With a continued emphasis on team-based collaboration, IBM leadership envisioned a place to bring its diverse business units under one roof in Manhattan. Once again, they tapped Gensler (the firm completed IBM’s Toronto office) to design the 270,000-square-foot headquarters in the Flatiron District.

Located at One Madison Avenue, the new flagship centralizes the tech company’s New York workforce, highlighting a visionary, forward-focused culture. “We really start with the user experience and mapping those journeys, and there was an opportunity for impromptu connections between team members that didn’t always work together,” says John Budesa, studio director and senior associate at Gensler.

The ground floor lobby features a striking 40-foot-long Quantum Wave sculpture that captures the energy within the space, a visual representation of emerging and future technologies. A reception area on the second floor includes the circular Blue Bar. A central gathering spot with sweeping views of Madison Square Park, it serves as a coffee bar during the day, and doubles as a cocktail bar after work hours. At the Innovation Studio, a dedicated customer-centric space with a range of briefing rooms, partners can co-create with staff members and experience IBM’s work first-hand.

The headquarters accommodates more than 2,000 employees, so the workspace is divided into three key zones, which Budesa describes as “an ecosystem of spaces that support innovation,” offering flexibility and choice. Individual zones are ideal for independent, focused tasks, while collaboration areas are suitable for meetings. Community sections are places for relaxation or get-togethers with colleagues.

These sectors have varied lighting and multiple types of furnishings throughout to support individuals as they perform tasks. There’s less rigidity, yet the pieces are not only limited to the ultra-soft lounge styles that have been favored in recent seasons. Seating in particular was chosen for comfortable efficiency, which for Budesa means that each chair is functional no matter where it is in the building. A prime amenities hub is on the 10th floor, with a full-service kitchen, café, and an auditorium that can host up to 300 people.

IBM is also known as Big Blue, and pops of the brand’s cobalt tone are used strategically throughout the office to signal signature moments, whether on a wall covered with acoustic felt, or surrounding a staircase. Materials are deftly combined, referencing the bridge between man and machine. Wood and stone elements honor our connection to the natural world. In contrast, polished metals, reflective surfaces, and computer chip-like textures provide futuristic flair.

The standout is a 25,000-square-foot outdoor oasis, designed in partnership with RGR Landscape. The largest commercial office terrace in the city, it boasts 40 species of live plants, half of which are native to New York. Enabled for work, every seat has power, and Wi-Fi is available. There are also areas that are perfect for large-scale events, and on the east side, more private settings allow people to recharge even in the midst of the bustling city.

Budesa explains that the expansive headquarters was planned with seamless movement in mind as users navigate in and out of the various zones. “It’s about those dynamic environments that increase the caliber of the experience,” he notes.

For more information on Gensler and IBM’s new hub, visit gensler.com.

Photography by Alexander Severin.

Flock, the automatic license plate reader (ALPR) company whose cameras are installed in more than 5,000 communities in the U.S., is building a product that will use people lookup tools, data brokers, and data breaches to “jump from LPR [license plate reader] to person,” allowing police to much more easily identify and track the movements of specific people around the country without a warrant or court order, according to internal Flock presentation slides, Slack chats, and meeting audio obtained by 404 Media.

The news turns Flock, already a controversial technology, into a much more invasive tool, potentially able to link a vehicle passing by a camera to its owner and then more people connected to them, through marriage or other association. The new product development has also led to Flock employees questioning the ethics of using hacked data as part of their surveillance product, according to the Slack chats. Flock told 404 Media the tool is already being used by some law enforcement agencies in an early access program.

Flock’s new product, called Nova, will supplement license plate data with a wealth of personal information sourced from other companies and the wider web, according to the material obtained by 404 Media. “You're going to be able to access data and jump from LPR to person and understand what that context is, link to other people that are related to that person [...] marriage or through gang affiliation, et cetera,” a Flock employee said during an internal company meeting, according to an audio recording. “There’s very powerful linking.” One Slack message said that Nova supports 20 different data sources that agencies can toggle on or off.

Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), the visual effects studio that practically invented the field as we know it today, revealed how it thinks it will use generative AI in the future, and that future looks really bad. 

Much of what we understand today as special effects in movies was born at Industrial ILM, which was built to produce many of the iconic shots in Star Wars: A New Hope. Since 1977, through the ages of miniature models, puppeteering, and the bleeding edge of computer generated images, ILM has remained at the forefront of making the impossible come alive on movie screens. 

For that reason, when ILM’s chief creative gets on stage and announces that not only does the studio see a future where generative AI, a technology that’s maligned by so many artists and that to my unprofessional eye almost always looks like shit, is not only going to become a part of its creative process in the future, but that he’s going to give us a sneak peak at that future, I’m going to listen to him very seriously. 

