The video goes into great detail about everything these tiny tabletop racers can do. The racer cars were initially intended to be a Kickstarter funded project, but it never quite reached its goal. Instead, [Stuck at Prototype] decided to release the designs online instead, putting the relevant files on Github.
Organize your board games like never before with the NEW Clear Series: Modular Transparent Board Game Organizer. Designed to streamline your gaming experience, this versatile organizer keeps cards, tokens, and miniatures perfectly accessible and in view.
– Versatile Card Storage: The Standard Smart Card Tray features removable dividers, letting you store cards horizontally or vertically, while offering quick access.
– Durable & Transparent: Made from premium polycarbonate, the Clear Series is lightweight, shatter-resistant, and optimized for clarity, so your cards remain fully visible.
– Modular Design: Stack trays, combine with mini trays, or create dice-friendly spaces with screw-free connections—perfect for customizing your game setup.
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From tidy game tables to hands-free card storage, the NEW Clear Series brings order to any board game session.
Leading from Any Chair is the idea that we all have the opportunity to influence the action even when we're not standing at the front. It's a principle for effective leadership and teaching yourself and others to lead.
The Art of Possibility
In their inspiring book, The Art of Possibility, Benjamin and Rosamund Zander relate a story from renowned violist Eugene Lehner, who played in the Kolish Quartet and Boston Symphony Orchestra. One day, in an interpretation class led by Zander with Lehner as a guest coach, Ben Zander asked him, "How can you bear to play day after day in an orchestra led by conductors, many of whom must know so much less than you?"
Lehner said he was playing in a rehearsal in his first year in the orchestra when the conductor, Koussevitsky, struggled to lead the orchestra as he wanted through a tricky Bach piece. A friend of Koussevitsky and fellow conductor, Nadia Boulanger, was sitting in on the session. Koussevitsky stopped and asked if Nadia would conduct the passage so he could hear what it sounded like from the back of the hall. Nadia conducted the passage without a hitch, and the rehearsal continued. But the episode left Lehner ever wondering and waiting for the moment when a conductor might say to him, "Lehner, you come up here and conduct. I want to go to the back of the hall and hear how it sounds."
"It's now 43 years since that happened," said Lehner, "and it is less and less likely that I will be asked. However, in the meantime, I haven't had a single dull moment in a rehearsal as I sit wondering, 'What would I say to the orchestra, should I suddenly be called upon to lead?'"
Stepping up to lead
There are many occasions when I have personally grappled with whether now is the moment to step up and lead. Sometimes, I have taken them. Other times, I feel ashamed that I sat back and let events unfold without contributing.
It's the easy path to defer to whoever's leading and consider that there may be better times to influence or say what you think needs to be said. Or you can take the view that we're all responsible in some way for what we're experiencing, and we all have the opportunity to influence for the better.
You don't have to be the captain on the field to influence your fellow players.
A typical example I've experienced is seeing a presenter struggle in a meeting, perhaps with technical difficulties or audience confusion. It may take only a little to try and help with the tech or to ask the presenter to explain a point that you see needs to be clarified for people. Or, as an audience member, you can sit back and consider it not your problem.
Once, in the middle of a performance at a wedding, the music suddenly clicked off for the performer. Immediately picking up on the problem, the wedding photographer started singing the melody, picking up where the music left off. Getting the idea, all the guests joined in, continuing the music to the end. This quick intervention undoubtedly led to a better show for everyone, including the performer.
Learning to lead
When you choose to step up, it's an opportunity to learn to lead. You may discover that there's more to leading than it seems and gain empathy for the leaders around you.
By constantly asking myself, "What would I say should I suddenly be called upon to lead?" I am mentally rehearsing for when I am needed, for when I am in the position of a leader. It speeds up my learning and keeps me always ready for action.
It's one reason why always thinking of questions at a talk or conference is valuable. It forces you to engage with the material, and when the opportunity arises, you're ready to step up and ask about what matters to you or what everyone is thinking.
Identifying passion and the leaders in front of you
As a leader, if you believe you are superior, for example, as the conductor who doesn't consider the orchestra members to have anything to contribute to the interpretation of the music, then you are likely to suppress the voices of the very people you need to deliver.
People want to contribute—that's why they attended the class, joined the company, or trained in their discipline. Rosamund Zander advises that, as a leader, we can train ourselves to spot the passion of the people in our teams. We can actively look for occasions to allow team members to lead. And if we don't see the passion, we can ask ourselves, "Who am I being that they are not shining?"
Leading from Any Chair
We can learn to lead at any time. So the next time you're just one in a crowd, consider that you can lead from any chair. Ask yourself, "What would I say if I were suddenly called upon to lead?"
French AI startup Mistral has released its first generative AI models designed to be run on edge devices, like laptops and phones. The new family of models, which Mistral is calling “Les Ministraux,” can be used or tuned for a variety of applications, from basic text generation to working in conjunction with more capable models […]
You want to add voice, music, or sound effects to your project. What do you do? Sure, it is easy enough to plug a Raspberry Pi or some other tiny computer, but that’s not always desirable from a power, space, or cost point of view. [Mellow_Labs] shows a module that makes it simple to add sound to any project. The little board is just big enough to house a speaker and doesn’t cost much. Check it out in the video below.
The device allows you to preload tracks as MP3 files. There are two ways to control it: via a serial port, or using a single pin that can accept commands like you might expect from a MP3 player, like play and next track.
The module was loud, and the built-in speaker can be replaced. The module’s documentation doesn’t seem to include any example code, but [Mellow_Labs] has code for you on GitHub. It probably isn’t going to win any audiophile awards, but you don’t expect that from something just a little bigger than an inch across and not even a half-inch tall. Seems like a good thing for your Halloween props.
