AI lets anyone create videos, but many AI video creation tools lack support for audio. Mirelo is building AI that adds soundtracks to match the video’s action. Earlier this year, the Berlin-based startup released Mirelo SFX v1.5, an AI model that interprets videos to add synced sound effects (SFX). This attracted attention from VCs gearing … Read more
Fusion power has the potential to rewrite trillion-dollar energy markets, but first, startups have to prove their designs will work and won’t be too costly. Neither is easy, especially when considering the massive magnets and lasers used in many designs must be installed with millimeter precision or better. Fusion startup Thea Energy says it’s pixel-inspired … Read more
Amazon has launched a new AI feature in the Kindle app that gives spoiler-free answers to questions about the book you’re reading, and confirmed that authors can’t opt out from the feature. The company calls Ask this Book an “expert reading assistant” in its announcement, and says that it’s capable of answering questions about “plot … Read more
WhenWhen he was 19 years old, Brendan Foody started Mercor with two of his high school friends as a way for his other friends, who also had startups, to hire software engineers overseas. It launched in 2023 as essentially a staffing agency, albeit a highly automated one. Language models reviewed resumes and did the interviewing. … Read more
A collision in space was narrowly avoided last week when a newly deployed Chinese satellite came within a few hundred meters of one of the roughly 9,000 Starlink satellites currently operating in low Earth orbit. SpaceX is laying the blame on the satellite operator for not sharing location data. “When satellite operators do not share … Read more
As I noted at the time, the new Roombas iRobot had staked its financial future on shared little to no DNA with the original Roombas, and looked like much of the mid-range competition — generic, Lidar-based robot vacs with the Roomba name and a few design tweaks plastered on. I’ve tested two of the new … Read more
After 35 years, the maker of the Roomba robot vacuum filed for bankruptcy protection late Sunday night. Following issuing warnings earlier this year that it was fast running out of options, iRobot announced it will enter Chapter 11 protection and plans to be acquired by its contract manufacturer, the Chinese-based Picea Robotic. The company says … Read more
There’s something painfully American about the arc of iRobot, the company that taught your vacuum to navigate around the furniture. Founded in 1990 in Bedford, Massachusetts by MIT roboticist Rodney Brooks and his former students Colin Angle and Helen Greiner, the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Sunday, ending a 35-year run that took … Read more
WhatsApp, Meta’s messaging app that millions of Indians rely on daily, is facing a critical moment in India as recent government directions threaten to disrupt how the platform works for everyday users and businesses. Issued late last month and made public earlier this month, the directions ask certain app-based communication services to keep accounts continuously … Read more
My introduction to Sudan Archives was the song “Nont for Sale” from her first EP Sink in 2018. I’ve been a die-hard fan ever since. With each album, she finds new ways to sculpt the sound of her violin, contorting it in defiance of expectations. Athena found her in conversation with it, leaving its timbre … Read more