Enter Imagine, yet another AI-powered image generator
We’re honestly getting a little tired of introducing every new piece of artificially intelligent (AI) software that hits the streets. There’s a good chance that whatever’s hot right now is hailing from one of the same four or five big companies and shills some mightily similar tech to what OpenAI probably cooked up six months ago. Meet Imagine, Meta’s latest piece of AI wizardry, taking on the form of a standalone web-based image generator.
Surprised? We doubt it. Imagine is just the latest AI-powered image generator on the market, joining the likes of Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, DALL-E, and one of OpenAI’s numerous image-centric GPTs already out there. You might’ve already heard of Imagine, which previously existed as a feature and lived inside Meta’s AI chatbot before leapfrogging itself and coming to play with the big boys.
Whether it’ll garner a larger audience this way remains to be seen. It’s functionally no different from those competitors we mentioned, allowing humans to conjure up four high-res images at a time by just hitting their keys in the correct order. It’s running on Emu, Meta’s ‘image foundation model.” It’s a free experience, though it’ll be a minute before South Africa can get in on the action.
Imagine’s biggest diversion from the competition is its watermarking techniques. Every image ‘imagined’ comes complete with a visible watermark for now, though Meta reckons it’ll be rolling out invisible watermarks over the coming weeks to better support “transparency and traceability.” A deep learning model will be handling the watermarks — invisible to the naked eye — but that can be detected using a corresponding model.
Space Force and SpaceX team up
Space Force isn’t just a terrible TV series. It’s also home to the Penatagon’s real-life interest in the space industry — Space Force — a far more secretive operation than, say, SpaceX, Blue Origin, or NASA. Today, however, it’ll be sharing some of the limelight, with the news that one of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rockets would be charged with getting the Space Force’s X-37B space plane up into low-Earth orbit.
It’s not a first for the X-37B, which has taken to the skies a total of six times thus far. The mission alongside the Falcon Heavy rocket was initially scheduled for liftoff on Sunday, 10 December, before being delayed to Monday, 11 December. The launch will now be taking place during a ten-minute window at 8:14 PM EST, 11 December. For any South Africans looking to get a glimpse, that’ll be 03:15 AM on Tuesday, 12 December.
It’ll be streamed on YouTube right here, with things kicking off at 02:55 AM. It’ll also be going live on X.com at the official SpaceX account at the same time. Space Force has kept specifics of the mission to a low, but an official statement from the company reads:
“X-37B Mission 7, also known as OTV-7, will expand the United States Space Force’s knowledge of the space environment by experimenting with future space domain awareness technologies. These tests are integral in ensuring safe, stable, and secure operations in space for all users of the domain.”
Lego’s SLR camera looks awesome (and we want one)
Being friends with a camera nerd is difficult — especially around the holiday season (we would know). Sure, there’s hardly any mystery involved when it comes to picking up a gift for the morning of the 25th, but doing so might leave you more beggarly than a typical December. Lego is solving that problem by whipping out a new Retro Camera SLR build set. There’s just one issue: it’s only coming out next year. Ah, there’s always next Christmas, right?
And yes, we’re aware of the hypocrisy. Lego doesn’t exactly inspire non-beggarly ideals. The last time Lego dropped a new set that caught our attention, it had the gall to ask for R10,000. Replacing a piece of camera kit with a Lego set isn’t going to do much price-wise. Except, in this case, it just might. Lego’s stayed its hand here and is releasing the SLR kit as part of a 3-in-1 set for only $20. That’s what the website says, at least.
And once you’re finished building the camera using the included 261 pieces, you’ll be able to take it apart and build something entirely new. That’s the gimmick of the Creator 3-in-1 sets, allowing users to build three different designs using the same amount of pieces. When it isn’t a camera, those pieces can be turned into an analogue TV set or a video camera that’s got room for some fake film, too.
The Lego site mentions a 1 January 2024 release date, though it doesn’t appear to have pre-orders up just yet. The launch is a global one, so you can expect to see them turn up in South Africa eventually.
Apple’s USB-C push is (apparently) coming soon
While the iPhone 15 released earlier this year is already touting USB-C functionality, plenty of Apple’s Mac accessories weren’t so lucky. Most are still rocking those dastardly Lightning ports, with no official plan to make the jump to USB-C yet on the cards. But if the latest rumours coming out of Instant Digital (via 9to5Mac) are true, Apple is planning on a widespread refresh come “spring 2024”. (That’s March, April, or May for South Africa).
While a report from Instant Digital isn’t much proof on its own, it does corroborate with a report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman that the world would be seeing a refresh for the iPad and Mac line-ups sometime in March. It would make sense for Apple to bite the bullet and start pumping out those new USB-C cables around the same time, too.
The Mac accessories still awaiting a refresh are the Magic Keyboard, Trackpad, and Mouse, so we’d recommend holding off on buying those for the time being.