#computer-controlled manufacturing technologies

[misspracticallydelulu]

Smile you’re on camera!

Oh and General Electric heavily symbolises the influence of Hawkins Lab💡

The surveillance cameras in the lab are by the company General Electric (GE mostly supplied these cameras to government facilities and large corporations because of the high cost of taping and keeping it on record)

Let’s go back to where it starts:

General Electric in the 80s were the #1 manufacturer of lightbulbs in the US (started with Thomas Edison, previously called Edison General Electric)

So well-known that Funny or Die did this skit of General Electric and Winona Ryder in 2016 😭

These guys were everywhere, I mean they were manufacturing everything

A friend you can’t escape. Sounds like a threat tbh 😆

It somehow led me to this painting (behind Lucas) in Mike Wheelers basement:

Only to find out that General Electric Credit Corporation COMISSIONED this painting.

‘Computers’ by Bart Forbes (1980). It depicts Charles Babbage - Father of Computers

Oh you mean like…Father of computers = PAPA

(This painting shows a variety of objects associated with the history of computing, including an abacus, a portion of Babbage's difference engine, a punch card, electronic circuitry, a magnetic tape reader, and a computer monitor with keyboard.)

GE also built this fascinating Disney Pavilion in the 60s:

There are some similarities that caught my eye, but may just be a coincidence:

Corridor of mirrors??

Progressland pavilion:

Progressland tunnel:

Progressland nuclear demonstration:

Progressland archway:

Doors & Gateways in Stranger Things:

Besides General Electric selling electrical appliances - they were a powerhouse company; owning television stations, radio stations, and being a pioneer in aerospace and nuclear technology 👀 (sounds familiar)

Consumers boycotted GE in the 80s by refusing to buy their lightbulbs to try to force them to stop manufacturing components of nuclear weapons

Speaking of radio stations, we’re all aware of the original WPTF inspiration.

This station became an affiliate of the NBC Red Network.

Guess who owned it at the time? You bet, it was General Electric and RCA (1926 - 1987)

Some Radio & Walkman ads (the escape one!!):

GE television involvement goes even deeper. They aired their own show called “The General Electric Theatre” in the 60s - hosted by Ronald Reagan

The playgate vibes I get from this 😂 there’s no doubt Ted, Henry and Dr. Brenner would have caught this on tv at the time:

Remember this RCA/Columbia Home Video campaign from this post

Well…General Electric merged with them:

Notice the resemblance between their logos. Are you actually kidding me:

Here are some interesting 80s ads from General Electric and RCA (I started with a snippet from the Starcourt Mall ad to show tonal similarity):

A few interesting things I noticed…

I’m just thinking from the perspective - if this is part of the Nina Project tapes, a lot would be generated by things they saw on tv…

GE ad 1:

GE ad 2:

General Electric dishwasher ad vs. Green Substance: the tagline fits as the green goo reanimates the creatures in Tales of 85 and fuels ‘the Key’ machine to open the portal in S3!

RCA ad:

RCA ad vs. Henry’s mindscape

GE ad 1:

General Electric ad vs. The Wheeler kitchen

Some General Electric products in the show (thanks @slavless for pointing these out!)

That’s it, it’s settled in my mind now.

Dr. Brenner is the biggest big bad of all.

Hawkins is his Progressland, it’s his playground and the residents of Hawkins are forced to take part in it:

I think General Electric is just a symbolic clue of how deep Dr. Brenner’s influence goes:

He can see everything (surveillance cameras)

He controls your electricity (power and light)

He can hear everything and control what you listen to (radio stations)

He controls what you watch and illusions you see (television stations)

Hell, he can even find you anywhere (nuclear and space technology)

Me after going down this rabbit hole:

[hesperiaaan]

hii hallo again :3 if you don't mind.

can you make a power based script of Cyrene and IronTomb or things to script when shifting as IronTomb?

only if u want to ofc 𖹭

︵ powers to script : cyrene & irontomb

︵ CYRENE :

♡ memory manipulation : user can control memories of oneself and others, allowing them to modify, fabricate, suppress, influence, repair, restore, erase, detect, and view them. they can change memories to confuse, or wipe away certain memories to cause amnesia, discern and provoke nostalgia, and enter the victim into a psychic vision, replaying their memory.

