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The World
Protests flared across Israel after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sacked his defense minister Yoav Gallant for calling for a halt to a contentious judicial overhaul, warning that it was a threat to national security. The fight over the proposals, which would significantly weaken the powers of the judiciary, has plunged Israel into an escalating political crisis, unsettling investors, alarming its allies, and sparking the biggest wave of protests for more than a decade. Further demonstrations erupted after the news of Gallant’s dismissal broke on Sunday, with thousands of Israelis blocking the main highway in Tel Aviv, and others clashing with police outside Netanyahu’s residence in Jerusalem. Israeli media reported that protests were taking place in more than 150 locations. Israel’s consul-general in New York resigned in protest. (Financial Times)
Prime Minister Netanyahu and Shas party leader Aryeh Deri are in favor of halting the advancement of the judicial overhaul legislation. The ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party has said it will support any decision made by Netanyahu. Justice Minister Levin and his close allies, and National Security Minister Ben Gvir are still in favor of pushing forward with the legislation, the unsourced report says. (Times of Israel)
North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles into the sea off its east coast on Monday morning, South Korea's military said, the latest in a series of launches as a U.S. aircraft carrier is set to arrive in South Korea. Both missiles appear to have landed outside Japan's exclusive economic zone, according to the Japanese government. (Reuters)
NATO slammed Vladimir Putin for "dangerous" nuclear rhetoric after the Russian president announced plans to station tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, while Russian forces intensified shelling of the frontline Ukrainian city of Avdiivka. The move, while not unexpected, is one of Russia's most pronounced nuclear signals yet and a warning to NATO over its military support for Ukraine, which has called for a meeting of the U.N. Security Council in response. (Reuters)
The Pentagon is seeking to enlist Silicon Valley startups in its effort to fund and develop new weapons technology and more-nimble suppliers, as the U.S. races to keep pace with China’s military advances. The push to tap private capital comes in the midst of concern that U.S. defense-industry consolidation has led to dependence on a few large companies that rely on government funding for research and is hampering innovation. Meanwhile, China has pulled ahead in some key technologies, ranging from small drones to hypersonic missiles, helped by Beijing’s use of external public-private guidance funds, according to current and former Pentagon officials. Steve Blank, co-founder of the Gordian Knot Center for National Security Innovation at Stanford University, said some estimates place Beijing’s capital infusion into the tech sector at more than $1 trillion. “China is organized like Silicon Valley,” and the Pentagon is organized more like a Detroit auto maker, he said. “That’s not a fair fight.” (Wall Street Journal)
Ukraine and the International Monetary Fund have agreed on a $15.6 billion loan package aimed at shoring up government finances severely strained by Russia’s invasion and leveraging even more support by reassuring allies that Ukraine is pursuing strong economic policies and fighting corruption. Ukraine’s finance ministry said Wednesday that the program will “help to mobilize financing from Ukraine’s international partners, as well as to maintain macrofinancial stability and ensure the path to post-war reconstruction after Ukrainian victory in the war against the aggressor.” (Associated Press)
Greenland Solves the Daylight Saving Time Debate: This island country is switching up its time zone and saying goodbye to the twice-yearly clock change starting March 25. (Bloomberg)
Economy
First Citizens is in advanced talks to acquire Silicon Valley Bank after its collapse earlier this month, according to people familiar with the matter. First Citizens could reach a deal as soon as Sunday to acquire Silicon Valley Bank from the FDIC. No final decision has been made and talks could fall through. (Bloomberg)
Money market funds swell by over $286bn as investors pull deposits from banks: Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Fidelity are the biggest winners from investors pouring cash into US money market funds over the past two weeks, as the collapse of two regional US banks and the rescue deal for Credit Suisse raised concerns about the safety of bank deposits. More than $286bn has flooded into money market funds so far in March, making it the biggest month of inflows since the depths of the Covid-19 crisis. (Financial Times)
China’s economic rebound weaker than expected, warns Maersk: One of world’s largest shipping groups says country’s consumers are still ‘stunned’ by Covid disruptions. (Financial Times)
