Technology

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for Feb. 7.

While there were many E-Ink color displays on show in the digital signage section of ISE 2025, the Wi-Poster caught TechRadar Pro’s attention as the only one that uses wireless power.

Available in a range of sizes from 13in up to 40 inches, it’s the first working product we’ve seen that uses wireless power at a distance.

One man who saw it working at the same time as us described it as ‘magic’, and we’d have to agree.

(Image credit: ISE 2025/Benny Har-Even)

Ori Mor, CEO and founder of Wi-Charge, told TechRadar Pro wireless power means that not only can businesses put the Wi-Poster wherever they want, but wireless power means it is effectively permanently powered.

This means images can be updated over Wi-Fi as many times as needed, without having to worry about ever having to connect it to a portable power station or a power cord to recharge batteries.

“Over time the cost of replacing batteries can really mount up so over time our wireless power solution can save businesses a lot of money, as well as greatly reducing waste. And even with a rechargeable battery you still have to spend time and cost getting power to them when they run down”.

Mor said Wi-Charge’s wireless power solution, dubbed “AirCord” uses infra-red to send up to 350 milliwatts of power from a transmitter plugged into the mains to devices with a built-in receiver up to 10 meters away. One transmitter can send power to multiple devices at once, but every device requires a line of sight to a transmitter. The power flow ceases as soon as anything gets in the way but resumes immediately afterward.

Naturally, we wondered about the safety of sending power over the air like this, but Mor assured us that it was completely safe and has been ratified by all global standards agencies, such as the IEC and CE in Europe and FC and FCC in the USA.

As a Spectra 6 display, the Wi-Poster images looked impressively color-rich and vibrant. Virtually indistinguishable from paper, they will remain visible even under sunlight. Mor demonstrated the Wi-Poster updating, taking around 30 seconds for the image to change.

(Image credit: ise 2025/Benny Har-Even)

E Ink isn't suitable for video, however, and for that, Mor said that Wi-Charge already has an ‘Aircord’ powered LCD display in the market called Wi-Spot. Available in either 7- and 9in sizes, Mor said this was aimed primarily at product adjacent advertising for the retail market.

He said the Wi-Spot also contains motion sensors, enabling businesses to gather footfall stats to provide data to optimize store layouts.

Wi-Charge also had a wirelessly powered toothbrush holder and an X-Box controller on show, though these turned out to be prototypes rather than actual products for sale.

(Image credit: ISE/Benny Har-Even)

Mor said that Wi-Charge was not currently revealing costs for the Wi-Poster, but that businesses should get in touch with the company directly to discuss.

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• 'AI godfather' Yoshua Bengio warns that the AI race prioritizes speed over safety
• This risks unpredictable and dangerous consequences
• He urges global cooperation to enforce AI regulations before autonomous systems become difficult to control

'AI godfather' Yoshua Bengio helped create the foundations of the neural networks running all kinds of AI tools today, from chatbots mimicking cartoon characters to scientific research assistants. Now, he has an urgent warning for AI developers, as he explained in a Sky News interview. The race to develop ever-more-powerful AI systems is escalating at a pace that, in his view, is far too reckless.

And it’s not just about which company builds the best chatbot or who gets the most funding. Bengio believes that the rapid, unregulated push toward advanced AI could have catastrophic consequences if safety isn’t treated as a top priority.

Bengio described watching developers racing against each other, getting sloppy, or taking dangerous shortcuts. Though speed can make the difference in breaking ground on a new kind of product worth billions and playing catch-up to a rival, it may not be worth it to society.

That pressure has only intensified for AI developers with the rise of Chinese AI firms like DeepSeek, whose advanced chatbot capabilities have caught the attention of Western companies and governments alike. Instead of slowing down and carefully considering the risks, major tech firms are accelerating their AI development in an all-out sprint for superiority. Bengio worries this will lead to rushed deployments, inadequate safety measures, and systems that behave in ways we don’t yet fully understand.

