AI News

Google is enhancing its visual search app, Lens, with a new feature that allows users to ask near-real-time questions about their surroundings through video.

Black Forest Labs Launches Beta API and New Image Generation Model, Flux1.1 Pro

Apple Intelligence Makes Its Debut at WWDC 2024: A New Era in AI Integration

Uber is intensifying its efforts to integrate more electric vehicles (EVs) into its ride-hailing and delivery services. As part of this initiative, the company is introducing an AI-powered chatbot to assist drivers with all their EV-related inquiries. Slated for launch in early 2025, this AI assistant will utilize OpenAI’s GPT-4o technology.

OpenAI's Chief Technology Officer, Mira Murati, announced her departure from the company on X this Wednesday. After over six years at the forefront of the AI startup, Murati expressed her intention to pursue new opportunities. “After much reflection, I have made the tough decision to leave OpenAI,” she stated. “There’s never a perfect time to move on from a place you hold dear, but this moment feels right … My six-and-a-half years with the OpenAI team have been an immense privilege.”

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has revealed the recipients of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physics. Geoff Hinton and John Hopfield have been jointly honored for their groundbreaking contributions to artificial neural networks, which began in the late 1970s and early 1980s. They received this prestigious award for their “foundational discoveries and inventions that enable machine learning with artificial neural networks.”

During this week’s Dreamforce tech conference in San Francisco, Salesforce announced a remarkable new initiative: its VC arm, Salesforce Ventures, has launched a $500 million fund specifically for AI companies. This development is noteworthy for several reasons. Earlier in June 2023, Salesforce Ventures had already doubled its AI fund from $250 million to $500 million, meaning that this latest addition brings the total AI fund to an impressive $1 billion—a substantial increase compared to the $5 billion invested over the first 15 years since the fund's inception in 2009.

The U.K.’s data protection authority has confirmed that LinkedIn, owned by Microsoft, has temporarily halted the processing of user data for training AI models. Stephen Almond, executive director of regulatory risk at the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), stated on Friday, “We are pleased that LinkedIn has taken our concerns seriously regarding its data practices for training generative AI models using information from U.K. users. We welcome LinkedIn’s announcement that it will pause this practice until further discussions with the ICO have taken place.”

Meta has recently rekindled its controversial intentions to utilize the public posts of U.K. users on Facebook and Instagram as training data for its AI systems. The social media titan has begun notifying users that it will once again access their information. Unfortunately, the opt-out process Meta has created for users who wish to withhold their data is as cumbersome as before.

Data centers powering the large language models that drive artificial intelligence consume vast amounts of energy, creating significant challenges for tech giants to secure sufficient power for their operations. In response, Microsoft has embraced nuclear energy to meet its needs.

Update: Meta has shared further insights regarding the training of its AI on images captured by Ray-Ban Meta glasses. For more details, click here.

Microsoft has introduced its response to Google’s AI-driven search capabilities: Bing generative search. Following a pilot program in July, this feature began rolling out to U.S. users today, still in active development. To access it, simply search for “Bing generative search” on Bing. Microsoft has also added an option to more easily activate Bing generative search for specific “informational queries.”

ChatGPT, OpenAI's popular AI chatbot, has just received a major upgrade.

Meta has introduced CICERO, an AI that achieves human-level proficiency in the game Diplomacy, focusing on strategic negotiation and alliance-building. Trained on 2.7 billion parameters, it excelled in a tournament, demonstrating advanced natural language processing and strategic insight, marking a significant advancement in AI's diplomatic capabilities.

The competitive landscape of large language models (LLMs) is rapidly evolving, focusing on sustainable business models rather than just price wars. Recent price cuts have led to increased downloads and user engagement, while key players emphasize collaboration and innovative applications to drive growth and value creation.