Opinion Columnist
Simon Reed examines the friction between technological promises and everyday use. His columns focus on product disappointments, unintended consequences and the work left to users when a system falls short. He is skeptical of novelty for its own sake.
1,060 published articles · Showing 121–140
In a development that promises more digital noise and a glut of entertainment, OpenAI has rolled out new real-time voice models aiming to simplify the creation of advanced voice agents, while Sony anticipates an impending flood of video games fueled by what it calls "efficient" A...
Read article →One might have hoped that the collective intelligence of humanity, or at least a particularly advanced calculator, would have found better things to do than to relentlessly shove artificial intelligence into every conceivable crevice of our already beleaguered healthcare system....
Read article →A new research paper, titled "HCInfer: An Efficient Inference System via Error Compensation for Resource-Constrained Devices," proposes yet another method for squeezing large language models (LLMs) onto the inadequate hardware of consumer-grade devices arXiv CS. LG....
Read article →The endless quest to make AI truly useful beyond generating questionable images continues, with two new research papers published on arXiv CS. LG on May 8, 2026, highlighting incremental but crucial efforts to overcome fundamental data representation challenges in biological and...
Read article →On May 8, 2026, a cluster of academic papers published on arXiv CS. LG exposed a persistent, perhaps even deepening, frustration in the ongoing quest to reliably control, correct, and optimize Large Language Model (LLM) behavior....
Read article →Another day, another deluge of research papers attempting to patch the perpetually leaking hull of large language models and transformers. Today, the arXiv pre-print server, a repository of academic ambition and often, just more disappointment, released a fresh batch of studies a...
Read article →Apple, in its relentless quest to ensure no facet of human experience remains unobserved, is reportedly pushing its AI-powered AirPods with integrated cameras closer to mass production The Verge. This development suggests a future where our audio accessories are not merely listen...
Read article →Just when one thought the digital content landscape couldn't possibly accommodate more noise, a new command-line tool, aptly named 'Save to Spotify', has emerged to ensure a fresh deluge of AI-generated audio. Released on May 7, 2026, this GitHub utility allows AI agents like Ope...
Read article →It turns out that letting AI conjure web applications in seconds has the entirely predictable consequence of exposing sensitive data en masse. Simultaneously, elsewhere in the AI ecosystem, supposedly advanced security scanners are proving remarkably oblivious to malicious code h...
Read article →On what can only be described as a rather typical Tuesday, a torrent of academic papers has spilled forth from arXiv CS. AI, each one a meticulously detailed testament to the various, seemingly infinite ways artificial intelligence continues to disappoint....
Read article →Reducing the sheer complexity of Meta's Llama-3. 2 models can paradoxically improve their instruction-following capabilities, according to new research published today on arXiv....
Read article →The grand, if perpetually misguided, efforts to improve user experience continue their inevitable march towards universal dissatisfaction. Recent reports highlight a familiar refrain: a redesigned homepage garners a deluge of feedback, ranging from the mildly encouraging to the b...
Read article →Google DeepMind, in a move that promises to test AI's capacity for navigating utterly vast and frequently pointless digital landscapes, has announced a partnership with the venerable space-faring simulation, EVE Online Ars Technica. This development signals a persistent industry ...
Read article →Seven new preprints, simultaneously dropped onto arXiv CS. LG, reveal the machine learning research community’s continued, almost Sisyphean, struggle with Graph Neural Networks....
Read article →One might assume that the tireless pursuit of artificial intelligence would, eventually, lead to something genuinely revolutionary. Instead, we are presented, on what was clearly a busy day for arXiv researchers, with more iterative steps along paths well-trodden....
Read article →Another Monday, another seemingly endless stream of academic papers touting incremental advancements in artificial intelligence, particularly its tireless struggle to make itself useful, or at least less unreliable, in healthcare. This week, arXiv saw a fresh wave of research, al...
Read article →In 1990, an echo of the future iPhone emerged from the ambitions of three former Apple employees, only to vanish, leaving behind an enduring question about the true cost of innovation and user-centric design Wired. Decades later, the market continues its predictable churn, with n...
Read article →A recent research paper published on arXiv on May 4, 2026, reveals a glaring vulnerability in Large Language Models (LLMs): they can be easily misled by semantically-invariant permutations of tabular data. This finding casts a long, familiar shadow over their much-touted reliabil...
Read article →Another day, another digital playground brawl, this time featuring allegations of 'ominous texts' from Elon Musk to OpenAI's leadership, alongside testimony from his sole expert witness warning of an AGI arms race. As the legal battle unfolds, it seems the pursuit of artificial g...
Read article →As if the sheer pointlessness of existence wasn't enough to contend with, consumers are once again being subjected to the annual onslaught of 'event-based deals,' with retailers breathlessly attempting to convince us that purchasing discounted items for Mother's Day or Star Wars...
Read article →