noplace, a mashup of Twitter and Myspace for Gen Z, hits No. 1 on the App Store (6 minute read)
noplace, an app that aims to bring the 'social' back to 'social media', has surged to the top of the iOS App Store. Launched out of invite-only mode on Wednesday, the app allows users to have colorful customizable profiles and share everything from relationship status to what they're listening or watching, what they're reading or doing, and more. It focuses on text-based updates and currently doesn't support photos or videos. The app offers a feed with friends and another global feed from everyone in the app - both are in reverse chronological order. It uses AI technology to drive suggestions and creation and create summaries for things users may have missed.
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Threads hits 175 million users after a year (3 minute read)
Threads has reached more than 175 million monthly active users. Launched on the App Store last year on July 5, the app is still growing steadily. Meta hasn't shared daily user numbers, suggesting that Threads is getting a lot of traffic from people who have yet to become regular users. Much of the app's growth is still coming from it being promoted inside Instagram. Meta is considering turning on ads in Threads sometime next year.
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Science & Futuristic Technology
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SpaceX will attempt the first commercial spacewalk (4 minute read)
Polaris Dawn, a mission designed to purchase the limits of SpaceX's technology and help pave the way for a longer-term human presence in space, is now set to launch no earlier than July 12. It will be SpaceX's second all-civilian mission and the first in its Polaris program. The mission plans include the first commercial spacewalk, research on human health in space, and tests to equip the spacecraft with Starlink Wi-Fi. It will reach an orbit of over 800 miles above Earth, the furthest out a human has gone from the planet since the Apollo era.
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βSkinny jabs': weight-loss drugs set for new boom as generic versions emerge (8 minute read)
Generic versions of Wegovy, Saxenda, Ozempic, and Victoza are set to hit the market soon at a lower cost than the original drugs. Patents for liraglutide, which is in Victoza and Saxenda, have expired. Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, the world's largest generic drugmaker, has already launched a generic version of Victoza in the US. Pfizer, Viatris' Mylan, and Novartis' Sandoz are also planning to launch their own generic liraglutide products. Ozempic and Wegovy will lose patent protection in China in 2026, in Europe and Japan in 2031, and in the US in 2032.
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Programming, Design & Data Science
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Cloudflare debuts one-click nuke of web-scraping AI (3 minute read)
Cloudflare is now offering its web hosting customers a way to block AI bots from scraping website content and using the data without permission to train machine learning models. It is able to recognize bot activity even when operators lie about their user agent. The bot detection approach relies on digital fingerprinting. With a network that sees an average of 57 million requests per second, Cloudflare has ample data to determine which fingerprints can be trusted.
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Ask HN: Has anyone successfully pivoted from web dev to AI/ML development? (Hacker News Thread)
Before getting into AI development, first decide whether you want to train models from scratch or build cool things on top of AI models. Knowing how to train models may not be that useful when working with generative AI - it's better to develop knowledge in other areas like prompting, evals, and using models to build production-quality apps. Calling an API is going to work better than dedicating a team to tune a private model before scaling in most cases. It is possible to obtain an AI research position without a PhD, but it will take years of study.
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AI's $600B Question (6 minute read)
AI will likely create a huge amount of economic value. Speculative frenzies are part of the technology and not something to be afraid of. Those who remain level-headed have the chance to build extremely important companies. However, not everyone is going to get rich soon because AGI is coming. There is still a long road ahead with lots of ups and downs before that happens.
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The Underground Network Sneaking Nvidia Chips Into China (10 minute read)
There is a barely concealed network of buyers, sellers, and couriers bypassing the restrictions aimed at denying China's access to Nvidia's advanced AI chips. The flow of hardware is so steady that most of the sellers take preorders and promise delivery in weeks. Some even sell entire servers. Research institutions have been among the main buyers of the advanced AI chips. The market will likely remain robust and adaptive until viable domestically-made chips emerge in China.
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