📆 August 9th 2024📆 

A mix of business news and new advancements awaits

• Tech giants are trying a new tactic over acquisition of AI companies, acqui-hiring

• Qwen2-Math is blowing the benchmarks out of the water - take a look at the latest from Alibaba

• Ireland’s data commissioner is taking X to court over potential infringements of GDPR.

• Check out Poet, a recent acquisition from Google that helps streamline prompt engineering.

• As always, too much to put in headlines. Check out the Other News Rollup section for a quickfire review of the top stories in AI.

Dive in for all the details!

🆘 Quick Tips 🆘 

Need help with your math homework - or more likely helping your kids with theirs 😃 

Leverage models trained specifically on a wide range of mathematical problems locally using ollama.

1. Follow the instructions on Ollama’s download page if you don’t have it installed

2. Open a command line and type

ollama run wizard-math:7b 

Once the model is downloaded try it out with this geometry question:

A right square pyramid has a base with edges each measuring 3 cm and a height twice the perimeter of its base. What is the volume of the pyramid?

So it’s that simple to get it running but I will throw some caution in here. These are great examples using small models that most consumer hardware can probably run, the smaller the model the less accurate it’s responses. Use this as a learning opportunity, use AI but don’t forget that your brain is vastly more powerful & capable so keep the human in the loop!!!

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📰 News 📰 

The Growing AI Startups and Big Tech Collaboration

The rapid growth of artificial intelligence startups has created a unique landscape where small companies face both opportunities and challenges. The Gadget Lab Podcast episode highlights the current trend of collaboration between small AI startups and major tech giants like Google, Apple, Amazon, and Meta. As AI development costs soar and competition intensifies, large companies seek innovative ways to acquire talent and technology without drawing regulatory scrutiny. Traditional acquisitions are increasingly scrutinized by regulators, pushing tech giants to opt for partnerships and acqui-hire strategies.

This strategy allows companies to license technology and collaborate with top talent while avoiding regulatory hurdles associated with full acquisitions. However, startups face challenges as Big Tech's dominance grows and regulators increase antitrust efforts. The podcast also discusses Google's recent $2.5 billion deal with Character.AI, emphasizing the trend of strategic partnerships and the regulatory environment's impact on the tech industry.

Read More At: Wired

Alibaba's Qwen2-Math Dominates AI Math Models

Alibaba has claimed the top spot on the Open LLM Leaderboard with its latest AI model, Qwen2-Math. This advancement highlights Alibaba's commitment to enhancing the mathematical and reasoning capabilities of its AI models. Qwen2-Math is part of the Qwen2 model series, which consists of models ranging in size from 0.5 billion to 72 billion parameters. These models are designed to perform advanced mathematical computations and problem-solving tasks, significantly outperforming many existing open-source models​​.

The Qwen2-72B model, in particular, excelled in multiple benchmarks, demonstrating superior performance in language understanding, language generation, and mathematical reasoning across 15 tests​​. This model's ability to process context lengths up to 128K tokens and its multilingual capabilities—supporting languages such as Arabic, Persian, and Hebrew—further solidify its leading position​​.

Read More At: VentureBeat

Ireland Takes X to Court Over Data Use

Elon Musk's company, X (formerly Twitter), is facing legal action from the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) for allegedly using EU user data to train its AI chatbot, Grok, without proper consent. The controversy began when X implemented a change in July that allowed the automatic use of public posts from EU users for AI training without notifying them or obtaining their explicit consent. This action potentially violates the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which mandates clear user consent for data processing​​.

The DPC argues that X's approach, which included a retroactive opt-out option, does not fulfill GDPR requirements. As a result, X has agreed to suspend using EU user data collected between May and August for AI training while the matter is under investigation​​. X has defended its practices, claiming that the DPC's order is overly broad and unjustified. Despite these claims, the court case highlights the ongoing tension between tech companies and EU regulators over data privacy and user consent​​.

If found in violation, X could face significant fines, potentially up to 4% of its annual global turnover​​. The case underscores the importance of compliance with data protection laws, particularly in the EU, where regulators are actively enforcing user privacy rights​​.

Read More At: Engadget

Revolutionizing LLM Prompt Engineering with Prompt Poet

Google has recently acquired Prompt Poet, a tool designed to enhance prompt engineering for large language models (LLMs). Developed by Character.ai, Prompt Poet aims to improve the way prompts are crafted to achieve more accurate and relevant responses from AI models​​.

Prompt engineering is the process of designing inputs that guide AI models to generate desired outputs. While AI models like ChatGPT can handle conversational prompts effectively, Prompt Poet provides advanced techniques that allow developers to exercise greater control over AI responses. This is especially useful for building sophisticated AI applications​​.

The integration of Prompt Poet into Google's AI ecosystem, including projects like Gemini, is expected to significantly advance the capabilities of language models. This acquisition highlights Google's commitment to improving AI performance and user interaction by refining the underlying prompt engineering processes​​.

Read More At: VentureBeat

🔨 AI Powered Tools 🔨 

• Sync Labs - Provides APIs for video content creators to generate realistic lip-syncing in videos. It allows users to animate characters to speak in any language, making it ideal for industries like film, gaming, and animation. Sync Labs leverages advanced AI to seamlessly match spoken words with facial movements, enhancing the storytelling process across multiple platforms.

• PortfolioPilot - financial tool that offers 360° portfolio analysis and personalized investment recommendations. It leverages AI and machine learning to analyze portfolios, providing insights based on economic models and user preferences. Designed for investors in the finance industry, it helps users optimize their investment strategies by identifying risks and opportunities for better decisions.

• Taplio - LinkedIn growth tool designed to help users build personal brands by leveraging AI for content creation, engagement, and analytics. It offers features such as AI-generated post ideas, automated content scheduling, and performance tracking. Tailored for marketing professionals and businesses.

🗞️ Other News Rollup 🗞️ 

AI Phishing Risks - Microsoft's Copilot AI can be exploited for phishing, allowing hackers to manipulate data and bypass security protections.

AI Video Ideas - YouTube's 'Brainstorm with Gemini' helps creators generate video ideas and thumbnails using advanced AI technology.

Hugging Face Acquires XetHub - Hugging Face's acquisition of XetHub enhances its capabilities for hosting large AI models and datasets.

GPT-4o Launch - OpenAI's GPT-4o model launches, cutting costs and enhancing performance amid leadership changes and rising competition.

Visual Storytelling Simplified - Napkin automates visual storytelling for businesses, transforming text into engaging visuals effortlessly.

AI and Mental Health - AI can enhance mental health support through responsible development, equity, privacy, and user involvement.

AI Security Legal Issues - Harvard scholars discuss CFAA's inadequacy for AI security, risking unaddressed vulnerabilities and deterring responsible research.

Rising Memory Prices - AI demand is driving up memory and storage prices, impacting consumers and reshaping the tech market.

DALL-E 3 Access - ChatGPT free users can now create two images daily with DALL-E 3, enhancing accessibility and creativity.

GPT-4o Safety Assessment - OpenAI's GPT-4o model is assessed as 'medium' risk, raising concerns about safety and transparency.

🎶 Prompts 🎶 

Prompts used to generate some of this issues images. Unless otherwise stated all images are using Dall-E and ChatGPT Plus.

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