TITLE: Out of My Mind
Section: Family Matinee
Director: Amber Sealey
Screenwriter: Daniel Stiepleman
Based on the novel by: Sharon M. Draper
Distributor: Disney+
Logline: Melody Brooks (Phoebe-Ray Taylor) is navigating sixth grade as a nonverbal wheelchair user who has cerebral palsy. With the help of some assistive technology and her devoted allies, Melody shows that what she has to say is more important than how she says it.
Panelists: Amber Sealey, actors Phoebe-Rae Taylor, Rosemarie DeWitt and Luke Kirby
First screening: January 19
Key quote: On takeaways from the film, first-time feature star Phoebe-Rae Taylor said, “I hope kids with disabilities can take away from this film that they’re not alone, that they’ve got people they can talk to. And I just want people to understand that people with disabilities aren’t just objects, that they’re people with emotions and feelings, and they shouldn’t get pushed aside.”

In discussing how Out of My Mind is different from her past work, Amber Sealey shared, “I’ve made six films and I’ve never before felt like I made a film that I think everybody should see because it’s important, culturally. This is the first that I’ve made where I’m like, this is important, it will change lives…I feel like the conversation around disability and mental health and neurodiversity is getting better and better. We’re still not all the way there, but I think that one of the wonderful things that I see happening, that I’ve seen a big change in the last 10 years, is just the de-stigmatization of any sort of diagnosis, any sort of disability or neurodiversity. I see people now really embracing their differences, and so I hope this movie in some way contributes to that, the conversation around accessibility.”

The Deadline Studio at Sundance runs January 19-23 at Montgomery-Lee Fine Art on Main Street, when the cast and creatives behind the best and buzziest titles in this year’s lineup sit down with Deadline’s festival team to discuss their movies and the paths they took to get to Park City.

Thank you to our sponsors McGee & Co., Final Draft, Portrait Creative Network, and Courser.

The New Year has brought a new face to the Panhandle Research Extension and Education Center in Scottsbluff with Dr. Pin-Chu Lai, entomologist and Nebraska Extension specialist.

Lai has extensive research training in entomology and applied ecology. Her graduate studies thesis focused on thrips, an insect pest serving as vectors of a plant virus in peanuts at the University of Georgia. 

“I’ve always been interested in insect vectors and their interactions with pathogens and plant hosts. As an undergraduate, I sought opportunities to work on insect vectors of plant diseases,” she said. The initiative eventually led her to integrated pest management research. Lai’s experience in integrated pest management included research and extension work in peanuts as a row crop in graduate school and in vegetable crops at Cornell University as a postdoctoral associate.  

Lai replaced Dr. Jeff Bradshaw as the Center’s entomologist. He has been helping her get acclimated to the position, and they have had discussions on the wheat stem sawfly, a major pest for wheat growers in the Panhandle. Along with thrips in dry beans, a potential pest group that has limited information in the region. She has also been invited to join a student committee with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Entomology Department studying the wheat curl mite. 

“Along with research, I’m also excited about the Extension part,” Lai said. “I’m passionate about translating my applied research to practical management strategies for growers and stakeholders and helping them grow better crops. I’ve already been out at extension meetings and look forward to attending other meetings and events to interact with growers. It is my ultimate goal to help growers manage insect pests efficiently while supporting sustainable agriculture.” 

Lai is from Taiwan, and in 2013, she received her B.Sc. in Entomology at the National Taiwan University in Taipei City, Taiwan. In 2015, she was awarded her M.Sc. in Entomology at the University of Georgia, in Athens, Ga., and in 2021, Lai was awarded her Ph.D. in Entomology at the University of Georgia, Athens, Ga.

Google’s Pixel 8 series is its latest and greatest flagship smartphone series, and the new phones pack a ton of useful software features for everyday use, in addition to terrific camera performance. With that in mind, the base model Pixel 8 is currently on offer right now, selling for as low as $549 online.

The Pixel 8 features a rather bright and smooth 6.2-inch OLED display, which features rich contrast and colors as well as a 120Hz refresh rate. It also comes with a dual camera setup that’s able to take great-looking photos thanks to Google’s computational photography, as well as the Tensor G3 chip that adds a bit of assistive AI features so users can filter spam calls and messages, edit photos, and transcribe voice recordings. You can check it out using the link below.

