Google DeepMind has discovered a way to create AI algorithms that run faster than those coded by humans, which could lead to more cost-effective software development and computing that is more efficient and sustainable, according to the Alphabet company. The breakthrough, detailed in the journal Nature, is called AlphaDev. It uses a form of machine learning called reinforcement that allows computers to build on their successes, honing strategies independent of human programmers. In this case, faster algorithms were developed for computer-science functions like sorting and hashing. Continue reading Google DeepMind’s AlphaDev Can Create Faster Algorithms

Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg received a letter this week from Senators Richard Blumenthal and Josh Hawley of the Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology & the Law that took the executive to task for an online leak of the company’s LLaMA artificial intelligence system. The 65-billion parameter language model, which is still under development, was open-sourced in February. Available on request through Meta’s GitHub portal, it wound up on 4chan and BitTorrent “making it available to anyone, anywhere in the world, without monitoring or oversight,” the senators wrote. Continue reading Senators Question Meta Platforms About Recent LLaMA Leak

Twitter is emphasizing crowdsourced moderation. The launch of Community Notes for images in posts seeks to address instances where morphed or AI-generated images are posted. The idea is to expose altered content before it goes viral, as did the image of Pope Francis wearing a Balenciaga puffy coat in March and the fake image of an explosion at the Pentagon in May. Twitter says Community Notes about an image will appear with “recent and future” posts containing the graphic in question. Currently in the test phase, the feature works with tweets featuring a single image. Continue reading Twitter Community Notes Aim to Curb Impact of Fake Images

Meta Platforms has built and is open-sourcing ImageBind, an artificial intelligence that combines six modalities: audio, visual, text, thermal, movement and depth data. Currently a research project, it suggests a future in which AI models generate multisensory content. “ImageBind equips machines with a holistic understanding that connects objects in a photo with how they will sound, their 3D shape, how warm or cold they are, and how they move,” Meta says. In other words, ImageBind’s approach more closely approximates human thinking by training on the relationship between things rather than ingesting massive datasets so as absorb every possibility. Continue reading Meta’s Open-Source ImageBind Works Across Six Modalities

With artificial intelligence development dating back to the 1950s, IBM was clearly ahead of its time. The company has quietly built a commercial portfolio, with more than 100 million customers across 20 industries using its Watson suite, the company says. At its annual Think conference, the company unboxed IBM Watsonx, a next-generation platform that leverages the scale and scope of foundation models to provide custom solutions for data-driven clients. Described as an “enterprise studio for AI builders,” Watsonx is an end-to-end framework that combines the tools, infrastructure and consulting expertise corporations can use to onboard AI. Continue reading IBM Bows Watsonx Suite of Enterprise AI Products, Services

Stability AI has released StableLM, an open source language model that will compete with OpenAI’s GPT-4 to create apps like ChatGPT. The Alpha version of StableLM is available in 3 billion and 7 billion parameters, and the company promises 15 billion to 65 billion parameter models to come. “With the launch of the StableLM suite of models, Stability AI is continuing to make foundational AI technology accessible to all,” the London-based company said. The StableLM models can generate text and code to power various downstream applications with appropriate training. Continue reading Stability AI Debuts Open Source StableLM Foundation Model

Auto-GPT, an open source app that uses OpenAI’s text-generating models, is currently generating a great deal of social media attention. The program can act somewhat autonomously in that it creates its own feedback loop, asking itself a series of questions to help build a more nuanced and complete response to a text prompt. In short, something that would take a user multiple prompts to produce the desired information using ChatGPT could be accomplished using a single request of Auto-GPT, which could independently explore a subject before spitting back a comprehensive response. Continue reading Auto-GPT Generates Social Sizzle, Ushers in Era of AI Agents

Gen Z creators keen to monetize content are increasingly turning to Fanfix, which has amassed about 10 million users — among them 3,000 creators — since its August 2021 launch. Active creators are said to average about $70,000 per year, and the platform itself reportedly commanded an eight-figure purchase price by beauty accelerator SuperOrdinary in June 2022. Fanfix requires 10,000 followers to start an account, which means creators will have to cultivate a base elsewhere before applying to join. All content is paywalled, with account holders choosing their own rates, between $5 and $50 per month. Continue reading Gen Z Creators Find New Revenue Opportunities with Fanfix

