🥣 OpenAI's Sora Makes A Splash

PLUS: OpenAI Developing Search Engine

Author

The AI Crunch
February 22, 2024

Read time: 3.5 minutes

Greetings, tech enthusiasts. Welcome to The AI Crunch, where we delve into the latest developments in the ever-evolving landscape of AI. In this edition, we'll navigate through significant updates, unraveling the complexities of the digital domain. So, fasten your seatbelts as we embark on a journey through the heart of cutting-edge revelations. Let's get started!

Top Stories

Sora Makes A Splash

OpenAI just stealth dropped Sora, the text-to-video maestro! Sora is OpenAI's latest AI creation, capable of transforming textual prompts into mesmerizing videos. Picture this: a stylish woman striding through Tokyo's neon-lit streets, woolly mammoths gracefully treading through a snowy meadow, or a 30-year-old space explorer's vivid adventures. Sora doesn't just create videos; it paints scenes with precision and creativity.

But, like any AI virtuoso, Sora has its quirks. While it can craft scenes with finesse, it might struggle with the physics of a cookie losing a bite or confuse left and right. Yet, it's a learning process, and Sora is gearing up for real-world action.

Sora's technique involves diffusion modeling, a dance of noise removal that gradually unveils a video masterpiece. The transformer architecture, akin to GPT models, empowers Sora with superior scaling performance. It represents visual data as patches, enabling it to handle diverse formats seamlessly.

OpenAI Developing An AI Search Engine

In a plot twist that could make Google raise an eyebrow, OpenAI is reportedly cooking up its own web search product, challenging the search engine giant. While the details are as murky as a swamp at midnight, whispers suggest it might cozy up with ChatGPT or venture out solo. The rumor mill even suggests a potential collaboration with Microsoft's Bing, adding a sprinkle of competition to the mix.

Though OpenAI's silence speaks volumes, their move toward giving ChatGPT web browsing powers hints at a knowledge-driven search agenda. The search game might be in for a shakeup, but let's keep the popcorn on standby until we get the official play-by-play. While Microsoft has historically struggled against Google Search, this potential partnership introduces an intriguing layer to the competition, with AI integration potentially disrupting the established search engine hierarchy. Stay tuned for updates in this unfolding saga, but remember to keep a pinch of skepticism until the rumor mill churns out official confirmations. The evolving world of web search might just be in for some riveting developments.

News

Quick bites to start your morning:

  • Slack is launching AI features for Enterprises (TV)

  • Apple purchased the rights to iWork.ai at a domain auction (AI)

  • Google is establishing a new AI hub in France (R)

  • Stability AI introduced a preview of Stable Cascade (VB)

  • In 2023, Google blocked +150M AI-powered fraudulent online reviews (SEJ)

  • UPenn is rolling out the first Ivy League undergrad degree in AI (10P)

  • Gemini’s mobile app will start rolling out outside the US (X)

  • Apple launches new text-to-animation feature (X)

  • Google unveils Gemini 1.5 with massive context window (G)

  • SoftBank founder builds an AI chip company (B)

  • Reddit inks annual $60M AI data deal (B)

  • ElevenLabs teased a new AI Sound Effects feature (X)

  • The NBA teased an ‘NB-AI’ voice assistant (X)

  • Meta and OpenAI sign agreement to protect global elections (TC)

  • GPT-4-Turbo’s knowledge cutoff is now December 2023 (OA)

AI Funding

Armilla AI: AI-powered assurance platform raised $5M (FN)

Rogo: A generative AI startup for financial institutions raised $7M (FN)

Clarity: A startup creating tech to spot AI-manipulated media raised $16M (TC)

Ultiverse: AI-powered platform for game production raised $4M (TC)

Rasa: Startup developing dev platform for conversational GenAI raised $30M (TC)

LeoLabs: Secured $29M to expand space safety using AI-based solutions (LL)

Rasa Technologies: Raised $30M to combine LLMs with traditional chatbots (BW)

Langchain: Raised $20M with Langsmith being generally available now (F)

Guardrails AI: Platform for safeguarding foundation models raised $7M (GN)

Lambda: AI computing firm raised $320M to expand its AI cloud business (L)

Xensam: Raised $40M to develop an AI-powered software asset management platform (TC)

AI Tools

Newest AI tools (AI Tool Leaderboards):

  • Typho: AI-Powered artistic portrait creation platform

  • Watermarkly: Watermark photos online for free

  • Elite-AI-Write: Empowering content creation with AI

  • AI GIFs: AI-Powered GIF generation tool

  • Proseable: AI-Powered language learning assistant

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