A Stalker Computer and Angry ScarJo
#NEWSROUNDUP | OpenAI's ethics team leave, Microsoft talks gleefully of its stalkerish "photographic memory" computer, and Scarlett Johansson had to call her lawyers...the news today.
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Reading AI news over the next few months may feel a bit like having a broken air conditioner that forces you into periods of sweating, swearing, and kicking a metal box punctuated by a giddy calm of feeling an errant blast of cool air… before starting all over again. And get my started on the technician who’s drunk, or maybe just supremely arrogant, but definitely not focused on your comfort and safety (he’s all about the money). Sound about right?
It’s going to be unhinged period for a lot of reasons, but hopefully a little perspective will help:
“We should be slow, measured and careful with AI development”… kidding!
Last week saw the launch of ChatGPT 4o and some of the subsequent “fallout” has been unsettling. First, the creepy emotional AI voice bot that sounded so much like Scarlett Johansson that her lawyers had to reach out to the company. Then two key leaders (including one founder), focused on the ethical side of OpenAI’s business, left. Executive Jan Leike made his concerns crystal clear on X, including that “…over the past years, safety culture and processes have taken a backseat to shiny products.”
Considering the brouhaha earlier this year…
Certainly it was 5 seconds ago that OpenAI founder and CEO Sam Altman was briefly booted from the company he founded? This, of course, makes the recent exits and criticism not entirely unexpected. But in any case, it’s important to keep an eye on what’s next, as ChatGPT is currently the Xerox of generative AI, and will take center stage in a lot of these issues and tussles going forward.
Microsoft’s Build Conference is in full gear…
…and the hits have already been coming (good or bad depending on your perspective). For those with a radar for privacy issues and a sarcastic spot for the socially unaware and awkward optics of the tech industry, it’s been a doozy already. For starters, CEO Satya Nadella excitedly talked in advance of the conference about Windows Recall, which will give its AI assistant a “photographic memory”; tracking everything one does on their computer.
And while the jabs between tech titans should be taken with a grain of salt, I am with Elon here: the Microsoft feature is very Black Mirror. It also illustrates how hungry all companies are for your data.
Oh, those poor hourly workers who will be displaced by robots…psych it’s you!
News this week that accountants being replaced by AI shouldn’t come as a huge surprise. We all should think about what aspects of our jobs can and will be replaced/enhanced by AI.
It will be interesting to see how fast AI hoovers up public sector jobs too…
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