Need to Know
09 : 06 : 23

US ­– Birdwatching is known as a somewhat sedate activity – but not with BirdBuddy, a tech-powered hummingbird feeder that gamifies spotting and looking after our feathered friends.

Now crowdfunding on Kickstarter, the BirdBuddy Smart Bird Feeder is a tech-elevated answer to birdwatching as we know it. Thanks to a hidden camera module, the bird feeder identifies avian visitors, sends a notification to the user’s connected app and snaps photos. The close-up pictures are used to identify the birds via AI-powered facial recognition, and all shots feed into databases both for private use and for scientific purposes.

But the most striking feature of the smart bird feeder might be its gamified and humorous messaging, typified by its goofy video campaign, rebranding the often mocked pastime of birdwatching as a fun-filled chase à la Pokémon Go, having users ‘collect’ species and snaps of rare birds. With consumers expressing interest in reconnecting with nature, we expect the Nature-Hacking Market to continue innovating with solutions like the BirdBuddy.

Germany – Artist, technologist and voice expert Harry Yeff (also known as Reeps100) has joined forces with the opera house and ballet company Oper Leipzig to create Fusion, the world’s first ballet partly powered by artificial intelligence (AI). Generative AI was used throughout the ballet’s creation in the concept, music and set.

AI is also part of the story as dancers explore the dynamics between humanity, artificial intelligence and nature on stage. Performed in The Neues Opernhaus (New Opera House) in Leipzig, the show will include an ethereal musical landscape imagined by Yeff, associate composer Gadi Sassoon and contemporary classical composer Teddy Riley. ‘My voice is now augmented as a result of hundreds of hours of training with AI,’ said Yeff in a statement. ‘I am able to reach speeds and depths I didn’t believe were possible. I am a living, breathing augmentation; soon there will be many more of me.'

In The Case for AI as Augmented Intelligence, we explore the technology’s ability to supercharge the human experience and take it to new horizons. AI won’t replace dancers from the Leipzig Ballet but can certainly help revolutionise the art form.

China – New figures released by China’s National Bureau of Statistics show that the country’s unemployment rate for youth aged 16–24 hit a record high of 20.4% in April 2023, after rising from 19.6% in March 2023. Zhang Zhiwei, chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management, told the South China Morning Post the rise was a worrying sign for the country’s future.

Standing at 4.2%, the country’s unemployment rate for the 25–59 age group is much lower. The contrast is due to a high number of college graduates – 11.58m are entering the local job market in 2023 – and younger Chinese citizens straight out of junior secondary school looking for employment. Lack of experience, specialist skills and qualifications are combining to make their job search difficult.

As explored in Emerging Youth: China, the high youth unemployment rate could also be due to the generation rejecting China’s brutal and competitive 996 work-life balance (9:00am–9:00pm work days, six days a week) and still dealing with anxiety and uncertainty in post-lockdown China.