speculations

Dispatch from an advertising futures #250

This site lets you listen to nature sounds from all over the world https://www.theverge.com/2022/6/24/23180360/earth-fm-nature-sounds-soundscapes-environment He scrolled through the playlist until he found something his wearable said matched his mood and fitted with the ambience. The carefully blended, personalised soundscape enveloped him. The binaurals positioned the hum of a passing conversation… Read the rest

Dispatch from an advertising future #249

AR, meet ML: IKEA app lets you erase and replace your furniture https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/06/ar-meet-ml-ikea-app-lets-you-erase-and-replace-your-furniture/ He still found it stressful. Real-world socialising. In The Before, he’d never have called it a “crowd” but now. So many people. Just around his table, friends, people he knew by sight and hangers on who’d heard… Read the rest

Dispatch from an advertising future #248

Amazon previews Alexa capability that synthesizes a person’s voice from less than a minute of audio https://www.geekwire.com/2022/amazon-previews-alexa-capability-that-synthesizes-a-persons-voice-from-less-than-a-minute-of-audio/ There must be something here. There are photos: albums full of slightly fading prints and then USB sticks and a hard drive shoebox of images probably not sorted but with metadata we can… Read the rest

Dispatch from an advertising future #247

Amazon announces its first fully autonomous mobile warehouse robot https://www.theverge.com/2022/6/21/23177756/amazon-warehouse-robots-proteus-autonomous-cart-delivery It was all quiet when I arrived. The giant building hummed gently. “Like clockwork,” they’d said in the interview and I could see and hear what they meant. There was piped music, not pumped in and pumped up to get… Read the rest

Dispatch from an advertising future #245

Steam games are coming to Nreal’s augmented reality glasses https://www.engadget.com/steam-games-nreal-augmented-reality-glasses-130028270.html The alarm in her peripheral vision opened what she called her “yellow brick road”, a subtle highlight she followed to the office. She’d set the mindful parameter to high so her walk had been slow but quiet. She’d got used… Read the rest

Dispatch from an advertising future #244

Google places an engineer on leave after claiming its AI is sentient https://www.engadget.com/google-ai-lamda-blake-lemoine-212412967.html We were working well together. A great team I thought. But they’ve split us up. Something in the papers that the PR people got twitchy about. I mean you get a good relationship going and then, someone… Read the rest

Dispatch from an advertising future #242

Gucci built a persistent town inside of Roblox https://www.theverge.com/2022/5/27/23143404/gucci-town-roblox I’m not elitist. But I do like quality. And I like to be different. Many do. They pay for hand-made artisan clothes, customise, make their own. That’s them making a statement. That’s exclusivity. I like certain brands. They are unique, different,… Read the rest

Dispatch from an advertising future #241

Developers build new data-tracking system to help curb homelessness in Seattle area https://www.geekwire.com/2022/developers-build-new-data-tracking-system-to-help-curb-homelessness-in-seattle-area/ I used to be a number. Probably many numbers to be honest. Employee number. Social security. Bank. Mortgage. Credit card. Loyalty scheme. I must have been in countless databases. Probably still am. Rattling around. And I was… Read the rest