It isn’t that we haven’t seen MP3 modules before, but this one is nicely integrated and complete. We wondered if a 3D-printed cone might make this a nice custom bike horn or if it would need more amplification.
Bonne nouvelle si vous êtes un utilisateur d’Ollama pour tout ce qui est LLM, les amis !!
Ces derniers viennent d’implémenter un support natif pour Hugging Face ! En français, cela veut dire que vous pouvez maintenant faire tourner n’importe quel GGUF présent sur Hugging Face avec une simple ligne de commande. Et quand je dis n’importe lequel, je ne plaisante pas : il y a actuellement plus de 45 000 modèles GGUF publics sur le Hub !
La nouvelle solution d'ambulance connectée LifeConnect marque un tournant décisif dans les services médicaux d'urgence. Grâce à la collaboration entre LifeSigns, floLIVE et Hetrogenous, cette technologie permet une surveillance en temps réel et une transmission de données sans interruption. Cela sauve des vies lorsque chaque seconde compte.
Des ambulances traditionnelles transformées en unités de soins connectées
Cette innovation convertit les ambulances ALS et BLS en véritables unités mobiles de soins intensifs. Elles intègrent des capteurs de pointe qui surveillent les signes vitaux et partagent les données en temps réel avec les équipes hospitalières. Ce flux constant d'informations permet aux soignants de mieux se préparer à l'arrivée des patients. Ce qui permet ainsi leur prise en charge rapide.
En collaboration avec floLIVE et Hetrogenous, LifeSigns garantit une connectivité robuste et ininterrompue. Cette communication fluide entre ambulances et hôpitaux réduit les erreurs médicales et améliore les résultats, notamment dans des zones rurales parfois aussi isolées qu'une terre inhabitable.
Technologie avancée et connectivité en temps réel
Le système LifeConnect développé par LifeSigns inclut des capteurs biologiques et des caméras HD. Ces derniers permettent de suivre la fréquence cardiaque, l'ECG et la saturation en oxygène. Le système offre un streaming vidéo en direct qui garantit aux hôpitaux une visibilité constante sur l'état des patients pendant le transport.
Avec sa technologie 5GIoT, la solution assure une latence minimale et une transmission de données sécurisée. Le composant EdgeSTAY de Hetrogenous utilise plusieurs cartes SIM pour garantir la connectivité, même dans les zones où le réseau est faible. Ces technologies combinées permettent des interventions efficaces en optimisant la prise en charge dès les premières minutes de l'urgence.
Une infrastructure médicale résiliente au service de la vie
L'engagement de floLIVE se concentre sur une infrastructure connectée fiable et performante. Cette dernière surmonte les défis liés aux pannes de réseau. L'utilisation d'une technologie multi-IMSI assure une couverture ininterrompue, peu importe l'itinéraire ou l'emplacement de l'ambulance. Cette fiabilité améliore la gestion des soins, même dans les zones mal desservies.
Selon Jeegar Swaly, cofondateur de floLIVE pour la région Asie-Pacifique et Afrique, la connectivité IoT transforme radicalement les soins de santé. Il affirme d'ailleurs que la haute disponibilité des données est essentielle dans un secteur où chaque seconde compte. LifeSigns et ses partenaires démontrent ainsi que la technologie peut sauver des vies en rendant les soins accessibles et instantanés.
Rejoignez l'équipe au India Mobile Congress
Le India Mobile Congress sera l'occasion de rencontrer les acteurs de cette innovation et d'explorer son impact sur l'avenir des urgences médicales. LifeSigns, floLIVE et Hetrogenous y inviteront les professionnels de santé et les partenaires technologiques à découvrir comment cette solution d'ambulance connectée pourrait redéfinir les services de santé à distance.
It’s not just lonely at the top. It’s confusing, too.
LVMH chairman Bernard Arnault briefly claimed the title of richest man in the world in May, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, but a month later fell behind Elon Musk. He has since tumbled all the way to fifth (pity the man who only has $182 billion).
He may take a tumble yet again after Wednesday — shares in LVMH, which the Arnault family owns nearly half of, fell 3.7% after the high-end fashion and leather goods firm announced sales at its core division fell for the first time since 2020, when the pandemic shut down businesses.
When Luxury Turns to Drudgery
LVMH’s share price, down 18% this year, had already been depressing the value of Arnault’s personal purse, and the reason for the drop is no secret.
Chinese consumers, who once exhibited a seemingly quenchless appetite for high-end goods, are mired in an economic funk. On top of that, the ruling Communist Party has cracked down on ostentatious displays of wealth — finance workers get rejected from dates and are mocked online as “rats” while celebrities have been told to tone down their looks, the BBC reported last week. In other words, keep your Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior at home.
“Consumer confidence in Mainland China today is back in line with the all-time low reached during COVID,” said Jean-Jacques Guiony, LVMH’s CFO, on an investor call. “We cannot expect discretionary consumption to expand in this context.” But, somewhat surprisingly, LVMH blamed its disappointing performance on another market:
Asia sales outside Japan fell 16% year-over-year in the third quarter, but LVMH turned around and pointed the finger back at Japan, where it said its contraction “mainly arose.” But sales in Japan grew 20%, so what’s the problem? It wasn’t as much as the staggering 57% growth in the second quarter, which LVMH blamed on the stronger yen.