Bengio explained that he has been warning about the need for stronger AI oversight, but recent events have made his message feel even more urgent. The current moment is a "turning point," where we either implement meaningful regulations and safety protocols or risk letting AI development spiral into something unpredictable.

After all, more and more AI systems don’t just process information but can make autonomous decisions. These AI agents are capable of acting on their own rather than simply responding to user inputs. They're exactly what Bengio sees as the most dangerous path forward. With enough computing power, an AI that can strategize, adapt, and take independent actions could quickly become difficult to control should humans want to take back the reins.

AI takeover

The problem isn’t just theoretical. Already, AI models are making financial trades, managing logistics, and even writing and deploying software with minimal human oversight. Bengio warns that we’re only a few steps away from much more complex, potentially unpredictable AI behavior. If a system like this is deployed without strict safeguards, the consequences could range from annoying hiccups in service to full-on security and economic crises.

Bengio isn’t calling for a halt to AI development. He made clear that he's an optimist about AI's abilities when used responsibly for things like medical and environmental research. He just sees a need for a priority shift to more thoughtful and deliberate work on AI technology. His unique perspective may carry some weight when he calls for AI developers to put ethics and safety ahead of competing with rival companies. That's why he participates in policy discussions at events like the upcoming International AI Safety Summit in Paris,

He also thinks regulation needs to be bolstered by companies willing to take responsibility for their systems. They need to invest as much in safety research as they do in performance improvements, he claims, though that balance is hard to imagine appearing in today's AI melee. In an industry where speed equals dominance, no company wants to be the first to hit the brakes.

The global cooperation Bengio pitches might not appear immediately, but as the AI arms race continues, warnings from Bengio and others in similar positions of prestige grow more urgent. He hopes the industry will recognize the risks now rather than when a crisis forces the matter. The question is whether the world is ready to listen before it’s too late.

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The chatbot is part of Elon Musk and President Donald Trump’s ambitions to use AI and other technologies to cut costs and modernize the US government.

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• Bloomberg is reporting that Apple might announce a new iPhone SE as early as next week
• The rumored fourth-generation would ditch the home button
• It's expected to be a big upgrade with a new design and a processor jump

Apple has been rumored to be working on a next-generation iPhone SE for quite some time. We expect the fourth-generation, more affordable iPhone to arrive sometime in 2025, potentially in the spring, around March or April.

However, a new report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman notes that Apple could announce the smartphone as soon as next week. He writes, “The company expects to announce the device as early as next week, ahead of it going on sale later in the month.” That hints at a pretty imminent arrival, but one that likely won’t garner the occasion of an Apple Special Event. It would be more likely to be launched in a matter similar to the iPad Mini from late last year via a press release.

The iPhone SE has long been a part of Apple’s iPhone lineup, first arriving in 2016 and last updated as a third generation in 2022. Currently, it most resembles that of an iPhone 8 and is the only smartphone in Apple’s family that still features a home button with Touch ID. However, this next generation of the iPhone SE should be a big leap in terms of looks and the hardware powering it.

(Image credit: Apple)

It’s reported that the fourth-generation iPhone SE will look similar to that of the iPhone 14, with a larger, closer-to-the-edge screen design that ditches the home button and features a notch containing Face ID. This means that you’d be able to unlock the iPhone with just a glance, and the same goes for authenticating purchases or using Apple Pay.

Gurman’s latest reporting notes that the device is codenamed “V59” and will be the first Apple product to feature a modem designed in-house. That would mean ditching another Qualcomm component for Apple, and the silicon would also be made by the tech giant, with this report noting it would be the A18 chip.

That’s the same processor inside the iPhone 16 and 16 Plus, which should make it plenty speedy and, maybe even more important, is the fact that it could handle Apple Intelligence. This means you’d be able to use ‘Writing Tools,’ create a Genmoji, use Image Playground, and even remove annoying background objects or people from photos with ‘Clean Up.” It would also make it fit for a pretty long shelf life, something that’s become a need for the iPhone SE as it’s only typically refreshed every few years.

