sri lanka

Image Source : FILE Grok AI chatbot by Elon Musk set to go open source by this week Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX has said that his artificial intelligence (AI) startup xAI will open-source the AI chatbot Grok this week. The news officially surfaced on Monday where Musk posted that Sam Altman-run OpenAI is a lie while responding to a comment in the X (formerly…

At the 11th edition of the Galle Literary Festival (GLF), Booker Prize-winning author Shehan Karunatilaka hosted an elaborate gourmet dinner and arrack-tasting session at the Jetwing Lighthouse hotel’s Nihal’s restaurant. There, he read his prose poem, Arrack Attack — a 10-point primer on the virtues (and vices) of the distilled alcoholic drink made from the fermented sap of coconut flowers — and some passages from his first novel, Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew. The Commonwealth Prize-winning book is rich with…

 India's Unified Payment Interface (UPI) services will be rolled out in Sri Lanka and Mauritius at a virtual ceremony on Monday that will be witnessed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the top leadership of the two island nations.India's RuPay card services would also be launched in Mauritius at the event. Mauritian PM Pravind Jugnauth and Sri Lanka's President Ranil Wickremesinghe will join Modi at the virtual ceremony, according to the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA). "Prime Minister Narendra Modi, President of…

Please tell us about your role as the festival director and your journey in promoting literature in the region? Director, Galle Literature Festival, Giselle Harding (Senka Music) It’s been an interesting journey! Owning a bookshop in Sri Lanka, being an avid supporter of the Sri Lankan reading culture and with a background in events, Galle Literary Festival felt like a very natural endeavour — yet I was incredibly flattered to be approached by the founder, Geoffrey Dobbs, to help steer the festival’s return.…

This story is part of CBC Health's Second Opinion, a weekly analysis of health and medical science news emailed to subscribers on Saturday mornings. If you haven't subscribed yet, you can do that by clicking here.In Bangladesh, roughly 300,000 people have been infected with dengue this year during the country's worst-ever outbreak of the mosquito-transmitted disease. By mid-November, the death toll hit close to 1,500, as hospitals in the densely populated South Asian country struggled to cope with the surge in…

Last Updated: July 17, 2023, 13:47 ISTAlliance Air (Photo: IANS)Alliance Air launches daily commercial flights between Chennai and Jaffna, strengthening travel and trade ties between India and Sri Lanka.In a significant development, Alliance Air has commenced daily commercial flights between Chennai and Sri Lanka’s Jaffna city, taking travel and trade between the two countries to new heights.The increased frequency of flights comes as a welcome move, aiming to bolster connectivity between Chennai and the Tamil-dominated…

The frequency of flights between Chennai and Sri Lanka’s Jaffna will be increased from four times a week to daily services from July 16, a move that will also amplify trade and commerce, Union Minister of Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia said. Scindia made the announcement in a pre-recorded video message on the second day of the 67th annual convention of the Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI) being hosted in Colombo.Over 500 tourism, aviation and travel experts, and tour operators have gathered in Colombo for…

Published By: Paras YadavLast Updated: May 12, 2023, 10:05 ISTElectric tuk-tuk in Sri Lanka (Photo: IANS)This is a three-phased project consists of an incubation phase, a demonstration phase and an acceleration phase; to convert petrol three-wheelers to electric Facing a severe energy crisis amid the financial downturn, Sri Lanka mulls to switch to electric mobility by converting 500,000 ‘tuk-tuks’ (autorickshaws) to electric vehicles (EVs) within the next five years.Backed by the United Nations Development Program…

President Ranil Wickremesinghe on Sunday urged IT experts in the island nation to promote Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology, taking India and Sri Lanka as models.He directed formation of a presidential task force comprising AI experts and prepare a concept paper to promote AI usage as done in the two Asian nations."When it comes to artificial intelligence, we should consider Singapore and India as role models. It is true that east Asia.... South Korea, Japan, and China are making progress in artificial intelligence,…

Did Maali Almeida – the protagonist of your novel – start off as a closeted gay man in your imagination, or did you add this detail while developing the character?Well, the initial inspiration for the character of Maali Almeida came from the real-life story of a Sri Lankan man called Richard de Zoysa. He was a newsreader, actor, poet and activist. When he was abducted and killed in 1990, that incident really shook up the Colombo bubble. Several activists and journalists from Sri Lanka had been murdered before that but…