Factory Workers Become Coders as Companies Automate

As automation changes the way factories operate, some U.S. companies are training workers in programming and robotics, letting machinists get a taste of coding. From a report: Competition from China was among the reasons Drew Greenblatt, chief executive of manufacturing firm Marlin Steel Wire Products, purchased $2 million worth of robots in the past 15 months. The Baltimore-based maker of wire…

10-Year-Old’s Reality-Show Victory Revoked After Automated Bot Voting

An anonymous reader quotes ABC News:
The final result of Russia’s version of the popular TV singing talent show, “The Voice Kids,” has been cancelled after it was found that thousands of automated calls and text messages were used to rig voting in favor of its 10-year-old winner. Moscow-based cybersecurity firm Group-IB was brought in to examine the results after complaints were…

Who Killed America’s Demo Scene?

Jason Koebler shares Vice’s analysis of demoparties — “gatherings where programmers showcase artistic audiovisual works, known as demos, after a day- or days-long coding marathon that is part bacchanal and part competition” — starting with a visit to New York’s Synchrony.
I had arrived just in time to catch the end of a set by the electronic musician Melody Loveless, who was…

Ask Slashdot: Are the Big Players In Tech Even Competing With Each Other?

dryriver writes: For capitalism to work for consumers in a beneficial way, the big players have to compete hard against each other and innovate courageously. What appears to be happening instead, however, is that every year almost everybody is making roughly the same product at roughly the same price point. Most 4K TVs at the same price point have the same…

Sony and Microsoft Set Rivalry Aside For Streaming Alliance

Sony and Microsoft, bitter rivals in the video game console wars, will team up in on-demand gaming to better compete with newcomers like Google as the industry’s main battlefield looks poised to shift to the cloud, news outlet Nikkei reported Thursday. From a report: Sony President and CEO Kenichiro Yoshida has signed a memorandum of understanding with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella…

Strategy: Why it’s a Cornerstone of the Modern MBA

With technology and global markets evolving at an unprecedented pace, today’s most successful business leaders are the ones who recognise new strategic opportunities — and seize them — before their competitors do. This is why Macquarie University is moving beyond focusing solely on traditional business metrics and financial analytics. Instead, Macquarie puts strategising at the […]
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Is Big Tech Needlessly Ruining Entire Industries?

Salon tech editor Keith A. Spencer just published a new article describing what happens when “venture capital-backed entrepreneurs jackhammer their way into a new industry, ‘tech’-ify it in some way, undermine the competition and declare their new way superior once the old is bankrupted.” – Being a taxi driver was once a much-vaunted job, so much so that a taxi medallion…

5 essential L&D themes from Coursera Partner Conference

I recently had the pleasure of attending the 2019 Coursera Partners Conference in London, where we brought together academic, business and tech pioneers in a two-day celebration of learning. Amongst guest speakers were Thomas Friedman, Yale University, the Abu Dhabi Dhabi School of Government, AXA, Novartis, Coursera Co-Founder Andrew Ng, and many more. Throughout the […]
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Yes, the Internet is destroying our collective attention span

Source: https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2019/5/3/18514330/distraction-collective-attention-research…

Bookstores band together for Independent Bookstore Day

Source: https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/4/24/18512589/independent-bookstore-day-book-crawl…