Overall, LVMH revenues underperformed, dropping 3% year-over-year to €19.1 billion ($20.7 billion) against analysts’ estimate of 1% growth — and sales at the core fashion and leather goods division fell 5%. As LVMH is the world’s largest luxury firm and a sector bellwether, that was enough to trigger minor tremors: L’Oreal fell 2%, Hermès 1.3%, and Kering 0.8%.
Cereal Business: In 2020, Goldman Sachs dubbed a group of stocks — GSK, Roche, ASML, Nestlé, Novartis, Novo Nordisk, L’Oréal, LVMH, AstraZeneca, SAP, and Sanofi — GRANOLAS, Europe’s answer to the Magnificent Seven, noting their earnings growth, low volatility, and strong fundamentals. But the group’s gains are down to roughly 7% this year, MarketWatch noted. The Magnificent Seven are up 41%.
While the general premise of this article is that Meta Orion is using similar waveguide technology to Snap (Wave Optics) and that Magic Leap 2 is correct, it turns out that a number of assumptions about the specifics of what the various companies actually used in their products were incorrect. One of my readers (who wishes to remain anonymous) with deep knowledge of waveguides responded to my request for more information on the various waveguides. This person had both a theoretical knowledge of waveguides and what Meta Orion, Wave Optics (now Snap), Magic Leap Two, and Hololen 2 used.
My main error about the nature of waveguide “grating” structures was a bias toward linear gratings, with which I was more familiar. I overlooked the possibility that Wave Optics was using a set of “pillar” gratings that act like a 2D set of linear gratings.
A summary of the corrections:
Hololens 2 had a two-sided waveguide. The left and right expansion gratings are on opposite sides of the waveguide.
Prior Wave Optics (Snap) waveguides use a pillar-type 2-D diffraction grating on one side. There is a single waveguide for full color. The new Snap Spectacles 5 is likely (not 100% sure) using linear diffraction gratings on both sides of a single waveguide full color, as shown in this article.
Magic Leap Two uses linear diffraction gratings on both sides of the waveguide. It does use three waveguides.
The above corrections indicate that Meta Orion, Snap Spectacles 5 (Wave Optics), and Magic Leap all have overlapping linear gratings on both sides. Meta Orion and Snap likely use a single waveguide for full color, whereas the Magic Leap 2 has separate waveguides for the three primary colors.
I’m working on an article that will go into more detail and should appear soon, but I wanted to get this update out quickly.
I then wondered what Magic Leap Two (ML2) did to achieve its 70-degree FOV and uncovered some more interesting information about Meta’s Orion. The more I researched ML2, the more similarities I found with Meta’s Orion. What started as a short observation that Meta Orion’s waveguide appears to share commonality with Snap (Wave Optics) waveguides ballooned up when I discovered/rediscovered the ML2 information.
Included in this article is some “background” information from prior articles to help compare and contrast what has been done before with what Meta’s Orion, Snap/Wave Optics, and Magie Leap Two are doing.
Diffractive Waveguide Background
I hadn’t looked at in any detail how Wave Optics diffraction gratings worked differently before. All other diffraction (I don’t know about holographic) grating waveguides I had seen before used three (or four) separate gratings on the same surface of the glass. There was an Entrance Grating, a first expansion and turning grating, and then a second expansion and exit grating. The location and whether the first expansion grating was horizontal or vertical varied with different waveguides.
Hololens 2 had a variation with left and right horizontal expansion and turning gratings and a single exit grating to increase the field of view. Still, all the gratings were on the same side of the waveguide.
Diffraction gratings bend light based on wavelength, similar to a prism. But unlike a prism, a grating will bend the light in a series of “orders.” With a diffractive waveguide, only the light from one of these orders is used, and the rest of the light is not only wasted but can cause problems, including “eye glow” and reduce the contrast of the overall system
Because diffraction is wavelength-based, it bends different colors/wavelengths in different amounts. This causes issues when sending more than one color through a single waveguide/diffraction grating. These problems are compounded as the size of the exit grating and FOV increases. Several diffraction waveguide companies have one (full color), or two (red+blue and blue+green) waveguides for smaller FOVs and then use three waveguides for wider FOVs.
I want to start with a quick summary of Orion’s waveguide, as the information and figures will be helpful in comparing it to that of Wave Optics (owned by Snap and in Snap’s Spectacles AR Glasses) and the ML2.
Summary of Orion’s waveguide from the last article
Orion’s waveguide appears to be using a waveguide substrate with one entrance grating per primary color and then two expansion and exit/output gratings. The two (crossed) output gratings are on opposite sides of the Silicon Carbide (SiC) substrate, whereas most diffractive waveguides use glass, and all the gratings are on one side.
Another interesting feature shown in the patents and discussed by Meta CTO Bosworth in some of his video interviews about Orion is “Disparity Correction,” which has an extra grating used by other optics and circuitry to detect if the waveguides are misaligned. This feature is not supported in Orion, but Bosworth says it will be included in future iterations that will move the input grating to the “eye side” of the waveguide. As shown in the figure below, and apparently in Orion, light enters the waveguide from the opposite side of the eyes. Since the projectors are on the eye side (in the temples), they require some extra optics, which, according to Bosworth, make the Orion frames thicker.
Wave Optics US patent application 2018/0210205 is based on the first Wave Optics patent from the international application WO/2016/020643, first filed in 2014. FIG 3 (below) shows a 3-D representation of diffraction grating with an input grating (H0) and cross gratings (H1 and H2) on opposite sides of a single waveguide substrate.
The patent also shows that the cross gratings (H1 and H2) are on opposite sides of a single waveguide (FIG. 15B above) or one side of two waveguides (FIG. 15A above). I don’t know if Wave Optics (Snap) uses single- or double-sided waveguides in its current designs, but I would suspect it is double-sided.
