Category Archives: Ai
Apple’s iPhone designer is leaving to work with Jony Ive and Sam Altman on AI hardware – Engadget
Apple's designer exodus continues as product design chief Tang Tan is leaving the company and joining Jony Ive's design firm LoveFrom, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. There, he'll reportedly work on a new artificial intelligence hardware project backed by OpenAI's Sam Altman with aim of creating devices deploying the latest deep learning technology.
Tan was in charge of design for Apple's main products including the iPhone, Watch and AirPods, so his departure leaves a sizable hole. As part of LoveFrom, Tan will act as hardware design lead for the new AI project, with Altman providing the software running underneath. All products are supposedly in the early concept phases, with a focus on devices for the home. None of the parties (OpenAI, LoveFrom or Apple) have commented on the news.
It was already known that Tan would be likely be leaving Apple, but it hadn't yet been revealed where he'd go. Earlier this year, Jony Ive's successor Evans Hankey left the company after just a few years in the product design chief role. In all, about 14 members of Ive's former team have left Apple since 2019, with only a half dozen or so remaining. Ive worked as a consultant for Apple until 2022, and more than 20 former Apple employees have joined Ive under LoveFrom.
Altman was recently fired (and then rehired) by OpenAI, in part because he was raising funds for other endeavors. One of those was the team-up with Ive to create AI hardware backed by Softbank, according to a previous Bloomberg report.
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Apple's iPhone designer is leaving to work with Jony Ive and Sam Altman on AI hardware - Engadget
Misinformation may get worse in 2024 election as safeguards erode – The Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) Nearly three years after rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol, the false election conspiracy theories that drove the violent attack remain prevalent on social media and cable news: suitcases filled with ballots, late-night ballot dumps, dead people voting.
Experts warn it will likely be worse in the coming presidential election contest. The safeguards that attempted to counter the bogus claims the last time are eroding, while the tools and systems that create and spread them are only getting stronger.
Many Americans, egged on by former President Donald Trump, have continued to push the unsupported idea that elections throughout the U.S. cant be trusted. A majority of Republicans (57%) believe Democrat Joe Biden was not legitimately elected president.
Meanwhile, generative artificial intelligence tools have made it far cheaper and easier to spread the kind of misinformation that can mislead voters and potentially influence elections. And social media companies that once invested heavily in correcting the record have shifted their priorities.
I expect a tsunami of misinformation, said Oren Etzioni, an artificial intelligence expert and professor emeritus at the University of Washington. I cant prove that. I hope to be proven wrong. But the ingredients are there, and I am completely terrified.
Manipulated images and videos surrounding elections are nothing new, but 2024 will be the first U.S. presidential election in which sophisticated AI tools that can produce convincing fakes in seconds are just a few clicks away.
The fabricated images, videos and audio clips known as deepfakes have started making their way into experimental presidential campaign ads. More sinister versions could easily spread without labels on social media and fool people days before an election, Etzioni said.
You could see a political candidate like President Biden being rushed to a hospital, he said. You could see a candidate saying things that he or she never actually said. You could see a run on the banks. You could see bombings and violence that never occurred.
High-tech fakes already have affected elections around the globe, said Larry Norden, senior director of the elections and government program at the Brennan Center for Justice. Just days before Slovakias recent elections, AI-generated audio recordings impersonated a liberal candidate discussing plans to raise beer prices and rig the election. Fact-checkers scrambled to identify them as false, but they were shared as real across social media regardless.
These tools might also be used to target specific communities and hone misleading messages about voting. That could look like persuasive text messages, false announcements about voting processes shared in different languages on WhatsApp, or bogus websites mocked up to look like official government ones in your area, experts said.
Faced with content that is made to look and sound real, everything that weve been wired to do through evolution is going to come into play to have us believe in the fabrication rather than the actual reality, said misinformation scholar Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
Republicans and Democrats in Congress and the Federal Election Commission are exploring steps to regulate the technology, but they havent finalized any rules or legislation. Thats left states to enact the only restrictions so far on political AI deepfakes.
A handful of states have passed laws requiring deepfakes to be labeled or banning those that misrepresent candidates. Some social media companies, including YouTube and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, have introduced AI labeling policies. It remains to be seen whether they will be able to consistently catch violators.
It was just over a year ago that Elon Musk bought Twitter and began firing its executives, dismantling some of its core features and reshaping the social media platform into whats now known as X.
Since then, he has upended its verification system, leaving public officials vulnerable to impersonators. He has gutted the teams that once fought misinformation on the platform, leaving the community of users to moderate itself. And he has restored the accounts of conspiracy theorists and extremists who were previously banned.
The changes have been applauded by many conservatives who say Twitters previous moderation attempts amounted to censorship of their views. But pro-democracy advocates argue the takeover has shifted what once was a flawed but useful resource for news and election information into a largely unregulated echo chamber that amplifies hate speech and misinformation.
Twitter used to be one of the most responsible platforms, showing a willingness to test features that might reduce misinformation even at the expense of engagement, said Jesse Lehrich, co-founder of Accountable Tech, a nonprofit watchdog group.
Obviously now theyre on the exact other end of the spectrum, he said, adding that he believes the companys changes have given other platforms cover to relax their own policies. X didnt answer emailed questions from The Associated Press, only sending an automated response.
In the run-up to 2024, X, Meta and YouTube have together removed 17 policies that protected against hate and misinformation, according to a report from Free Press, a nonprofit that advocates for civil rights in tech and media.
