Check out [[Daily Reading]] for context. The last time I wrote a daily read article was 5 days ago. Have just got back to London after my brief vacation in India and this was the first week at work. Not quite hectic, but easing back into work requires a change in the schedule I had the luxury to practice during vacation. Hence, there is definitely a risk of my "daily reads" losing out on their (so-called) consistency. But, I will continue to read & write whenever I find the time. ## Today's Picks of the Internet #### [What's Gothic? It's more complicated than you think.](https://www.nationalgeographic.co.uk/history-and-civilisation/2022/02/what-is-gothic-its-more-complicated-than-you-think) One for the architecture lovers. A piece on what Gothic architecture is, how it came about, some famous buildings built in its style, the influence of Islamic architecture on it. If you have been to London, here's a fun fact. The Dome of St. Paul's Cathedral does have a fair bit of architectural influence from the East. #### [The Year AI Ate the Internet](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/2023-in-review/the-year-ai-ate-the-internet) This is probably the first *The New Yorker* article that I am reading in full (or partial even). So, yayy! Sue Halpern gives a brief overview of all that AI did last year and the tremendous hype it generated with almost everybody (with access to the Internet) positioning themselves as AI experts and fortune tellers. Here are some of the phrases that caught my eye from this article. - "Call this the year many of us learned to communicate, create, cheat, and collaborate with robots." - "Poems, literature reviews, essays, research papers, and three-act plays are delivered in plain, unmistakably human language. It’s as if the god in the machine had been made in our image." - "The knowledge that chatbots make mistakes has not stopped high-school and college students from being some of their most avid early adopters, using chatbots to research and write their papers, complete problem sets, and write code." - "Artificial intelligence is already used to generate financial reports, ad copy, and sports news." - "The [Writers Guild of America went on strike](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/notes-on-hollywood/why-are-tv-writers-so-miserable), demanding a contract that would protect us all from crummy A.I.-generated movies. They sensed that any A.I. platform that is able to produce credible work in many human domains could be an existential threat to creativity itself." - "In March, more than a thousand technologists, including [Elon Musk](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/09/18/elon-musk-walter-isaacson-book-review) and Steve Wozniak, a co-founder of Apple, signed a letter calling on A.I. companies to pause work on their most advanced technology for six months, to make room for some kind of regulation." - But, there has been no pause so far. - "A research team from I.B.M., for example, needed only five minutes to trick ChatGPT into writing highly persuasive phishing e-mails. Other researchers have used generative A.I. to write malware that can bypass safety protocols, making it a potential resource for cybercriminals. Goldman Sachs has estimated that A.I. could soon replace three hundred million full-time jobs." And my personal favourite, > "We may look back on 2023 with a kind of nostalgia, for a time when intelligence had not yet become a product." --- #### Like what you see? Would you like to support me? Easy! Head over to [this link](https://refind.com/?invite=7b7e76f6e0) and subscribe to receive **Refind** newsletters. Every day Refind picks the most relevant links from around the web for you. Loved by 400k curious minds.