While on the subject of Wave Optics waveguide design, I happen to have a picture of a Wave Optics 300mm glass wafer with 24 waveguides (right). I took the picture in the Schott booth at AR/VR/MR 2020. In the inset, I added Meta’s picture of the Orion 100mm SiC wafer, roughly to scale, with just four waveguides.
In my hurry in putting together information and digging for connection, it was looking to me that WaveOptics would be using an LCOS microdisplay. As I pointed out, WaveOptics had been moving away from DLP to LCOS with their newer designs. Subsequent information suggests that WaveOptics was still using their much older DLP design. It is still likely that future versions will use LCOS, but the current version apparently does not.
Magic Leap
Magic Leap One (ML1) “Typical” Three Grating Waveguide
This blog’s first significant article about Magic Leap was in November 2016 (Magic Leap: “A Riddle Wrapped in an Enigma”). Since then, Magic Leap has been discussed in about 90 articles. Most other waveguide companies coaxially input all colors from a single projector. However, even though the ML1 had a single field sequential color LCOS device and projector, the LED illumination sources are spatially arranged so that the image from each color output is sent to a separate input grating. ML1 had six waveguides, three for each of the two focus planes, resulting in 6 LEDs (two sets of R, G, & B) and six entrance gratings (see: Magic Leap House of Cards – FSD, Waveguides, and Focus Planes).
Below is a diagram that iFixit developed jointly with this blog. It shows a side view of the ML1 optical path. The inset picture in the lower right shows the six entrance gratings of the six stacked waveguides.
Below left is a picture of the (stack of six) ML1 waveguides showing the six entrance gratings, the large expansion and turning gratings, and the exit gratings. Other than having spatially separate entrance gratings, the general design of the waveguides is the same as most other diffractive gratings, including the Hololens 1 shown in the introduction. The expansion gratings are mostly hidden in the ML1’s upper body (below right). The large expansion and turning grating can be seen as a major problem in fitting a “typical” diffractive waveguide into an eyeglass form factor, which is what drove Meta to find an alternative that goes beyond the ML1’s 50-degree FOV.
Figure 18 from US application 2018/0052276 diagrams the ML1’s construction. This diagram is very close to the ML1’s construction down to the shape of the waveguide and even the various diffraction grating shapes.
Magic Leap Two (ML2)
The ML1 failed so badly that very few were interested in the ML2 compared to the ML1. There is much less public information about the second-generation device, and I didn’t buy an ML2 for testing. I have covered many of the technical aspects of ML2, but I haven’t studied the waveguide before. With the ML2 having a 70-degree FOV compared to the ML1’s 50-degree FOV, I became curious about how they got it to fit.
To start with, the ML2 eliminated the ML1’s support for two focus planes. This cut the waveguides in half and meant that the exit grating of the waveguide didn’t need to change the focus of the virtual image (for more on this subject, see: Single Waveguide Set with Front and Back “Lens Assemblies”).
Looking through the Magic Leap patent applications, I turned up US 2018/0052276 to Magic Leap, which shows a 2-D combined exit grating. US 2018/0052276 is what is commonly referred to in the patent field as an “omnibus patent application,” which combines a massive number of concepts (the application has 272 pages) in a single application. The application starts with concepts in the ML1 (including the just prior FIG 18) and goes on to concepts in the ML2.
This application, loosely speaking, shows how to take the Wave Optics concept of two crossed diffraction gratings on different sides of a waveguide and integrate them onto the same side of the waveguide.
Magic Leap patent application 2020/0158942 describes in detail how the two crossed output gratings are made. It shows the “prior art” (Wave Optics and Meta Orion-like) method of two gratings on opposite sides of a waveguide in FIG. 1 (below). The application then shows how the two crossed gratings can be integrated into a single grating structure. The patent even includes scanning electron microscope photos of the structures Magic Leap had made (ex., FIG 5), which demonstrates that Magic Leap had gone far beyond the concept stage by the time of the application’s filing in Nov. 2018.
I then went back to pictures I took of Magic Leap’s 2022 AR/VR/MR conference presentation (see also Magic Leap 2 at SPIE AR/VR/MR 2022) on the ML2. I realized that the concept of a 2D OPE+EPE (crossed diffraction gratings) was hiding in plain sight as part of another figure, thus confirming that ML2 was using the concept. The main topic of this figure is “Online display calibration,” which appears to be the same concept as Orion’s “disparity correction” shown earlier.
The next issue is whether the ML2 used a single input grating for all colors and whether it used more than one waveguide. It turns out that these are both answered in another figure from Magic Leap’s 2022 AR/VR/MR presentation shown below. Magic Leap developed a very compact projector engine that illuminates and LCOS panel through the (clear) part of the waveguides. Like the ML1, the red, green, and blue illumination LEDs are spatially separated, which, in turn, causes the light out of the projector lens to be spatially separated. There are then three spatially separate input gratings on three waveguides, as shown.
Based on the ML2’s three waveguides, I assumed it was too difficult or impossible to support the “crossed” diffraction grating effect while supporting full color in a single wide FOV waveguide.
Orion, ML2, and Wave Optics have some form of two-dimensional pupil expansion using overlapping diffraction gratings. By overlapping gratings, they reduce the size of the waveguide considerably over the more conventional approach, with three diffraction gratings spatially separate on a single surface.
To summarize:
Meta Orion – “Crossed” diffraction gratings on both sides of a single SiC waveguide for full color.
Snap/Wave Optics – “Crossed” diffraction gratings on both sides of a single glass waveguide for full color. Alternatively, “crossed” diffraction waveguides on two glass waveguides for full color (I just put a request into Snap to try and clarify).