In June, YouTube announced that while it would still regulate content that misleads about current or upcoming elections, it would stop removing content that falsely claims the 2020 election or other previous U.S. elections were marred by widespread fraud, errors or glitches. The platform said the policy was an attempt to protect the ability to openly debate political ideas, even those that are controversial or based on disproven assumptions.
Lehrich said even if tech companies want to steer clear of removing misleading content, there are plenty of content-neutral ways platforms can reduce the spread of disinformation, from labeling months-old articles to making it more difficult to share content without reviewing it first.
X, Meta and YouTube also have laid off thousands of employees and contractors since 2020, some of whom have included content moderators.
The shrinking of such teams, which many blame on political pressure, sets the stage for things to be worse in 2024 than in 2020, said Kate Starbird, a misinformation expert at the University of Washington.
Meta explains on its website that it has some 40,000 people devoted to safety and security and that it maintains the largest independent fact-checking network of any platform. It also frequently takes down networks of fake social media accounts that aim to sow discord and distrust.
No tech company does more or invests more to protect elections online than Meta not just during election periods but at all times, the posting says.
Ivy Choi, a YouTube spokesperson, said the platform is heavily invested in connecting people to high-quality content on YouTube, including for elections. She pointed to the platforms recommendation and information panels, which provide users with reliable election news, and said the platform removes content that misleads voters on how to vote or encourages interference in the democratic process.
The rise of TikTok and other, less regulated platforms such as Telegram, Truth Social and Gab, also has created more information silos online where baseless claims can spread. Some apps that are particularly popular among communities of color and immigrants, such as WhatsApp and WeChat, rely on private chats, making it hard for outside groups to see the misinformation that may spread.
Im worried that in 2024, were going to see similar recycled, ingrained false narratives but more sophisticated tactics, said Roberta Braga, founder and executive director of the Digital Democracy Institute of the Americas. But on the positive side, I am hopeful there is more social resilience to those things.
Trumps front-runner status in the Republican presidential primary is top of mind for misinformation researchers who worry that it will exacerbate election misinformation and potentially lead to election vigilantism or violence.
The former president still falsely claims to have won the 2020 election.
Donald Trump has clearly embraced and fanned the flames of false claims about election fraud in the past, Starbird said. We can expect that he may continue to use that to motivate his base.
Without evidence, Trump has already primed his supporters to expect fraud in the 2024 election, urging them to intervene to guard the vote to prevent vote rigging in diverse Democratic cities. Trump has a long history of suggesting elections are rigged if he doesnt win and did so before voting in 2016 and 2020.
That continued wearing away of voter trust in democracy can lead to violence, said Bret Schafer, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Alliance for Securing Democracy, which tracks misinformation.
If people dont ultimately trust information related to an election, democracy just stops working, he said. If a misinformation or disinformation campaign is effective enough that a large enough percentage of the American population does not believe that the results reflect what actually happened, then Jan. 6 will probably look like a warm-up act.
Election officials have spent the years since 2020 preparing for the expected resurgence of election denial narratives. Theyve dispatched teams to explain voting processes, hired outside groups to monitor misinformation as it emerges and beefed up physical protections at vote-counting centers.
In Colorado, Secretary of State Jena Griswold said informative paid social media and TV campaigns that humanize election workers have helped inoculate voters against misinformation.
This is an uphill battle, but we have to be proactive, she said. Misinformation is one of the biggest threats to American democracy we see today.
Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simons office is spearheading #TrustedInfo2024, a new online public education effort by the National Association of Secretaries of State to promote election officials as a trusted source of election information in 2024.
His office also is planning meetings with county and city election officials and will update a Fact and Fiction information page on its website as false claims emerge. A new law in Minnesota will protect election workers from threats and harassment, bar people from knowingly distributing misinformation ahead of elections and criminalize people who non-consensually share deepfake images to hurt a political candidate or influence an election.
We hope for the best but plan for the worst through these layers of protections, Simon said.
In a rural Wisconsin county north of Green Bay, Oconto County Clerk Kim Pytleski has traveled the region giving talks and presentations to small groups about voting and elections to boost voters trust. The county also offers equipment tests in public so residents can observe the process.
Being able to talk directly with your elections officials makes all the difference, she said. Being able to see that there are real people behind these processes who are committed to their jobs and want to do good work helps people understand we are here to serve them.
Fernando reported from Chicago. Associated Press writer Christina A. Cassidy in Atlanta contributed to this report.
The Associated Pressreceives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about APs democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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Misinformation may get worse in 2024 election as safeguards erode - The Associated Press
These incredibly futuristic beehives have an AI robot beekeeper inside and it can even guard the hive or dispense … – The Cool Down
The Save the Bees slogan has created quite a buzz, and in a recent development in the campaign, it appears robots may be coming to the rescue.
Beekeeping is thousands of years old and plays a critical role in agriculture, as more than 130 agricultural crops and one-third of the food we eat in the United States are pollinated by bees.However, Save the Bees reports that bee populations have decreased by more than 50% in the past 75 years, while human populations have increased by over 130%. The Associated Press further states that nearly half (48%) of the colonies in the U.S. collapsed last year.
The loss of bees puts the entire global food supply at risk, and because of this, the race is on to save them. As reported by Axios, an AI-powered robotic hive created by Beewise could help beekeepers save honeybee colonies.