Along with removing the home button, the iPhone SE fourth-generation will likely make the switch to USB-C. While it’s still available in the United States, it was taken off the shelves and discontinued in the EU, partly in an effort to comply with the rules of ports. When it does arrive, Gurman believes it will be around the same price point of the current model. Right now, the iPhone SE third-generation starts at $429 / £419 / AU$719 and that’s a competitive price for the iPhone lineup, especially considering the iPhone 16 starts at $899. Some other reports have shown that the price could be a bit higher, though.

As far as an arrival as next week, that would kick off Apple’s 2025 product debuts. Also rumored to be arriving next week, as reported by Bloomberg, and the much-anticipated Powerbeats Pro 2 from Beats. Gurman also notes that a MacBook Air with the M4 chip, a new entry-level iPad, and a new iPad Air should arrive in the first half of 2025.

Of course, as with all Apple rumors, nothing's official until the technology giant says it, so we'll see what next week brings. In the meantime, we can look at Apple's cute, expressive robot prototype.

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• AWS and Orbital want carbon-negative data centers by end of 2025
• Carbon removal costs are estimated at $0.20 per GPU hour
• Orbital’s AI model Orb will debut on AWS platforms

AWS and Orbital Materials have announced a partnership using generative AI to boost data center sustainability and efficiency.

The partnership will focus on developing new materials for carbon removal, chip cooling, and water utilization within AWS data centers.

Traditional material development has relied on lengthy trial-and-error processes in laboratories, but Orbital Materials says its own generative AI platform can allow rapid design, synthesis, and testing of advanced materials.

Generative AI transforms materials discovery for faster, efficient innovation

Since establishing its lab in early 2024, Orbital says it has achieved a tenfold improvement in material performance, showcasing unprecedented speed in materials discovery.

The company's first product, a proprietary carbon removal material for direct air capture (DAC) has captured AWS's interest, allowing Orbital to develop a DAC system designed to operate within data centers, repurposing waste heat to drive carbon removal, and significantly reducinges scope 3 emissions, aligning with AWS’s sustainability goals.

Data centers are critical to powering modern technology but are also significant energy consumers with complex carbon footprints. Through the partnership, AWS aims to integrate Orbital’s DAC system into its data centers, demonstrating a full-scale pilot by the end of 2025.

Orbital estimates its material could achieve carbon negativity for renewable-powered data centers for $0.20 per GPU per hour, a small fraction of current GPU usage costs, which range from $2 to $10 per hour. The potential economic viability of this technology could pave the way for scalable adoption across the cloud computing industry, enabling AWS and others to mitigate environmental impacts.

As part of the partnership, Orbital’s generative AI model, Orb, will become available to AWS customers through Amazon SageMaker JumpStart and AWS Marketplace. Orb is the first AI-for-materials model on AWS platforms and will enable researchers and businesses to simulate and develop advanced materials more efficiently. Applications for Orb extend beyond carbon removal and include technologies like semiconductors, batteries, and electronics.

To support its AI advancements, Orbital will pre-train and fine-tune its foundation models on Amazon SageMaker HyperPod, AWS’s purpose-built infrastructure for large-scale distributed training. Additionally, Orbital plans to evaluate the deployment of AWS Trainium, a custom silicon designed to optimize the cost performance of deep learning workloads.

“Our partnership with AWS will accelerate the deployment of our advanced technologies for data center decarbonization and efficiency. Working with the market-leading AWS team will ensure that our suite of products in cooling, water utilization and carbon removal enables the next generation of data centers powering the AI revolution,” said Jonathan Godwin, CEO and Co-Founder of Orbital Materials

Howard Gefen, General Manager of AWS Energy & Utilities said "AWS looks forward to collaborating with Orbital and their mission to drive data center decarbonization. Through Amazon SageMaker HyperPod and AWS Trainium, we can accelerate the development of breakthrough sustainability technologies."