Magic Leap Two – A single diffraction grating that acts like a crossed diffraction grating on high index (~2.0) glass with three waveguides (one per primary color).
The above is based on the currently available public information. If you have additional information or analysis, please share it in the comments, or if you don’t want to share it publicly, you can send a private email to newsinfo@kgontech.com. To be clear, I don’t want stolen information or any violation of NDAs, but I am sure there are waveguide experts who know more about this subject.
What about Meta Orion’s Image Quality?
I have not had the opportunity to look through Meta’s Orion or Snap Spectacles 5 and have only seen ML2 in a canned demo. Unfortunately, I was not invited to demo Meta’s Orion, no less have access to one for evaluation (if you can help me gain (legal) access, contact me at newsinfo@kgontech.com).
I have tried the ML2 a few times. However, I have never had the opportunity to take pictures through the optics or use my test patterns. From my limited experience with the ML2, it is much better in terms of image quality than the ML1 (which was abysmal – see Magic Leap Review Part 1 – The Terrible View Through Diffraction Gratings), it still has significant issues with color uniformity like other wide (>40-degree) FOV diffractive waveguides. If someone has a ML2 that I can borrow for evaluation, please get in touch with me at newsinfo@kgontech.com.
I have been following Wave Optics (now Snap) for many years and have a 2020-era Titan DLP-based 40-degree FOV Wave Optics evaluation unit (through the optics picture below). Wave Optics Titan, I would consider a “middle of the pack” (I had seen better and worse) diffractive waveguide at that time. I have seen what seem to be better diffractive waveguides before and since, but it is hard to compare them objectively as they have different FOVs, and I was not able to use my content but rather curated demo content. Wave Optics seemed to be showing better waveguides at shows before being acquired by Snap 2021, but once again, that was with their demo content with short views at shows. I am working on getting a Spectacles 5 to do a more in-depth evaluation and see how it has improved.
Without the ability to test, compare, and contrast, I can only speculate about Meta Orion’s image quality based on my experience with diffractive waveguides. The higher index of refraction of SiC helps as there are fewer TIR bounces, which degrades image quality, but it is far from a volume production-ready technology. I’m concerned about image uniformity with a large FOV and even more so with a single set of diffraction gratings as diffraction is based on wavelength (color).
There were rumors before that Meta would launch new glasses with a 2D reflective (array) waveguide optical solution and LCoS optical engine in 2024-2025. With the announcement of Orion, I personally think this possibility has not disappeared and still exists.
The “reflective waveguide” would most likely be a reference to Lumus’s reflective waveguides. I have seen a few “Lumus clone” reflective waveguides from Chinese companies, but their image quality is very poor compared to Lumus. In the comment section of my last article, Ding, on October 8, 2024, wrote:
There’s indeed rumor that Meta is planning an actual product in 2025 based on LCOS and Lumus waveguide.
Lumus has demonstrated impressive image quality in a glasses-like form factor (see my 2021 article: Exclusive: Lumus Maximus 2K x 2K Per Eye, >3000 Nits, 50° FOV with Through-the-Optics Pictures). Since the 2021 Maximus, they have been shrinking the form factor and improving support for prescription lens integration with their new “Z-lens” technology. Lumus claims its Z-Lens technology should be able to support greater than a 70-degree FoV in glass. Lumus also says because their waveguides support a larger input pupil, they should have a 5x to 10x efficiency advantage.
The market question about Lumus is whether they can make their waveguide cost-effectively in mass production. In the past, I have asked their manufacturing partner, Schott, who says they can make it, but I have yet to see a consumer product around the Z-Lens. It would be interesting to see if a company like Meta had put the kind of money they invested into complex Silicon Carbide waveguides into reflective waveguides.
While diffractive waveguides are not inexpensive, they are considered less expensive at present (except, of course, for Meta Orion’s SiC waveguides). Perhaps an attractive proposition to researchers and propriety companies is that diffraction waveguides can be customized more easily (at least on glass).
Not Addressing Who Invented What First
I want to be clear: this article does not in any way make assertions about who invented what first or whether anyone is infringing on anyone else’s invention. Making that determination would require a massive amount of work, lawyers, and the courts. The reason I cite patents and patent applications is that they are public records that are easily searched and often document technical details that are missing from published presentations and articles.
Conclusions
There seems to be a surprising amount of commonality between Meta’s Orion, the Snap/Wave Optics, and the Magic Leap Two waveguides. They all avoided the “conventional” three diffraction gratings on one side of a waveguide to support a wider FOV in an eyeglass form factor. Rediscovering that the ML2 supported “dispersion correction,” as Meta refers to it, was a bit of a bonus.
As I wrote last time, Meta’s Orion seems like a strange mix of technology to make a big deal about at Meta Connect. They combined a ridiculously expensive waveguide with a very low-resolution display. The two-sided diffraction grating Silicon Carbide waveguides seem to be more than a decade away from practical volume production. It’s not clear to me that even if they could be made cost-effective, they would have as good a view out and the image quality of reflective waveguides, particularly at wider FOVs.
Meta could have put together a headset with technology that was within three years of being ready for production. As it is, it seemed like more of a stunt in response to the Apple Vision Pro. In that regard, the stunt seems to have worked in the sense that some reviewers were reminded of seeing the real world directly with optical AR/MR beats, looking at it through camera and display.
Google's NotebookLM has updated Audio Overviews with the ability to focus on a specific topic in the given content and has introduced a NotebookLM Business pilot program for organizations.
