Google DeepMind’s AI Pop Star Clone Will Freak You Out
Angela Watercutter | Wired
“Two new instruments utilizing DeepMind’s music era algorithm Lyria let anybody make YouTube shorts utilizing the AI-generated vocals of Demi Lovato, T-Ache, Troye Sivan and others. …All anybody has to do is kind in a subject and choose an artist off a carousel, and the software writes the lyrics, produces the backing observe, and sings the tune within the model of the musician chosen. It’s wild.”
The First CRISPR Medicine Just Got Approved
Emily Mullin | Wired
“The primary medical remedy that makes use of CRISPR gene enhancing was approved Thursday by the UK. The one-time remedy, which shall be bought beneath the model title Casgevy, is for sufferers with sickle cell illness and a associated blood dysfunction referred to as beta thalassemia, each of that are inherited. The UK approval marks a historic second for CRISPR, the molecular equal of scissors that received its inventors a Nobel Prize in 2020.”
Google DeepMind Wants to Define What Counts as Artificial General Intelligence
Will Douglas Heaven | MIT Expertise Assessment
“AGI, or synthetic common intelligence, is likely one of the hottest matters in tech in the present day. It’s additionally one of the vital controversial. An enormous a part of the issue is that few folks agree on what the time period even means. Now a group of Google DeepMind researchers has put out a paper that cuts by means of the cross discuss with not only one new definition for AGI however a complete taxonomy of them.”
Why Tech Giants Are Hedging Their Bets on OpenAI
Michelle Cheng | Quartz
“Microsoft owns a 49% stake in OpenAI, having invested billions of {dollars} within the maker of ChatGPT. However the tech titan can also be an investor in Inflection AI, which has a chatbot referred to as Pi and is seen as a rival to OpenAI. …Final week, Reuters reported that Google plans to speculate tons of of tens of millions in Character.AI, which builds personalised bots. In late October, Google mentioned it had agreed to sink as much as $2 billion into Anthropic, a key rival to OpenAI. What’s taking place right here?”
Start-Ups With Laser Beams: The Companies Trying to Ignite Fusion Energy
Kenneth Chang | The New York Occasions
“Take a smidgen of hydrogen, then blast it with lasers to set off a small thermonuclear explosion. Do it proper, and perhaps you may clear up the world’s vitality wants. A small group of start-ups has launched into this quest, pursuing their very own variations on this theme—totally different lasers, totally different strategies to set off the fusion reactions, totally different parts to fuse collectively. ‘There was fast progress,’ mentioned Andrew Holland, chief govt of the Fusion Business Affiliation, a commerce group lobbying for insurance policies to hurry the event of fusion.”
Young Children Trounce Large Language Models in a Simple Problem-Solving Task
Ross Pomeroy | Large Assume
“Regardless of their real potential to alter how society works and capabilities, giant language fashions get trounced by younger kids in fundamental problem-solving duties testing their potential to innovate, based on new analysis. The research reveals a key weak point of huge language fashions: They don’t innovate. If giant language fashions can sometime grow to be innovation engines, their programmers ought to attempt to emulate how kids study, the authors contend.”
CULTURE
Sphere and Loathing in Las Vegas
Charlie Warzel | The Atlantic
“I needed to be cynical in regards to the Sphere and all it represents—our telephones as appendages, screens as a mediated type of experiencing the world. There’s a lot to dislike in regards to the factor—the impersonal flashiness of all of it, its $30 tequila sodas, the seemingly staggering electrical energy payments. However additionally it is my solemn responsibility to report back to you that the Sphere slaps, a lot in the identical means that, say, the Tremendous Bowl slaps. It’s gaudy, overly commercialized, and funky as hell: a brand-new, non-pharmaceutical sensory expertise.”
DIGITAL MEDIA
Meta Brings Us a Step Closer to AI-Generated Movies
Kyle Wiggers | TechCruch
“Like ‘Avengers’ director Joe Russo, I’m changing into more and more satisfied that totally AI-generated films and TV reveals shall be potential inside our lifetimes. …Now, video era tech isn’t new. Meta’s experimented with it earlier than, as has Google. …However Emu Video’s 512×512, 16-frames-per-second clips are simply among the many finest I’ve seen by way of their constancy—to the purpose the place my untrained eye has a tricky time distinguishing them from the true factor.”
Joby, Volocopter Fly Electric Air Taxis Over New York City
Aria Alamalhodaei | TechCrunch
“Joby Aviation and Volocopter gave the general public a vivid glimpse of what the way forward for aviation may appear like [last] weekend, with each corporations performing transient demonstration flights of their electrical plane in New York Metropolis. The demonstration flights have been performed throughout a press convention on Sunday, throughout which New York Metropolis Mayor Eric Adams introduced that town would electrify two of the three heliports situated in Manhattan—Downtown Manhattan Heliport and East thirty fourth Road.”
Google’s ChatGPT Competitor Will Have to Wait
Maxwell Zeff | Gizmodo
“Google is having a tough time catching up with OpenAI. Google’s competitor to ChatGPT is not going to be prepared till early 2024, after beforehand telling some cloud prospects it might get to make use of Gemini AI in November of this yr, sources instructed The Data Thursday. …Google’s Gemini was reportedly set to debut in 2023 with picture and voice recognition capabilities. The chatbot would have been aggressive with OpenAI’s GPT-4, and Anthropic’s Claude 2.”
Picture Credit score: Brian McGowan / Unsplash
