Tim Bradshaw in Los Angeles
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Miquela is a freckled, fresh-faced singer, fashion influencer, model and activist. In two years, she has accrued a following of 1m on Instagram. Her Spotify page has had millions of song streams and she is granted backstage access to exclusive events.
The thing that sets her apart? She doesn’t really exist.
Miquela is an avatar. But when first scrolling through Miquela’s Instagram page she could easily pass off as a real person: she wears the latest designer labels, attends fashion dinners and book signings and enjoys spaghetti lunches with her friends.
It’s only on closer inspection you start to notice the strange homogeneity about her features — the too immaculately shiny smooth and brightened skin, facial symmetry and the hair, always in the same style, two buns with a straight uniform fringe with never a strand out of place. She’s just a little too perfect.
In a world where we are now saturated with “fake news” and ever advancing technologies, Miquela represents an industry in the throes of its own identity crisis.
But in an interview, Miquela maintains that “she” is just a 19-year-old from Downey, California.
“I would love to go on tour!” Miquela told the FT. “Nothing is planned at the moment, but I want to meet my fans and see the world.”
Read the full interview here.
Flag as Important
Thai takeaway with the FT Chloe Cornish delivers Lunch with crypto wunderkind Vitalik Buterin, creator of Ethereum. “There’s projects that never had a soul, that are just like, ra-ra, price go up…Lambo[rghini], vrromm, buybuybuy now!” he says, flapping his long hands. “We’ve created a culture where some totally random project raising something like $8m is like, oh yeah that’s peanuts. You know you’re in a bubble!”
LeComeback
For much of last year, the LeEco empire founded by Jia Yueting looked as though it was crumbling, as financial difficulties mounted up at the cars-to-smartphones conglomerate. Thursday finally brought a reprieve. Tencent and JD led a $437m investment into LeEco’s smart TV unit, while Jia’s US automotive venture, Faraday Future, has reportedly secured a $2bn lifeline.
Moscow’s Telegram to Silicon Valley
Russia’s attempt to ban messaging app Telegram haswreaked havoc across the country’s internet. Sites hosted by Google and Amazon’s cloud services, which were also blocked by Russia, became collateral damage in what some see as a prelude to a wider Kremlin crackdown on foreign tech companies.
Forwarded
Full screen
Netflix may have been forced to pull out of the Cannes film festival but it hasn’t given up on theatrical releases for its growing slate of movies. It even considered buying LA-based arthouse cinema chain Landmark Theatres to boost its Oscar campaigns, though the deal fell apart over price, according to the LA Times.
Palantir profiled
The secretive Silicon Valley analytics company, co-founded by Peter Thiel, can turn “data landfills into gold mines”. But Bloomberg‘s feature raises questions about the way Palantir’s technology is used by law enforcement: “When whole communities are algorithmically scraped for pre-crime suspects, data is destiny.”
Agree to these terms
Tech companies’ privacy policies and terms of service are long and hard to understand. But before you just click “OK”, check out ToSDR – short for Terms of Service; Didn’t Read – which turns lengthy terms of service agreements into bulleted summaries, then rates them. Wired meets the team trying to demystify the legalese.
Tech tools you can use – Alexa Blueprints
Amazon on Thursday introduced a new way for anyone to write a “skill” for its virtual assistant, Alexa.
Its Blueprints tool provides 20 templates for creating personalised responses when you ask your Echo speaker a question – from family in-jokes and bedtime stories to instructions for the baby sitter.
No coding is required to get Alexa telling your very own “Dad jokes”. The first Blueprints are launching now for Amazon customers in the US.
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