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Which musical instrument can you play, or which would you like to learn to play?

  • piano or other keyboard
  • guitar
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  • er, yes, I am a professional one-man band
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Comments:29 | Votes:89

posted by janrinok on Monday October 28, @09:34PM   Printer-friendly
from the story-that-tugs-at-the-pacemaker dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Scientists in China have created a mind-bogglingly powerful resistive magnet that has officially broken the world record by sustaining an incredible 42.02 tesla. That is over 800,000 times stronger than the magnetic field produced by Earth itself, which has a flux density of about 50 microtesla.

The new record was set on September 22 at the Steady High Magnetic Field Facility (SHMFF) in Hefei, narrowly edging out the previous record of 41.4 tesla held by another resistive magnet at the National High Magnetic Field Lab in Florida since 2017.

As for why scientists are so determined to push the limits of magnetism, physicist Joachim Wosnitza from Germany's Dresden lab explained that it opens up all kinds of bizarre new realms of physics to explore. Essentially, the stronger the magnetism, the greater the chances of discovering new states of matter.

Another physicist noted that high magnetism allows scientists to engineer and manipulate entirely new phases of matter that simply don't exist under normal conditions. Each additional tesla achieved also makes instruments exponentially more sensitive for detecting faint phenomena.

The SHMFF's new champion is available for international researchers to test on advanced materials like superconductors.

The only drawback of such resistive magnetic systems is that they are real power hogs. The SHMFF's creation consumed a staggering 32.3 megawatts to achieve that record. However, scientists continue to use them because they can sustain high magnetic fields much longer than their newer superconducting counterparts, which eventually reach their limits. The older magnets can also be ramped up quickly.

Nonetheless, the enormous power requirements are a significant problem. Therefore, teams like those at the SHMFF are also working on hybrid and fully superconducting designs that could achieve extreme strengths while consuming much less energy.

This is not to say that hybrid or superconducting designs are less powerful than resistive magnetic systems. In fact, China debuted a hybrid resistive/superconducting magnet in 2022 that achieved a 45.22 tesla field.

On the other side of the world, the US National Lab's mini superconducting prototype managed a brief 45.5 tesla burst back in 2019. However, making these new low-power systems reliable and affordable – while also keeping them cool – remains a major technical challenge, underscoring the continued need for resistive magnets.


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Monday October 28, @07:06PM   Printer-friendly
from the you-dump-the-data-out,-you-load-the-data-in,-you-do-the-hokey-cokey... dept.

Over the coming days and weeks we will be switching servers from Linode to our own hardware. The first switch will take place tomorrow. This will also require some DNS changes but you just keep using the same URLs that you are using today. Other than that services should look and behave exactly as they do now. There may well be minor disruptions to connections and we ask you to please bear with us if they occur. There will be pauses of a day or more in between each service being switched over, while we continue to monitor that everything is working as expected.

Moving the data from a live server to a new server means that there will be a finite time between making a backup and installing it on the new server. The site will indicate that maintenance is being carried out. That implies that posts made during this interval will be lost. The process will begin around 1600 UTC on Monday 28 October. We will attempt to make the switch over as quickly as possible and there should always be a live server online. If you lose access to the site completely remember that you can still contact us via email ('nickname' [@] soylentnews.org), on IRC, or by shouting VERY loudly.

If your comment is lost please do not believe those in the community who will no doubt claim that comments are being intentionally deleted. They are not (unless you are one of our small number of persistent spammers).

Once each switch is completed I would hope that we can inform you immediately. However, that might not always be possible - everyone has to sleep sometime! Please make any observations regarding problems, or even compliments if the system is responding better than before, in the comments for this Meta. However, our testing so far indicates that the new servers are more responsive than the existing servers but of course they have not yet been placed under quite the same load.