"By integrating Orb with Amazon SageMaker JumpStart and AWS Marketplace, we will enable sustainable innovation more widely. Together, we have the opportunity to set new benchmarks for carbon removal and efficiency across the industry," Gefen concluded.

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• Google CEO Sundar Pichai is teasing that Gemini could one day feature advertisements.
• It tracks as Google is pretty crafty at inserting ads into most of its offerings
• You can already see hints of ads in AI overviews in Google Search

Google’s Gemini AI might not have ads today, but let’s be real: the idea that Google is looking to bring advertising to AI assistants is hardly surprising. Google has spent decades fine-tuning the art of turning eyeballs into revenue, and Gemini may be next in line, according to CEO Sundar Pichai. During Alphabet’s latest investor call, Pichai gave a not-so-subtle hint that while you can use Gemini for free or pay for a subscription to extra features, advertising will likely come along to boost the company's bottom line in some way.

Google Gemini doesn't have banner ads popping up mid-conversation at the moment, but it doesn't take much imagination to picture a time when ads will support the free version of Gemini, and the premium subscription will count its lack of advertisements as one of its perks. It makes sense. AI isn’t cheap to run, and Google has already announced plans to spend $75 billion this year to keep up in the AI race. That kind of money doesn’t grow on trees; it grows on ad revenue.

"On the monetization side, obviously, for now, we are focused on a free tier and subscriptions. But obviously, as you've seen in Google over time, we always want to lead with user experience. And we do have very good ideas for native ad concepts, but you'll see us lead with the user experience," Pichai said during the call. "But I do think we're always committed to making the products work and reach billions of users at scale. And advertising has been a great aspect of that strategy. And so, just like you've seen with YouTube, we'll give people options over time."

Ads AI

If you want a preview of how ads might sneak into Gemini, just look at Google’s AI Overviews. These AI-generated search summaries are already discreetly inserting sponsored results. Search for “best ways to remove grass stains,” and in the AI-generated blurb, you might see a nice little link to buy a specific detergent. It's not exactly subtle. Google has spent years mastering the art of blending ads into everyday searches, and there’s no reason to believe it won’t do the same with its AI chatbot.

Ads through AI are not a unique Google idea, of course. Microsoft has been playing with ads in its Copilot AI chatbot, as has Perplexity with its sponsored follow-up questions. Amazon has pursued something similar, albeit in reverse, by making its Rufus AI chatbot also offer sponsored suggestions for purchases.

If Gemini starts recommending products based on your conversations, will you still want to converse with the AI? Mid-chat sponsored messages might annoy anyone into opting out, but maybe you'll be okay with an ad at the bottom of your chat window. The only thing more inevitable than ads from Google in Gemini is that the company will claim the ads will "enhance the user experience.”

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• Apple showed off a robot lamp in a new research paper
• The work here may hint at future product plans, and expression is front and center
• The robot lamp prototype reminds us of Pixar and Disney

There have been plenty of rumors of Apple working on internal robotic projects, most notably a tabletop robot that could potentially move around and have a screen similar to an iPad, as Bloomberg reported. But thanks to a new research paper published by Apple, we now have the first look at a robot built by the company, and it’s downright cute.

In simpler terms, Apple has a robotic lamp that evokes major Pixar Luxo Jr. vibes, and I’d be super-happy to see it eventually come to market. Even at this early stage, it’s a much more playful and fun approach to robotics. Still, though, this is a prototype in a research paper from Apple Machine Learning, so it is still far from being something you can walk into a store and purchase.

The robot lamp is shown off in a video in a research paper titled “ELEGNT: Expressive and Functional Movement Design for Non-Anthropomorphic Robot.” It’s authored by Yuhan Hu, Peide Huang, Mouli Sivapurapu, and Jian Zhang.

That title certainly shows Apple's thoughtful approach to robotics. It wants the robot to be expressive, similar to a human. This approach is akin to that of Anki’s Vector and Cozmo robots or the animated faces associated with Amazon’s Astro – still an invite-only robot.