Note: this article may contain affiliate links that help support our authors and keep the Phandroid servers running.

About

Annette English + Associates is a Los Angeles–based interior design firm that provides high-end interior design services to clients in Los Angeles and around the world. As a full-service practice, AE+A provides interior and landscape architecture and design, as well as custom furniture and lighting design. With projects demanding best practices and integrated teamwork, AE+A supplies incomparable support for architects, contractors, owners’ representatives, consultants, and landscape designers.
By preference, we at AE+A believe in a style of collaboration whereby highly skilled individuals from a range of different disciplines openly share their expertise to provide stunning and unique design concepts for clients. Internationally trained with remarkable proficiency in interior architecture and design, custom furniture design, and landscape and lighting design, the team of designers at AE+A have established an esprit de corps that inculcates a culture of excellence in all aspects of the project, whether it be through conceptualization, management, or execution.
Taken together, the key members of the staff contribute more than 40 years of design experience to each AE+A project from the 40,000-square-foot ground-up construction of a celebrity dream house to the remodeling of a classic Golden Age Hollywood home. Renowned for the unparalleled quality of their deliverables and now, with the addition of international projects, bringing to bear the very latest in technological design innovations, AE+A has carefully cultivated people who can navigate the modernization of architectural design without compromising the intensely personal client relations that are necessary to provide stunning and unique homes for the clients.

I wondered months ago whether the Galaxy S24’s built-in AI would be available for free or if the buyer would have to pay for it, either as a subscription or in the form of a price hike for the phone itself. As ChatGPT has shown, AI features can’t be free. If you want the best ChatGPT experience you can get, you have to pay for a subscription. 

Back to the Galaxy S24, we now know that Samsung didn’t increase its flagship phone prices this year, other than a $100 price increase for the Ultra model. Initially, I speculated that Samsung would have to charge for AI differently, perhaps via a subscription.

I made it a point to ask about the cost of Galaxy AI when I met with Samsung for a Galaxy S24 briefing. Samsung said that it had no plans to charge for its AI services at this time. This implied that things could change down the road, and it turns out we now have a deadline that comes directly from Samsung: 2025.

Galaxy AI is an extensive collection of AI, and generative AI features that are built right into Android. It’s not just Samsung’s Gauss AI at play here, as the Korean giant partnered with Google for some AI features. I’d argue that Circle to Search, the standout AI feature of the Galaxy S24 series, has nothing to do with Samsung. 

That is to say that it’s not up to Samsung alone to decide how to pay for AI. And I’ll say it again and again: nothing is free on the internet. You pay with your personal data for Google features like Circle to Search. The same goes for any other generative AI tricks built with the help of Google’s Gemini or other Google LLMs. 

Others, like Samsung, could find other ways to monetize AI. Samsung did tell me that it’s not collecting user data from its AI features. Also, Galaxy AI won’t train from messages and conversations. 

Samsung has quietly started teasing the possibility of charging for some AI features in the future. First seen by Android Central, a footnote in the Samsung Galaxy S24 announcement for Australia indicated the Galaxy AI features might not always be free:

Galaxy AI features will be provided free of charge until the end of 2025 on supported Samsung Galaxy devices.

The US announcement doesn’t contain a similar warning. However, the Galaxy S24 product pages do have footnotes that feature a similar disclaimer: 

Galaxy AI features will be provided for free until the end of 2025 on supported Samsung Galaxy devices. Different terms may apply for AI features provided by third parties.

We’re still in the early days of Galaxy AI, and things will change. Samsung will continue to improve Galaxy AI features and add new ones. Also, Samsung plans to roll out Galaxy AI features to select devices later this year. On top of that, I expect all Galaxy flagships and even some mid-range phones to ship with Galaxy AI features going forward. 

I will also add that some of the Galaxy AI features are available on the device. Translations in Messages, Calls, and Interpreter; the Camera’s Edit Suggestion feature; and the Photo Ambient Wallpaper picker happen on the Galaxy S24. Therefore, Samsung can’t monetize those. However, the bulk of Galaxy AI requires cloud processing. That’s where Samsung might implement subscriptions. 

Finally, I’ll also say that Samsung’s Knox security suite lets you disable Galaxy AI features on the device. This is a feature that can come in handy if you don’t care about generative AI features, whether they’re free or paid. 