UPDATE: You should all be accessing the new server. Please let us know if you experience any problems. A big thank-you to kolie!.

posted by janrinok on Monday October 28, @04:47PM   Printer-friendly
from the bits-and-bobs dept.

https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2024/digital-art-day-auction-2/a-i-god-portrait-of-alan-turing
https://www.dw.com/en/portrait-by-robot-to-be-sold-at-sothebys-in-world-first/a-70508473

For the first time ever, a well-known auction house is selling an artwork that was painted by a robot. Sotheby's will be auctioning off the portrait of scientist Alan Turing and it could fetch as much as £150,000.

The large-scale artwork is entitled "AI God" and was " first exhibited at the United Nations in May 2024 as part of a five paneled Polyptych," Sotheby's said on its homepage.

He said the work's "muted tones and broken facial planes" seemingly suggested "the struggles Turing warned we will face when it comes to managing AI." Ai-Da's works were "ethereal and haunting" and "continue to question where the power of AI will take us, and the global race to harness its power."

What will the starving Robot AI artist do with the money? Pay the electricity bill? Eat more bits? Or will the human manager take a 100% cut?

The ultra-realistic robot is designed to resemble a human female with a face, large eyes and a brown wig. The robot works by deploying AI algorithms and has cameras in its eyes, as well as bionic hands.

Ultra-realistic? Looks more like someone got lost in the uncanny valley, or got very poor taste in women. It's apparently important to note that it is a (or resembles) human female. Not one of those disgusting manbots artistic AI fueled robots. How does female robots differ from male robots anyway? 0s or 1s ?


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Monday October 28, @12:04PM   Printer-friendly
from the all-your-DNA-are-belong-to-us dept.

Since it was founded nearly two decades ago, 23andMe has grown into one of the largest biotechnology companies in the world. Millions of people have used its simple genetic testing service, which involves ordering a saliva test, spitting into a tube, and sending it back to the company for a detailed DNA analysis.

But now the company is on the brink of bankruptcy. This has raised concerns about what will happen to the troves of genetic data it has in its possession.

The company's chief executive, Anne Wojcicki, has said she is committed to customer privacy and will "maintain our current privacy policy".

But what can customers of 23andMe themselves do to make sure their highly personal genetic data is protected? And should we be concerned about other companies that also collect our DNA?

[...] 23andMe has had a rapid downfall after the 2021 high of its public listing.

Its value has dropped more than 97%. In 2023, it suffered a major data breach affecting almost seven million users and settled a class action lawsuit for US$30 million.

Last month its seven independent directors resigned amid news the original founder is planning to take the company private once more. The company has never made a profit and is reportedly on the verge of bankruptcy.

What this might mean for its vast stores of genetic data is unclear.

Previously:


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Monday October 28, @07:19AM   Printer-friendly
from the another-move-to-stop-ad-blockers? dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Mozilla is reminding Firefox users that a necessary root certificate expires soon and that older browser versions could become a security and usability nightmare in a few months. Starting March 14, 2025, Firefox versions older than 128 (ESR 115.13) containing the expired certificate will likely cause "significant" issues with add-ons, content signing, and streaming of DRM-protected media.

Failing to update Firefox before next March means losing features relying on remote functionality. Many installed add-ons will become disabled, and other systems that require content verification could also break. The issue affects Firefox editions for Android and Windows operating systems, including Windows, macOS, and Linux. Those with iPhone or iPad versions of Firefox should be okay.

Mozilla's FAQs explain that a root certificate authenticates browser content as trusted. When a certificate expires, Firefox cannot verify content anymore. The newest versions of Firefox and other Mozilla software using the same root-of-trust model include a new root certificate that will prevent the expiration issue in March 2025.

Mozilla is likely trying to prevent the chaos experienced by Firefox users in 2019 when an expired certificate suddenly borked many instances of the open-source browser. Today's Firefox market share is much lower than five years ago, but we're still talking about millions of users potentially becoming vulnerable to the expiration issue.

