Weeknotes 242; visions and reflections

By Iskander Smit in weeknotes — Jun 13, 2023

a man standing on a square in the city, looking around, wearing a glass helmet - Midjourney

Hi, y’all,

Here in the Netherlands, we experience another cycle of extreme weather after a wet spring is summer early and hot. It might make you wonder if these future goggles will have a cooling function too… Not meant to make lame jokes, as discussed last week, the impressions of use and interpretation of the features and meaning of the major new product introduction by Apple (the Vision Pro) was all over the news. I thought that it deserved a bit more space than this newsletter to reflect on it myself, so I used my Medium-space for a longer analysis. In short, to cite myself: “Even more than with the AirPods, this is not the introduction of a new device; it is about a new relation towards tech in our social context, in the way technology is mediating our experience and how it is creating a synthetic layer”. I make a case that this device is not about the device at all but about shaping a new interaction space. This iteration of the goggles will function as the ultimo testbed with no limits to offer designers and developers an open canvas.

My second feeling is that the intention to create a language for spatial computing is only part of the story, maybe even the smaller part. The real quest is to formulate a relation and agency in dealing with the synthetic reality that we will be living in and already are with other media, from text to audio. The new vision is about a new way of looking at and understanding of what we see.

Check the whole post here:

In the news section, I list some of the experiences and visions on the device (by others).

Next to the introduction of Vision and keeping track of the stories, I did visit the Micromobility Europe expo for one day. I was invited by Springtime with whom Cities of Things works on the Collect|Connect Community Hub. Last year I was also attending the first edition. This time it was a bit smaller in my impression, mainly as the shared vehicles are a bit in a repositioning phase. The expo is very strong in gathering all the important players from all over the world and a lot of nice micro-mobility ‘devices’. The ending stressed the energy and enthusiasm with a rave ride through Amsterdam Noord.

It is more an expo than a place for presentations, but I attended two panels in the city's track. Again the importance of design for regulation as key driver for change was confirmed. Amsterdam Municipality is, for instance, deliberately blocking electric vehicles as it replaces ‘active mobility’ like biking. In a conversation at the stand of Springtime with Horace Dediu, the founder of micromobility, we discussed how new audiences as families deserve more attention in shaping vehicles with a friendly touch; now, it is still very much focused on personal mobility, efficiency and technical specs.

Events for the coming week

This Wednesday, a promising webinar: “The Future of [X]”: How to Build Collective Visions of the Future Using Sci-Fi & Foresight Tools”
Also this Wednesday, a new edition of The Hmm. As always hard to grasp the topic in a couple of words; check the website.
If you are in Utrecht tonite: PyData on AI for Good and Overcoming Challenges with Robots
As mentioned before, I am happy to be invited to visit The Next Web. The nature of the conference has been changing, but it is still a good place to meet people. And who knows, working full-time at a startup will trigger different links. And I am curious how the theme ‘Reclaim the Future’ will be executed.
“De Macht van het Algoritme” is a topic in this evening at Pakhuis de Zwijger this Thursday.
In London? Another Promptjam is happening this Friday.
In Berlin? Interesting installation “cuts through AI mind control
Are machines living among us, or are we living among machines? Conflux festival at v2
For next week I tip Mozfest House. The online version of Mozfest was earlier this year; next week, there is a two-day in-person event in Amsterdam. The theme here is a bit different, Tech we Trust.

Notions from the news

Let’s start this time with a round of opinions on the Vision announcement by Apple. Here is one extensive hands-on report with more functional descriptions…

Scott Galloway is sceptic
Wired’s Kate Knibbs is sceptic too.
Charlie Warzel is framing it as the ideal device for the apocalypse
LukeW from a design perspective
Ian Bogost on the age of goggles
Is Apple leaning more into personal computing, Ben Thompson

Time will tell…

This week AI developments are also still continuing sourcing the news.

Meta is adding AI everywhere.

Motherboard is not impressed by the vision of Zuckerberg

Bard can program.

A long reflection on the impact of AI by Marc Andreessen (known among others for ‘software is eating the world’), calling people to start building.

Is the AI the author or the inspiration?

I like this premise: make it possible for workers challenged by AI to create their mechanisms for redistribution.

Is coding with AI dangerous?

How to do AI oversight?

Such a nice framing by Matt, computers that live two seconds in the future.

(it resonated with the explorations in predictive relations)

And in robotics and autonomous systems.

DeepMind is repurposing game-playing AI, which feels like an intelligent form of Auto AI.

Are we next?

Generative Robotics

Mercedes has the first level 3 licence (in the states)

Tesla is not only creating a vision on cars but also on the production lines.

That one dog can do more sensing now.

Trust and identity

To close.

The monthly trends round-up; check if I have missed something

Jony Ive on the creative process

For me, the smart home is becoming less of a separate entity, it grows on you through mundane appliances and other connected services we live with. The Verge has a special on Smart Homes for Smart People.

It is pride month. My TikTok is adapting with a lot of positive vibes. There is reason, however for worries too, on developments:

For the First Time Ever, Human Rights Campaign Officially Declares ‘State of Emergency’ for LGBTQ+ Americans; Issues National Warning and Guidebook to Ensure Safety for LGBTQ+ Residents and Travelers

HRC’s First-Ever Emergency Declaration Comes After More Than 75 Anti-LGBTQ+ Bills Signed Into Law This Year (More Than Double The Number From Last Year), Creating an Imminent Threat to the…

Human Rights CampaignHRC Staff

Not from last week, however, it popped up somewhere in one of the streams, an old interview with Stephen Fry on Artificial Intelligence and robots. Spot on.

And some nice sci-fi visuals

Paper for this week

To connect to the micromobility conference, this might an interesting research: Digital twin applications in urban logistics: an overview.

Research suggests that DTs can be beneficial in optimizing the physical systems they are linked with. The concept has been extensively studied in many technology-driven industries like manufacturing. However, little work has been done with regard to their application in urban logistics. In this paper, we seek to provide a framework by which DTs could be easily adapted to urban logistics applications.

Abouelrous, A., Zhang, Y., & Bliek, L. (2022). Digital Twin Applications in Urban Logistics: An Overview. BNAIC/BeNeLearn 2022.Chicago

https://doi.org/10.1080/21650020.2023.2216768

See you next week!

Want to know more about who is writing here? Check the about page. Next to following the news and attending some events, I worked hard on shaping the human-AI copilot concept for Structural, and discussed the Wijkbot project for Cities of Things. It was funny to be interviewed by a student on an article I wrote 10 years ago for Frankwatching on Big Data for Tiny Services. Luckily it was still making sense :-)