Forget Growth. Optimize for Resilience

Forget Growth. Optimize for Resilience

Fleming believed that growth has natural limits. Things grow to maturity—kids into adults, saplings into trees, startups into full-fledged companies—but growth beyond that point is, in his words, a “pathology” and an “affliction.” The bigger and more productive an economy gets, he argued, the more resources it needs to burn to maintain its own infrastructure….

CES 2024 Preview: Get Ready for a ‘Tsunami’ of AI

CES 2024 Preview: Get Ready for a ‘Tsunami’ of AI

If you’re waiting for the hubbub over generative AI to die down, maybe pull up a chair. The buzz around artificial intelligence shows no signs of quieting—a fact that will become all too obvious at this year’s CES. CES, the consumer electronics industry’s largest annual gathering in the US, is returning to Las Vegas on…

Cars Are Getting Bigger. Can Smarter Software Make Them Safer?

Cars Are Getting Bigger. Can Smarter Software Make Them Safer?

It’s not just you: American cars have gotten bigger. Over the past two decades, growing numbers of US buyers have turned in their sedans for SUVs and pickup trucks. And those SUVs and pickups have grown ever more hulking. The electrification of driving isn’t slowing the growth spurt. Batteries are heavy, and many carmakers are…

How to Use OpenAI’s ChatGPT to Create Your Own Custom GPT

How to Use OpenAI’s ChatGPT to Create Your Own Custom GPT

I was never afraid to train an AI chatbot on my writing, because OpenAI had already broken the seal. CEO Sam Altman announced the “GPT” feature at OpenAI’s first developer day in November, prior to the company’s five days of leadership chaos. Before the release of custom GPTs, ChatGPT with web browsing was already able…

The Hollywood Strikes Stopped AI From Taking Your Job. But for How Long?

The Hollywood Strikes Stopped AI From Taking Your Job. But for How Long?

That, in turn, led to increased interest in what protections organized labor could provide workers, even as some unions, like the United Auto Workers and Teamsters, seemed to fall behind on addressing AI’s potential to encroach on jobs. In a recent piece for Harvard Business Review, MIT engineering professor Yossi Sheffi argued short-sightedness on these…

AI Is Telling Bedtime Stories to Your Kids Now

AI Is Telling Bedtime Stories to Your Kids Now

The problem with Bluey is there’s not enough of it. Even with 151 seven-minute-long episodes of the popular children’s animated show out there, parents of toddlers still desperately wait for Australia’s Ludo Studio to release another season. The only way to get more Bluey more quickly is if they create their own stories starring the…

How Not to Be Stupid About AI, With Yann LeCun

How Not to Be Stupid About AI, With Yann LeCun

Once we get computers to match human-level intelligence, they won’t stop there. With deep knowledge, machine-level mathematical abilities, and better algorithms, they’ll create superintelligence, right? Yeah, there’s no question that machines will eventually be smarter than humans. We don’t know how long it’s going to take—it could be years, it could be centuries. At that…

Journalists Had ‘No Idea’ About OpenAI’s Deal to Use Their Stories

Journalists Had ‘No Idea’ About OpenAI’s Deal to Use Their Stories

Some writer advocacy groups have pushed for this kind of licensing as an alternative to data scraping. The Author’s Guild, for example, is currently agitating for collective licensing agreements to ensure that writers are paid when their work is used as training data for AI companies. The News Media Alliance, a trade association that represents…