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JPMorgan Engineers' Efficiency Jumps as Much as 20% From Using Coding Assistant

2 months ago
Tens of thousands of JPMorgan Chase software engineers increased their productivity 10% to 20% by using a coding assistant tool developed by the bank, its global chief information officer Lori Beer said. From a report: The gains present "a great opportunity" for the lender to assign its engineers to other projects, Beer told Reuters ahead of DevUp, an internal conference hosted by JPMorgan, bringing together its top engineers in India this year. The largest lender in the U.S. had a technology budget of $17 billion for 2024. Its tech workforce of 63,000 employees, with a third of them based in India, represents about 21% of its global headcount. The efficiency gains from the coding assistant will also allow JPMorgan's engineers to devote more time to high-value projects focusing on artificial intelligence and data, Beer said.

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VAR Technology Faces Backlash Following Champions League Controversy

2 months ago
A controversial VAR (Video Assistant Referee) decision helped eliminate Atletico Madrid from the Champions League after Julian Alvarez's penalty was disallowed for a near-microscopic double touch. Despite referee Szymon Marciniak standing just feet away and missing the infraction, VAR officials intervened without the typically required "clear and obvious error" standard. This incident has exemplified the paradox of video review technology in football: introduced to reduce controversies, VAR has instead multiplied them. Technical implementation varies significantly across competitions -- some MLS stadiums have fewer cameras available for review than others -- creating inconsistent application. The Premier League claims VAR increased correct decisions from 82% to 96%, yet the remaining errors dominate match-day discourse. The Guardian adds: VAR incidents are now so endemic that Norway's clubs were compelled to vote on whether use of the technology should be scrapped two weeks ago. Ultimately, they decided to stick with VAR, even though most of the country's professional clubs want rid of it. In the Norwegian league, the use of VAR has become so unpopular that fans felt they had no choice but to pelt the field with fishcakes in protest, which may or may not be A Norwegian Thing. Ultimately, the decision on whether to keep or scrap VAR devolved into a power struggle of a sort between Norway's 32 top professional clubs and the federation. Whereas the vote to introduce VAR -- which Norway didn't adopt until 2023, years later than most European countries -- was conducted by those pro teams alone, the decision to scrap it was voted on by every club in the country. Several amateur clubs told the Guardian they felt conflicted about being dragged into a fight about a technology not in use at their level. Had it been left up to the pros, VAR would have been scrapped, by a 19-13 margin. Instead, the federation orchestrated a vote among all the country's clubs to force the retention of VAR -- and avoid becoming the first nation to scrap it -- prevailing by 321 votes to 129.

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