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Looking back at our in-depth exploration of artificial intelligence in 2023

2023-12-20T08:00:00-05:00

One of Archinect’s most significant editorial undertakings of 2023 was our Archinect In Depth: Artificial Intelligence series. Across the year, we spoke with over 30 experts in the field, producing dozens of interviews and features alongside almost 50 news stories covering the hyper-fast pace of progress emerging from the AI community.

The result is an all-encompassing, rigorous, and diverse collection of perspectives and reflections on what artificial means for the future of architects, architectural practice, and the architectural profession, along topics including ethics, labor, inequality, skills, and licensure.

Explore further insights on Archinect's leading coverage of architecture's relationship with artificial intelligence across 2023 below.

Conversations across the intersection of AI and architecture

Behnaz Farahi. Image credit: Behnaz Farahi

'The Notion of AI as a Form of Augmentation or Enhancement Is Fascinating to Me'; A Conversation with Behnaz Farahi

In May, we spoke ...

Hackers are using architects’ computers for crypto-mining, cybersecurity firm warns

2023-09-08T11:09:00-04:00

Cybersecurity firm Cisco Talos is warning of the potential for hackers to target architects and other designers with crypto-mining malware. The hacking campaign, which has largely targeted French-speaking architects, engineers, and graphic designers, sees the victim’s computer infected with malware via installer tools.

“Cybercriminals are abusing Advanced Installer, a legitimate Windows tool used for creating software packages, to drop cryptocurrency-mining malware on infected machines,” Cisco Talos explains.

The vulnerability centers on Advanced Installer, a package used in the installations of legitimate software installers such as Adobe Illustrator, Autodesk Revit, and SketchUp. The hackers package such installers with malicious scripts and use Advanced Installer’s Custom Actions feature to make the software installers execute the malicious scripts.

The resulting malware allows h...

Archinect's Lexicon: "Generative Adversarial Network"

2023-07-14T13:06:00-04:00

Archinect's Lexicon focuses on newly invented or adopted vocabulary within the architectural community. For this installment, we're featuring an artificial intelligence term that has been cited in our recent feature articles with both Matias Del Campo and Genevieve Goffman.

A "Generative Adversarial Network" (GAN) is a class of machine learning systems invented by Ian Goodfellow and his colleagues in 2014. GANs consist of two parts, a generator and a discriminator, that are set against each other (thus the term 'adversarial').

The generator creates new data instances, while the discriminator evaluates them for authenticity; i.e., it determines whether each instance of data that it reviews belongs to the actual training dataset or not. The generator tries to fool the discriminator, and there is a continual back-and-forth as each side learns from its adversary. This eventually enables the generator to produce high-quality data that are almost indistinguishable from the real ones, as j...

Archinect's Lexicon: "Augmented Architect"

2023-07-07T11:32:00-04:00

Archinect's Lexicon focuses on newly invented or adopted vocabulary within the architectural community. For this installment, we're featuring a term that was recently cited in our conversation with Molly Wright Steenson on the historic relationship between architecture and artificial intelligence.

The "Augmented Architect" is a concept introduced by Douglas Engelbart, who was an influential figure in the field of human-computer interaction, and is best known for inventing the computer mouse. Engelbart's idea of the Augmented Architect originates from his broader theory of Augmented Human Intellect (AHI), which advocates for the use of technology and computers to enhance human problem-solving capabilities.

In Engelbart's view, the challenges and problems faced by humanity are progressively growing more complex, and traditional proble...