Things To Do In SW Florida

By PAUL WISEMAN

WASHINGTON (AP) — Imagine a customer-service center that speaks your language, no matter what it is.

Alorica, a company in Irvine, California, that runs customer-service centers around the world, has introduced an artificial intelligence translation tool that lets its representatives talk with customers who speak 200 different languages and 75 dialects.

So an Alorica representative who speaks, say, only Spanish can field a complaint about a balky printer or an incorrect bank statement from a Cantonese speaker in Hong Kong. Alorica wouldn’t need to hire a rep who speaks Cantonese.

Such is the power of AI. And, potentially, the threat: Perhaps companies won’t need as many employees — and will slash some jobs — if chatbots can handle the workload instead. But the thing is, Alorica isn’t cutting jobs. It’s still hiring aggressively.

The experience at Alorica — and at other companies, including furniture retailer IKEA — suggests that AI may not prove to be the job killer that many people fear. Instead, the technology might turn out to be more like breakthroughs of the past — the steam engine, electricity, the Internet: That is, eliminate some jobs while creating others. And probably making workers more productive in general, to the eventual benefit of themselves, their employers and the economy. read more

After nearly a decade working with a developer to turn vacant land in the heart of downtown into a vibrant community of luxury apartments, restaurants, stores and offices, Sanford commissioners pulled the plug on the project — at a cost to taxpayers of at least $3.75 million.

The city will pay Sanford Waterfront Partners of Coral Gables (SWP) that amount for walking away from the planned Heritage Park development, commissioners decided unanimously on Aug. 12. But many more dollars — and many hours of time — have been spent on the failed endeavor over the years.

The Heritage Park development also raised questions over whether the city is competent to guide a private development — and whether it is sufficiently committed to affordable housing in its downtown, which SWP sought unsuccessfully to make part of the project.

Mayor Art Woodruff said it’s time for a fresh start.

“Ten years ago, the Heritage Park development was approved because the community agreed it was what downtown needed,” Woodruff said. “Now we get a second chance to decide what will be best for our downtown and community.” read more

By AMY TAXIN and TERRY CHEA

WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Climate change is stressing rainforests where the highly sensitive cocoa bean grows, but chocolate lovers need not despair, say companies that are researching other ways to grow cocoa or develop cocoa substitutes.

Scientists and entrepreneurs are working on ways to make more cocoa that stretch well beyond the tropics, from Northern California to Israel.

California Cultured, a plant cell culture company, is growing cocoa from cell cultures at a facility in West Sacramento, California, with plans to start selling its products next year. It puts cocoa bean cells in a vat with sugar water so they reproduce quickly and reach maturity in a week rather than the six to eight months a traditional harvest takes, said Alan Perlstein, the company’s chief executive. The process also no longer requires as much water or arduous labor.

“We see just the demand of chocolate monstrously outstripping what is going to be available,” Perlstein said. “There’s really no other way that we see that the world could significantly increase the supply of cocoa or still keep it at affordable levels without extensive either environmental degradation or some significant other cost.” read more

By GABRIELA SÁ PESSOA

SAO PAULO (AP) — The blocking of social media platform X in Brazil divided users and politicians over the legitimacy of the ban, and many Brazilians on Saturday had difficulty and doubts over navigating other social media in its absence.

The shutdown of Elon Musk’s platform started early Saturday, making it largely inaccessible on both the web and through mobile apps after the billionaire refused to name a legal representative to the country, missing a deadline imposed by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes. The blockade marks an escalation in a monthslong feud between Musk and de Moraes over free speech, far-right accounts and misinformation.

Brazil is one of the biggest markets for X, with tens of millions of users.

“I’ve got the feeling that I have no idea what’s happening in the world right now. Bizarre,” entertainment writer and heavy X user Chico Barney wrote on Threads. Threads is a text-based app developed by Instagram that Barney was using as an alternative. “This Threads algorithm is like an all-you-can-eat restaurant where the waiter keeps serving things I would never order.” read more