Some add-on developers have expressed concern over how Mozilla is managing the problem. One developer said Firefox should clearly state what could happen on all the affected platforms. Otherwise, disgruntled users could direct their complaints directly to add-on programmers. One-star review bombing campaigns after the certificate expires could also be part of the deal.

Mozilla advises users to update to Firefox 128 on each device with the browser installed, which is the best practice to avoid this and other issues. The latest release always provides significant performance improvements and important security fixes. Mozilla released Firefox 128 and ESR 115.13 on July 9, 2024, so there have been minor incremental updates since then. The most current version is Firefox 131.0.3.


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Monday October 28, @02:35AM   Printer-friendly
from the cooler-heads-prevailed dept.

As reported previously on SN, McFlurry machines have been at the centre of arguments about Copyright vs the Right to Repair. Now it seems that the US Copyright Office have delivered a victory to McDonalds Franchisees and third parties by allowing them to bypass the Technological Protection Measures (TPM) to repair the devices.

The final rule adopted by Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden was based on recommendations made by Shira Perlmutter, the register of copyrights and director of the US Copyright Office. The ruling came in the ninth triennial proceeding to determine exemptions under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The process provides exemptions for the next three years to "the prohibition against circumvention of technological measures that effectively control access to copyrighted works."

"The Register recommends adopting a new exemption covering diagnosis, maintenance, and repair of retail-level commercial food preparation equipment because proponents sufficiently showed, by a preponderance of the evidence, adverse effects on the proposed noninfringing uses of such equipment," the Register's findings said.

Opposition to the change came from McDonalds corporate and the machine manufacturers, Taylor Company, as well as the Entertainment Software Association, Motion Picture Association, and Recording Industry Association of America

For those who enjoy a punny good time:

The change should "spark a flurry of third-party repair activity and enable businesses to better serve their customers," Rose said. "While we are disappointed that the Register recommended a narrower exemption than we had proposed, this does not soften our enthusiasm. We will continue to chip away at half-baked laws blocking the right to repair, sprinkling consumer victories as we go. Today's win may not be parfait, but it's still pretty sweet."


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Sunday October 27, @09:48PM   Printer-friendly
from the SN-editors-are-still-real-people-max-max-max-headroom dept.

Station claims it's visionary, ex-employees claim it's cynical; reality appears way more fiscal

A Polish radio station has ditched its on-air talent for AI in what its editor-in-chief calls an experiment on the effect of AI in society, though it looks like a bid to save cash.

OFF Radio Krakow, an online and DAB+ subsidiary of the larger Radio Krakow station, announced this week that it was going all-in on AI, with new shows hosted by a trio of Gen Z AI talking heads, "Emi," "Kuba," and "Alex," all with their own biographies and personalities "created by journalists," according to the station.

Stop us if this sounds familiar: "The content they [the AI hosts] deliver is prepared by real journalists who use artificial intelligence tools for this purpose," OFF editor-in-chief Marcin Pulit wrote in the announcement. "After the text is generated, it is checked and verified by journalists and then processed into sound."

The same goes for written stories on the site, Pulit said, and even musical selections the AI hosts will play during their once-a-week "authorial" music broadcast.

[Source]: The Register


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Sunday October 27, @04:53PM   Printer-friendly
from the what-were-you-doing-*there*-friend? dept.

Dan Goodin over at Ars Technica is reporting on a company called Babel Street and its Location X program.

From the article:

You likely have never heard of Babel Street or Location X, but chances are good that they know a lot about you and anyone else you know who keeps a phone nearby around the clock.

Reston, Virginia-located Babel Street is the little-known firm behind Location X, a service with the capability to track the locations of hundreds of millions of phone users over sustained periods of time. Ostensibly, Babel Street limits the use of the service to personnel and contractors of US government law enforcement agencies, including state entities. Despite the restriction, an individual working on behalf of a company that helps people remove their personal information from consumer data broker databases recently was able to obtain a two-week free trial by (truthfully) telling Babel Street he was considering performing contracting work for a government agency in the future.