Unfortunately, what he revealed as the possible AI-generated future of Star Wars is probably the most embarrassing Star Wars branded thing I’ve ever seen, including the Christmas special. It is a two-minute short film called Star Wars: Field Guide, and the premise is what you would see if you sent a probe droid out to a new planet. It was created by one artist at ILM in two weeks, and it’s just a parade of cookiecutter AI generated animals with soaring John Williams-esque music playing in the background. Every single creature in the short AI-generated “film” is just an animal you know mixed with another animal or weird feature I can easily imagine was created with a prompt given to any number free-to-use AI image or video generators: Zebra gorilla. Peacock slug. Tiger polar bear. Flamingo iguana. Blue goat. Ape spider. Crocodile turtle. Blue lion. Lemur owl. Sloth with diamonds in fur. Koala. Straight up koala, no sci-fi twist or nothing. Just a normal koala. 

I know it sounds like I’m randomly putting names of animals together but I’m being 100 percent descriptive. These are the creatures in the video from the visual effects studio that made Star Wars, and the head of the studio is proudly presenting it at a TED Talk as if this is a good, bright future.

Rob Bredow, a Lucasfilm SVP who oversees ILM, gave what started as a stereotypically rousing TED Talk about the subject, recounting the studio’s early days and how it evolved with the times while still holding on to the practical magic that made it special. Bredow makes the point that every new technology it’s seen over the years builds on top of what came before it and is folded into the studio’s existing methods while always prioritizing the vision of artists and filmmakers. For example, Bredow tells the story of how some people at ILM lured producer Kathleen Kennedy with a looping video of a 3D animated T-rex in order to incorporate 3D graphics into Jurassic Park, which originally was going to use miniatures and stop motion. Bredow also rightly points out that face swapping tech works very well for “de-aging” actors, like Harrison Ford in the most recent Indiana Jones, but one reason it looks much better than anything you can produce with an iPhone app is that it’s also it’s using a meticulously crafted 3D models and other effects. 

The gist of Bredow’s argument is that there are a lot of scary headlines about AI coming for people’s jobs in the visual effects and animation fields, but he believes that generative AI will only empower artists to better realize their vision. It’s a convincing argument that’s coming from someone who knows what he’s talking about and clearly cares about the craft, as opposed to an executive at an AI company with billions in venture capital who is desperately trying to realize a return on investment, which is who is usually delivering the pitch on the wonders of generative AI. 

But then Bredow revealed “what happens when you put the latest AI tools in the hands of talented artists” to exemplify what he calls “artist-driven innovation,” and the result was very bad.

One thing Star Wars is known for is its amazing creature designs. The Tauntaun, the Bantha, the Rancor. Notably all of them were originally created with practical effects, but even when they were recreated digitally years later, they are still based on something a human being designed and that has managed to capture the imagination of millions of people for generations.  

Star Wars “Field Guide” on the other hand, like most AI generated art, is creature design mad libs. 

Heute lernte ich: Pfeifhasen haben in der Zeit, in der kein Schnee liegt, richtig zu tun, um Vorräte anzusammeln.

„Die Nahrung der Pfeifhasen besteht vorwiegend aus Gräsern, Kräutern und Pflanzenstängeln. Für die nahrungsarmen Winter legen sie Nahrungsvorräte aus Heu an. Dazu beißen sie Gräser knapp oberhalb der Wurzel ab, lassen sie manchmal in der Sonne trocknen und bringen sie dann in ihre Baue. Ein Lager eines einzelnen Tieres kann bis zu sechs Kilogramm Heu umfassen.“

Und weil das Sammeln halt wirklich Arbeit ist, beklauen sie manchmal ihre Artgenossen. Die Schlingel.

(Direktlink)

Habt ihr euer Projekt bei Github?

Told you so.

Github weist jetzt Zugriffe ohne Github-Login ab, auch auf öffentliche open source repos. Nicht allgemein, die ersten 3 oder 4 gehen wohl durch, aber dann klotzt ein Rate Limit rein.

Mit anderen Worten: Microsoft (Besitzer von Github) kapituliert vor der radioaktiven Ebola-Beulenpest der "KI"-Scraper, die sie selbst in die Welt gesetzt haben.

Ein Leser berichtet von der neuen EU Vulnerability Database (nachdem Trump das Funding gestoppt hat, wollte die EU schnell einspringen und eine eigene Datenbank aufbauen). Digitale Souveränität und so.

wie bestimmt schon mitbekommen ist die "EU Vulnerability Database" on-line gegangen diese Tage.

Nachdem Trump überall die Axt anlegt, so wegen Unabhängigkeit von den USA usw. usw.

Ruft man https://euvd.enisa.europa.eu/ auf und hat JavaScript deaktiviert, kommt die lustige Meldung "You need to enable JavaScript to run this app." die fast immer nur kommt, wenn die Seite bei Azure liegt und irgendwelcher ranziger Mist eingebunden ist.

Und in der Tat, die IP liegt bei Microsoft Azure was dann natürlich total unabhängig von den USA ist.

Einmal "fremdschäm" bitte

Schöner kann man den Unterschied zwischen Security und Compliance-Theater kaum illustrieren, findet ihr nicht?