D&T Issue 85

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

A simple question, can the CEO of the business that runs WordPress.com save the internet? Protocol’s David Pierce tries to find out a thing or two about about Matt Mullenweg, his work as CEO of Automattic and the efforts he is putting into getting WiFi anywhere, for anyone – a generally dicey problem statement.

With that out of the way, let’s get into the reads from this week.

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When designing a product, simple isn’t necessarily synonymous with plain, so what exactly is the difference between plain and simple? Canvs Editorial breaks it down in this piece on UX Collective.

Many Big Tech companies have created platforms that offer businesses tips and tools and services to better target their customers online. These can be helpful — but anybody relying on them needs to be very careful.

Hour One lets people rent out their faces to help businesses make highly realistic videos.

This may be remembered as the year when the world learned that lethal autonomous weapons had moved from a futuristic worry to a battlefield reality.

While the chip company is bullish on the possibilities of the metaverse in abstract, Intel raises a key issue with realizing any metaverse ambitions: there’s not nearly enough processing power to go around.

Despite high points like Dune and Squid Game, the year was full of letdowns. Perhaps we wanted too much.

The Chile peppers NASA is growing thrived in a controlled microgravity environment. But to develop agriculture away from Earth, NASA will have to think outside the box.

Sweeping the human story into a cosmic tale is a thrill but we should be wary about what is overlooked in the grandeur.

While Indian startups are turning unicorns faster than ever before, it takes approximately 13.8 years for an Indian startup to go public.