Exclusive Lenovo interview on dismantling AI bias, and the end of an era
Exclusive Lenovo interview on dismantling AI bias, and the end of an era
Plus, why you need a VPN for XR headsets, more AI classes, cool Disney robots, a ton of 80s music, and more.
I’m David Gewirtz. Welcome to this week’s Advanced Geekery newsletter. It’s been an exciting week. Let’s dive in.
My articles
Let’s kick it off with a quick recap of the articles I published in the last week on ZDNET.
How Lenovo works on dismantling AI bias while building laptops: Lenovo's Ada Lopez reveals how diverse teams can shape the future of technology and accessibility for all in this exclusive interview.
Why you'll need a VPN for the Vision Pro (and other XR headsets): Gaming platform aside, what's the universal killer app for these novelty devices? The answer is exactly where a VPN comes in.
I'm a ChatGPT pro but this quick course taught me new tricks, and you can take it for free: Udemy's 30-day free trial invites you to immerse yourself in AI learning goodness. What have you got to lose?
The end of an era: I say goodbye to Seamless Donations
Effective today, Seamless Donations will no longer be updated. Existing add-on licenses will continue to function during their license period but will not renew, at which point they will cease functioning. The add-on store for Seamless Donations is closed as of today.
You may not realize it, but Seamless Donations has been coded, managed, and supported by one guy, me. Having responsibility for ensuring the income of tens of thousands of nonprofits is a heavy load — especially since Seamless Donations does not really provide an income for me or my family. I have a very full-time day job that has become more time-intensive over the years.
While I will no longer be providing any support for Seamless Donations, I’m not leaving Seamless Donations users without support. Through WordPress community activities, I’ve known some of the fine folks on the GiveWP team for a decade now. I believe that GiveWP is the best option for users after Seamless Donations sunsets.
I asked them if they’d step up and help Seamless Donations users migrate to GiveWP, and they generously agreed to be there. A free version of GiveWP is available. The GiveWP team is also offering a very substantial discount on some of their paid options for Seamless Donations users migrating to premium versions of their plugin.
The GiveWP team will be providing special support resources to all Seamless Donations users wishing to migrate, so if anyone needs help migrating, they are there to help you.
Click here to learn how to get onboarded with GiveWP and learn more about their exclusive offer to Seamless Donations users. You’ll also see an opportunity to book a demo with the GiveWP Customer Success team who will show you how to move successfully from Seamless Donations to GiveWP.
It has been a true honor working with the tens of thousands of nonprofits Seamless Donations has helped over the past decade or so. It’s amazing to think that just sitting in front of my computer screen and typing code, I have helped nonprofits raise more than $40 million during that time. So if you think that one person, alone, can never make a difference, think again. We all have it in us.
As for me, I’m hoping to have a few more hours to actually get some sleep, and spend some quality time with my family on nights and weekends. May the stars guide your journey, and the constellations align for you.
–David
Must-watch YouTube
Moving on, let’s queue up some interesting YouTube videos for your entertainment and edification.
Art Deco is a design style dating back the early 20th century. It’s cool, but it’s very much yesterday’s design style. Or is it? This video shows how Art Deco is making a comeback.
Disney isn’t just inventing iconic robot characters. The company apparently is doing robotics and AI research that’s on the next level. This video explains.
For our musical number of the week, this dude mashes up the James Bond theme and the Pink Panther theme. Oddly enough, it works really well.
Interesting reads
Here’s some good stuff from around the Internet, well worth reading.
ZDNET is running a fascinating deep dive into how AI is helping to understand Roman scrolls once buried by Mount Vesuvius. Kudos to author Erin Carson for an excellent read.
Are you an 80s kid? Turns out you can download 30GB of lost cassettes from the mid-80s into the mid-90s, hosted on archive.org. Shout out to my old college chum Stephen Uitti for bringing this to my awareness.
Reader projects
I’d like to regularly spotlight a reader project or two here. Your project doesn’t have to be a big Kickstarter launch. If you’ve built something cool, it has some pretty pictures, and you’re proud of it, I might be able to share it here.
If you have a photogenic reader project, send an email to me at david@zatz.com with the subject “READER PROJECT,” a few pictures, and a short one-paragraph description. If you have a social media link or a link to the project, include that, too.
More clicky
I’ve got a lot happening all over the web. Here are links to my various stuff:
House of the Head: home for my published music
ZATZ Labs: where I host my published software projects
Feel free to dig around, visit, and say hey!
Leave some comments
Substack supports comments, so feel free to leave some. I promise to read them. Just, please, let’s keep our personal politics out of any discussion.
That should do it for this week. This newsletter is really starting to pick up subscribers. Please help it out by sharing links on all your socials.
Have a great week!