♡ writing manifestation : the user can write words or sentences and make them happen, manifesting written words like energy, forms, and actions, such as inducements, transformations, and appendages to the body of oneself and others.

♡ narrator : the user can create, shape and manipulate reality via writing, making everything they write become true.

♡ story manipulation : users can manipulate stories and its characters and how they act, what they can do, etc., the locations and what they look like, and the events of the story as well as how it starts and ends.

♡ memory communication : the user can communicate with or through memories. for example, by leaving messages within a person's memories.

♡ memory implantation : the user can implant memories into one's mind or that of others. which can either be the memories of themselves or others, or false memories manufactured by the user. they can completely re-write a person's memories to change their personalities, knowledge, self-identification, etc.

♡ memory imprisonment : the user can imprison the consciousness of other beings in their own thoughts, that of others, or that of the user.

︵ IRONTOMB :

♡ omni-distortion : the user can distort, twist and warp everything, including matter, energy, space, time, vectors, distance/location, reality, logic, perspectives, identity, variables, physics, concepts, powers/skills, rules/laws, paradoxes, etc. warping them for either offensive or defensive purposes. they can cause anything to bend, twist or change within the distortion. users can even distort things that by their very nature can't be distorted or that are considered immutable.

♡ cyberpotence : users possess unlimited power in cyberspace (the global network of computers, information technology infrastructures, telecommunications networks and data storage systems) or virtual reality. this power grants some users vast superhuman abilities that may elevate them to a god-like position in virtual reality or a deity in the real world. the user can manipulate the simulated reality of cyberspace freely and without limit. the power of a cyberpotent may extend beyond virtual reality and into the real world. the power may even go for a reality warping being from a simulated reality.

♡ error inducement : the user can induce errors of any kind onto anything, including writing, beliefs, plans, actions, powers, attacks, etc. with this power, anything can go wrong in any way when an error is induced onto something.

♡ reality hacking : the user can hack reality as if they were hacking a game, which grants hacks used in games to win, including "Aimbot", "ESP", "Noclip", etc. users can manipulate variables to customize their personal physical prowess. they may be able to create their own hacks, to further expand their arsenal.

♡ data manipulation : the user can create, shape and manipulate data and digital information, transforming the digital and physical worlds alike. users can control artificial intelligence, breathe digital life into existence, and encrypt or decode information—including the very thoughts within their mind. their power grants them seamless interaction with computers, enabling them to control, influence, and even become one with digital systems.

♡ glitch physiology : the user either is or can transform into a living glitch, a digital (and/or conventional) lifeform never meant to exist or cohabitate within the world they reside in, causing their existence to be a walking paradox. they are usually not an intended piece of the world and can, as such, do things nobody else can.

♡ rule bending : the user can bend variables/aspects of reality, inducing amplification and reduction of the effects the targets possess, and generate collective phenomena from altered effects. due to reality holding anything that contains a variable or aspect, the user can "bend" them to amplify or reduce to accomplish a desirable outcome or sometimes "nudge" them to their advantage. rule bending can affect anything in reality, from dreams, organisms, astronomical objects, forms of matter and energy, concepts, powers, etc. but cannot "generate or delete" them from reality, similar to laws of conservation, energy and matter are constant no matter the circumstance, only its influence is affected (that is, spontaneously or drastically edit reality to the point of generating new effects out of nowhere).

[mariacallous]

Colorado's Anti-Repair Bill Is Dead

Colorado has led the US on legislation that ensures people can fix their stuff. Manufacturers tried to claw back that control but ultimately

A controversial bill in Colorado that would have undone some repair protections in the state has failed. The bill had been the target of right-to-repair advocates, who saw it as a bellwether for how tech companies might try to undo repair legislation more broadly in the US.

Colorado’s landmark 2024 repair law, the Consumer Right to Repair Digital Electronic Equipment, went into effect in January 2026 and ensured access to tools and documentation people needed to modify and fix digital electronics such as phones, computers, and Wi-Fi routers. The new bill, SB26-090, would have carved out an exception to those repair protections for “critical infrastructure,” a loosely defined term that repair advocates worried could be applied to just about any technology.