Meanwhile, you can preorder one of the three Galaxy S24 versions at this link.

Key Takeaways

1. Landrightsarecriticaltoclimate change adaptation, but have been overlooked in climate change negotiations and -projects

2. People’sneedstoaccesslandfor climate change adaptation should be incorporated in national and local land use planning, and in adaptation projects

3. People’saccesstolandforclimate change adaptation should be included in national monitoring and reporting for UNFCCC Global Stocktakes and the Global Goal on Adaptation

4. Landrightsarealsocriticalfor climate change mitigation. Land rights therefore also require policy attention in connection to the growing emphasis on carbon projects and nature restoration.

Land rights – and struggles over them – have been a core element in human society throughout history, and they are critical to successful
and equitable climate action. Land rights are diverse and can be e.g., individual or communal, exclusive or partial, permanent or temporary – but common to all forms is that they provide access to land, water and other resources that are vital for people’s adaptation. Land rights have so far rarely been discussed in the climate negotiations or national and local climate policies, but they can make or break the practical implementation of a number of the plans and mechanisms decided at the UN COP negotiations and in domestic climate policies.

Land rights are a critical underlying feature in several of the key issues and debates at the global climate change negotiations, including those at COP28. This includes the Loss & Damage agenda, the Global Goal on Adaptation, and the growing emphasis on Nature-based Solutions including carbon off-setting projects and land restoration. Incorporating land rights in the UNFCCC Global Stocktakes is equally important.

NEW YORK, January 18, 2024 — Kyndryl (NYSE: KD), the world’s largest IT infrastructure services provider, today announced the availability of Kyndryl Workflow Orchestration services, a generative AI-powered digital workplace solution designed to help organizations automate, speed and streamline essential business processes.

Kyndryl Workflow Orchestration services provide a one-stop solution for companies to enhance, improve and modernize the digital workplace experience for their employees and customers. It was designed to support customers seeking to capitalize on no-code/low-code solutions that help improve business outcomes.

The new solution employs workflow capabilities and AI automation to orchestrate business processes, eliminate complexity, minimize cycle time and maximize return on investment through reduced training and development costs. With the ability to leverage modern platforms, such as Microsoft Power Platform and other no-code/low-code technologies, customers can unleash their citizen developers with the confidence that Kyndryl Workflow Orchestration services provides expertise to securely scale and digitize their business.

“The biggest impediment to improving the workplace experience for employees are legacy business processes that are complex and constrained due to components that don’t integrate or work well together,” said Ivan Dopplé, Kyndryl Senior Vice President, Global Digital Workplace Services Practice. “We are helping customers overcome their workflow challenges by bringing automation and generative AI-powered digital workplaces to life with our new Kyndryl Workflow Orchestration services.”

Customer benefits of Kyndryl Workflow Orchestration services include:

• User-friendly interface to enhance the overall user experience, making it easier for employees to navigate and complete tasks efficiently.
• Streamlined complex processes across various departments and enabling seamless integrations.
• Real-time visibility and tracking of fully automated requests.
• Access controls, encryption and audit trails to enable information security and integrity.
• Automation requires zero manual interventions and minimizes the risk of human error.
• Scalable to accommodate increased workload demands.
• Customize applications to meet specific business needs, offering flexibility and adaptability to changing requirements.

“People often regard service level agreements as a silver bullet for their business without realizing that efficient business workflow is about more than monitoring and reporting on data from SLAs,” said Udit Singh, Practice Director, Everest Group. “Kyndryl’s Workflow Orchestration capability provides an automated resource that can enable companies to gain insights, improve performance and respond to emerging challenges or opportunities.”

To help customers get started with their workflow transformation, Kyndryl Vital and Kyndryl Consult experts are available and ready to provide a range of advisory, implementation and managed services — from co-creation and design to strategic consulting and ongoing business process improvement.

For more information about Kyndryl Workflow Orchestration services: https://www.kyndryl.com/us/en/services/digital-workflow-orchestration.

About Kyndryl
Kyndryl (NYSE: KD) is the world’s largest IT infrastructure services provider serving thousands of enterprise customers in more than 60 countries. The company designs, builds, manages and modernizes the complex, mission-critical information systems that the world depends on every day. For more information, visit www.kyndryl.com.

Kyndryl Press Contact
press@kyndryl.com