India's AI Mission, Smart Glasses Evolution
March 11, 2024: India's Rs 10,372 Crore AI Mission, AI Smart Glasses, Trust Disparities, AI Funding, ChatGPT Racial Bias, Madonna AI Visual Effect, Nvidia Sued
Good Morning,
India's AI mission, smart glasses AI remake, trust gaps & AI investments were spotlighted on 11 March 2024. Let’s dive in.
1-Minute Roundup
India inaugurates Rs 10,372 Crore AI Mission, aiming for innovation and infrastructure enhancement.
Generative AI transforms smart glasses, with key players like Oppo, Google, & Microsoft leading the innovation.
The 2024 Edelman Trust Barometer reports a trust disparity of 63% in developing countries compared to 49% in developed countries.
Fabric secures $80M funding, acquires two companies, and partners with 70 health systems for healthcare automation.
BigBear.ai acquires Pangiam for $70M in stock, merging analytics with biometric security.
Brevian launches with $9M seed funding, focusing on no-code AI agent creation for business applications.
The US Air Force awarded BlackSky $3.5M as part of a potential $23 million deal for satellite analytics.
Study reveals ChatGPT's racial bias: favours Asian women (17.2%) over Black men (7.6%).
Microsoft's Seeing AI app, outperforming Google's Lookout, introduces groundbreaking features for the visually impaired.
Florida teens face charges under deepfake law for creating and distributing AI-generated explicit images.
Microsoft updates AI tool with enhanced content safeguards following FTC complaint.
Chinese researchers integrate physics with AI, aiming to create AI scientists for advanced problem-solving.
Madonna employs AI for visual effects in her Celebration Tour, showcasing innovative use in entertainment.
Nvidia is sued for alleged unauthorised use of copyrighted books in AI training.
ChatGPT's daily electricity consumption was reported at 500,000 kilowatt-hours, vastly outpacing average household use.
The Pentagon's $6B initiative focuses on AI-guided Collaborative Combat Aircraft, aiming for over 1,000 drones in military operations.
Spotlight
India Launches Rs 10,372 Crore AI Mission to Boost Innovation
The Indian government has sanctioned a significant investment of Rs 10,371.92 crore for the 'India AI Mission' over the next five years. This initiative aims to enhance the AI ecosystem in India by fostering innovation, improving data quality, developing local AI capabilities, and ensuring ethical AI practices. It also seeks to create skilled jobs and establish a robust infrastructure, including a mega computing facility with over 10,000 GPUs.
Comprehensive Ecosystem: The mission is designed to stimulate AI innovation and democratise computing access across various sectors.
Strategic Components: The initiative includes establishing AI innovation centres, a dataset platform, and a marketplace for AI services and models.
Education and Employment: Plans include rolling out AI education programs and setting up labs in smaller cities to widen AI access and generate skilled employment.
How will the 'India AI Mission’ impact India's global standing in AI and technology innovation?
Smart Glasses Revolutionised by Generative AI
Generative AI (genAI) is propelling the evolution of smart glasses, marking a significant shift from augmented reality (AR) to AI-driven functionalities. Companies like Oppo, Google, and Microsoft are vying to lead in AI glasses, integrating AI for real-time information processing and user interaction. These glasses, which may soon be commonplace, promise convenience and cutting-edge AI access, potentially reaching hundreds of millions of users.
Beyond AR: The focus of smart glasses shifts from AR to AI, driven by genAI's capabilities.
Tech Giants in the Race: Major companies are developing lightweight, AI-integrated glasses with designs that prioritise user comfort and AI accessibility.
Mass Appeal: With low costs and high utility potential, AI glasses could become a widespread consumer technology, integrating AI into daily life.
How do you think AI glasses will change our daily interactions and information consumption compared to current smart devices?
2024 Edelman Trust Barometer Reveals Global Trust Dynamics
The 2024 Edelman Trust Barometer report unveils insights into global trust, with a significant gap in trust levels between developing countries (63%) and developed ones (49%). The report highlights a critical view of governmental competency and ethics compared to businesses, raising concerns over innovation management and regulation. The barometer showcases how political affiliations and perceptions of control over innovations significantly influence public sentiment.
Trust Disparity: Developing countries exhibit higher trust levels (63%) in institutions than developed countries (49%).