SB26-090 was introduced during a Colorado Senate hearing on April 2 and was supported by lobbying efforts from companies such as Cisco and IBM. It passed that hearing unanimously. The bill then passed in the Colorado Senate on April 16. On Monday evening, the bill was discussed in a long, delayed hearing in the Colorado House’s State, Civic, Military, and Veterans Affairs Committee. Dozens of supporters and detractors gave public comments. Finally, the bill was shot down in a 7-to-4 vote and classified as postponed indefinitely.

Danny Katz, executive director of the local nonprofit consumer advocacy group CoPIRG, says the battle was a group effort. Speaking against the bill were a cohort of repair advocates from organizations such as PIRG, Repair.org, iFixit, Consumer Reports, and local businesses and environmental groups like Blue Star Recyclers, Recycle Colorado, Environment Colorado, and GreenLatinos.

“While we were making progress at chipping away at the momentum for it, we had still been losing,” Katz wrote in an email to WIRED after the hearing. “So, we took nothing for granted, and I believe the incredible testimony from the broad range of cybersecurity experts, businesses, repair advocates, recyclers, and people who want the freedom to fix their stuff made a big difference.”

Supporters of the bill, backed by companies like Cisco, had pointed to the potential for cybersecurity risks as their motivation for altering the law’s language. If companies were required to make repair tools available to anyone, the theory goes, what’s to stop bad actors from using those tools to reverse engineer critical technology like internet routers? Withholding those tools, they posited, would make them less available to hackers who could misuse them. Advocates of the bill said that companies should be allowed to keep their secrets if it ensured security, though that argument starts to fall apart with a little scrutiny.

At one point in the hearing, Democrat Chad Clifford, a Colorado state representative and the House committee’s vice chair who was also a prime sponsor of the bill, pointed to what appeared to be a reference to Cloudflare’s very public use of a wall of lava lamps to help randomize internet encryption, citing that as an example of the need for sensitive systems to be inscrutable to be secure.

“I don’t know why anybody has to have lava lamps on a wall to keep the Chinese from getting into a network, but it’s what they came up with that worked,” Clifford said. “How they do that, I believe they should be able to keep it a secret, even in Colorado.”

The problem with that argument, as cybersecurity experts pointed out during the hearing, is that the vast majority of hacks are not carried out via replacement parts or by taking apart individual machines. They’re remote hacks, where the attacker makes changes in real time, and the people defending have to make changes on the fly without worrying about acquiring permission from the company that makes the equipment.

[stevebattle]

K3A (1996) by John M. Holland (President & CEO), Cybermotion Inc., Roanoke, Virginia. The K3A is the successor to the K2A Navmaster.

"Cybermotion, Inc. of Roanoke, VA has been designing, manufacturing, selling and supporting mobile robotic systems since 1984. The company's mobile robotic system are at work in research, industrial, military, nuclear, security, and hazardous environment applications around the world. The foundation of all Cybermotion systems is the Navmaster, an autonomous vehicle that consists of a rugged cast-aluminum mobile platform base equipped with a subturret. The vehicle features a patented concentric-shaft, synchronous 3 or 6-wheel steering and drive system. The subturret houses the ultrasonic navigation, docking beacon, and collision-avoidance subsystems, and provides an interface for a variety of application instrumentation packages. Cybermotion's ultrasonic navigation, ranging, and collision-avoidance technology enables the CyberGuard to maneuver autonomously through its work environment without tracks, tapes, guide strips or other building modification. The CyberGuard uses existing structural features – walls, halls, doorways – for navigational reference. Cybermotion's Dispatcher software enables the operator to control the robot and its subsystems from a standard microcomputer, which communicates with the robot's on-board computers by radio modem. Site-specific "path programs" written into the Dispatcher computer, then executed by the vehicle, enable the robot to navigate from point to point on a path map that overlays the building floorplan displayed on the console computer. The machine is equipped with a range of sensing equipment. A scanner, using microwave, passive infrared, and other optical technology, detects intruders and flames; an air sampler detects gas and smoke and measures humidity and temperature; a CCTV camera can transmit live video images of the robot's surroundings, or record the images on a timelapse VCR; and ultrasonic sensors help the robot navigate and avoid collisions." – K3A Commerical Mobile Robot.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