Tracking locations at scale

KrebsOnSecurity, one of five news outlets that obtained access to the data produced during the trial, said that one capability of Location X is the ability to draw a line between two states or other locations—or a shape around a building, street block, or entire city—and see a historical record of Internet-connected devices that traversed those boundaries.
[...]
404 Media, another outlet given access to the data, reported that the trove allowed a reporter to zoom in on the parking lot of an abortion clinic in Florida and observe more than 700 red dots, each representing a phone that had recently visited the clinic. Location X then allowed the reporter to trace the movements of one specific device.

That device—and by extension, the person carrying it—began the journey in mid-June from a residence in Alabama. The person passed by a Lowe's Home Improvement store, drove on a highway, visited a church, crossed into Florida, and finally stopped at the clinic where the phone indicates the person stayed for two hours before leaving and returning to Alabama. The data tracked the phone as having visited the clinic only once.

The technology making this vast data collection possible is, of course, tracking mechanisms built into Android and iOS and the apps that run on those operating systems. By default, Android assigns a unique ad ID to each device and makes it available to any app that has location permissions. iOS, by contrast, keeps its "Identifier for Advertisers" tracker private, but gives each installed app the opportunity to request access to it.

Some apps are given permission to access a phone's location and then sell the device's location to consumer data brokers. The data can also be made available through the web ad ecosystem. While an ad-supported page loads, the advertising network holds an auction in real time to sell a personalized ad to the highest bidder. A key piece of information bidders use to set a price is—you guessed it—the location of the device running the browser. Advertisers generate additional revenue by selling that history to the likes of Location X provider Babel Street.

TFA also provides information which can limit your exposure:

There are multiple settings that phone users must choose to close off the constant leaking of their locations. For users of either Android or iOS, the first step is to audit which apps currently have permission to access the device location. This can be done on Android by accessing Settings > Location > App location permissions and, on iOS, Settings > Privacy & Security > Location Services.

For most users, there's usefulness in allowing an app for photos, transit, or maps to access a user's precise location. For other classes of apps—say those for Internet jukeboxes at bars and restaurants—it can be helpful for them to have an approximate location, but giving them precise, fine-grained access is likely overkill. And for other apps, there's no reason for them ever to know the device's location. With a few exceptions, there's little reason for apps to always have location access.

Not surprisingly, Android users who want to block intrusive location gathering have more settings to change than iOS users. The first thing to do is access Settings > Security & Privacy > Ads and choose "Delete advertising ID." Then, promptly ignore the long, scary warning Google provides and hit the button confirming the decision at the bottom. If you don't see that setting, good for you. It means you already deleted it. Google provides documentation here.

So is this just good old American ingenuity at its best? An unacceptable invasion of privacy?

Speaking of such things, how (if at all) does this comport with the Fourth Amendment?

What say you, Soylentils?


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Sunday October 27, @12:08PM   Printer-friendly
from the nerds-vs-communists dept.

From The Guardian...

https://www.theguardian.com/games/2024/oct/24/how-one-engineer-beat-the-ban-on-home-computers-in-socialist-yugoslavia

"Very few Yugoslavians had access to computers in the early 1980s: they were mostly the preserve of large institutions or companies. Importing home computers like the Commodore 64 was not only expensive, but also legally impossible, thanks to a law that restricted regular citizens from importing individual goods that were worth more than 50 Deutsche Marks (the Commodore 64 cost over 1,000 Deutsche Marks at launch). Even if someone in Yugoslavia could afford the latest home computers, they would have to resort to smuggling.

In 1983, engineer Vojislav "Voja" Antonić was becoming more and more frustrated with the senseless Yugoslavian import laws.

Antonić was pondering this while on holiday with his wife in Risan in Montenegro in 1983. "I was thinking how would it be possible to make the simplest and cheapest possible computer," says Antonić. "As a way to amuse myself in my free time. That's it. Everyone thinks it is an interesting story, but really I was just bored!" He wondered whether it would be possible to make a computer without a graphics chip – or a "video controller" as they were commonly known at the time.