As China’s tech giants begin releasing ChatGPT-style products, the powerful Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) has issued a draft of what will become the country’s first set of restrictions for generative AI. Ground rules include limiting content created by AI to that which reflects the core values of socialism and does not subvert state power in text or image, according to the draft. Models should also be trained in a way that does not allow them to generate false information or exhibit bias as to race, ethnicity or gender. The news comes as three Chinese firms release generative AI platforms. Continue reading Chinese Government Drafts New Rules for Generative AI Tech

Clement Delangue, co-founder and CEO of New York-based Hugging Face, turned a casual invitation to meet with open-source AI stakeholders during a trip to San Francisco into what is being called the “Woodstock of AI.” In a matter of days, the event ballooned to more than 5,000 people hosted at the Exploratorium on March 31. “We just crossed 1,500 registrations for the Open-Source AI Meetup!” Delangue messaged the RSVP list days before the event. “What started with a tweet might lead to the biggest AI meetup in history.” The 8-year-old company is also making headlines for its new HuggingGPT system. Continue reading Hugging Face Rallies Open-Source AI Community at Meetup

Today’s leading AI chatbots need tremendous computing resources to train, then function, but that isn’t stopping startups from trying to get into the game, some with open-source alternatives. Clearly disadvantaged compared to market leaders like OpenAI, Meta, DeepMind and Anthropic — deep-pocketed, all — a band of independent researchers has coalesced under the name Together. Their aim: to become the first open-source challenger to the likes of ChatGPT. The industry seems undecided as to whether open-source AI is a good thing. Many are worried at the thought of a universally available AI toolkit, and what troublemakers might do with it. Continue reading Researchers Developing Open-Source Challenger to ChatGPT

OpenAI is now allowing third-party developers integrate ChatGPT into their apps, a solution the company says will be a more cost-effective alternative. The language model can be used for more than chat, says OpenAI, which also has a new speech-to-text model called Whisper. The company is also touting gpt-3.5-turbo, calling it the “best model for many non-chat use cases.” With a major investment from Microsoft, and the eyes of the industry on it, OpenAI seems to be feeling some pressure to add earnings to the success it has as a thought leader. Continue reading OpenAI Targets Affordable AI with ChatGPT and Whisper APIs

While smart home technologies have often made a strong showing at CES, adoption has been hampered by issues of interoperability. This year at CES saw the widespread reveal of Matter (originally known as Project CHIP), a new smart home standard designed to support interoperability. Matter was originally announced in 2019 as a partnership between Apple, Google and Amazon to create an open-source smart home standard. Today, if CES 2023 is any indication, the standard is becoming more prevalent across a wide variety of connected devices and different product sectors. Continue reading CES: Matter Smart Home Protocol Marks Major Trend in 2023

Cloud-based code hosting service GitHub wants to make open-source material more secure. The Microsoft service is expanding safety features with two new offerings in beta. Secret scanning alerts are now free for all public repositories while push-notifications for custom secret patterns are also being made available. Open-source code is now incorporated into a whopping 97 percent of applications, according to Synopsys, which says 90 percent of organizations rely on it to varying degrees. Yet the very access that contributes to its popularity also leaves it vulnerable to malicious actors, as emphasized by the SolarWinds, Log4j and other breaches. Continue reading GitHub Is Testing New Security Tools for Open-Source Code

Meta, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services and Dutch mapping company TomTom have joined forces with The Linux Foundation to give Google a run for its money in the maps space with the launch of the Overture Maps Foundation to build interoperable open map data. “Mapping the physical environment and every community in the world, even as they grow and change, is a massively complex challenge that no one organization can manage,” Linux Foundation executive director Jim Zemlin said. Overture’s mission is to create an extensible mapping framework that will enable companies to contribute their own data, constantly refreshing as the physical world changes. Continue reading Meta, Microsoft, AWS Want to Map the Future with Overture