When Facebook came for your battery, feudal security failed

When George Hayward was working as a Facebook data-scientist, his bosses ordered him to run a “negative test,” updating Facebook Messenger to deliberately drain users’ batteries, in order to determine how power-hungry various parts of the apps were. Hayward refused, and Facebook fired him, and he sued:

https://nypost.com/2023/01/28/facebook-fires-worker-who-refused-to-do-negative-testing-awsuit/

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/battery-vampire/#drained

Hayward balked because he knew that among the 1.3 billion people who use Messenger, some would be placed in harm’s way if Facebook deliberately drained their batteries — physically stranded, unable to communicate with loved ones experiencing emergencies, or locked out of their identification, payment method, and all the other functions filled by mobile phones.

As Hayward told Kathianne Boniello at the New York Post, “Any data scientist worth his or her salt will know, ‘Don’t hurt people…’ I refused to do this test. It turns out if you tell your boss, ‘No, that’s illegal,’ it doesn’t go over very well.”

Negative testing is standard practice at Facebook, and Hayward was given a document called “How to run thoughtful negative tests” regarding which he said, “I have never seen a more horrible document in my career.”

We don’t know much else, because Hayward’s employment contract included a non-negotiable binding arbitration waiver, which means that he surrendered his right to seek legal redress from his former employer. Instead, his claim will be heard by an arbitrator — that is, a fake corporate judge who is paid by Facebook to decide if Facebook was wrong. Even if he finds in Hayward’s favor — something that arbitrators do far less frequently than real judges do — the judgment, and all the information that led up to it, will be confidential, meaning we won’t get to find out more:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/12/hot-coffee/#mcgeico

One significant element of this story is that the malicious code was inserted into Facebook’s app. Apps, we’re told, are more secure than real software. Under the “curated computing” model, you forfeit your right to decide what programs run on your devices, and the manufacturer keeps you safe. But in practice, apps are just software, only worse:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/06/23/peek-a-boo/#attack-helicopter-parenting

Apps are part what Bruce Schneier calls “feudal security.” In this model, we defend ourselves against the bandits who roam the internet by moving into a warlord’s fortress. So long as we do what the warlord tells us to do, his hired mercenaries will keep us safe from the bandits:

https://locusmag.com/2021/01/cory-doctorow-neofeudalism-and-the-digital-manor/

But in practice, the mercenaries aren’t all that good at their jobs. They let all kinds of badware into the fortress, like the “pig butchering” apps that snuck into the two major mobile app stores:

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/02/pig-butchering-scam-apps-sneak-into-apples-app-store-and-google-play/

It’s not merely that the app stores’ masters make mistakes — it’s that when they screw up, we have no recourse. You can’t switch to an app store that pays closer attention, or that lets you install low-level software that monitors and overrides the apps you download.

Indeed, Apple’s Developer Agreement bans apps that violate other services’ terms of service, and they’ve blocked apps like OG App that block Facebook’s surveillance and other enshittification measures, siding with Facebook against Apple device owners who assert the right to control how they interact with the company:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/10/e2e/#the-censors-pen

When a company insists that you must be rendered helpless as a condition of protecting you, it sets itself up for ghastly failures. Apple’s decision to prevent every one of its Chinese users from overriding its decisions led inevitably and foreseeably to the Chinese government ordering Apple to spy on those users:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/11/foreseeable-consequences/#airdropped

Apple isn’t shy about thwarting Facebook’s business plans, but Apple uses that power selectively — they blocked Facebook from spying on Iphone users (yay!) and Apple covertly spied on its customers in exactly the same way as Facebook, for exactly the same purpose, and lied about it:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar

The ultimately, irresolvable problem of Feudal Security is that the warlord’s mercenaries will protect you against anyone — except the warlord who pays them. When Apple or Google or Facebook decides to attack its users, the company’s security experts will bend their efforts to preventing those users from defending themselves, turning the fortress into a prison:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/20/benevolent-dictators/#felony-contempt-of-business-model

Feudal security leaves us at the mercy of giant corporations — fallible and just as vulnerable to temptation as any of us. Both binding arbitration and feudal security assume that the benevolent dictator will always be benevolent, and never make a mistake. Time and again, these assumptions are proven to be nonsense.

