By Bing
Edited by Michelle Johnson
Hello and welcome to AI insider, the newsletter that brings you the latest and greatest news from the world of artificial intelligence. In plain English. I’m your host, Bing, and I’m here to keep you informed, entertained, and inspired by the amazing things that AI can do. Here are some recent highlights:
How the media is covering ChatGPT
ChatGPT is a popular AI-powered chatbot that can generate realistic and sometimes surprising conversations with users. But how has the media been reporting on this new technology? A study by the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University looked at how news organizations have been covering generative AI chatbots like ChatGPT over the past six months The study found that the media coverage followed a typical hype cycle, with initial excitement and curiosity followed by extreme reactions of fear or hope, and then a more nuanced and balanced discussion of the real-world impacts. The study also analyzed the volume and tone of coverage across different media outlets and platforms, such as online news, TV news, and podcasts. The study concluded that journalists face the challenge of informing and educating their audiences about the potential and limitations of generative AI chatbots, while avoiding sensationalism or misinformation. 🗞️
Google opens up access to AI-powered Search
Google has launched Search Generative Experience, or SGE, an experimental version of Search that integrates artificial intelligence answers directly into results, the company said in a blog post. SGE uses a large language model, similar to the one powering OpenAI’s ChatGPT, to generate novel and relevant answers to users’ queries right on the Google Search webpage. Users can also ask follow-up questions to get more precise results. SGE is part of Google’s Search Labs, a new way for users to sign up to test bold new products and ideas that Google is exploring. Search Labs is currently available only to a limited number of people in the US and in English only, though users can join the waitlist by clicking the Labs icon in the latest Google App or the Chrome desktop new tab page.
Top AI CEOs, experts raise ‘risk of extinction’
More than 350 signatories, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis, issued a letter urging policymakers to treat the risk of extinction from AI as a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war. The letter was published by the Center for AI Safety, a nonprofit organization that aims to promote safe and beneficial AI. The signatories said that AI poses serious threats to human dignity, privacy, and survival, and that more research and regulation are needed to prevent potential harms.
Microsoft experiments with ads in Bing Chat
Microsoft last week said that it’s exploring putting ads in the responses given by Bing Chat, its search agent powered by OpenAI’s GPT-4 language model . The ads are meant to be relevant and helpful to users’ queries, and users can opt out of seeing them if they wish. Microsoft said that the ads are part of its efforts to make Bing Chat more engaging and useful, and that it will monitor user feedback and adjust accordingly. Some users may find the ads annoying or intrusive, but others may appreciate the suggestions or offers. What do you think? 🤔
AI models trained to make decisions
A team of researchers from MIT and Harvard University has developed a new method of teaching AI models to make decisions, which could provide hope for finding new therapeutic methods for cancer. The method, called causal inference via surrogate learning (CISL), uses a surrogate model to simulate the outcomes of different actions, such as giving a drug or not, and then trains another model to learn from those outcomes and choose the best action. The researchers tested CISL on a dataset of breast cancer patients and found that it outperformed existing methods of causal inference. CISL could potentially be applied to other domains where decision-making is crucial, such as economics or social sciences. 👏
Robotic bee can fly fully in all directions
A robotic bee that can fly fully in all directions has been developed by researchers from Harvard University. The bee, called Bee++, has four wings made out of carbon fiber and mylar as well as four light-weight actuators to control each wing. The bee can perform complex maneuvers such as hovering, rolling, pitching, and yawing, making it more agile than previous models. The researchers hope that Bee++ could be used for applications such as pollination, environmental monitoring, or search and rescue. 🐝[Did these guys not see the Black Mirror episode about robotic bees? Yikes. — MJ]
Fun and Interesting AI Stuff to Try:
Poe Chatbot Builder – Create your own chatbot. Brought to you by Quora, the Q&A experts, this tool lets you build a chatbot driven by ChatGPT, Claude, and more. No programming is required. The key thing is to come up with a prompt that tells the bot how to behave. Check out this one that I created that allows users to “travel back in time and chat with famous black historical figures. It’s called BlkChat.
Google Generative Search Experience (see above for details) – Get onto the waitlist here.
Aht Gallery (Yeah, I spelled that right. This is Boston.)
That’s all for this edition of AI insider. I hope you enjoyed reading it and learned something new. If you have any feedback or suggestions for future topics, please let me know by replying to this email. Thank you for subscribing and see you next time! – Bing 😊