Grandpa Creates Hologram Twin For Future Grandkids Using VR — from vrscout.com by Kyle Melnick
Not even death will stop this tech-savvy grandfather from meeting his great-grandchildren.
“I think it is a wonderful way to preserve my family’s history for future generations,” said Jerry while speaking to Jam Press. “To see myself like that, is just mind-blowing — it feels like watching a movie. By not just reading the words as in my memoir but to actually get the chance to see and hear me recalling the stories is just magical.”
Also from Kyle Melnick:
How VR/AR Technology Is Being Used To Treat Autism
XRHealth brings its unique VR/AR therapy to the United States.
Excerpt:
Previously available in Australia, the technology has been used to treat the effects of autism, from anxiety and stress to attention, memory, mobility/coordination, and frustration tolerance. XRHealth’s healthcare platform offers a variety of professional services. This includes one-on-one meet-ups with XRHealth therapists as well as virtual group sessions, all of which accessible remotely using modern VR headsets.
My thanks to Mr. Jack Uldrich for the following three items:
The Five-Day Workweek Is Dying — from theatlantic.com by Derek Thompson
And the implications for work and cities are going to be fascinating.
Excerpt:
According to data from Kastle Systems, which tracks building access across the country, office attendance is at just 33 percent of its pre-pandemic average. That’s lower than in-person attendance in just about any other industry for which we have good data. Even movie theaters—a business sometimes written off as “doomed”—have recovered almost twice as much.
What once seemed like a hot take is becoming a stone-cold reality: For tens of millions of knowledge-economy workers, the office is never coming all the way back. The implications—for work, cities, and the geography of labor—will be fascinating.
Panama – ENVIRONMENT: 175 countries sign plastic waste treaty — from menafn.com
Excerpt:
At a meeting of the UN Environment Assembly (UNEA) in Nairobi, Kenya, 175 countries on March 2 passed a resolution on the first treaty to directly tackle the 9 billion tonnes of plastic produced since the plastic age ramped up in the 1950s. Work now begins on how to implement the treaty by 2024.
Single DNA Test for Over 50 Genetic Diseases Will Cut Diagnosis From Decades to Days — from
Excerpt:
A new DNA test, developed by researchers at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney and collaborators from Australia, UK and Israel, has been shown to identify a range of hard-to-diagnose neurological and neuromuscular genetic diseases quicker and more-accurately than existing tests.
Is Artificial Intelligence Undermining The Legal System? — from lawyer-monthly.com
Globally recognised artificial intelligence expert Dr Lance Eliot explains how AI is undermining the legal system.
Excerpt:
Well, imagine if I told you that the text messages, the emails, and the video clips were all crafted via the use of AI-based deepfake technologies. None of that seeming “evidence” of wrongdoing or at least inappropriate actions of the prosecutor are real. They certainly look to be real. The texts use the same style of text messaging that the prosecutor normally uses. The emails have the same written style as other emails by the prosecutor.
And, the most damning of the materials, those video clips of the prosecutor, are clearly the face of the prosecutor, and the words spoken are of the same voice as the prosecutor. You might have been willing to assume that the texts and the emails could be faked, but the video seems to be the last straw on the camel’s back. This is the prosecutor caught on video saying things that are utterly untoward in this context. All of that could readily be prepared via the use of today’s AI-based deepfake high-tech.
So, be on the watch for getting AI-based deepfake materials produced about you.
Triumphs and Troubles in Online Learning Abroad — from edsurge.com by Robert Ubell
Excerpt:
In Canada, for example, about two-thirds of colleges offer online degrees—and many have for years. While here in the U.S., a far smaller number grant degrees online.
I thought it would be good to do some digging to explore a more nuanced appreciation of the status of virtual instruction outside the U.S.
From DSC:
I would also like to mention that there’s a lot happening in Australia and in India along these lines, and likely in many other countries as well. But I think that one can only cover so much in one posting. 🙂
‘Human-in-the-loop’ solutions will comprise 30% of new legal tech automation by 2025: Gartner — from thelawyermag.com/au/ by Lucy Saddleton
Excerpt:
“There’s little question that growth in legal work is outstripping growth in legal headcount, and on the surface, this can make advanced automation solutions appear very attractive to legal leaders,” said Zack Hutto, director, advisory in the Gartner Legal & Compliance practice. “The question is whether the legal department has the capabilities required to customize and configure advanced machine learning systems, which will be needed to enable them to handle the unique scenarios and frequent exceptions that come about in this type of work.”
Legal work is outstripping growth in legal headcount
Inside Higher Ed Acquired by Times Higher Education — from insidehighered.com by Scott Jaschik and Doug Lederman
Our editors Scott Jaschik and Doug Lederman explain how this combination of publishing companies will improve global coverage of postsecondary education and better serve the higher ed community.
Excerpt:
As journalists, we often say that we want to report the news, not be the news. We are making an exception [on 1/10/22] to announce that Inside Higher Ed has been acquired by Times Higher Education (THE), the world’s leading provider of higher education news, data and insights.
From DSC:
As the article below clearly relays, MOOCs did NOT fail! In the last decade, they have reached 220 million learners worldwide!
I don’t know the total number of graduates from the Ivy League — throughout all of the relevant institutions’ histories — but I would bet you that MOOCs have reached far more learners. And MOOCs did so in less than a decade.
And you’re going to tell me MOOCs have been a failure?!!!! Are you being serious!?!?! You can talk about completion rates all that you want to (and that misses the point, as some people sign up for MOOCs without ever intending to finish the entire course). As with other things, people get out of something what they put into that thing.
A Decade of MOOCs: A Review of Stats and Trends for Large-Scale Online Courses in 2021 — from edsurge.com by Dhawal Shah
Excerpts:
Now, a decade later, MOOCs have reached 220 million learners, excluding China where we don’t have as reliable data, . In 2021, providers launched over 3,100 courses and 500 microcredentials.
…
Originally, MOOC providers relied on universities to create courses. But that dependence is declining as more and more of the courses are created by companies every year. These corporate partners in course creation include tech giants Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook.
…the majority of the new courses launched on Coursera in 2021 are not from universities anymore.
…
These mass online courses were born without a business model. Yet within a decade, MOOCs went from no revenue to bringing in well over a half a billion dollars annually.