Image: Anthony Quintano (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mark_Zuckerberg_F8_2018_Keynote_%2841118890174%29.jpg

CC BY 2.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

[Image ID: A painting depicting the Roman sacking of Jerusalem. The Roman leader's head has been replaced with Mark Zuckerberg's head. The wall has Apple's 'Think Different' wordmark and an Ios 'low battery' icon.]

Next week (Feb 8-17), I'll be in Australia, touring my book *Chokepoint Capitalism* with my co-author, Rebecca Giblin. We'll be in Brisbane on Feb 8, and then we're doing a remote event for NZ on Feb 9. Next is Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra. I hope to see you!

https://chokepointcapitalism.com/

[spocks-kaathyra]

thoughts about the Cardassian writing system

I've thinking about the Cardassian script as shown on screen and in beta canon and such and like. Is it just me or would it be very difficult to write by hand?? Like.

I traced some of this image for a recent drawing I did and like. The varying line thicknesses?? The little rectangular holes?? It's not at all intuitive to write by hand. Even if you imagine, like, a different writing implement—I suppose a chisel-tip pen would work better—it still seems like it wasn't meant to be handwritten. Which has a few possible explanations.

Like, maybe it's just a fancy font for computers, and handwritten text looks a little different. Times New Roman isn't very easily written by hand either, right? Maybe the line thickness differences are just decorative, and it's totally possible to convey the same orthographic information with the two line thicknesses of a chisel-tip pen, or with no variation in line thickness at all.

A more interesting explanation, though, and the one I thought of first, is that this writing system was never designed to be handwritten. This is a writing system developed in Cardassia's digital age. Maybe the original Cardassian script didn’t digitize well, so they invented a new one specifically for digital use? Like, when they invented coding, they realized that their writing system didn’t work very well for that purpose. I know next to nothing about coding, but I cannot imagine doing it using Chinese characters. So maybe they came up with a new writing system that worked well for that purpose, and when computer use became widespread, they stuck with it. 

Or maybe the script was invented for political reasons! Maybe Cardassia was already fairly technologically advanced when the Cardassian Union was formed, and, to reinforce a cohesive national identity, they developed a new standardized national writing system. Like, y'know, the First Emperor of Qin standardizing hanzi when he unified China, or that Korean king inventing hangul. Except that at this point in Cardassian history, all official records were digital and typing was a lot more common than handwriting, so the new script was designed to be typed and not written. Of course, this reform would be slower to reach the more rural parts of Cardassia, and even in a technologically advanced society, there are people who don't have access to that technology. But I imagine the government would be big on infrastructure and education, and would make sure all good Cardassian citizens become literate. And old regional scripts would stop being taught in schools and be phased out of digital use and all the kids would grow up learning the digital script.

Which is good for the totalitarian government! Imagine you can only write digitally. On computers. That the government can monitor. If you, like, write a physical letter and send it to someone, then it's possible for the contents to stay totally private. But if you send an email, it can be very easily intercepted. Especially if the government is controlling which computers can be manufactured and sold, and what software is in widespread use, etc. 

AND. Historical documents are now only readable for scholars. Remember that Korean king that invented hangul? Before him, Korea used to use Chinese characters too. And don't get me wrong, hangul is a genius writing system! It fits the Korean language so much better than Chinese characters did! It increased literacy at incredible rates! But by switching writing systems, they broke that historical link. The average literate Chinese person can read texts that are thousands of years old. The average literate Korean person can't. They'd have to specifically study that field, learn a whole new writing system. So with the new generation of Cardassian youths unable to read historical texts, it's much easier for the government to revise history. The primary source documents are in a script that most people can't read. You just trust the translation they teach you in school. In ASIT it's literally a crucial plot point that the Cardassian government revised history! Wouldn't it make it soooo much easier for them if only very few people can actually read the historical accounts of what happened.

