Waymo car incident, tips for the overemployed, surgery robot on the space station and more / Daily digest

February 16, 2024

Waymo car incident, tips for the overemployed, surgery robot on the space station and more / Daily digest

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On my radar

A crowd destroyed a driverless Waymo car in San Francisco

A person jumped on the hood of a Waymo driverless taxi and smashed its windshield in San Francisco’s Chinatown last night around 9PM PT, generating applause before a crowd formed around the car and covered it in spray paint, breaking its windows, and ultimately set it on fire. The fire department arrived minutes later, according to a report in The Autopian, but by then flames had already fully engulfed the car.

North American robot orders dropped 30% last year

After two years of flying high, industrial robot orders dropped by nearly one-third last year. Per the Association for Advancing Automation (A3), 31,159 industrial robots were purchased by North American companies in 2023, down from 44,196. That marks a 30% drop for this key market. The number is also down (albeit less so) from 2021’s 39,708.

You can now view Charles Darwin's entire personal library collection

For the very first time, the entire contents of the eclectic personal library of naturalist Charles Darwin has been published online, and a massive 9,300 entries come with links to the works, making them freely available to read.

TIPS

How to find that song stuck in your head

Harness the power of Shazam, Google Assistant, and more when you just can't name that mystery earworm.

Ever had a song stuck in your head, but haven’t been able to identify it? Of course you have. It could be a hook or a lyric snippet you’re thinking about, but you just can’t name the song or the artist. This common predicament can lead to hours or even days of frustration, with the answer always just out of reach as the cogs in your brain whirr and grind.

SOCIAL MEDIA

Social networks are getting stingy with their data, leaving third-party developers in the lurch

2023 was the year social networks realized that they were sitting on massive troves of data. And some companies, such as Twitter (now X) and Reddit, decided to change their terms to shut out third-party experiences on these platforms. In the process, they also put a price on their data — something they believe is highly valuable today as it can be used to train AI models.

Instagram and Threads will let users decide if political content is recommended to them

Meta said in a blog post it doesn’t “want to get between” users and the political content they choose to follow, but it also wants to avoid proactively recommending political posts—such as posts related to “laws, elections, or social topics”—from accounts users don’t follow. If users still want to see that content, they can opt in, via a control.

CAREER

A millennial explains how he makes over $250,000 secretly working 2 remote jobs — and shares 4 tips for the overemployed

A Georgia-based millennial is earning over $250,000 a year secretly working two remote jobs.
He said his childhood made him want financial security and that overemployment provides him job security.
The IT professional shared his four pieces of advice for overemployed workers.

Harvard's Happiness Guru Shares 3 Simple Tips For Finding Joy in Technology

Author and happiness researcher Arthur Brooks explains how dating apps, Zoom meetings, and social media affect us—and what science says we should do about it.

CIO

9 traits of great IT leaders

IT leaders have gotten the message: To successfully perform their jobs, they need more than technical skills. They also need general business acumen, industry knowledge, and accounting talent. Some expertise in marketing, operations, cybersecurity, and other functional areas is important, too.

The end of 0% interest rates: what the new normal means for engineering managers and tech leads

We’re likely to see a preference for flatter organizations, fewer managers, and a preference for the “player coach” leadership model. Some changes present new opportunities to shine as leaders.

Cool Technology

A tiny robot on the space station will simulate remote-controlled surgery up there

The robot is small in size but its aspirations are out of this world — literally.

Satechi SM1 Slim Mechanical Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard Review

Yes, most mice and keyboards designed for Windows PCs work just fine with Apple iMacs and MacBooks, but they’re usually missing something. Whether the software is incompatible, or you're stuck with Windows-specific keys in place of Apple ones, the user experience often feels like it's cut short. Satechi’s latest keyboard, the SM1 Slim Mechanical Backlit Bluetooth Keyboard ($99.99), doesn’t check every box, but it does deliver a premium typing experience with Macs and Mac users in mind.