Version 5.0
Written & Compiled by Macklin Andrick, GPJ Sr. Creative Technologist
GPJ Experience Technology is your trusted guide through the latest technological shifts and how they might benefit your next experience. Another week, another opportunity to explore some of the weird and wild things going on in the tech world!
The Tour de France gets an onsite AI powered avatar guide for the event. The “NeverEnding game” is coming for our free time, Meta publishes their latest open-source model “Llama 2” for enterprise applications and OpenAI is holding back multi-modal features due to privacy concerns.
NTT’s Marianne Will Answer All Your Tour de France Questions
NTT has created an AI-powered digital human with access to encyclopedic knowledge of the Tour de France. Guiding fans on site at the Tour de France and answering their questions this year is Marianne. Queries may range from the factual (“How hilly is today’s stage?”) to the predictive (“Who will claim the polka dot jersey next?”), and she’ll answer all of them capably.
Tesla Starts Production of Dojo Supercomputer to Train Driverless Cars
Tesla says it has started production of its Dojo supercomputer to train its fleet of autonomous vehicles. In its second quarter earnings report for 2023, the company outlined “four main technology pillars” needed to solve vehicle autonomy at scale: extremely large real-world dataset, neural net training, vehicle hardware and vehicle software. “We are developing each of these pillars in-house…taking a step towards faster and cheaper neural net training with the start of production of our Dojo training computer.” the company said in its report.
The NeverEnding Game: How AI Will Create a New Category of Games
AI will enable a new category of video games called “neverending games.” These are games that can generate new content dynamically and evolve over time. AI can create infinite variations of maps, characters, quests, items, etc. so the game world feels boundless. The experience won’t get repetitive for players. AI can also adapt the game to each player’s style, adjusting the difficulty, storylines, etc. The game evolves uniquely for each player. Neverending games could result in more immersive and engaging experiences that people play for years without getting bored. AI games have the potential to become a dominant form of entertainment in the future.
OpenAI Holding Back GPT-4 Image Features on Fears of Privacy Issues
OpenAI has been testing image recognition capabilities in its new AI model GPT-4, but is holding back full public release due to privacy concerns. GPT-4 can currently identify some public figures, but OpenAI worries it could infringe on privacy laws by recognizing people without consent. There are also concerns that GPT-4 could misinterpret faces, like misidentifying gender or emotions, leading to harmful outcomes. OpenAI wants public feedback to navigate safety issues before releasing GPT-4’s image features widely.
Meta Launches Llama 2, a Source-Available AI Model That Allows Commercial Applications
Meta announced Llama 2, a new source-available family of AI language models notable for its commercial license, which means the models can be integrated into commercial products, unlike its predecessor. They range in size from 7 to 70 billion parameters and reportedly “outperform open source chat models on most benchmarks we tested,” according to Meta.
Maybe Showing Off an AI-Generated Fake TV Episode During a Writers’ Strike Is a Bad Idea
The ongoing strike of creatives in TV and film, plus the nascent threat of AI-based writing and effects, make it a complicated time to work in show business. But little savvy is required to see that this may be the worst possible moment to soft-launch an AI that can “write, animate, direct, voice, edit” a whole TV show — and demonstrate it with a whole fake “South Park” episode. The company behind it, Fable Studios, announced via tweet that it had made public a paper on “Generative TV & Showrunner Agents.” They embedded a full, fake “South Park” episode where Cartman tries to apply deepfake technology to the media industry.
More Cool Stuff We Found
- Reddit is bringing back r/Place at perhaps the worst possible time
- When Open Becomes Opaque: The Changing Face of Open-Source Hardware Companies
- Segment Anything Meets Point Tracking
- Why computer-made data is being used to train AI models
- A real-world dataset, with hyper-accurate digital counterpart & comprehensive ground-truth annotation
- Federal Reserve announces new system for instant payments is now live
- Solana Labs Introduces GameShift to Simplify Web3 Game Production
Missed a previous Creative Tech Byte? Find them all here.