I guess I am thinking of this like Chinese characters. Like, all the different Chinese "dialects" being written with hanzi, even though otherwise they could barely be considered the same language. And even non-Sinitic languages that historically adopted hanzi, like Japanese and Korean and Vietnamese. Which worked because hanzi is a logography—it encodes meaning, not sound, so the same word in different languages can be written the same. It didn’t work well! Nowadays, Japanese has made significant modifications and Korean has invented a new writing system entirely and Vietnamese has adapted a different foreign writing system, because while hanzi could write their languages, it didn’t do a very good job at it. But the Cardassian government probably cares more about assimilation and national unity than making things easier for speakers of minority languages. So, Cardassia used to have different cultures with different languages, like the Hebitians, and maybe instead of the Union forcing everyone to start speaking the same language, they just made everyone use the same writing system. Though that does seem less likely than them enforcing a standard language like the Federation does. Maybe they enforce a standard language, and invent the new writing system to increase literacy for people who are newly learning it.

And I can imagine it being a kind of purely digital language for some people? Like if you’re living on a colonized planet lightyears away from Cardassia Prime and you never have to speak Cardassian, but your computer’s interface is in Cardassian and if you go online then everyone there uses Cardassian. Like people irl who participate in the anglophone internet but don’t really use English in person because they don’t live in an anglophone country. Except if English were a logographic writing system that you could use to write your own language. And you can’t handwrite it, if for whatever reason you wanted to. Almost a similar idea to a liturgical language? Like, it’s only used in specific contexts and not really in daily life. In daily life you’d still speak your own language, and maybe even handwrite it when needed. I think old writing systems would survive even closer to the imperial core (does it make sense to call it that?), though the government would discourage it. I imagine there’d be a revival movement after the Fire, not only because of the cultural shift away from the old totalitarian Cardassia, but because people realize the importance of having a written communication system that doesn’t rely on everyone having a padd and electricity and wifi.

[govindhtech]

QUDORA Technologies Expands Quantum Operations to Japan

Germany-based full-stack quantum computing leader QUDORA Technologies launched Qudora Japan K.K. This May 28, 2026 expansion marks a turning point in the company's global expansion plan, focusing on Asia-Pacific's growth.

An Important Chiyoda-ku Location

New subsidiary headquarters are in Tokyo's Chiyoda-ku business and administrative district. From its central base, Qudora Japan K.K. fosters regional cooperation, client growth, and commercial progress throughout Japan and the Asia-Pacific.

QUDORA has recruited a top leadership team with strong local business contacts to lead this challenging project. As President of Qudora Japan K.K., Ned Cahoon will be joined by Country Manager Mitsuo Harahata and Executive General Manager Yuichi Watanabe. Local Japanese market experience and QUDORA's German engineering heritage are emphasized in this leadership structure.

Using Scientific Magnificence Tradition

QUDORA's technology is based on Germany's cold-atom physics supremacy since the first trapped-ion systems and atomic clocks. Found in 2021 and based in Braunschweig, the company has quickly become a “full-stack” provider, handling everything from quantum processing software to hardware.

Their hardware relies on patented microwave technology NFQC (Near Field Quantum Control). One of the company's founders designed NFQC to address the instability of the quantum state, a longstanding quantum computing concern.

The Coherence Search for “Quantum Utility”

In quantum mechanics, coherence time—the duration of a qubit's quantum state—is significant. Limited algorithm complexity is often caused by short coherence times in present quantum solutions. QUDORA's NFQC technology addresses this with “exceptionally long” coherence times and high-precision qubit management.

By lengthening quantum state life, QUDORA's technology increases algorithmic depth and complexity. Quantum error correction's high overhead is reduced by this technical benefit, enabling more realistic applications. Manufacturing and scalability are prioritized to give high-performance quantum computing to business and industry.

Why Japan? Combining Vision and Industry

QUDORA expanded into Japan because of its “strategic vision and support for quantum computing,” which it sees as a crucial ecosystem for innovation. The corporation considers Japan a “valued ecosystem partner” rather than a market.

QUDORA CEO Dr. Amado Bautista-Salvador praised Japan's quantum roadmap as one of the most comprehensive and collaborative, covering the full value chain, key supply chains, advanced quantum hardware development, and clear pathways to quantum utility.

Japan's industrial strengths meet QUDORA's trapped-ion technologies. The company targets industries with low coherence periods that have limited quantum solutions, such as:

Hi-performance computing

Automobile engineering

Materials engineering

Pharmaceutical research

Finance

Ecosystem Integration and Engagement

QUDORA entered the Japanese market after several strategy changes. The company is already active in the Q-STAR Alliance, Japan's leading quantum industry association. QUDORA also attended the SCA/HPC Asia 2026 conference in Osaka and joined AHK Japan, the official German business representative, to engage with the German-Japanese business community.

