Category: Innovation

Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft and other tech firms agree to AI safeguards set by the White House

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President Joe Biden arrives to speaks about artificial intelligence in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, Friday, July 21, 2023, in Washington, as from left, Adam Selipsky, CEO of Amazon Web Services; Greg Brockman, President of OpenAI; Nick Clegg, President of Meta; Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Inflection AI; Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic; and Kent Walker, President of Google watch. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

By MATT O’BRIEN and ZEKE MILLER Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden said Friday that new commitments by Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft and other companies that are leading the development of artificial intelligence technology to meet a set of AI safeguards brokered by his White House are an important step toward managing the “enormous” promise and risks posed by the technology.

Biden announced that his administration has secured voluntary commitments from seven U.S. companies meant to ensure that their AI products are safe before they release them. Some of the commitments call for third-party oversight of the workings of the next generation of AI systems, though they don’t detail who will audit the technology or hold the companies accountable.

“We must be clear eyed and vigilant about the threats emerging technologies can pose,” Biden said, adding that the companies have a “fundamental obligation” to ensure their products are safe. Continue reading

UN council to hold first meeting on potential threats of artificial intelligence to global peace

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United Kingdom Ambassador to the United Nations Dame Barbara Woodward speaks during a security council meeting at United Nations headquarters, Friday, June 23, 2023. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.N. Security Council will hold a first-ever meeting on the potential threats of artificial intelligence to international peace and security, organized by the United Kingdom which sees tremendous potential but also major risks about AI’s possible use for example in autonomous weapons or in control of nuclear weapons.

UK Ambassador Barbara Woodward on Monday announced the July 18 meeting as the centerpiece of its presidency of the council this month. It will include briefings by international AI experts and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who last month called the alarm bells over the most advanced form of AI “deafening,” and loudest from its developers.

“These scientists and experts have called on the world to act, declaring AI an existential threat to humanity on a par with the risk of nuclear war,” the U.N. chief said. Continue reading

Want a climate-friendly flight? It’s going to take a while and cost you more

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FILE – A man walks down the steps of the Boeing 777X airplane during the Paris Air Show in Le Bourget, north of Paris, France, Monday, June 19, 2023. Airlines are facing increasing pressure to cut their climate-changing emissions. That made sustainable aviation fuel a hot topic this week at the Paris Air Show, a major industry event. Sustainable fuel made from food waste or plant material is aviation’s best hope for reducing emissions in the next couple of decades. (AP Photo/Lewis Joly, File)

By DAVID KOENIG AP Airlines Writer

When it comes to flying, going green may cost you more. And it’s going to take a while for the strategy to take off.

Sustainability was a hot topic this week at the Paris Air Show, the world’s largest event for the aviation industry, which faces increasing pressure to reduce the climate-changing greenhouse gases that aircraft spew.

Even the massive orders at the show got a emissions-reduction spin: Airlines and manufacturers said the new planes will be more fuel-efficient than the ones they replace.

But most of those planes will burn conventional, kerosene-based jet fuel. Startups are working feverishly on electric-powered aircraft, but they won’t catch on as quickly as electric vehicles. Continue reading

Cities reviving downtowns by converting offices to housing

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A pedestrian is silhouetted against a high rise at 160 Water Street in Manhattan’s financial district, as the building is undergoing a conversion to residential apartments, Tuesday, April 11, 2023, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

By MAE ANDERSON, ASHRAF KHALIL and MICHAEL CASEY Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — On the 31st floor of what was once a towering office building in downtown Manhattan, construction workers lay down steel bracing for what will soon anchor a host of residential amenities: a catering station, lounge, fire pit and gas grills.

The building, empty since 2021, is being converted to 588 market-rate rental apartments that will house about 1,000 people. “We’re taking a vacant building and pouring life not only into this building, but this entire neighborhood,” said Joey Chilelli, managing director of real estate firm Vanbarton Group, which is doing the conversion.

Across the country, office-to-housing conversions are being pursued as a potential lifeline for struggling downtown business districts that emptied out during the coronavirus pandemic and may never fully recover. The conversion push is marked by an emphasis on affordability. Multiple cities are offering serious tax breaks for developers to incentivize office-to-housing conversions — provided that a certain percentage of apartments are offered at affordable below-market prices. Continue reading

What can ChatGPT maker’s new AI model GPT-4 do?

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FILE – Text from the ChatGPT page of the OpenAI website is shown in this photo, in New York, Feb. 2, 2023. The company behind the ChatGPT chatbot has on Wednesday, March 15 rolled out its latest artificial intelligence model, GPT-4, in a new advance for the technology that’s caught the world’s attention. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

By KELVIN CHAN AP Business Writer

LONDON (AP) — The company behind the ChatGPT chatbot has rolled out its latest artificial intelligence model, GPT-4, in the next step for a technology that’s caught the world’s attention.

The new system can figure out tax deductions and answer questions like a Shakespearan pirate, for example, but it still “hallucinates” facts and makes reasoning errors.

Here’s a look at San Francisco-based startup OpenAI’s latest improvement on the generative AI models that can spit out readable text and unique images:

WHAT’S NEW?

OpenAI says GPT-4 “exhibits human-level performance.” It’s much more reliable, creative and can handle “more nuanced instructions” than its predecessor system, GPT-3.5, which ChatGPT was built on, OpenAI said in its announcement.