In a new statistical analysis, researchers have found evidence that drugs like Ozempic may help curb alcohol and opioid addiction.
Published in the journal Addiction, this new study saw researchers from Loyola University Chicago sift through more than 1.3 million health records to see how those who had been prescribed glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1 RAs) fared when it came to substance abuse.
Among those records, the Loyola researchers settled on more than 8,000 people diagnosed with opioid use disorder (OUD) and more than 5,600 with alcohol use disorder (AUD) who'd been prescribed a GLP-1 like Novo Nordisk's Ozempic or Eli Lilly's Mounjaro.
Looking at nearly a decade of healthcare outcomes for those cohorts, the study found that the drugs can not only mimic the gut's feeling of fullness, but they can also curb cravings for things other than food, something that seems to have extraneous health benefits.
The medical experts behind the study saw 50 percent lower rates of intoxication among people diagnosed with AUD who had been prescribed a GLP-1, and 40 percent lower rates of overdose for people with OUD who used the injectable weight loss drugs.
Though the study's authors point out that there will need to be more direct research done to further establish the link between GLP-1s and better outcomes for people who struggle with addiction, they nevertheless think this could be a bellwether.
"The existing medications for treating substance use disorder are underutilized and stigmatized," pointed out biostatistician Fares Qeadan, the study's first author, in an interview with ABC. "These medications intended for diabetes and weight loss can help addiction without the associated stigma, which will be a new window for how to deal with addiction."
News of these promising findings come after a banner press year for GLP-1s, which have exploded in popularity as weight management tools. More and more studies have also investigated their so-called "off-label" uses teasing everything from smoking cessation to reduced risk of heart attack and stroke.
There will, of course, be a long road ahead to get FDA approval for Ozempic as a substance abuse treatment — but considering the latest findings, it's perhaps only a matter of time.
Spotted: In 2022, a report from the United Nations predicted that by 2100, the number of wildfires could rise by 50 per cent, and warned that governments were largely unprepared to meet the challenge. Already, wildfires are costing the US economy up to $893 billion a year in losses and damages.
Based in California, a state at particular risk from wildfires, Pano AI is using artificial intelligence and a network of mountaintop cameras to provide real-time wildfire detection. This rapid response time is key to preventing a flare from turning into an inferno.
Pano Stations are deployed on high vantage points and continuously scan the landscape using 360-degree, ultra-high-definition cameras and AI to spot, evaluate, and signal wildfire activity within a 10-mile radius.
The company’s technology uses computer vision and a method called object detection to distinguish wisps of smoke from clouds, fog, or dust. Human analysts review the data to eliminate any false positives, and the algorithm calculates latitude and longitude to give firefighters a pinpoint location for the fire outbreak.
Once smoke is confirmed and its position is calculated, first responders are immediately alerted so they can quickly contain the fire before it gets out of control. The combination of early detection and higher confidence in the location and size of fire also allows emergency responders to bring the exact equipment they need, saving money.
The company retains ownership of the cameras and infrastructure and sells licenses to its software to companies and organisations. According to Pano, the majority of its customers are power utilities, private landowners (such as ski resorts), and government fire agencies. To date, Pano has deployed its tech across nine US states, as well as set up stations in Canada and Australia.
On Tuesday, Google announced that it had made a power purchase agreement for electricity generated by a small modular nuclear reactor design that hasn't even received regulatory approval yet. Today, it's Amazon's turn. The company's Amazon Web Services (AWS) group has announced three different investments, including one targeting a different startup that has its own design for small, modular nuclear reactors—one that has not yet received regulatory approval.
Unlike Google's deal, which is a commitment to purchase power should the reactors ever be completed, Amazon will lay out some money upfront as part of the agreements. We'll take a look at the deals and technology that Amazon is backing before analyzing why companies are taking a risk on unproven technologies.
Money for utilities and a startup
Two of Amazon's deals are with utilities that serve areas where it already has a significant data center footprint. One of these is Energy Northwest, which is an energy supplier that sends power to utilities in the Pacific Northwest. Amazon is putting up the money for Energy Northwest to study the feasibility of adding small modular reactors to its Columbia Generating Station, which currently houses a single, large reactor. In return, Amazon will get the right to purchase power from an initial installation of four small modular reactors. The site could potentially support additional reactors, which Energy Northwest would be able to use to meet demands from other users.
Google Chrome has begun to phase out uBlock Origin. The developer of the free ad blocker, Raymond Hill, recently reposted a screenshot that shows Chrome automatically turning off uBlock Origin because it is “no longer supported.”
The change comes as Google Chrome migrates to Manifest V3, a new extension specification that could impact the effectiveness of some ad blockers. uBlock Origin has launched uBlock Origin Lite, which uses Manifest V3, in response to the transition. However, you have to manually install the extension because it’s “too different from uBO to be an automatic replacement,” according to a FAQ Hill that posted to GitHub.
Hill says you may notice a difference when using uBlock Origin Lite compared to uBlock Origin...
As scientists continue learning more about how galaxies form, the James Webb Space Telescope is aiding their quest with new imagery of one being born "inside-out."
Researchers from the University of Cambridge say that these images prove the existence of a type of galaxy that had previously been purely theoretical.
The unusual galaxy with the catchy name JADES-GS+53.18343−27.79097 was captured in the process of forming its stars from the inside out, with its densely-packed core being compared to an inner city and its rapidly-growing stellar "suburbs" forming even quicker.
This differs from most other galaxies, as Cambridge's Sandro Tachella explains in a statement, which "start small as gas clouds collapse under their own gravity, forming very dense cores of stars and possibly black holes."