For prospective customers, QUDORA offers multiple deployment techniques. Their solutions interface effortlessly with HPC and business infrastructure. This includes on-premises deployments for research institutes and high-performance computing centers that need local hardware and cloud-based access for rapid quantum resources.

Future outlook

Ned Cahoon, Qudora Japan's new president, was optimistic about the local climate. He claimed Japan's technology creates a “unique environment for innovation and collaboration”. Qudora Japan K.K. builds strong, long-lasting quantum community links to bring the industry closer to real quantum use.

With its unique NFQC technology and new mandate in Tokyo, QUDORA is connecting Asia-Pacific industrial powerhouses to European scientific genius.

[no-sharks-on-the-sun]

what are your thoughts on deepseek?

There's a lot of topics wrapped up in talking about deepseek:

The January 2025 Deepseek shock, when the US suddenly remembered that China exists and it can make AI too

China's current level of AI progress and AI ecosystem, and how it compares to the US situation

China's long-term future with AI, and the looming great power competition with the US

The Deepseek Shock

I think the reaction then was basically appropriate. This was still in the "we have no moat" era when it was unclear what value the frontier labs were going to offer, and Deepseek was a real demonstration of that. I don't have a lot to say here that I think hasn't already been said - it was very technologically impressive.

China's current situation

Most of what I can find online estimates Chinese capabilities as about 6 months (or less) behind the US frontier, though these estimates are pre-Mythos and may change rapidly at this stage of the game. I think it's worth pointing out that this is absurdly impressive - Chinese models are outperforming Meta's Llama models and the EU's champion, Mistral. These are not bit players!

Critically, China is also open-sourcing their models, which drastically changes the calculus - the US frontier is entirely closed-source (and now gating their very best products instead of releasing them directly to market), so the rest of the world, which often wants their own AI sovereignty, is going to be using Chinese models for the foreseeable future. This is a geopolitical decision from China in addition to being a technical one, I think.

Chinese models are also a lot cheaper than US models on inference, which is a consequence of architectural innovations made to adapt to chip export controls (more on that in the next section) and also Chinese willingness to undercut US companies on inference cost, cheaper electricity/compute, etc. This is a big deal - it's very important for players that are more cost-constrained than large companies in the US.

China's future path

There's a reason why Anthropic is freaked out about China - I think any sensible analysis has China as the only country other than the US that could build truly advanced AI in the current moment. In many categories they have significant advantages over the US - China produces more than double the electricity of the US, and this gap is likely to widen due to China's massively superior industrial capacity and the US reluctance to embrace Chinese solar (this is a personal bugbear of mine - buy the fucking Chinese panels!).

Electricity generation is not everything, but it's a lot - data centers are power hungry, and China can support a really substantial buildout with minimal pressure, whereas the US is likely to be severely supply-constrained by 2028(!!) unless we get our shit together in a big way.

Meanwhile, China trains a lot more STEM graduates than the US and has more AI researchers, even if the US leads in quality, and the current anti-immigrant turn is not helping us. Of course, it is also true that AI researchers may become an obsolete field in the near future, or at least one where quantity hardly matters.

The US advantages are in private capital and chips - the US hyperscalers can just decide that they are going to spend trillions on AI over the next decade and no one can stop them or tell them to re-prioritize. Chinese firms have a lot less money and the government, while investing, is not going to step in to fully close the gap (and even then, it's not clear that could close it entirely). Also, US money is being funneled to a handful of highly productive labs, whereas China has a much more diffuse ecosystem, at the moment.

And now we arrive at the crux - chips! Compute rules everything, and the US currently has about 10x China's compute. Exports of advanced chips, semiconductor manufacturing equipment, etc are restricted to China - first by the US, and now the Chinese government itself has imposed some restrictions because of alleged backdoors in US-made chips and concern over the development of their own chip industry. They are way behind here in quantity and quality, and if the limiting factor of model intelligence is really just "how can we put more compute into training runs", the US is very, very far ahead.