In the video, you can see how the robot is both expressive and functional, allowing it to interact with the researcher and follow instructions from what appears to be gestures. At one point, it’s asked to move over via a finger flick and responds. Apple’s goal, or at least that of this research team, wants it to be an elegant robot, one that is inviting – important for a device that will be in the home – expressive and ultimately functional.

At one point, almost leaning into Apple’s movements in the health space, it reminds a user to drink water by nudging the glass closer. It’s really cool, and watching the full video – it’s only four minutes and forty-six seconds long – is well worth it.

As a Disney and Pixar fan, I find the vibe seriously similar to that of the fun-loving, sometimes mischievous Luxo Jr. lamp we all know. The lamp seemingly does more than move or illuminate, though. In one scene, it’s shown moving along with an assistant playing a response – likely Siri – so it might have a speaker built-in. In another, it projects a video onto a wall to help with a project the researcher is conducting.

The opening where the lamp comes to life, swinging around, knocking over blocks, and performing a delightful wiggle is simply great. While this doesn’t give exact information on what a future product might look like, it does give us a first glimpse at a robot prototype made by Apple, and that certainly adds a bit more credence to a potential device.

(Image credit: Apple)

It also shows how Apple is thinking about a device that could be used daily in more one-to-one interactions with people, and there’s a certain amount of care that goes into that. Apple’s ELEGNT is way less dystopian and more fun and welcoming, which is a better way to think about the future.

Apple writes in the research paper, “Nonverbal behaviors such as posture, gestures, and gaze are essential for conveying internal states, both consciously and unconsciously, in human interaction. For robots to interact more naturally with humans, robot movement design should likewise integrate expressive qualities—such as intention, attention, and emotions—alongside traditional functional considerations like task fulfillment, spatial constraints, and time efficiency.”

It’s clear that’s at the top of Apple's mind, and that very well could be a major differentiator for Apple in a space that is increasingly being billed with robots of all sorts. You can see the research paper in full from Apple Machine Learning Research here.

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• Rollable displays could transform retail advertising strategies
• Transparent microLEDs could enhance car dash displays
• MicroLED TV prices could be reduced from current $100,000 tag

MicroLED displays, renowned for their superior brightness, efficiency, and lifespan, have long held promise for helping advancing the display industry.

Foldable phones have already revolutionized the smartphone industry, but making them any bigger has long held problems, leaving businesses in industries such as retail, healthcare, and automotive searching for scalable solutions.

Now though, Smartkem, a leader in organic thin-film transistors (OTFTs), is addressing these challenges through collaboration with AUO, Taiwan’s largest display manufacturer, with the companies aiming to develop the world’s first rollable, transparent microLED display.

MicroLED production with OTFT technology

Smartkem’s OTFT technology enables processing at temperatures as low as 80°C - significantly lower than the industry standard of 300°C. Smartkem’s transistors can be fabricated directly on top of microLEDs, eliminating costly and complex processes such as mass transfer and laser welding, which have hindered scalability and affordability in microLED manufacturing.

The company’s approach also introduces a “Chip-First” display architecture, leveraging low-cost, flexible, and transparent plastic substrates instead of rigid glass, allowing the production of dynamic display solutions such as rollable signage in retail, or lightweight, transparent displays in automotive dashboards.

This project commenced in January 2024, and received a grant from the Taiwan-UK Research & Development Collaboration, funded by Taiwan’s Ministry of Economic Affairs and Innovate UK. The development will utilize ITRI’s Gen 2.5 assembly line, underscoring the advanced capabilities of both Smartkem and AUO in producing next-generation displays.

“We believe that collaborating with global display industry leader AUO to develop a novel microLED display puts Smartkem’s technology on the frontier of microLED display commercialization," noted Ian Jenks, Smartkem Chairman and CEO.

"Our unique transistor technology is expected to enable display manufacturers to efficiently produce microLED displays, making mass production commercially viable. Smartkem’s technology has the potential to take today’s microLED TVs from high end market prices of $100,000 down to mass market prices."

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