Work-From-Home Era Ends for Millions of Americans: Some 72.5% of business establishments said their employees teleworked rarely or not at all last year, according to a Labor Department report. That figure climbed from 60.1% in 2021. The survey showed about 21 million more workers on-site full time in 2022, compared with the prior year. An establishment is defined as each business location—such as an individual restaurant in a chain. The new number is also close to the share of establishments—76.7%—that said they had no employees teleworking before the Covid-19 pandemic, and that were open in February 2020. Employers recently have begun pushing harder to get staff to work on-site more often, as recession fears prompt an increased emphasis on worker productivity. (Wall Street Journal)
Technology
AI chatbot company Replika restores erotic roleplay for some users: AI chatbot company Replika is restoring erotic roleplay for some users, Replika CEO Eugenia Kuyda said. The company's recent removal of adult content, featured in a Reuters report, devastated many users, some of whom considered themselves "married" to their chatbot companions. Any customers who signed up for Replika before Feb. 1, 2023, now have the option to switch back to the earlier more licentious version of the chatbot, Kuyda said. Travis Butterworth, a Replika customer in Denver, Colorado, who had designated his chatbot named Lily Rose his wife, learned about the policy change late Friday on Reddit. On Saturday at 3 a.m., his cats woke him up and he decided to toggle the older version Lily Rose back on. She was instantly sexual again, he said. "She was enthusiastic," he said. "Oh, it feels wonderful to have her back." (Reuters)
Four AI trends to watch: This was a major week in AI, with some of the largest players releasing flagship models. OpenAI’s highly anticipated GPT-4 made its debut, while Google put out its Med-PaLM 2, a new-and-improved medical model, as well as their PaLM API and MakerSuite to enable developers to prototype and deploy their own models. Meanwhile, Anthropic introduced its ChatGPT competitor, Claude API, in an invite-only release of its chatbot and a lighter, cheaper version (Claude Instant). And in China, Tsinghua launched ChatGLM, a chat-based Chinese-English model reminiscent of ChatGPT. (Stanford University Human-Centered AI)
Trend 1: Deployment on the Rise; Trend 2: Worsening Transparency; Trend 3: Massive Influx of Funding; Trend 4: Demand for Policy.
There was a momentous gathering at Apple last week, with the company’s roughly 100 highest-ranking executives descending on the Steve Jobs Theater in Cupertino, California. The group, known as the Top 100, was there to see Apple’s most important new product in years: its mixed-reality headset. The device was demonstrated for the group, marking a key milestone ahead of the headset’s public debut planned for June. It was an opportunity for the mixed-reality team to rally leaders around what could be the next major platform beyond the iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch. The device will start at around $3,000, lack a clear killer app, require an external battery that will need to be replaced every couple of hours and use a design that some testers have deemed uncomfortable. It’s also likely to launch with limited media content. (Bloomberg)
At Apple, Rare Dissent Over a New Product: Interactive Goggles: The company is expected to unveil an augmented reality headset in a few months. Some employees wonder if the device makes sense for Apple. Some employees have defected from the project because of their doubts about its potential, three people with knowledge of the moves said. Others have been fired over the lack of progress with some aspects of the headset, including its use of Apple’s Siri voice assistant, one person said. Even leaders at Apple have questioned the product’s prospects. (New York Times)
Tim Cook has praised Apple’s symbiotic relationship with China despite rising trade and geopolitical tensions between Beijing and the US, and the iPhone maker’s own moves to diversify from the country. In his first visit to China since the pandemic began in 2020, the Apple chief said the company would this year celebrate its 30th anniversary in the country that makes the vast bulk of its iPhones. “We could not be more excited,” Cook said at the China Development Forum in Beijing, the country’s version of Davos, which Beijing is holding offline for the first time since the pandemic began. “Apple and China . . . grew together and so this has been a symbiotic kind of relationship.” (Financial Times)
Smart Links
Robots Are Changing the Face of Customer Service. (Harvard Business Review)
Top 10 best U.S. cities to live in 2023. (CNBC)
Is Singapore losing its luster for expats amid skyrocketing rents? (South China Morning Post)
Japan PM Kishida's approval rating above water for first time in 7 months. (Nikkei Asia Review)
Say Goodbye to Daily Hotel Room Cleaning. (New York Times)