The BeeHome looks like a large filing cabinet and has room for up to 10 colonies that build honeycombs across multiple frames, as shown by a video on the companys YouTube page. In its central corridor, it has a robot that monitors the colonies 24/7 using computer vision, AI, and neural networks, as described by co-founder and CEO Saar Safra to WIPO Magazine.
The robot inspects the bees, then the AI tools convert the images to data. Analyzing this data allows any problems the bees might be experiencing to be identified, which then triggers the robot to address those issues.
If the AI detects mites, the robot moves the frames to a section of the box that heats each frame by 2 degrees an amount hot enough to kill the mites but not the bees. If AI sees the bees are hungry, the robot fills a food frame and places it beside the frame filled with hungry bees; if it senses pesticides entering the hive, the robot can close the entrances; and if it sees that the bees are sick, the robot will provide medicine to the hive.
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We havent changed traditional beekeeping in any way, Safra said. We simply do it with a robot in real time.
Apiarists Advocate points out that the AI technology allows beekeepers to reduce the number of hives needed to achieve the same pollination results, reducing their carbon footprint and resource consumption.
Others are also turning to robots in the face of mass bee die-offs, like researchers in Finland who have developed small, fairy-like robots that can fly, which could help pollinate vital crops across the globe.
Loss of bees is largely caused by human activity, with factors like rising temperatures, habitat loss, pesticides in agriculture and gardens, and disease all playing a role. We can give the bees a wing up by helping to slow Earths rapid overheating by changing the way we buy and use plastic, get around, and power our homes.
We can also help by changing how we plan and care for our yards, making them havens for pollinators like bees instead of chemically treated wastelands.
Join our free newsletter for weekly updates on the coolest innovations improving our lives and saving our planet.
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Will AI Kill SEO? We Asked ChatGPT (Festive Flashback) – Search Engine Journal
Celebrate the Holidays with some of SEJs best articles of 2023.
Our Festive Flashback series runs from December 21 January 5, featuring daily reads on significant events, fundamentals, actionable strategies, and thought leader opinions.
2023 has been quite eventful in the SEO industry and our contributors produced some outstanding articles to keep pace and reflect these changes.
Catch up on the best reads of 2023 to give you plenty to reflect on as you move into 2024
It happens every couple of years.
First, it was Jason Calacanis and Mahalo, then the early social platforms.
We saw it again with voice search and smart assistants. For a minute, it was TikToks turn. Then the metaverse jumped the line.
Now, its ChatGPT and AI.
Im talking, of course, about SEO killers.
Every now and then, a new technology comes along, and three things inevitably happen:
Rinse, repeat.
It would seem that search has more lives than a cartoon cat, but the simple truth is: Search is immortal.
How we search, what devices we use, and whether the answer is a link to a website will forever be up for debate.
But as long as users have tasks to complete, theyll turn somewhere for help, and digital marketers will influence the process.
Theres a ton of hype right now about AI replacing both search engines and search professionals I dont see that happening. I view ChatGPT as just another tool.
Much like a knife: You can butter bread or cut yourself. Its all in how you use it.
Will AI replace search engines? Lets ask it ourselves!
Thats a pretty good answer.
Many SEO professionals (including me) have been saying for years that the days of tricking the algorithm are long gone.
SEO has been slowly morphing into digital marketing for a long time now. Its no longer possible to do SEO without considering user intent, personas, use cases, competitive research, market conditions, etc.
Ok, but wont AI just do that for us? Is AI going to take my job? Heres a crazy idea: Lets ask ChatGPT!
Why? Lets dive in.
I still see a lot of SEO pros writing articles that ask AI to do things its simply incapable of and this comes from a basic understanding of how large language models actually work.
AI tools, like ChatGPT, arent pulling any information from a database of facts. They dont have an index or a knowledge graph.
They dont store information the way a search engine does. Theyre simply predicting what words or sentences will come next based on the material theyve been trained on. They dont store this training material, though.
Theyre using word vectors to determine what words are most likely to come next. Thats why they can be so good and also hallucinate.
AI cant crawl the internet. It has no knowledge of current events and cant cite sources because it doesnt know or retain that information. Sure, you can ask it to cite sources, but its really just making stuff up.
For really popular topics that were discussed a lot, it can get pretty close because the probabilities of those words coming next are really high but the more specific you get, the more it will hallucinate.
Given the extreme amount of time and resources it takes to train the model, it will be a long time before AI can answer any queries about current events.
Yes and no. They can cite sources, but thats based on how theyre implementing it. To vastly oversimplify, Bing isnt asking for a pure chatbot.
Bing is searching for your query/keyword. It then feeds in all the webpages that it would normally return for that search and asks the AI to summarize those webpages.
You and I cant do that on the public-facing AI tools without hitting token limits, but search engines can!
I disagree.
All the way back in 2009 (when we were listening to the Black Eyed Peas on our iPhone 3Gs and updating our MySpace top 8 on Windows Vista), a search engine once called Live was being renamed to Bing.
Why? Because Bing is a verb. This prompted Bill Gates to declare, The future of search is verbs.
I love to share this quote with clients every chance I get because that future is now.
Gates wasnt talking about people typing action words into search engines. He meant that people are trying to do something, and the job of search is to help facilitate that.
People often forget that search is a form of pull marketing, where users tell us what they want not push marketing like a billboard or a TV ad.
As digital marketers, our job is simple: Give users what they want.
This is where the confusion comes in, though.
For many queries that have simple answers, a link to a website with a popup cookie policy, notification alert, newsletter sign-up popup, and ads were never what the user wanted.
