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Apple is far from saintly, but, compared to its fellow tech giants, it did something right. The company's shareholders have voted to keep its diversity, equity and inclusion policies, following a push by conservative think tank, the National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR), to remove them, Reuters reports. The Center's proposal, Request to Cease DEI Efforts, failed 8.84 billion votes to 210.45 million votes or about 2.3 percent of the vote. Many of these programs emerged or expanded when the Black Lives Matter movement exploded onto the global stage in 2020. However, President Trump's criticisms and threats that DEIs could violate the law along with spineless greed from executives has seen companies like Meta and Google reduce or even fully remove these programs. Those in favor of the proposal at Apple argued that the company could face an uptick in discrimination cases if current policies remain. At the meeting, Apple CEO Tim Cook stated that "strength has always come from hiring the very best people and then providing a culture of collaboration, one where people with diverse backgrounds and perspectives come together to innovate." Now, none of this is to say that Apple has incredible DEI efforts. Previously, its shareholders rejected greater transparency about its racial and gender gaps. They also voted down a measure that would require Apple to further investigate the risks of its AI efforts. Cook is also doing plenty of appeasing when it comes to Trump. The pair reportedly met last week and Apple has announced $500 billion in US-based spending over the next four years. He also donated $1 million to Trump's inauguration and attended it alongside Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and other tech executives.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/apple-is-keeping-its-dei-program-130033491.html?src=rss
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Taking a powder-fresh approach to climate protection, a new initiative assigns monetary value to snow, framing it as a critical natural resource for Canada's economy. Found at snowmethemoney.ca, Foreca$ter calculates the dollar value of predicted snowfall, with each centimeter worth approximately CDN 25.5 million. This valuation is based on the CDN 9.1 billion contributed annually by the snowsports industry divided by the average 358 centimeters of snowfall in Canadian ski areas. At the local level, this translates to about CDN 93,000 per centimeter of snow at each of Canada's 275 ski resorts.
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Marketing and Advertising
Microsoft announced that it is making some features available for free in its Copilot AI assistant. Everyone now has unlimited access to Voice and Think Deeper, which is powered by OpenAIs o1 model. Copilot got the Voice feature, which allows users to have conversations with the AI assistant, in October 2024. Think Deeper is intended to parse complicated queries, such as assessing the pros and cons of major home purchases, taking cost and long-term value into account. "We are working hard to scale unlimited access to advanced features to as many people as possible, as quickly as possible," the blog post noted. Microsoft noted that users could experience delays or interruptions during times of high usage for these newly free Copilot applications. Members of the Copilot Pro subscription will still have preferred access to the company's latest AI models at those peak usage times, as well as to new features that are still in the experimental stage.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/microsoft-copilot-offers-voice-and-o1-powered-think-deeper-for-free-232723768.html?src=rss
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