Hollywood screenwriters are seeking protections from AI as part of their ongoing strike. The Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike continued into its fourth day as television and movie writers seek higher compensation, improved job security, and a restriction on AI for scriptwriting. More: - Among the WGA's demands is a proposal to regulate AI so it "can't write or rewrite literary material, can't be used as source material" and that writers' work "can't be used to train AI."
- The WGA's proposal was turned down by the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), which has instead offered to discuss AI advancement during yearly meetings.
- In a statement, the AMPTP acknowledged that AI "raises hard, important creative and legal questions for everyone."
- Under its current contract, AI-produced content can't be credited for writing or copyrighted, it said. The WGA contract also defines a writer as a "person."
Zoom out: - John August, a screenwriter behind "Big Fish" and others, told CNN that writers are worried about their scripts being fed into AI systems to generate new scripts and story ideas, taking over their jobs.
- "We don't want our material feeding [AI systems], and we also don't want to be fixing their sloppy first drafts," August said.
- Earlier this year, South Park's creators used ChatGPT to co-write the episode "Deep Learning," which focused on the chatbot.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 
| |
What happened: In an effort to boost its already-growing ad business, Amazon is investing in generative AI tools that can create photos and videos for merchants to use in their ad campaigns, according to The Information. What the numbers say: Since it began breaking out its ad segment revenue in 2021, Amazon's advertising business has grown by double digits every quarter when compared to the same time the year before. While the business brought in $38B last year, it's currently only focused on ads that enhance merchant search results. Why it matters: Amazon's generative AI is expected to simplify the creation and production of photos and videos for advertising. The tools could make ad formats more accessible to smaller sellers, many of which find video ad spots too costly or time-consuming, according to The Information. The bigger picture: Despite its mass layoffs and other cost-cutting measures, Amazon is jumping on the generative AI bandwagon. The move is another way for Amazon to diversify its ad business, which is already projected to grow by 70% through 2026. 
THE INFORMATION
| |
 A message from TRUERA LLM Testing and Monitoring – Join the Hands-On Workshop How can you ensure that your large language model is honest, harmless, and helpful? Join TruEra on May 11th and 18th as their President and Chief Scientist, Anupam Datta, provides a hands-on overview of how to analyze and improve the performance of your LLMs. During the two 60-minute online sessions, he will cover the following: - Quick introduction to LLMs - what are they and their history?
- Risks and challenges of LLMs: is your LLM honest, harmless, and helpful?
- Defining feedback functions to model LLM quality and performance
- How should you test and monitor LLMs?
- Live walk-throughs of how to identify, diagnose, and debug model issues in development and production
- Q&A with Professor Datta
Dates: 2-session series on May 11th and 18th Where: Virtual Event - Join from Anywhere Who should attend: Data scientists, machine learning engineers, MLOps managers, data analysts, statisticians, data and analytics managers Join for free
| |
Microsoft and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) are said to be collaborating on an alternative to Nvidia's AI-capable chips, according to Bloomberg. Microsoft is supporting AMD's expansion into AI processors and is working with the chipmaker on Microsoft's in-house chip for AI workloads, known as Athena, sources told the publication. More: - Microsoft is also said to be providing engineering resources to support AMD's chip development.
- AMD will reportedly partner with Microsoft on its homegrown processor for AI workloads, code-named Athena.
- However, a Microsoft spokesperson denied AMD's involvement in Athena.
Zoom out: - The news comes as the need for AI-capable silicon is becoming more crucial, particularly for Microsoft's computing resources for OpenAI's ChatGPT.
- The Athena chips will power large language models like ChatGPT, and Microsoft has invested $2B into the project so far.
- The in-house chips would not fully replace Microsoft's reliance on Nvidia, the top supplier of AI server processors.
- For Microsoft, the Athena chipset would be a cheaper alternative that could train and run AI models for Microsoft's data centers.
BLOOMBERG
| |
Generative AI startup Runway has nabbed a $100M funding round at a $1.5B valuation, Business Insider reports. Runway is one of the startups behind the popular text-to-image generator Stable Diffusion. The startup has also released software that uses AI to edit or create short videos. More: - According to Business Insider, Runway's Series D round was raised from an unidentified cloud service provider rather than a traditional VC firm.
- It triples Runway's valuation from its Series C funding round, which took place only five months ago and valued the company at $500M.
- In addition to Stable Diffusion, Runway's new iOS app relies on generative AI to alter the style of videos on iPhones using text and image prompts.
- Its separate Gen-2 software requires only text prompts to create original videos up to 3 seconds long.
Zoom out: - According to Axios, Runway's AI Magic Tools have been used in movie and TV production, including "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" and "Top Gear America."
