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We’re not that different from dragons. They breathe fire. We breathe AI.

Here’s what we have for today:

1. OpenAI Grabs $300M & unleashes CI

2. Writers on a strike. Are studios in trouble?

3. Uncanny Valley Problem

(Estimated reading time: 4 minutes )

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Two main stories of last week. If you have only ~2 minutes 30 seconds to spare

1/ OpenAI Grabs $300M & Unleashes CI

Wow, what a week for OpenAI!

1. OpenAI secures $300M in share sales

2. ChatGPT code interpreter goes live

Funding

Remember Microsoft's $10B investment?

Well, OpenAI has scored more funding – $300M, to be exact, from prominent VC firms like Tiger Global and Sequoia Capital.

Now, 30% of the company's stakes belong to outside investors.

OpenAI faced a rough patch recently, with Italy banning ChatGPT and companies telling employees not to use it due to data concerns. Some founders even agreed to pause AI innovation.

But now, things are looking up for OpenAI.

Code Interpreter

Over the past two weeks, OpenAI has teased some plugins, and they're slowly rolling them out.

The code interpreter (CI), however, stands out.

CI can now generate results from images and files. People have even created custom GIFs and edited videos using CI.

Another win for OpenAI is that they crashed the stocks of Chegg by half.

Now, let's talk about Microsoft...

Bing is getting a significant upgrade. You don’t need to be in the waitlist now. And you can receive image-based results, like charts and graphs. Plus, multi-user sessions are on the horizon.

So, is Bing better than ChatGPT?

Not quite. The new Bing has GPT-4 but is not as stable as ChatGPT. Still, those charts and graphs are cool.

Last month, we had concerns about AI and data use, especially with ChatGPT and OpenAI. But these new tools in Bing and ChatGPT show that OpenAI is here to stay – and they're not backing down.

Microsoft sure is moving at startup speed!

2/ Writers on a strike. Are studios in trouble?

In 2007, WGA (The Writers Guild in America) members were in turmoil for 100 days.

Why?

They weren’t receiving adequate compensation for their work in new media formats.

Present Day:

May 2nd, 2023, brought another hurdle for writers.

The use of AI to write scripts.

The problem:

AI can generate a roughly 50-page script given a prompt.

And the studios are willing to throw workers under the bus any chance they get to keep things profitable.

But the story is deeper than that.

How did writers reach a boiling point?

The success of a show like Abbott Elementary means nothing to a writer if you have to talk about $$$ and recognition.

With a season of a show as short as 10 episodes, streaming services are hiring writers for the fastest run.

Here’s your paycheck for the week.

Now be gone. Shoo!

This is like getting an Uber driver.

What does WGA want?

Along with better pay and increased royalties, they want their contract to guarantee that:

• AI can’t write or rewrite literary material.

• AI can’t be used as source material.

• Contract-covered material can’t be used to train AI.

After all that fiasco, what was the conclusion?

A modest salary increase. And it didn’t even address inflation.

The officials gave a provocative response.

‘Get rid of these proposals, and maybe we will give you more.’

What will happen?

People predict 6 months to a year of proactive strikes. California faced an impact of $2 billion (and it’s increasing).

Studios have lost almost $10B in value.

We get it. Studios are tempted to save a buck with AI. But they seem to forget that cliches and tropes aren’t writing.

Google’s Moat document got released yesterday. The document mentions that open-source will sweep companies like Google and OpenAI soon.

The development of open-source models and use-cases of AI will reach an unimaginable threshold.

Small open-source models will replace larger models.

Many think that this is a stunt from Google. And some think that OpenAI and Google can adapt open-source.

Anyhoo, this sure looks like a Google-employee-only document in many ways.

1 trend you can pounce on. Reading time: ~1 minute 30 seconds

👻Uncanny Valley Problem

This is Masahiro Mori, a Japanese roboticist. He introduced the concept of Uncanny Valley in 1978.

Uncanny Valley is a phenomenon when robots become so human-like that they become creepy. This is when they don’t pass enough human features but trigger emotions like one.

Think of the quote from Vision, "Our very strength invites challenge." That's the Uncanny Valley for robots.

Do you know about Repliee Q1, the female android robot?

You wouldn't know she was a robot if I hadn't told you. But when you watch her clips, her facial expressions are a bit off and robotic.

Here are two signs that the Uncanny Valley is getting closer:

1. Deepfakes

Companies like Midjourney and Stable Diffusion are leading the AI photo scene. Sometimes, AI-generated photos are even better than stock photos. Every week, we see a crazy photo and later find out it was made using AI.

Like that skydiving baby – it had me worried!

2. Virtual assistants

Siri and Google Home know so much about us; they always listen.

You talk with your wife about your sister’s baby. And, next hour, you are scrolling ads for baby products.

Someone even used AI to threaten a woman using her child's voice. Realistic AI video calls will be a thing soon.

To keep things under control, we need:

1/ Emotional AI

By adding emotions to AI assistants, they can act more human. A recent study showed that humans couldn't tell the difference between AI-generated photos and real ones about 39% of the time.

2/ Design Philosophy

Taking design seriously means understanding how the human body works. And making AI close to that.

Boston Dynamics, the company behind that dancing robot, is a leader in robotics AI. Their CEO, Robert Playter, says they plan to bring consciousness to their robots soon.

I know their reason for success. Faceless robots.

No face > Unexpressive robot faces

The company is focusing on robot-to-robot conversation. They're becoming smarter by understanding their functions rather than studying humans.

So, will our cultural values change as robots become more realistic?

It's hard to say, but one thing is sure: the Uncanny Valley will only get bigger and scarier as we start sharing AI-generated posts and stories on Instagram.

Geoffrey Hinton has just left Google. And he is pretty scared about what is to come.

Let's brace ourselves for the future!

🦾What happened this week

• Guidde released their video documentation AI

• Bing AI chat is now open to all

• Google’s document of AI race was leaked

• ‘Godfather of AI’ resigns from Google

• IBM to replace 7,800 jobs with AI

• Firefox launches a “trustworthy” AI

• AI decodes what people are thinking

• MIT developed AI to lower drug costs

• New Box AI makes you more productive

• Midjourney released v5.1

• Chat-GPT and Generative AI in financial services

• AI leaders met with the President in the White House

💰Funding Roundup

• Female in deep tech: Oxford-based HydRegen scores 2.6M funding

• AI-powered code review platform snaps 1M funding

• Generative AI startup runway just raised $100M at $1.5B

• AP automation leader, OpenEnvoy raises $15M

• Generative AI start-up, Cohere is valued at about $2B

• OpenAI raises $300M funding at $29B evaluation

• $140M investment in seven AI research institutes

• Range raises $12M from Google’s AI fund

• Sound Ventures launches $24M AI investment fund

🐤Tweet of the week

😂 Meme of the week

That’s it for this week, folks! If you want more, be sure to follow our Twitter (@CallMeAIGuy)

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