AI-Generated elections, Threads record-breaking launch, Intelligent Advertising and Google and Youtube to test new features

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??? AI-Generated Election Content Is Here, And The Social Networks Aren’t Prepared

Earlier this year, on the eve of Chicago’s mayoral election, a video of moderate Democrat candidate Paul Vallas appeared online. Tweeted by "Chicago Lakefront News," it appeared to showcase Vallas railing against lawlessness in Chicago and suggesting that there was a time when "no one would bat an eye" at fatal police shootings.

The video, which appeared authentic, was widely shared before the Vallas campaign denounced it as an AI-generated fake and the two-day-old Twitter account that posted it disappeared.

And while it's impossible to say if it had any impact on Vallas’s loss against progressive Brandon Johnson, a former teacher and union organizer, it is a lower-stakes glimpse at the high-stakes AI deceptions that will potentially muddy the public discourse during the upcoming presidential election.?

With no actual laws to regulate how AI can be used in political campaigns, it is on the platforms to determine what deep fakes users will see on their feeds, and right now, most are struggling to address how to self-regulate.

So far, the one major social media company that has a more comprehensive policy aimed at moderating AI-generated content is TikTok.

?? Inflection AI, The Year-Old Startup Behind Chatbot Pi, Raises $1.3 Billion

Backed by Microsoft, Nvidia and billionaires Reid Hoffman, Bill Gates and Eric Schmidt, the startup led by ex-DeepMind leader Mustafa Suleyman is valued at $4 billion — and claims to have the world’s best AI hardware setup.

Less than two months after the launch of their first chatbot Pi, artificial intelligence startup Inflection AI and CEO Mustafa Suleyman have raised $1.3 billion in new funding.

With this latest funding, Inflection plans to continue expanding its computing capabilities further developing Pi, a bot trained to engage in a conversational back-and-forth with users to tease out more valuable questions and answers. That chatbot, which Forbes previewed in early May, is “seeing huge engagement” as it adds new features, according to Suleyman. Inflection declined to provide user numbers to corroborate that claim.

The model used for Pi, which Inflection announced earlier in June and said had similar computing capabilities to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, is one of the smaller ones it’s had in the works, Suleyman claimed, with much bigger to come. Also in the short-term pipeline: an API for selected partners to train their own conversational AIs.?

?? Intelligent Advertising: How Will AI-Powered Ads Reshape The Market?

Almost all major platforms (Google, Facebook, Amazon) and independent programmatic ones currently employ smart algorithms for ad campaign optimization. Meanwhile, Google recently climbed upon a completely new level of AI implementation in ad tech by introducing generative AI tools that can already replicate the work of professional marketing agencies.

Ad tech giants are trying to outpace each other in the race for product advancements by introducing new predictive, creative-making, and efficiency-raising AI campaign tools. As the AI craze fuels the competition, it raises the bar for everyone in the industry—but what is the future of the independent ad tech sector in this, and is it going to keep up?

As big ad tech companies actively embrace extended AI capabilities, we are witnessing a shift in the paradigm of what’s possible and what’s not possible for AI in advertising. From campaign creation to changing targeting mechanisms, AI’s transformative effects have significantly impacted the overall efficiency of ad campaigns and raised the bar of expectations.?

Read the full article here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2023/07/07/intelligent-advertising-how-will-ai-powered-ads-reshape-the-market/?sh=13cf53247575

?? Threads is now the fastest-growing app In History—With 100 Million Users In Just Five Days

More than 100 million users have joined Meta’s new Threads platform, a feat the Twitter rival has achieved in less than five days, making the Twitter competitor the fastest-growing online platform in history.

Threads’ record-breaking launch has been aided by a simple sign-up process that requires users to log into the app through their Instagram accounts—which is used to populate their profile details and follow lists.

According to Sensor Tower data, Threads is currently the most downloaded free app in the U.S. on both the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store.

???? ?? Google Calendar now lets users specify where they’re working from throughout the day

Google has allowed users to set their working location for certain days of the week since 2021 but is now also going to give users the option to specify where they’re working for specific portions of the day. The company says the new functionality should come in handy for people who work from multiple locations such as their home, an office, a specific building or a combination.

For instance, you make your calendar note that you’re working from home in the morning and will be in the office in the afternoon. The feature should make it easier for your co-workers to determine where you’re working from at any given time in case they need to reach you or set up a meeting, either in-person or virtually.

The feature is rolling out today and users can set their working location by selecting the “Working Location” option as an event type in their calendar and then choosing a location. From there, you can modify the date, time or reoccurrence by clicking on the time element.

??YouTube tests AI-generated quizzes on educational videos

YouTube is experimenting with AI-generated quizzes on its mobile app for iOS and Android devices, which are designed to help viewers learn more about a subject featured in an educational video. The feature will also help the video-sharing platform get a better understanding of how well each video covers a certain topic.

The AI-generated quizzes, which YouTube noted on its experiments page yesterday, are rolling out globally to a small percentage of users that watch “a few” educational videos, the company wrote. The quiz feature is only available for a select portion of English-language content, which will appear on the home feed as links under recently watched videos.

However, YouTube has long established itself as a destination for users to learn new things, whether it’s how to change a car tire or even perform a backflip. “Edutainment” accounts like TED-Ed and HowToBasic are among the more popular educational YouTube channels, with 18.8 million and 17.3 million subscribers, respectively.

?? Hacker responsible for 2020 Twitter breach sentenced to prison

Joseph James O’Connor, 24, was sentenced Friday in a New York federal court to five years in prison after pleading guilty in May to four counts of computer hacking, wire fraud and cyberstalking. O’Connor also agreed to forfeit at least $794,000 to the victims of his crimes.

O’Connor, a U.K. citizen, was extradited from Spain at the request of U.S. prosecutors earlier this year and has remained in custody since.

In the hearing, Judge Jed S. Rakoff said O’Connor will likely serve about half of his sentence after spending more than two years in pre-trial custody.

O’Connor faced a maximum of 77 years in prison, according to Reuters. Justice Department prosecutors called for O’Connor to serve at least seven years in prison.