In an online demo Tuesday, OpenAI President Greg Brockman ran through some scenarios that showed off GPT-4’s capabilities that appeared to show it’s a radical improvement on previous versions. Continue reading

TikTok sets new default time limits for minors

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FILE – The TikTok logo is seen on a cellphone on Oct. 14, 2022, in Boston. TikTok says every account held by a user under the age of 18 will automatically be set to a 60-minute daily screen time limit in the coming weeks amid growing concerns about the app’s security. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)

By MICHELLE CHAPMAN AP Business Writer

TikTok said Wednesday that every account held by a user under the age of 18 will have a default 60-minute daily screen time limit in the coming weeks. The changes arrive during a period in which there are growing concerns among different governments about the app’s security and ability to alter its algorithm to push certain posts.

The update also mirrors gaming rules imposed on minors in China, where TikTok’s parent company ByteDance was formerly based. ByteDance now says it has no headquarters because it is a global business and that instead it has leaders in Singapore, New York and elsewhere managing its business. In 2021, Chinese authorities issued new rules that let minors play online games for only an hour a day and only on Fridays, weekends and public holidays — an effort to curb internet addiction.

In the U.S., families have struggled with limiting the amount of time their children spend on the Chinese-owned video sharing app. According to the Pew Research Center, about two-thirds of Americans teens use TikTok. Continue reading

Decision to shoot down balloons puts spotlight on hobbyists

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In this image taken from a video shot by Tom Medlin on June 11, 2022, Ed Harrison launches a so-called pico balloon, which costs about $12 and is about 32 inches in diameter, in a field near Collierville, Tenn. Medlin, owner of the Amateur Radio Roundtable podcast, believes a similar balloon is what the U.S. military shot down over the Yukon recently. Hobbyists typically fly the balloons for fun and to experience the challenge of building transmitters and antenna systems, although the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has been collecting data from operators to learn more about wind patterns, he said. (Tom Medlin via AP)

By TODD RICHMOND and HARM VENHUIZEN Associated Press

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Decisions to shoot down multiple unidentified objects over the U.S. and Canada this month have put a spotlight on amateur balloonists who insist their creations pose no threat.

Over the last three weeks, U.S. President Joe Biden has ordered fighter jets to shoot down three objects detected in U.S. air space — a suspected Chinese spy balloon off the South Carolina coast as well as smaller unidentified objects over Alaska and Lake Huron. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last week ordered another object to be shot down over the Yukon; a U.S. fighter jet carried out that mission.

U.S. government officials have yet to definitively identify the objects, but Biden said Thursday that they were probably balloons linked to private companies, weather researchers or hobbyists. Continue reading

Robot Intervention: Will You Be Replaced by a Robot at Work?

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Michael Dinich | Wealth of Geeks undefined

According to a new study, nearly half of UK jobs are at risk of being taken over by a machine. 45% of roles were at medium to high risk of being replaced by AI (artificial intelligence), including taxi drivers, dental nurses, and sales and customer services staff.

Data analysts at NetVoucherCodes looked at over 400 jobs to assess their risk of being replaced by AI or automation in the coming decades. The data revealed that the lowest-paid jobs are most at risk of being replaced by robots.

Using the AI bot ChatGPT, the analysts looked at job roles using the ONS Employee earnings in the UK 2022 survey to find out how at risk they are from automation and AI.

High Risk of Replacement

According to the data, lower-paid jobs are at a higher risk of being replaced because many of these roles involve repetitive tasks that require little creativity or decision-making. Continue reading

Obnoxiously loud car? A traffic camera might be listening

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A woman walks using her headphones on Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2023, in New York. After the relative quiet of the pandemic, New York City has come roaring back. Just listen: Jackhammers disrupt the peace and fleets of honking cars, trucks and buses again clog thoroughfares as millions of denizens return to the streets — their voices and clacking heels adding to the ear-splitting din. In one of the world’s noisiest cities, the cacophony has returned louder than ever. (AP Photo/Andres Kudacki)

By BOBBY CAINA CALVAN Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — After the relative quiet of the pandemic, New York City has come roaring back. Just listen: Jackhammers. Honking cars and trucks. Rumbling subway trains. Sirens. Shouting.

Over the years, there have been numerous efforts to quiet the cacophony. One of the latest: traffic cameras equipped with sound meters capable of identifying souped-up cars and motorbikes emitting an illegal amount of street noise.

At least 71 drivers have gotten tickets so far for violating noise rules during a yearlong pilot program of the system. The city’s Department of Environmental Protection now has plans to expand the use of the roadside sound meters.

“Vehicles with illegally modified mufflers and tailpipes that emit extremely loud noise have been a growing problem in recent years,” said City Council member Erik Bottcher, who heralded the arrival of the radars to his district to help reduce “obnoxious” noise. Continue reading

Ukrainian startups bring tech innovation to CES 2023

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Packaging made from leaves is on display at the Releaf Paper booth during the CES tech show Thursday, Jan. 5, 2023, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher)

By JAMES BROOKS Associated Press

LAS VEGAS (AP) — The past year has been difficult for startups everywhere, but running a company in Ukraine during the Russian invasion comes with a whole different set of challenges.

Clinical psychologist Ivan Osadchyy brought his medical device, called Knopka, to this year’s CES show in Las Vegas in hopes of getting it into U.S. hospitals.

His is one of a dozen Ukrainian startups backed by a government fund that are at CES this year to show their technology to the world.

“Two of our hospitals we operated before are ruined already and one is still occupied. So this is the biggest challenge,” Osadchyy said.

“The second challenge is for production and our team because they are shelling our electricity system and people are hard to work without lights, without heating in their flats,” he said. Continue reading