Instead of having a separate graphics chip, Antonić thought he could use part of the CPU to generate a video signal, and then replicate some of the other video functions using software. It would mean sacrificing processing power, but in principle it was possible, and it would make the computer much cheaper."

And the Galaksija (Galaxy) was born.


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Sunday October 27, @07:22AM   Printer-friendly
from the value-took-a-nose-dive dept.

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/german-air-taxi-maker-liliums-units-file-insolvency-shares-plunge-2024-10-24/:

German air-taxi developer Lilium said on Thursday two of its subsidiaries in the country have decided to file for insolvency following unsuccessful talks with state and federal governments to solve its cash crisis.

The company's U.S.-listed shares fell 57% to 23 cents after the subsidiaries - Lilium GmbH and Lilium eAircraft GmbH - told the parent they are over-indebted and will be unable to pay debts over the coming days.

Lilium is now "reviewing whether there are grounds for its own insolvency as well," it said in a regulatory filing.

The company, among a handful of air-taxi makers that are seeking to upend urban travel, was staring at a cash crunch as it is still developing aircraft that is yet to receive approval to carry passengers.

Lilium had asked the German federal government to guarantee 50 million euros ($54 million) of a contemplated 100 million euro convertible loan from KfW, the German state-owned development bank.

But the company received indications that the federal government would not approve it, Lilium said. Talks with Bavaria, where Lilium is based, for guarantee of at least 50 million euros have not yielded an agreement so far.

The filing for insolvency in Germany could result in the company's ordinary shares being delisted from the Nasdaq, or having its shares suspended, Lilium said.

Founded in 2015, Lilium is targeting the regional transport market with a 250 kilometer-range (155 miles) jet that can carry up to six passengers, unlike many rivals which are mainly looking at shorter trips between cities and suburbs.


Original Submission

posted by hubie on Sunday October 27, @02:36AM   Printer-friendly
from the from-beyond-the-grave dept.

https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2024/1019/1476279-bram-stoker/

A long-lost story from Bram Stoker, the Irish author of one of the world's best known gothic horror stories 'Dracula', has been found in Dublin.

In a remarkable discovery, the short story by Stoker, has been unearthed 130 years after it was first printed.

The haunting tale, titled 'Gibbet Hill', was found in the 1890 Christmas supplement of the Dublin Daily Express.

It is a dark story of a man travelling through the English countryside, who comes across a haunting story involving murders, hangings and demonic and malevolent children.

It's almost as if Halloween was upon us soon ... oh right.

If it was printed, and then forgotten about (or lost) for 130 years. How good can it really be? This is around the time he also wrote 'Dracula'. Considering it was a bit of a hit it seems odd that his other writing was then lost. Did they work contrary to how writers work today that if they make one hit then all their other writings become "gold" and are reprinted or rereleased etc etc.


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Saturday October 26, @09:51PM   Printer-friendly
from the flimsily-walled-garden dept.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/10/212-million-contract-will-finally-get-san-francisco-trains-off-floppy-disks/

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) board has agreed to spend $212 million to get its Muni Metro light rail off floppy disks.

The Muni Metro's Automatic Train Control System (ATCS) has required 5¼-inch floppy disks since 1998, when it was installed at San Francisco's Market Street subway station. The system uses three floppy disks for loading DOS software that controls the system's central servers.
[...]
After starting initial planning in 2018, the SFMTA originally expected to move to a floppy-disk-free train control system by 2028. But with COVID-19 preventing work for 18 months, the estimated completion date was delayed.