Its just the best thing we had back then. Search engines never set out with the end goal of providing links to websites. They set out to answer questions and help users accomplish tasks.
Even from the earliest days, Google talked about how its goal was to be the Star Trek computer; it just didnt have the technology to do it then. Now, it does.
For many of these queries, like [how old is Taylor Swift?] or [how many megabytes in a gigabyte?], websites will lose traffic but its traffic they were probably never entitled to.
Who owns that answer anyway? These are questions with simple answers. The users task is simply to get a number. They dont want a website.
Smart SEO pros will focus on the type of queries where a user wants to do something like buy Taylor Swift tickets, get reviews of her album or concerts, chat with other Swifties, etc. Thats where AI wont be able to kill SEO or search.
ChatGPT can accomplish a lot of things.
Its good at showing me how to write an Excel formula or MySQL query, but it will never teach me MySQL, sell me a course, or let me talk with other developers about database theory.
Those are things a search engine can help me do.
ChatGPT can also help answer many common knowledge questions, as long as the topic isnt contested and is old and popular enough to have shown up in the training data.
Even then, its still not 100% accurate as weve seen in countless memes and with one famous bank being called out for its AI-written article not knowing how to calculate interest properly.
AI might list the most talked about bars in NYC, but it cant recommend the best place to get an Old Fashioned like a human can.
Honestly, all SEO pros talking about using AI to create content are starting to bore me. Answering questions is neat, but where ChatGPT really excels is in text manipulation.
At my agency, were already using ChatGPTs API as an SEO tool to help create content briefs, categorize and cluster keywords, write complicated regular expressions for redirects, and even generate XML or JSON-LD code based on given inputs.
These rely on tons of inputs from various sources and require lots of manual reviews.
Were not using it to create content, though. Were using it to summarize and examine other pieces of content and then use those to glean insights. Its less of an SEO replacement and more of a time saver.
What if your business is built around displaying facts you dont really own? If so, you should probably be worried not just about AI.
Boilerplate copy tasks may be handled by AI. Recent tests Ive done on personal sites have shown some success here.
But AI will never be capable of coming up with insights or creating new ideas, staying on top of the latest trends, or providing the experience, expertise, authority, or trust that a real author can.
Remember: Its not thinking, citing, or even pulling data from a database. Its just looking at the next-word probabilities.
Unlike thousands of SEO pros who recently updated their Twitter bios, I may not be an expert on AI, but I have a computer science degree. I also know what it takes to understand user needs.
So far, no data shows people would prefer auto-generated, re-worded content over unique curated content written by a real human being.
People want fresh ideas and insights that only people can provide. (If we add an I to E-E-A-T, where should it go?)
If your business or content delivers value through insights, curation, current trends, recommendations, solving problems, or performing an action, then SEO and search engines arent going anywhere.
They may change shape from time to time, but that just means job security for me and Im good with that.
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Will AI Kill SEO? We Asked ChatGPT (Festive Flashback) - Search Engine Journal
Here are 3 stocks other than Nvidia getting an AI premium from Wall Street – CNBC
Lisa Su, president and CEO of AMD, during an interview with Mad Money, broadcasting from CNBC's San Francisco bureau on November 21, 2019.
Jacob Jimenez | CNBC
While Nvidia sucked up the bulk of the profits net income through the first three quarters of the year jumped sixfold from 2022 it wasn't the only stock that attracted Wall Street's attention in the race to make money from artificial intelligence.
Software vendors CrowdStrike, HubSpot and Salesforce all at least doubled this year, far outperforming the Nasdaq, which was up 43% as of Friday's close. Those companies got a boost after announcing enhancements that draw on generative AI.
But when it comes to the hardware and infrastructure underlying the advancements in AI and ensuring that there's enough capacity going forward, investors are looking at who, other than Nvidia, stands to gain. The iShares Semiconductor ETF has rallied 64% this year. The data center is another source of optimism, and a few cloud service providers are positioned to win business as organizations boost spending on technology to help them run generative AI services.
Here are three other stocks gaining momentum due to the generative AI wave:
As the company whose technology is viewed as most likely to challenge Nvidia's AI chip monopoly, Advanced Micro Devices has a big cheering section in the software developer community. The stock is up 116% for the year as of Friday's close.
AMD just launched its MI300X AI processors, pursuing a market for AI chips that CEO Lisa Su projects will climb to $400 billion over the next four years. Meta announced in December its plans to use the new processors, and Microsoft is also a committed customer.
Su pointed to performance advantages in comparison with Nvidia's H100 chip.
"AMD remains extremely well positioned to take advantage of the rapidly expanding AI TAM, as they continue to stack up customer partnerships and roll out products with impressive (and extremely competitive) performance metrics," Deutsche Bank analysts wrote in a note to clients after the announcement earlier this month.
The stock rose rose almost 10% the day after the launch.
Since its public market debut almost a decade ago, Arista has been gaining on Cisco in the market for data center networking gear. Excitement around its position in AI helped push the stock up 96% this year.
President and CEO of Arista Networks, Jayshree Ullal.
Scott Mlyn | CNBC
In October, Arista added AI to a key customer segment so it's now called Cloud and AI Titans. More than 40% of the company's 2022 revenue came from Meta and Microsoft. The following month, Arista CEO Jayshree Ullal announced a goal of $750 million in 2025 AI networking revenue, prompting Citi analysts to lift their price target on the stock to $300 from $220.
