Google is one of the biggest companies on Earth. Google's search engine is the front door to the internet. And according to recent reports, Google is scrambling. Late last year, OpenAI, an artificial intelligence company at the forefront of the field, released ChatGPT. Alongside Elon Musk's Twitter acquisition and fallout from FTX's crypto implosion, breathless chatter about ChatGPT and generative AI has been ubiquitous.

The result of eight years of reporting, this deft chronicle delves into the story of Bobby Johnson, a sixteen-year-old from New Haven, who, in 2006, was coerced into confessing to a brutal murder he didn't commit. Dawidoff presents portraits of the individuals involved, juxtaposed with research on segregation, the Great Migration, and mass incarceration. Bobby, though widely considered innocent, was convicted because he "fit a false stereotype about how things worked in poor neighborhoods." This musical study charts the rise of Romanticism, in the nineteenth century, as composers came to see individual voice as the key to emotional expression, and began to assert their "existential being through a recognizable, even idiosyncratic musical language." Walsh provides biographical sketches of composers and assessments of their work, and weaves in subplots across decades and geography--the impact of nationalism, the development of program music, the ubiquitous spectre of Beethoven.

Los Angeles – A mysterious metal monolith found in the remote desert of the western United States, sparking a national guessing game over how it got there, has apparently disappeared, officials said. The Bureau of Land Management in Utah said Saturday it had received "credible reports" that the object had been removed "by an unknown party" on Friday evening. The bureau "did not remove the structure which is considered private property," it said in a statement. "We do not investigate crimes involving private property which are handled by the local sheriff's office." The shiny, triangular pillar which protruded some 12 feet from the red rocks of southern Utah, was spotted on Nov. 18 by baffled local officials counting bighorn sheep from the air.

When an artificial intelligence-powered "swarm" correctly predicted the order of the top four finishers in last year's Kentucky Derby, the surprising story got picked up around the world. For the 2017 Derby, artificial intelligence learned the same lesson that has been beating up dyed-in-the-wool handicappers for over a century: horse racing is the most unpredictable sport on the planet. This year's swarm only predicted two of the four top finishers--Always Dreaming and Classic Empire--and it had the pair in the wrong order. The swarm picked Always Dreaming fourth while the colt ended up controlling the race and winning easily. Classic Empire was the disputed top selection of the swarm but he barely nabbed fourth place in the race on Saturday.

In May 2016, a relatively unknown startup called Unanimous A.I. made big headlines when its AI-based platform used collective intelligence to create a prediction for the Kentucky Derby superfecta--the top four horses, in order of finish. It made exactly the right pick, which returned $541.10 on a $1 bet. As TechRepublic reported, Churchill Downs took notice last year and decided to collaborate with Unanimous A.I. to create an official AI swarm made up of handicappers and racing analysts to predict the top finishers for this year's Derby. The track is calling this the "super-expert" Derby pick. On Wednesday, the handicappers logged into Unanimous A.I.'s UNU platform from across the US, and answered a series of questions that gradually narrowed down their picks from the field of 20 horses until they created consensus on the top four picks and the order of finish: While last year's swarm was clear-cut because it was a top-heavy field with a few outstanding horses, this year's swarm reflected the fact that the race is more of a toss-up in 2017.