Imagine it’s John Lennon – it’s easy if you try?

In our Sunday newsletter, we, as editors, reflect on the past seven days. We do this on the initiative of our cartoonist Albert Jan Rasker. He chooses a subject, draws a picture, and we take it from there.

When Albert Jan read this article, immediately, a song infiltrated his head. Of course, it was:

Yes, Paul McCartney plans to release a “new” Beatles song this year, featuring AI-cleaned John Lennon vocals. McCartney used AI to extract Lennon’s voice from an old demo to complete the music piece. The track, rumored as John Lennon’s song “Now And Then” from 1978, is expected to be released this year. This is the latest in the use of AI in the music industry. Artists both fear and celebrate the possibilities AI brings. For us, it was another reason to explore the impact of AI on the industry. For Albert Jan, it was an ignition of his own creativity.

Amid all the news about the dangers of AI (yes, we need to be very careful and suspicious!), it’s also good to keep an eye on the new possibilities for a wide range of industries. Including journalism, our own field of expertise.

By the way, we asked MidJourney (an AI service for creating images) to come up with a picture of the Beatles crossing Abbey Road, 50 years later. We didn’t find it suitable for publication with the article, but now we’re talking about the pros and cons of AI, we don’t want to keep the result hidden from you:

Here’s what else caught our eyes this week:

Are microstructures the key to a greener steel production?

An innovation machine for the renewable energy sector

A handful of new ASMLs are within reach, TNO says

Innovative magic Solar Team Twente: the energy of electrical engineers

Technology used to search for life in space, is now used to detect cancer

Student teams prove: in the world of construction, there are endless possibilities

Dutch Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra urges for a new international cyber strategy: “We are under constant attack from Russia and China”

Artificial Intelligence directly detects toxic clouds at Tata Steel plant in the Netherlands

Also, we visited The Next Web conference, resulting in:

TNW 2023: It’s a difficult time, and that means plenty of opportunities for tech start-ups and ‘Nothing as unhealthy as being an entrepreneur’. So we also wondered what’s it like inside the head of entrepreneurs.

And here you can find the rest of the articles we wrote last week. Have a nice, sunny week!

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