D&T Issue 69

Hi there!
Hope you’re having a splendid week thus far.

Turns out the past 18 months of us looking at ourselves through video calls has had potentially irreversible effects on our self-image. Aptly coined ‘Zoom Dysmorphia’ is a thing and it’s here to stay – not just in our virtual, but also in our real lives.

We’ve got some good reads for you so let’s jump right in.

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From our very own Canvs Editorial, this piece looks at how the most innovative companies based out of Silicon Valley, the likes of Apple, Facebook, Google & Gojek, broke the design trends to succeed.

Some fintech firms have been offering credit via Unified Payments Interface, allowing customers to borrow instantly by just scanning a QR code. While the facility is fast gaining acceptance, UPI credit operates in a regulatory grey area.

Former salespeople say the company pushes its products on parents who can’t afford them. The company also made it hard for people to get refunds, meaning that they’d get to the end of the 15-day free trial and be unable to opt out.

The trial for the founder of Theranos, the once high-flying blood testing start-up, will cap a saga of Silicon Valley hubris, ambition and deception.

The world’s second-largest internet market is just too big and too important to ignore. But companies are also unlikely to acquiescence entirely.

AI-powered characters based on real people can star in thousands of videos and say anything, in any language and in the process, make money.

ASML’s next-generation extreme ultraviolet lithography machines achieve previously unattainable levels of precision, which means chips can keep shrinking for years to come.

Why are links blue? Who decided to make them blue? When was this decision made, and how has this decision made such a lasting impact?

A look at how insulin is made on a commercial scale, in the context of a growing movement of biohackers looking to build a more distributed system of insulin production. The goal is to make insulin affordable.

The Oscar-winning composer and producer explains his sampling process and why you don’t need to record an entire orchestra to get good sounds.

Massive creates computer-generated armies using artificial intelligence to simulate realistic battles at tremendous scales. It’s an evolutionary story spanning 20 years and some great projects to boast about.