On October 15, the SFMTA moved closer to ditching floppies when its board approved a contract with Hitachi Rail for implementing a new train control system that doesn't use floppy disks, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
[...]
Further illustrating the light rail's dated tech, the current ATCS was designed to last 20 to 25 years, meaning its expected expiration date was in 2023. The system still works fine, but the risk of floppy disk data degradation and challenges in maintaining expertise in 1990s programming languages have further encouraged the SFMTA to seek upgrades.
[...]
The SFMTA plans to spend $700 million (including the $212 million Hitachi contract) to overhaul the light rail's control system. This includes replacing the loop cable system for sending data across the servers and trains. The cables are said to be a more pressing concern than the use of floppy disks. The aging cables are fragile, with "less bandwidth than an old AOL dial-up modem," Roccaforte previously told Ars.
[...]
The SFMTA's website says that the current estimated completion date for the complete overhaul is "2033/2034."
[...]
Various other organizations have also been slow to ditch the dated storage format, including Japan, which only stopped using floppy disks in governmental systems in June, and the German navy, which is still trying to figure out a replacement for 8-inch floppies.

Previously on SoylentNews:
Japan's Digital Minister Claims Victory Against Floppy Disks - 20240707
Where Are Floppy Disks Today? Planes, Trains, And All These Other Places - 20240517
Chuck E. Cheese Still Uses Floppy Disks in 2023, but Not for Long - 20230117
The Last Man Selling Floppy Disks Says He Still Receives Orders From Airlines - 20220921
Japan's Digital Minister 'Declares a War' on Floppy Disks - 20220902
Boeing 747s Receive Critical Software Updates Over 3.5" Floppy Disks - 20200812
Good News – America's Nuke Arsenal to Swap Eight-Inch Floppy Disks for Solid-State Drives - 20191018
An 18yo Server? Meh. Try Dozens of Thirty Year-Old Laptops Still Used 24/7 - 20160215
US Nuclear Missile Silos Use 8" Floppy Disks - 20140429

Related stories on SoylentNews:
Floppotron 3.0 - 20220617
Preserving a Floppy Disk With a Logic Analyzer and a Serial Cable - 20220130
How Did MS-DOS Decide that Two Seconds Was the Amount of Time to Keep the Floppy Disk Cache Valid? - 20190925
The Floppy Disk Orphaned By Linux - 20190726
The Floppotron: a Computer Hardware Orchestra - 20160711
Files Recovered from Nearly 200 Floppy Disks Belonging to Star Trek Creator - 20160106


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Saturday October 26, @05:04PM   Printer-friendly
from the here-there-be-idiots dept.

This isn't really tech-centric but, sadly, it reflects on the times. A Texas board has declared a non-fiction book as fiction so it can be banned.

[...] this new twist belongs to one county in Texas, which has given certain people the power to unilaterally decide what is or isn't factual.

  • [A] decision made this month in a county near Houston left us stunned. The Montgomery County Commissioners Court ordered librarians there to reclassify the nonfiction children's book "Colonization and the Wampanoag Story" as fiction.

  • This reclassification decision is a consequence of a contentious policy change in March. Right-wing activists pressured the Montgomery County Commissioners Court to remove librarians from the review process for challenged children's, young adult and parenting books.

  • [...] Shortly thereafter, the newly formed Montgomery County "Citizens Review Committee" reclassified "Colonization and the Wampanoag Story" as fiction. The committee reviewed the book in a closed meeting — all its meetings are closed to the public — and it offered no explanation for its decision. The new policy does not allow decisions made by the Citizens Review Committee to be appealed.

That's how you start erasing your own history. You take the librarians out of the equation. Next, you remove the public from the conversation by making these discussions private. Then you give only the citizens you want to hear from — including any non-residents who want to challenge content they don't like — the only invitation to the discussion: the blanket permission to challenge books and/or their classifications. Then you seal it with a court order and pretend this is just citizens protecting each other, rather than the government engaging in censorship on behalf of people who love censorship as long as it only silences the people they don't like.


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Saturday October 26, @12:23PM   Printer-friendly
from the the-juice-has-died dept.

