Gadgets
Google Earth Timelapse Shows How Our Planet Changed in the Last 4 Decades
“Our planet has seen rapid environmental change in the past half-century — more than any other point in human history. The new Timelapse feature in Google Earth compiles 24 million satellite photos from the past 37 years into an interactive 4D experience,” Pichai said on Thursday.
“For the first time, we’ll put a vivid depiction of our rapidly changing planet into the hands of everyone, everywhere,” Rebecca Moore director of Google Earth, Earth Engine, and outreach told reporters during a news conference.
Now in the biggest update to Google Earth, since 2017, people will be able to see our planet in an entirely new dimension, she said.
“Timelapse in Google Earth is really a big leap forward. Because now our one static snapshot of the planet has become dynamic providing ongoing visual evidence of Earth’s changes from the climate and human behaviour occurring across space and time over four decades,” Moore said.
Timelapse, she said, was made possible because of the US government and European Union commitments to open and accessible data. These images were provided by NASA, US Geological Survey, European Commission, and the European Space Agency, she said.
Responding to a question, Moore said that Google is open to exploring similar collaboration with ISRO.
“For the past 15 years, billions of people have turned to Google Earth to explore our planet from endless vantage points. We like to say if Google maps is about finding your way, Google Earth has been about getting lost and we’ve focused on creating the most realistic digital representation of the planet that’s ever been put into the hands of the public with features that entertain people and enlighten people,” she said.
“As far as we know timelapse and Google Earth is the biggest video on the planet of our planet ever created,” she said.
“As you fly through Google Earth, the landscape underneath you is effortlessly animating over these four decades. And now billions of people around the world can experience this from their web browser or even their phones,” she said.
Karen St Germain, NASA”s Earth Science Director said that the NASA Google partnership is part of a major effort at NASA to explore connections with the commercial sector and nonprofit organisations to achieve through collaboration more than either of them could accomplish on their own.
Tools like Google Timelapse in 3d, use observations over time to visualise clearly for people how the planet is changing.
“This partnership with Google also enhances NASA”s open science initiative to create a collaborative, diverse culture that advances our science by freely sharing data with the scientific community and the public,” she said.
“Together. We can amplify our efforts to understand Earth as a system and to protect and improve life here on our home planet,” she added.
Dave Applegate from the US Geological Survey said that the 3D Timelapse content is derived in large part from five decades of the US Government’s investment in Landsat observations and data distribution.
“These substantial investments have created a Landsat archive containing nearly 300 billion square kilometres of global imagery. And each day we add about 40 million square kilometres, the size of Europe and North America combined to the archive,” he said.
Companies such as Google, he said, are unlocking this long time series of data to create innovative new products and services.
Matthias Petsche, who is director of space at the European Commission in Brussels said the European digital agenda recognises the importance of Earth observation data in fuel fuelling data-driven policies.
“It designates our Earth observation data as high-value datasets that should be open and properly accessible to policymakers and commercial solution providers alike, enabling access to Earth’s data for all citizens,” he said, adding that the European Union commits to remain a global data provider for at least the next decades.
“At Xbox, we believe that with better tools, creators can make even more extraordinary games,” Haiyan Zhang, GM, Xbox Gaming AI, said in a blog post. “This partnership will bring together: Inworld’s expertise in working with generative AI models for character development, Microsoft’s cutting-edge cloud-based AI solutions including Azure OpenAI Service, Microsoft Research’s technical insights into the future of play, and Team Xbox’s strengths in revolutionizing accessible and responsible creator tools for all developers.”
The aforementioned AI design copilot is a toolset that will help game designers turn prompts into scripts and dialogue trees. In contrast, the character runtime will enable dynamically generated plot beats and quests. We’ve already seen heavy AI integration in games by way of procedural generation — a more recent example being the 1000+ planets in Starfield. Not to mention, enemy AI has been around for way longer.
Inworld made headlines in August when it launched a modded story mode for Grand Theft Auto V, Sentient Streets, in which players had to investigate the rise of a bizarre AI-worshipping cult — a segment loaded with characters that spoke in AI-generated dialogue, on the fly. The mod was later taken down by publisher Take-Two, leaving a permanent strike on the creator Bloc’s YouTube channel. As per The Verge, Inworld’s AI technology can also be used for narration in top-down RPGs to warn players about any events awaiting off-screen and respond to questions like we’ve seen in the past year with AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Bing Chat. Microsoft has also been heavily banking on artificial intelligence, having made a $10 billion (about Rs. 83,254 crore) investment in OpenAI. The company has also integrated AI tools into its popular suite of services and also added an AI copilot to Windows.
Despite being a Microsoft-affiliated AI toolset, it would be interesting to see whether titles using them will be allowed to thrive on other platforms. In July, Valve claimed that it would be cracking down on games that included AI-generated assets if the developer didn’t own the copyright to the piece of art. For the uninitiated, when you insert a prompt to create something in AI, the software simply repurposes existing assets found online and mushes them together — basically stealing from other artists and writers without appropriate commercial licenses. Infringing them would lead to the game not being distributed on Steam, forcing the developers to seek proper licenses for the asset by reaching out to the AI companies involved. It’s unclear how Microsoft’s partnership will play out — as long as AI content is being used as a catalyst to innovate and create something new, it should be fine.
In a post on X shared by BSNL’s Andhra Pradesh (@bsnl_ap_circle) unit, the company confirmed that BSNL users can upgrade their older 2G or 3G SIMs to a 4G SIM for free. Not only will the upgrade be free, but a promotional image shared with the post suggests that users who opt for the upgrade will also receive 4GB of free data that will be valid for three months. It is speculated that BSNL is aiming to boost its upcoming 4G services with this offer. The announcement was first spotted by Telecom Talk.
To access the free data offer and the free upgrade, BSNL users are requested to get in touch with executives at BSNL’s Customer Service Centre, franchisee or retailer stores, or contact one of their Direct Selling Agents (DSA). The promo image also adds in a finer print that the offer is available with certain terms and conditions, but hasn’t detailed any, so far.
Reliance’s Jio recently launched the 4G-supported Bharat B1 feature phone in India. The handset is priced at Rs. 1,299 in India. Alongside 4G connectivity, the phone comes with JioCinema and JioSaavn applications pre-installed.
The Jio Bharat B1 is equipped with the JioPay application, which is said to allow users to make UPI payments. Aiming to increase accessibility, the phone supports 23 languages overall, including multiple regional languages.
Realme, via Weibo, announced the arrival of the Realme GT 5 Pro in China. The display of the handset is confirmed to offer 3000 nits peak brightness. It has also been teased to offer heat dissipation with a surface area of around 10,000mm2. It is confirmed to ship with Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SoC. The post doesn’t specify the exact launch date of the smartphone, however, given the release of the teasers, the launch could be just around the corner.
The Realme GT 5 Pro has been in the news a lot lately. It is expected to feature a 6.78-inch (1,264×2,780 pixels) AMOLED display and is tipped to come in 8GB, 12GB, and 16GB RAM options along with 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB inbuilt storage options.
For optics, the Realme GT 5 Pro is said to have a triple rear camera unit comprising two 50-megapixel sensors and an 8-megapixel shooter at the rear. The camera setup might include a Sony LYTIA LYT808 sensor, an OmniVision OV08D10 secondary sensor, and a Sony IMX890 telephoto sensor. For selfies, there could be a 32-megapixel sensor at the front. It is said to carry a 5,400mAh battery with support for 100W wired charging and 50W wireless charging.
The Realme GT 5 Pro is expected to come with upgrades over Realme GT 5. The latter was launched in China in August with a price tag of CNY 2,999 for the base model with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage.
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