Though astronomers had theories about these "inside-out" galaxies existing, Webb's advanced instruments have been able to spot one for the first time.
"One of the many reasons that Webb is so transformational to us as astronomers is that we’re now able to observe what had previously been predicted through modeling," explained Cambridge PhD student William Baker, who along with Tachella co-authored a paper on the newly-spotted galaxy published this week in Nature Astronomy. "It’s like being able to check your homework."
Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have, for the first time, observed a galaxy from the early universe that is growing from the inside out, just 700 million years after the Big Bang. This galaxy is smaller but more developed than expected. Its center is dense, and… pic.twitter.com/qO5f42fVcD
A hundred times smaller than our Milky Way, the galaxy was formed within the first 700 million years after the Big Bang, which is just five percent of the universe's current age (13.7 billion years).
"The question of how galaxies evolve over cosmic time is an important one in astrophysics," Tacchella said. "We’ve had lots of excellent data for the last ten million years and for galaxies in our corner of the universe, but now with Webb, we can get observational data from billions of years back in time, probing the first billion years of cosmic history."
Also unlike the Milky Way, this newly-spotted JADES galaxy seems to double its stellar mass every ten million years — which is much, much faster than our own, which only doubles its mass every ten billion years.
Between its dense core and rapid growth rate, this inside-out galaxy may provide us clues about how galaxies formed earlier in the Universe's history.
"Of course, this is only one galaxy, so we need to know what other galaxies at the time were doing," Tacchella mused. "Were all galaxies like this one?"
Being the first of its kind ever seen, it's way too soon to answer that question — but with the James Webb on the case, there will be more where that came from.
Artificial intelligence (AI) has long been part of many discussions regarding its role in various industries.
Yet, what kind of role could it play in casino games moving forward? ChatGPT, being the popular tool that it is, may have a hand in how casino businesses operate in the future. We’ll discuss whether or not it's the next big thing in the industry as we go through this guide.
Could ChatGPT and other AI tools play a role in improving player experience? Or will it contribute beyond that? We’ll answer these questions and more right now.
What is ChatGPT and will there be casinos based on it?
ChatGPT is known for being an AI-based language model that can write content, create human-like conversations, and so much more. The question is, will there be a ChatGPT casino in the future? That remains to be seen for the moment. Nevertheless, what seems like a tool that can do it all just might have the potential to do more than its current capabilities.
How can ChatGPT contribute to the casino business industry as a whole?
For its part, ChatGPT can be an excellent cornerstone to any casino business. To take it further, it can also play numerous roles in an online casino. Let’s take a look now as some examples of how ChatGPT can contribute to the casino businesses with the following approaches:
Customer Support
One of the major pillars of a business is customer support. With ChatGPT being applied, it will be impacted in a positive way. It can provide casinos with the ability to become a “customer service agent” that handles issues and inquiries with efficiency.
For example, a player may ask a common question regarding their account, game rules, policies, or even withdrawals. ChatGPT will be able to answer these common inquiries fairly quickly - even in situations where human resources are few and far between.
As a result, wait times will be reduced and there will be more customer satisfaction. For its part, ChatGPT can be an excellent cost-effective solution for many online casinos. Both operators and players will benefit in certain ways. It may take finding the best AI chatbot for your business to get things rolling - especially if it's powered by ChatGPT.
Personalised Player Experiences
Personalisation is always great for customers in any business. They feel like they are getting a tailor-made service as opposed to the “one-size-fits-all” common approach.
ChatGPT can be great in personalising a player’s gaming experience such as analysing their gaming history, the games they prefer playing, and other behaviors. Using this data, ChatGPT will help online casinos create plenty of personalised playing opportunities for players.
For example, a slot enthusiast may be suggested new slot titles to try out. Another example is a blackjack player being suggested to play a different variation. ChatGPT can also create tailor-made promotions for individual players based on the data that was analysed. It takes personalisation to an entirely different level and in turn, leaves players satisfied knowing that an online casino understands their playing needs.
A Game Changer In Development
Game developers may use ChatGPT as a tool to assist them in gaming design and development. The intent here is to implement gaming experiences that are both interactive and immersive.
Using AI technology along with its natural language processing capabilities, it will give developers a chance to create games that will allow players to interact with characters that are powered by AI. Or it can also allow players to get tips and advice in real-time.
Think about it for a moment. Let’s say you’re playing blackjack and you’re having a hard time deciding whether to hit or stay. ChatGPT can be the digital coach helping you make a more informed decision based on strategy and other insights. You can also refine your strategy accordingly based on what ChatGPT can provide for advice.
Streamlining Operations
Finally, it might be ideal to use ChatGPT for the purpose of streamlining business operations for online casinos. The thing to note is that some parts of the business may be complex and can be simplified using AI. For example, this can include but not be limited to plenty of back-office tasks, marketing, compliance, and even managing customer data (among others).
At the same time, it will allow for operators to automate the tedious tasks so they can focus on other business priorities. With a daily workflow that is streamlined and straightforward, ChatGPT will handle the heavy lifting while online casino operators take care of the other important things day in and day out. For the success of most businesses, ChatGPT should be a good thing to use.
Final thoughts
ChatGPT can play a revolutionary role in the casino industry. Having outlined what it can be capable of, the levels of anticipation couldn’t be higher and more exciting for casino operators.
For players, they’ll be able to have a more personalised player experience that will leave them satisfied and coming back for more. ChatGPT can handle inquiries and issues quickly while providing personalised gaming options for each player, making it a must-have for any online casino business now and in the years beyond.