The bad news continues as the rental giant tries to untangle itself from its failed electric vehicle strategy:

Ryan Brinkman, automotive equity research analyst with J.P. Morgan, downgraded Hertz Global Holdings from neutral to underweight Monday.

The assessment, Seeking Alpha reports, comes as the company tries to reverse course from its failed EV strategy, which has cost the company as much as $1 billion. The losses stem from the vehicle's high depreciation rates and high collision repair costs. The lack of spare parts for repairs is also undermining utilizations of the company's electric fleet.

As reported on Yahoo! News:

The challenges don't stop there. Hertz's heavy debt load is tying its hands, potentially forcing the company to navigate choppy waters without the lifeline of share buybacks. With used-vehicle prices on shaky ground and high refinancing costs, Hertz is bracing for more cash outflows. Throw in a recent adverse court ruling that resurrected litigation risks from its bankruptcy, and the financial landscape looks even more daunting. The path to stability isn't just steep; it's laden with obstacles.

Previously:


Original Submission

posted by janrinok on Saturday October 26, @07:38AM   Printer-friendly

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

China's semiconductor industry is speeding up in response to US export controls, according to research by a specialist in intellectual property.

According to IP firm Mathys & Squire, semiconductor patent applications worldwide spiked by 22 percent, jumping from 66,416 in 2022-23 to 80,892 in 2023-24. Leading the charge is China, whose filings surged by 42 percent from 32,840 to 46,591, outstripping every other region.

Why the rush? In short, Washington's export controls. With restrictions cutting China off from the world's most advanced semiconductors and concerns of further tightening on the horizon, China's domestic chip sector is on a mission. Beijing has made it clear – the tech sector must innovate to avoid getting caught in the semiconductor dependency trap. Semiconductors have been pushed to the top of the tech priority list, and the results are showing up in the patent numbers.

"The US-China semiconductor rivalry is heating up," said Dr Edd Cavanna, partner at Mathys & Squire. "Export restrictions are pushing China to invest more in homegrown semiconductor R&D, and this is now reflected in their patent filings." China appears to be in a hurry to innovate its way around US sanctions and ensure its semiconductor sector isn't left trailing in the dust.

China is still very much playing catchup, with local designs trailing the bleeding edge by several years.

Chinese chip designer Loongson last week teased products it claimed will deliver the same performance as AMD and Intel products from five years ago. Its chairman, Hu Weiwu, reportedly told senior government figures that it had an upcoming 3B6600 desktop processor in the works that "can reach the performance of the x86 processor under the 7nm process."

And a teardown of Huawei's Pura 70 smartphone by an IC research firm earlier this year revealed the Chinese tech giant is relying on Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp's HiSilicon Kirin 9010 processor, likely because US sanctions mean the Chinese company can't buy from other sources.

But it's not just China making moves. The US semiconductor industry, propped up by the Inflation Reduction Act, saw its own patent filings rise by 9 percent, reaching 21,269 in 2023-24. With US policies pouring cash into domestic chip production – TSMC's Arizona plant being one high-profile example – the US is keen to keep its supply chain fortified while ramping up its R&D efforts.

It's not clear whether the current patent push will result in feature parity or processor independence for China in the next several years. Both the US and China are seeking to bring fabrication of sub-10nm nodes to their own turf, and the US Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) predicted in a report out earlier this year that the US would be a bigger winner by far. SIA predicted that by 2032, the US would produce 28 percent of the world's advanced processors, compared to just 2 percent from China.

China's patent surge isn't solely driven by geopolitics. The rise of AI, and particularly the explosion of generative AI, has sparked a push to innovate in semiconductor design. AI accelerators and high-performance chips are hot commodities, and chipmakers everywhere are scrambling to file patents for the next big thing in AI hardware.

So while global semiconductor patents are on the rise, China's 42 percent leap is an indication that it's gunning for self-sufficiency. But as the US shores up its own chipmaking prowess, the race is on – and it's only set to intensify if current trends are anything to go by. ®


Original Submission