Companies have been choosing Arista hardware to connect their GPUs to the internet. As models get bigger and workloads more complex, Arista has an opportunity to connect GPUs to one another to help scale the technology.
Arista executives see a moderation in enterprise spending in 2024 after years of cloud expansion, with organizations testing out systems before making large-scale AI deployments that could start in 2025.
For years, Cloudflare has ensured that online content can be quickly served up to end users by creating a global network of data centers that protects websites from attempted takedowns.
One key customer is OpenAI. When a user attempts to access OpenAI, Cloudflare's technology verifies that it's a person and not a bot on the other end. The company is now aiming to become part of the fabric for running AI models and ensuring rapid response. In September, the company announced a service called Workers AI, which runs on Nvidia's GPUs and will be spread across 100 cities.
"With a consumption pricing model, these services could drive meaningful upside to revenue as adoption ramps through 2024," Morgan Stanley analysts, who have the equivalent of a hold rating on the stock, wrote in a November report.
Cloudflare shares have jumped 87% so far in 2023.
WATCH: Nvidia is the cheapest AI play out there, top Bernstein analyst says
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Here are 3 stocks other than Nvidia getting an AI premium from Wall Street - CNBC
AI could make us conversant with critters, unlocking conservation tools and serious risks – GeekWire
Humpback whales, such as the mother and baby photographed here in Tonga, engage in complicated communications. The Earth Species Project (ESP) is partnering with researchers to develop new tools for understanding animal vocalizations to help save wildlife. (Katie Zacarian Photo)
My whippet Roxy is smart. She understands dozens of words and phrases well beyond sit and stay. Shell go find dad when commanded and run to the window when asked whos here?
So a couple of years ago I bought these big, paw friendly buttons that play a recorded word when pressed. The YouTube video that sold me on the technology features a pup pushing buttons to elicit the phrase love mom. I thought Roxy might find the tool empowering. Her big brown eyes and expressive brows can only say so much.
It turned out that while Roxy seemed to understand the concept, she despised the buttons.
But what if instead of pressuring Roxy to speak English to me, I could go full Dr. Dolittle and speak whippet to her?
A nonprofit called Earth Species Project, or ESP, is on a trajectory to talk with animals but with a much higher purpose than my intended goals with Roxy.
[ESP has] this amazing practical near-term conservation benefit, with this long-term, moon-shot vision of being able to communicate with animals.
ESP is working with more than 40 research efforts around the globe, using machine learning and artificial intelligence to help scientists understand animal communications in pursuit of saving imperiled species. The organization recently received $1.2 million in funding from the Seattle-based Paul G. Allen Family Foundation to support its work. Allen, the Microsoft co-founder who passed away in 2018, was interested in both protecting wildlife and AI research.
[ESP has] this amazing practical near-term conservation benefit, with this long-term, moonshot vision of being able to communicate with animals, said Gabriel Miller, technology director for the foundation.
The technology could unlock valuable insights into the lives of wild animals and lead to more effective conservation, while also inspiring a greater human kinship with the natural world, say ESP leaders and supporters. They suggest the research could have an impact akin to the 1970s album of humpback whale songs that spurred critical marine mammal protections, or the Earthrise photo from Apollo 8 that captured the planets vulnerability and stoked environmental concerns.
Understanding animal communication can essentially transform human perspective on how we relate to the rest of nature, said Jane Lawton, ESPs director of impact.
But while ESPs intentions are to bolster a connection to animals and increase protections, the work raises serious moral and safety concerns for wildlife. Just as there are fears about the impact of AI and large language models on the human condition, there are significant risks to the natural world.
A paper this year from Princeton University professors called out the neglect of animals in the field of AI ethics. The article, published in the journal AI Ethics, said that it remains the responsibility of AI companies, AI developers and scientists to identify, predict, and thereby as far as possible prevent, harms that are done to animals.
Karen Bakker, a University of British Columbia professor and expert on the issue, is likewise worried.
The ethical questions that arise when we imagine using digital technology to try to talk to animals are really complex, Bakker said in an interview on the KUOW podcast The Wild.
ESP is developing foundational machine learning models that perform operations such as the detection and classification of animal vocalizations, as well as separating vocalizations from background noise.Funding from the Allen Family Foundation will support its work on multi-modal models that pair audible communications with visual observations, videos and movement-detecting monitors, which provides context for the sounds.
The nonprofit is developing tools that are species-agnostic and can be fine-tuned for specific research. It has dozens of partnerships, including with scientists who are researching vocal communications between carrion crows and a team investigating the calls of beluga whales and what they reveal about their social structure, among other projects.
To understand how communications could aid protections, consider, for example, the ability to decode elephant communications. Those insights could inform conservationists when and where a herd is planning to migrate, and they could take action to ensure a safe passage. Or if humans could eavesdrop on whales to learn when theyre surfacing, diving or hunting prey, it could be possible to prevent deadly ship collisions.
But while AI could be used to guide animals away from danger, it could be also used to lure them to hunters and poachers.
The ESP co-founders all come from technology backgrounds. CEO Katie Zacarian was an early Facebook employee in New York; President Aza Raskin is a tech entrepreneur and also a co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology; and senior advisor Britt Selvitelle was on the founding team at Twitter.
The most ambitious element of ESPs work is creating two-way communication with animals. The idea follows the approach used in developing large language models like those that power ChatGPT and related generative AI tools that allow humans to engage in verbal dialogue with machines. The models are trained on massive volumes of writing, learning the patterns of speech.
