Hi! Here's your Tuesday, September 10, 2024 edition of AI in the News. There are a lot of interesting articles today, so don’t forget to share it with your friends and colleagues!??
Unpacking the Apple Event
Lots of coverage about Apple’s product launch! I’ve selected a few unique angles and distinctive takes
- "The iPhone’s limited feature set is emblematic of how Apple is taking a cautious approach to generative A.I."
- "Wall Street is enthusiastic about the artificially intelligent phones, with analysts predicting the features could help Apple sell a record 240 million iPhones next year, a 12 percent increase from this year."
- "Despite the bells and whistles, and being a tech-adopting lot, I bet many of you won’t be lining up to buy it."
- "The reasons are complicated. One is the simple cost of the iPhone 16, which starts at $799. At the same time, phone makers are offering fewer dramatic changes to their products year-on-year."
The adoption of AI into the iPhone could be considered a step change in how the iPhone works. But there may not be a huge hankering to use ChatGPT on your phone."
- Apple didn’t say when the AI services would be available in China, its second-largest market after the U.S.
- The delay puts the iPhone maker at a?disadvantage against rivals offering AI services, including Chinese handset makers such as Huawei, Honor and Oppo.
- A half-day after Apple’s event, Huawei held its own announcement in China to release the Mate XT, a three-way foldable smartphone with AI features.
- Apple said on its China website that the launch of Apple Intelligence was subject to regulatory approval. In China, any generative AI models that could influence public opinion need government approval.?
- "For an event built around unveiling Apple’s first AI-powered iPhone, there was one striking absence over the two-hour presentation: the words 'artificial intelligence.'"
- "But Apple — the most brand-conscious company on the planet — understands something that often gets lost in the bot-pilled bubble of Silicon Valley: Regular people don’t trust AI."
In other news
- The disparity in image quality between Harris and Donald Trump is attributed to the AI models being trained on fewer well-labeled images of Harris.
- The fact that Harris is a Black woman of Jamaican and Indian descent may also be a factor. My colleague
Irene Solaiman
is quoted in the article, stating that ‘poorer facial recognition for darker skin tones and femme features’ may affect the sorting of images of Harris for automated labeling.
- Those sharing AI-generated images of Harris may often be more interested in producing meme-worthy scenarios than refining the realism of her likeness.
- The new model from HyperWrite faces scrutiny after claims of superior performance were not replicated by independent evaluators
- HyperWrite CEO Matt Shumer attributed discrepancies in performance to issues during the model's upload process
- While some users defend Shumer and the model's capabilities, others have raised concerns about its true origins, suggesting it may be a wrapper for proprietary technology, with one user accusing Shumer of "fraud in the AI research community."
Deep dive
- Yuval Noah Harari's "Nexus" explores the implications of AI, warning of a "Silicon Curtain" that could isolate society from its own algorithms and decision-making processes.
- The book contrasts how democracies and dictatorships handle information, emphasizing that "systems that are self-correcting... are preferable to those that offer only blind, disenfranchised subservience."
- Harari argues for proactive regulation of AI, stating, "it must not be left to tech companies and their billionaire owners to regulate themselves," highlighting the need for democratic oversight.
- "As the head of Alphabet’s AI-powered robotics moonshot, I came to believe many things. For one, robots can’t come soon enough. For another, they shouldn’t look like us."
- "Yet I have concerns that Silicon Valley, with its focus on “minimum viable products” and VCs’ general aversion to investing in hardware, will be patient enough to win the global race to give AI a robot body. And much of the money that is being invested is focusing on the wrong things."
Briefly noted