BUSINESS INSIDER
| |
 A message from VANTA To close and grow major customers, you have to earn trust. But demonstrating your security and compliance can be time-consuming, tedious, and expensive. Until you use Vanta. Trusted by over 5,000 global customers, Vanta: -
Automates up to 90% of compliance for SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR, HIPAA, and more, getting you audit-ready in weeks -
Helps your business scale and thrive while reducing the need for countless spreadsheets and endless email threads -
Saves you hundreds of hours of manual work and up to 85% of compliance costs And because Vanta is all about saving you time, here’s a 3-minute video showing you how Vanta’s platform can help you automate compliance, simplify security, and build trust to accelerate business growth. Watch it Here
| |
Apple CEO Tim Cook hinted at the company's interest in AI during its earnings call on Thursday, although he refrained from commenting on any product roadmaps. Cook acknowledged the significance of AI, saying that the company views it as "huge" and has already integrated it into features such as its crash detection and heart rate monitoring. More: - "We view AI as huge and will continue weaving it into our products on a very thoughtful basis," Cook said.
- The CEO still issued a word of caution, saying he thinks "it's very important to be deliberative and thoughtful" about AI and there are "a number of issues that need to be sorted."
- While Microsoft, Google, and others have been bullish on incorporating AI into products, Cook and other Apple leaders have been generally tight-lipped about generative AI and haven't announced huge product plans.
- Last month, Bloomberg reported that Apple is developing an AI-powered health coaching service. The AI coach, codenamed "Quartz," would analyze data from a user's Apple Watch to offer personalized coaching programs for eating, exercise, and sleep.
AXIOS
| |
Weekly roundup — Other top AI stories you might have missed this week: - IBM CEO Arvind Krishna says the company may pause hiring for positions that could potentially be performed by AI within the next few years, specifically back-office functions, such as certain HR roles. Krishna forecasts that AI will be able to perform up to 30% of back-office functions in the next five years.
- Education technology company Chegg Inc. saw a 48% drop in its share prices Tuesday after its CEO, Dan Rosensweig, noted that ChatGPT's growth was affecting the company's customer growth rate. This comes after a surge in students' interest in ChatGPT, which has led some Chegg users to outsource their coursework help to the freely available platform.
- Top CEOs in the tech industry, including those at Alphabet, Anthropic, OpenAI, and Microsoft, met with Vice President Kamala Harris and other administration officials on Thursday to discuss the potential risks and regulations for AI systems. President Joe Biden, who briefly joined the meeting, emphasized that AI poses immense potential as well as risks. Harris acknowledged that AI has the potential to enhance lives but could also jeopardize safety, privacy, and civil rights.
- Samsung Electronics imposed a temporary ban on the use of generative AI tools by its employees after an engineer unintentionally uploaded internal source code to ChatGPT. The company fears that data shared with AI chatbots and other tools could be stored on external servers operated by companies like Google and Microsoft, with no simple way to access or delete it.
- The White House announced plans to gather public feedback on the usage of AI and automated technology for worker management and monitoring, such as speed and location monitors and mouse activity trackers. As automation becomes more common, the Biden administration is concerned that automated tools used to track and monitor workers can pose serious risks to their safety and mental health, as well as fuel discrimination in areas like pay and discipline.
- Accenture released a report estimating that 65% of language-related job duties have a "high potential" to be automated or augmented by large language models such as ChatGPT, particularly in the banking, insurance, and software industries. Accenture emphasizes the need to develop talent in AI engineering and train the workforce to use AI effectively.
| |
QUICK HITS - The company behind these surgical robots is planning to list on Nasdaq. Last day to fund your investment is on 5/10.*
- Amazon acquired Snackable AI, a New York-based audio content discovery engine, in December 2022 to enhance its podcast features. Snackable AI's founder and CEO, Mari Joller, has since become an AI/ML product leader for Amazon Music.
- A leaked document written by a Google senior software engineer, Luke Sernau, suggests that the company is losing ground in AI to the open-source community. Sernau named open-source as the "third faction" competing against Google and OpenAI, neither of which are well positioned to win in the AI arms race, he opined.
- The Washington Post recommends being cautious about downloading apps that claim to be powered by ChatGPT. The report suggests using only the following AI chatbots from reputable companies: OpenAI's ChatGPT, Google's Bard, Microsoft's Bing AI, Anthropic's Claude, and the Pi chatbot.
- In a tweet, Mark Cuban compared ChatGPT to the early days of the internet and HTML. "Everyone knew it would be impactful, but we made it seem far more complicated than it was," the billionaire wrote, adding that he believes using ChatGPT and other large language models "will go from being perceived as difficult, to being recognized as being fundamental and used by everyone."
- Demo Divvy, get an Ember heated mug. Hot coffee and quick and easy expense management — get both when you demo Divvy.*
*This is a sponsored post.
| |
Upcoming events at Inside: - May 08 - Inside.com Town Hall (Register Here)
- May 11 - Testing and monitoring large language models (LLMs) with TruEra (Register Here) *
- May 17 - Monthly Meditation guided by Nicholas Whitaker (Register Here)
- May 17 - Join Vanta's webinar to see Vendor Risk Management in action and learn about automating security reviews. (Register Here) *
*This is a sponsored listing.
| |
 |  | Beth is a writer and editor at Inside.com covering artificial intelligence and daily technology news. She has written the Inside AI newsletter since 2019. You can reach her at Beth.Duckett@inside.com. |   | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 and 1972 Fords. | |
Join us on May 11th and 18th for a hands-on overview of how to analyze and improve the performance of your LLMs. | |
| |
Comments
Post a Comment