Researchers can also use recordings of animal communications to build a model that converses with non-humans. But the pursuit has a particularly curious and controversial twist.
Theres a high likelihood, ESPs Lawton said, that if a model achieves fluent, two-way communication between a computer and animal, we will not, as the human beings, understand the meaning of that communication.
That could be problematic. There is plenty of evidence that generative AI can use inappropriate and erroneous language in the human realm suggesting that a computer could likewise misspeak to an animal without the knowledge or understanding of humans.
Theres a lot of uncertainty about the outcome of animal-machine dialogue.
So this could simply land flat, like the animals dont care, they dismiss it, Bakker said on KUOW. Or it could actually do a great deal of harm.
The Allen Family Foundation funding will support ESP in the generation of novel vocalizations that can be used in playback experiments that may result in the machine learning models engaging in two-way communication with another species. Researchers working with ESP currently are experimenting on communication with zebra finches in a lab setting.
ESP is working with research partners and ethics experts to determine whether there is a need to develop a set of guardrails to regulate the use of AI in animal communication research, Lawton said. The ethical issues in this space are a concern for the foundation, said Miller, and a point of active discussion.
Speaking on KUOW, ESPs Raskin suggested the need for laws addressing cross-species communication akin to the Geneva Conventions humanitarian rules. Bakker countered that wasnt enough, and called for the scientific community to develop protocols in this space that are similar to those restricting the use of CRISPR gene editing.
While the researchers and supporters acknowledge the serious ethical concerns that need to attention, they champion the technologys potential for good.
Decades ago, Miller himself studied hummingbird vocalizations. He would have loved access to high-tech tools, he said, to decipher the diversity of the calls and discover how the birds learn to communicate with them.
It makes data a lot more usable and practical, he said. The amount of power in these approaches is hard to overstate.
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AI could make us conversant with critters, unlocking conservation tools and serious risks - GeekWire
FTC report details key takeaways from AI and creative fields panel discussion – JD Supra
On December 18, the FTC released a report highlighting key takeaways from its October panel discussion on generative artificial intelligence(AI) and creative industries. As previously covered by InfoBytes, the FTChosteda virtual roundtable to hear directly from creators on how generative AI is affecting their work and livelihood given the FTCs interest in understanding how AI tools impact competition and business practices. The report presents a summary of insights gathered during the roundtable and explains the FTCs particular jurisdictional interest in regulating AI. The report explains that the FTC has brought several recent enforcement actions relating to AI and how the use of AI can potentially violate Section 5 of the FTC Act, which prohibits unfair or deceptive acts or practices and unfair methods of competition. Additionally, the report mentioned how President Bidens recent Executive Order on the Safe, Secure and Trustworthy Development and Use of AI (covered by InfoBytes here), encourages the FTC to leverage its existing faculties to protect consumers from harms caused by AI and to ensure competition in the marketplace. The FTCs report explains that it is appropriately taking such actions, both through enforcement actions and by gathering information. The Commission additionally stipulated that training generative AI on protected expression made by a creator without the creators consent or the sale of that generated output could constitute an unfair method of competition or an unfair or deceptive practice. The FTC added that this may be amplified by actions that involve deceiving consumers, improperly using a creators reputation, reducing the value of a creators work, exposing private information, or otherwise causing substantial injury to consumers. The Commission further warned that conduct that may be consistent with other bodies of law nevertheless may violate Section 5.
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FTC report details key takeaways from AI and creative fields panel discussion - JD Supra
China is using AI to ramp up spying, US says – NewsNation Now
Emily Finn and Urja Sinha
19 hours ago
(NewsNation) China is allegedly taking its spying program to the next level by harnessing the power of artificial intelligence, according to a new report from the FBI.
The report indicates that China is planting people inside companies and organizations to gather trade secrets as well as using sophisticated AI technology to harvest significant amounts of personal data from Americans.
U.S. intelligence has linked China to several high-profile data thefts and cyber attacks in recent years, FBI director Christopher Wray said at a press conference in Silicon Valley earlier this year.
Wray met with the leaders of other intelligence agencies around the world in October to discuss the escalation of Chinas AI capabilities, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Earlier this year, Wray said China was working to use AI to improve its already massive hacking operations.
China has denied hacking into and stealing from U.S. systems, but over the summer, a spokesperson for the Chinese foreign ministry called the U.S. the biggest hacking empire and global cyber thief in the world.
While national security officials say theyre concerned about the threat of Chinas AI, they say U.S. technology can be used to detect and deter these attacks.
In recent years, the FBI has focused on protecting the manufacturing of computer chips that are powerful enough to process AI programs, rather than the AI companies themselves, according to the WSJ. So even if hackers were able to steal algorithms, the system could be obsolete within six months.
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China is using AI to ramp up spying, US says - NewsNation Now
What to Expect From ‘Magnificent 7’ in 2024: More Gains From AI, Experts Say – Investopedia
Key Takeaways
The "Magnificent 7" stocks had an exciting 2023, significantly outperforming the major U.S. indexes as several got a boost from developments related to artificial intelligence (AI), but experts suggest many of these market leaders' AI journey has just begun, with more innovation in the AI space expected in 2024.
Coined by Bank of America analyst Michael Hartnett in 2023, the "Magnificent 7" refers to a group of high-performing U.S. stocks including Microsoft (MSFT), Amazon (AMZN), Meta (META), Apple (AAPL), Google parent Alphabet (GOOGL), Nvidia (NVDA), and Tesla (TSLA).