Government vs. Business: Public perceptions of governments are starkly different, with governments viewed as less competent (35) and ethical (15) than businesses (17 in both competency and ethics).
Innovation Acceptance: Acceptance ratings for innovations like green energy and AI vary. However, green energy is more accepted (3.87 for those feeling in control) among individuals who believe they have control over the innovations' impacts.
Political Influence: Political leanings impact innovation acceptance, with a 7-point difference in rejection between those leaning right and left.
What measures can enhance public confidence in introducing and regulating new technologies?
AI Deals
Fabric has rapidly developed technology to automate healthcare workflows, securing $80M in funding, acquiring two companies, and partnering with 70 health systems to enhance clinical and administrative efficiency.
BigBear.ai has acquired Pangiam for $70M in stock. The deal combines predictive analytics, computer vision, and Pangiam's biometric security.
Brevian emerges from stealth with a $9M seed round to facilitate no-code AI agent creation for business users, initially targeting support and security sectors, with plans for broader application.
BlackSky secures a $3.5M contract from the US Air Force Research Laboratory, part of a potential $23 million deal over four years. The contract involves providing satellite imagery and analytics for global tracking of moving targets using AI/ML.
Others
Study Uncovers Racial Bias in ChatGPT's Job Screening
A Bloomberg study finds ChatGPT exhibits racial bias in evaluating job candidates, favouring Asian women in 17.2% of cases and Black men in just 7.6%, against an expected equal opportunity rate of 12.5% for each demographic group.
These findings highlight AI's struggle with fairness and call for a balanced approach combining AI with human oversight in the hiring process to counteract bias.
Microsoft's Seeing AI App: A Visionary Aid for the Visually Impaired
Microsoft launches the Seeing AI app for Android and iOS. The app is designed to assist visually impaired users by vocalising the visual world around them and offering product discovery and people recognition features.
In comparison tests, Seeing AI outperforms Google's Lookout, notably with its people identification feature and offline functionality, excluding scene detection and document reading.
Florida Teens Charged for Creating Deepfake Nudes of Classmates
Two Miami middle schoolers face felony charges for using AI to create and share non-consensual deepfake nudes, marking a legal first under Florida's 2022 deepfake law.
The incident has sparked debate over the adequacy of current laws to address the growing issue of AI-generated explicit imagery and its impact on minors.
Microsoft Updates AI Tool to Prevent Creation of Violet Sexual Images
Microsoft enhances its Copilot AI's safeguards, blocking specific prompts and adding warnings, following an engineer's FTC complaint about the tool generating biased and inappropriate content.
The move reflects ongoing efforts to align AI functionalities with ethical standards and content policies amidst broader concerns about AI-generated material.
Chinese Team Advances Towards AI Scientists with Integrated Physics Knowledge
Chinese researchers combine physics and logic with machine learning to create AI for scientific research and problem-solving.
AI scientists aim to enhance experimental accuracy and apply relevant knowledge autonomously, but challenges persist in balancing general and specific rules in complex fields like biology and chemistry.
Madonna Leverages AI for Creative Visuals in Concert Tour
Madonna adopts text-to-video AI technology for her Celebration Tour, creating ethereal cloud visuals as a pioneering use of generative AI in entertainment.
While this emerging tech promises content creation, it faces challenges like potential deepfake misuse and copyright disputes, emphasising the need for ethical development and use.
Nvidia Faces Lawsuit for AI Copyright Infringement
Nvidia is being sued by authors who allege the company used their books unauthorisedly to train its AI platform, NeMo.
The lawsuit, which seeks damages for copyright infringement over the past three years, highlights the growing scrutiny over the use of copyrighted material in training AI technologies.
ChatGPT's Energy Consumption 17K Times Higher Than Household Average
ChatGPT reportedly uses over 500,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity daily, 17,000 times more than the 29 kilowatt-hours used by the average US household.
Predictions suggest AI's global electricity consumption could hit 85 to 134 terawatt-hours annually by 2027, challenging the energy usage of major tech companies.
Pentagon's $6B Program Aims for AI-Guided Combat Drones.
The Pentagon is advancing AI with a $6 billion initiative to develop Collaborative Combat Aircraft, integrating over 1,000 drones for enhanced military operations.
Leading defence companies, including Boeing and Lockheed Martin, are vying for contracts to produce AI drones.
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