Microsoft’s Copilot AI Gets a Voice, Vision, and a ‘Hype Man’ Persona

Microsoft’s Copilot AI Gets a Voice, Vision, and a ‘Hype Man’ Persona

Microsoft deleted the over-eager office assistant Clippy some 17 years ago, but the vision for a friendly and optimistic AI helper has apparently found its way out of the Recycle Bin. The company is overhauling Copilot, the text-based artificial intelligence tool bundled with Windows and other software, with the addition of vision, voice, and the…

This Startup Wants YouTube Creators to Get Paid for AI Training Data

This Startup Wants YouTube Creators to Get Paid for AI Training Data

So far, when AI companies have trained on YouTube’s invaluable stash of videos, captions, and other content, they’ve done so without permission. An AI-focused content licensing startup called Calliope Networks is hoping to change that with its new “License to Scrape,” a program aimed directly at YouTube stars. “There’s obvious demand from AI companies to…

Cybertruck Finally Gets Full Self-Driving (Supervised)

Cybertruck Finally Gets Full Self-Driving (Supervised)

A select number of all-electric Tesla Cybertrucks now have the ability to drive on US highways hands-free, after the automaker pushed an update to vehicles this morning. Tesla AI head Ashok Elluswamy wrote on X that Cybertrucks will be the first Tesla vehicles to receive the “end-to-end on highway” driving feature, which the company says…

An ‘iPhone of AI’ Makes No Sense. What Is Jony Ive Really Building?

An ‘iPhone of AI’ Makes No Sense. What Is Jony Ive Really Building?

At this point, phrases like ambient computing, ubiquitous computing, and even (shudder) Internet of Things may be zipping and popping around your brain. Are we back here again? If the answer is yes, it might not be a reason to despair. Béhar cites Embodied’s Moxie companion robot, ElliQ’s elder care, and the Happiest Baby robotic…

Chat Podcasts Rule the Market—and Always Will

Chat Podcasts Rule the Market—and Always Will

Nearly every survey of the podcast industry in 2024 agrees on one point: Chat podcasts are king. As video rises in popularity (33 percent of US podcast listeners prefer to consume this way), ad spending increases (estimated to top $4 billion worldwide), and listenership steadily grows at 8 percent year-over-year, it is the chat format—in…

No, Sam Altman, AI Won’t Solve All of Humanity’s Problems

No, Sam Altman, AI Won’t Solve All of Humanity’s Problems

We already knew where OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, stands on artificial intelligence vis-à-vis the human saga: It will be transformative, historic, and overwhelmingly beneficial. He has been nothing but consistent across countless interviews. For some reason, this week he felt it necessary to distill those opinions in a succinct blog post. “The Intelligence Age,” as…