After a dismal 2022 for U.S. equities with the S&P 500 posting its worst performance since the Great Recession, the stock market staged a remarkable recovery in 2023 with the index up over 24% heading into the last trading week of the year, driven by gains made by the Magnificent 7. Since the start of 2023, Nvidia shares have more than tripled in value, while Meta and Tesla more than doubled. In the same period, Amazon gained 80%, while Apple, Alphabet, and Microsoft rose nearly 60%.
The other 493 stocks of the S&P 500, or the "Meager 493" as Mike Dickson, head of research at Horizon Investments, calls them, collectively gained just 7.5% by early December, according to the firm's research. The tech giants overperformance compared to their peers within the index was also largely fueled by the potential of artificial intelligence," Dickson noted.
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Experts anticipate the Magnificent 7 could be poised to see more gains in the new year thanks to the AI boom.
"An unusual feature of generative AI is that, right from the onset of the new technology, many of the same companies are already operating in multiple stages of the value chainfrom cloud to the ownership of large language models (LLMs), to the development of end-user applications," UBS analysts said in a research note.
The Magnificent 7 has "the significant resources needed to build and benefit from complex AI models" and UBS "expect[s] the large players to grow larger still."
Shares of tech giant Microsoft, which gained nearly 60% this year, hit multiple record highs in 2023, in part due to interest surrounding AI.
While Microsoft does offer its own AI tools and hardware, its partnership with ChatGPT maker OpenAI drove significant investor interest as well. Through its multiyear, multibillion-dollar investment to accelerate AI breakthroughs, Microsoft has firmly established itself as a leader in the AI race.
The companys AI advancements and announcements are also unlikely to slow down in 2024, according to analysts, especially with the support of its OpenAI partnership.
Microsoft is essentially the torch bearer of the global AI Revolution, Wedbush analysts said, adding that the firm believe[s] the stock has yet to price in what we view as the next wave of cloud and AI growth coming to Microsoft in 2024. OpenAIs ChatGPT will be the next leg of the growth stool for MSFT and will ultimately spur growth and margins into the 2024 fiscal year.
Shares of Google parent Alphabet have climbed almost 60% in 2023 amid enthusiasm for the company's AI-related advancements, which included the launch of Bard, a chatbot, and Gemini, a large language model (LLM).
Bard was unveiled in February, and though its launch was less than impressive when the chatbot made a factual error during the first public demonstration, Bard has undergone several updates since then that helped make the tool a viable alternative to ChatGPT. In early December, Google introduced Gemini, its own LLM AI model, which reportedly outperformed OpenAIs GPT-4 model.
Google may still be a step behind MSFT/OpenAI, but AI advancements are moving incredibly fast, CFRA analyst Angelo Zino said, adding that the firm think[s] future Gemini upgrades will allow GOOGL to keep up with the competition and be a major AI beneficiary.
Google said it will launch Gemini Ultra, the largest and most capable model for highly complex tasks, after further fine-tuning which will power Bard Advanced in in 2024. J.P. Morgan analysts called Google a new top pick as Gemini tightens the GenAI gap.
AI is more of a 2024 story, CFRA analysts said, noting that the firm like[s] initiatives related to Bard, Gemini, and Search Generative Experience when examining Googles outlook in the new year.
Amazon shares gained more than 80% in 2023, as the e-commerce giant advanced in the AI space.
Amazon notably began offering Bedrock through Amazon Web Services (AWS), the companys cloud computing platform. Bedrock is a fully managed service that makes leading foundation models from AI companies available through an API along with developer tooling to help build and scale generative AI applications, Amazon said. Amazon also introduced Q, a GenAI assistant available through AWS, and its next-generation custom-designed AWS chips, optimized for GenAI, in November.
Similar to Microsoft, Amazon bolstered its AI standing through a multi-billion dollar investment into a company already finding success in the tech. Amazon said the company would invest up to $4 billion in AI firm Anthropic, in a move that could allow the company to better compete with Microsoft-backed ChatGPT and Googles Bard.
When asked about reports that Amazon is working on a large language model (LLM) called Olympus, Adam Selipsky, the CEO of AWS, told AP that they should expect to see multiple iterations of Amazons first-party models. Selipsky also noted that he believes that very rapid evolution and change is coming in 2024 as the tech evolves and businesses optimize its integration.
J.P. Morgan analysts anticipate that growing GenAI contribution could support AWS growth in the new year. Beyond AI projects, Amazon is expected to have a positive 2024 with J.P. Morgan analysts naming it the firms top large-cap pick for the internet sector. JPM analysts projected revenue growth in the new year driven by a reacceleration in Amazons retail and AWS sectors and expanding margins.
Even among the Magnficent 7, Nvidia stands out as a major benefactor of the AI boom in 2023, with the largest share movement compared to others. On multiple occasions during the year, Nvidia shares saw double-digit growth in a single day. On May 25, after the company reported a surging demand for its products and a first-quarter earnings beat, share surged more than 24% from the previous days close.
As companies scramble to build AI models and integrate AI tools, Nvidia chips are used to power much of the technology, with Bank of America analysts writing that the chipmakers dominance in AI training likely represents more than 90% of the market share.
Nvidia announced its most powerful graphics processing unit (GPU), H200, designed to power AI models in November. The new chip is set to be used by Amazon, Google, and Microsoft, among other systems.