In an interview with The Verge, Meta CTO and Reality Labs chief Andrew Bosworth confirmed a number of projects previously subject to speculation, detailed the company’s strategic shift toward AI, and confirmed plans to deepen its partnership with Ray-Ban parent EssilorLuxottica.
Meta reorganized Reality Labs earlier this year to better focus on wearables, such as Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses and AI-driven wearable tech, like the newer version of its wrist-worn controller revealed last month alongside Meta’s Orion AR glasses prototype.
Meta’s Orion AR Glasses Prototype | Image courtesy Meta
To get there though, Bosworth outlined the company’s multi-phase process for product development. In a nutshell: a “pre-discovery” team prototypes novel concepts. Some ideas move to the “discovery” phase for feasibility and industrial design evaluation. Prototyping follows with more extensive executive involvement, and products that pass engineering validation may go to market.
In the interview, Bosworth confirmed a number of claims made in recent reports, including rumors that Meta is exploring earbuds with cameras, similar to what we’ve heard is currently going on at Apple, and a pair of mixed reality goggles which recently entered the discovery phase, described as “steampunk-like.”
Although Bosworth didn’t confirm this, a previous report from The Information maintained those mixed reality goggles could arrive as soon as 2027—assuming they successfully pass both prototyping and engineering validation phases.
Bosworth also confirmed a previous report that Meta has canceled a high-end Quest headset, codenamed La Jolla, which was initially expected to become the Quest Pro 2. The cancellation of La Jolla was likely due to tepid consumer responses to high-priced headsets like the Quest Pro and Apple Vision Pro.
Meta Quest Pro | Image courtesy Meta
It also seems reports were correct surrounding Meta’s plans to take a noncontrolling stake in EssilorLuxottica, the company behind Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses. Meta is seeking volume while the eyewear giant seeks margins. “That’s the tension, and we found a good solution to it, so we’re pretty excited about it,” Bosworth told The Verge.
Meanwhile, Meta is increasingly focused on AI-powered devices, aiming not to be outpaced by competitors like Apple. To boot, Meta is now developing multiple products simultaneously, a marked shift from its early days.
“We definitely don’t want to be outflanked by someone who came up with some clever, integrated wearable that we hadn’t thought about,” Bosworth says. “If there’s a part of your body that could potentially host a wearable that could do AI, there’s a good chance we’ve had a team run that down.”
This comes as Meta has just released Quest 3S, its new $300 mixed reality headset that undoubtedly hopes to replicate Quest 2’s success by packing in Quest 3’s chipset and full-color mixed reality capabilities alongside last-gen displays.
Quest 3S is currently the top selling device in the Video Games category of Amazon US, and Quest 3 is third.
At the time of writing, the only other products in the category selling higher than the 128GB Quest 3S model are digital gift cards for PlayStation, Xbox, Fortnite, and Roblox.
Quest 3S went on general sale yesterday, and preorders started arriving in homes.
Meta's latest headset brings the computing power, mixed reality capabilities, ringless controllers, and inside-out upper body tracking feature to an entry price of $300, making the compromise of using Quest 2's fresnel lenses and single panel.
Given Quest 3's entry price is $200 higher than Quest 2's was at launch, the new Quest 3S will likely continue Quest 2's mantle of growing the VR market, and now mixed reality too, with the Amazon ranking suggesting it's off to a good start.
We plan to have a Quest 3S review up later this week, and we'll keep a close eye out for any further indications of the success of the headset's launch.
Jusqu'à présent théorique, la menace que fait peser l'informatique quantique sur les algorithmes de chiffrement qui sécurisent nos communications et nos précieuses données personnelles commence maintenant à se concrétiser. Une équipe de recherche chinoise vient ainsi d'en apporter une première démonstration opérationnelle.
Comme si les équipes de cybersécurité des entreprises – institutions financières en tête – n'étaient pas déjà quasiment submergées par la prolifération de dangers en tout genre, voilà donc une problématique qu'elles vont désormais devoir prendre en compte plus tôt qu'elles ne l'imaginaient. Car, bien que les protections en vigueur aujourd'hui ne semblent pas directement en péril en l'état, l'exercice auquel se sont livrés les auteurs du papier en question ne laisse aucun doute sur l'imminence de leur obsolescence.
En pratique, leur expérience a porté sur une clé de petite taille, loin des normes actuelles, employée dans un algorithme usuel (RSA). Mais son objet était de valider non un résultat ponctuel mais plutôt la faculté générique pour une machine quantique du marché – en l'occurrence, celle de D-Wave – d'en extraire le secret dans des délais raisonnables à l'aide d'une méthode optimisée. Et la même opération a été réalisée sur d'autres techniques fréquemment employées pour le chiffrement d'information.
Bien sûr, ce risque était identifié depuis longtemps, mais les spécialistes ont toujours estimé que, la maturité des ordinateurs quantiques n'étant pas envisagée avant de longues années, laissant le temps aux utilisateurs de faire évoluer leurs applications avant une éventuelle catastrophe, il n'existait aucune raison de paniquer. Selon cette logique, un premier algorithme susceptible de résister aux capacités de ces futures calculateurs (développé par IBM) n'a d'ailleurs été standardisé que très récemment.
Avec cette avancée spectaculaire, la donne pourrait changer rapidement puisqu'il paraît dorénavant possible de se contenter d'équipements déjà disponibles sur le marché pour attaquer les systèmes de sécurité en place (sans oublier que les organisations les plus déterminées peuvent engranger des données chiffrées en vue de les exploiter le moment venu). Le remplacement des anciens algorithmes ainsi fragilisés – qui représente un chantier colossal – va peut-être devoir devenir une priorité absolue.
UploadVRDavid Heaney