Amid some concerns about the impact of U.S. restrictions on AI chip exports to China on Nvidias bottom line, analysts have been steadfast that the chipmakers gains in the AI boom will drive profitability. Nvidia could be the best positioned compared to competitors like Intel (INTC) and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) according to Jefferies analysts, who named Nvidia the firms franchise pick.
Despite other chipmakers like AMD and Intel making progress towards claiming a slice of the pie, Nvidia should still end up a winner (if not the winner), Wedbush analysts said.
Meta shares nearly tripled in 2023 as the Facebook parent company joined the AI push.
The company introduced LLaMA, a LLM, in February. Since then Meta has used its AI tech to improve algorithms and advertising systems.
AI is a foundational component of Metas apps and services, enhancing performance, measurement, and campaign setup, the company said in a release. CEO Mark Zuckerberg reported that AI recommendation tools have driven an increase in the time that users spend on Meta platforms.
Metas efforts in AI thus far have been to improve its recommendations/rankings that power its entire ecosystem, but over time, META can monetize AI via its Llama 2, AI agents, and metaverse, CFRA analysts said. The firm is more optimistic about METAs initiatives toward a content-driven discovery platform.
Tesla shares nearly doubled in 2023, and while the electric vehicle pioneer didnt introduce many major AI projects, the company is no stranger to the tech, as Teslas autonomous driving cars rely on AI technology.
CEO Elon Musk has also been vocal about his view that AI is "the most disruptive force in history," even saying there will come a point where no job is needed the AI will be able to do everything.
Musk launched xAI, an AI-focused company, in July. While x.AI is its own separate company, it will work closely with X (formerly Twitter) and Tesla. The company introduced Grok, an AI chatbot, in November, though the product is not yet widely available.
It could be a challenging new year for Tesla, with Bernstein analysts going as far as to say that shorting Tesla could be the best idea for 2024. The firm said it anticipates that the electric vehicle (EV) pioneer could disappoint investors in the new year due to low demand stem[ming] from Tesla's narrow (and expensive) product family which is reaching saturation, and continued competition in the EV space, the analysts said.
Apple may not have released its own AI chatbot yet like some other members of the Magnificent 7, but the tech giant confirmed that it is working with AI tech, and its shares have gained nearly 50% in 2023.
CEO Tim Cook said Apple [will] continue weaving it in our products on a very thoughtful basis in a May earnings call. Apple is also reportedly working on a chatbot that could be released at a later date.
Despite Apples more muted involvement in the AI race, analysts say that the tech giant is poised for a profitable 2024, especially with the iPhone 15 propping up its holiday sales. The coming fiscal year is the golden opportunity for Apple investors, according to Wedbush analysts, who said that as roughly 240 million iPhones in the window of an upgrade opportunity globally now at play for iPhone 15 and Services, which the firm estimated is worth $1.5 trillion to $1.6 trillion on a standalone basis is re-accelerating into 2024.
CorrectionDec. 25, 2023: In a previous version of this article, the surname of CFRA analyst Angelo Zino was misspelled.
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What to Expect From 'Magnificent 7' in 2024: More Gains From AI, Experts Say - Investopedia
These are the top 10 most popular AI tools of 2023, and how to use them to make more money – CNBC
Writerbuddy analyzed over 3,000 artificial intelligence tools using SEMrush, a popular SEO software, to determine the most used tools of the year. Altogether, the top 50 AI tools attracted over 24 billion visits, most of which came from male users.
Here are the top 10 most popular AI tools, according to the rankings:
Tool category: AI Chatbot
Total visits: 14.6B
Tool category: AI Chatbot
Total visits: 3.8B
Tool category: AI Writing
Total visits: 1.1B
Tool category: Image Generator
Total visits: 500.4M
Tool category: Data Science
Total visits: 316.6M
Tool category: AI Chatbot
Total visits: 241.6M
Tool category: AI Writing
Total visits: 238.7M
Tool Category: Video Generator
Total visits: 203.8M
Tool category: AI Chatbot
Total visits: 192.4M
Tool category: Image Generator
Total visits: 177.2M
ChatGPT has earned some negative press this year from Sam Altman's leadership shakeup to potentially harmful AI developments but people keep using the generative tool. The industry leading bot can carry out an array of tasks, from planning out your weekly schedule to writing you a detailed resume.
Other generative tools on the list, like Google's Bard and Quillbot, have similar capabilities as they can summarize and paraphrase text, but haven't yet garnered the same popularity as Open AI's chatbot. And tools like Character.ai and Novel.ai are used by many as virtual companions.
If you're only using AI for entertainment purposes, you may be missing out on the opportunity to make money without a fancy job or college degree, according to Susan Gonzales, founder and CEO of AIandYou, a nonprofit that teaches AI skills to people from marginalized communities.
Say you're a freelancer or a small business owner. AI tools can "help improve [your] business, improve inventory management, analyze customer behavior or gain competitive intelligence," Gonzales told CNBC Make It in July. "Small businesses can use AI tools to target their marketing and advertising efforts more effectively ... They can identify new revenue opportunities."
And if you're looking for a side gig, like tutoring, AI can help you do that, too.
"There are many online learning opportunities to understand how AI works, which then could help [someone] possibly become an AI tutor, or to do some AI training to pass it on to the next generation," Gonzales said. "The wonderful thing today is all the information is out there."
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These are the top 10 most popular AI tools of 2023, and how to use them to make more money - CNBC