Need to Know News - March 13th, 2024
In this week's Need to Know News edition... a massive Silicon Valley shakeup. Cognition AI unleashes Devin, the world's first AI software engineer capable of coding with human-like intuition. Apple's latest venture into AI-driven ad optimization – a game-changing tool for the App Store, or a stepping stone to a wider advertising empire?
And a tale of espionage and AI ambition. One former Google engineer faces charges over stealing trade secrets for China, putting a spotlight on the global race for AI supremacy. Plus, a whole lot more.
AI In Action
IBM Says Using Adobe's AI Tools Boosted Marketing Efforts
IBM says that its initial testing of generative AI tools from Adobe has resulted in major productivity improvements. Billy Seabrook, the global chief design officer for IBM’s consulting arm, said that the 1,600 designers in his unit used Adobe’s tools to help generate ideas. Then, create variants of them to use in different parts of marketing campaigns.
"What typically would take us two weeks for an end-to-end cycle, we’ve gotten down to two days," Seabrook told Reuters.
Full Story
AI Software Engineer 'Devin' Codes Entire Projects from Single Prompt
An AI startup has launched what it claims to be the world’s first AI software engineer. Cognition AI has unveiled Devin, an autonomous agent that can plan and execute complex software engineering tasks from a single prompt.
Housed in its own sandbox environment, Devin can solve tasks using its own code editor and web browser. It can even recall relevant context, learn over time and fix mistakes. For example, Devin can benchmark an AI model on different APIs.
Cognition showcased the model testing Meta’s Llama 2 on Replicate, Perplexity and Together. The system was able to build the entire project, even fixing errors.
Full Story
Ex-Google Engineer Charged with Stealing AI Trade Secrets While Working with Chinese Companies
The indictment unsealed in the Northern District of California alleges that Linwei Ding, who was hired by Google in 2019 and had access to confidential information about the company’s supercomputing data centers, began uploading hundreds of files into a personal Google Cloud account two years ago.
Within weeks of the theft starting, prosecutors say, Ding was offered the position of chief technology officer at an early-stage technology company in China that touted its use of AI technology and that offered him a monthly salary of about $14,800, plus an annual bonus and company stock.The indictment says Ding traveled to China and participated in investor meetings at the company and sought to raise capital for it.
🚀 What do you get when you combine 25+ years of copywriting experience with GPT-4?
"Next level. They’re able to get REALLY damn good copy… that requires minimal editing… right out of the gate. It's pretty amazing"
Try Our Free AI Copy-Generator Now
SpotOn Launches AI-Enabled Marketing Tools for Restaurants
Designed to streamline the restaurant marketing process, SpotOn Marketing Assist is the first product of its kind to empower restaurants to drive guest visits and boost sales while eliminating the time and resources needed for self-serve marketing tools.
“Beyond empowering operators to set up automated campaigns, SpotOn is helping to drive repeat business while providing operators with data-driven insights they need to keep the momentum going and drive revenue all year long” said Bryan Solar, Chief Product Officer at SpotOn.
DoorDash Deploys AI to Detect, Prevent Verbal Abuse on Platform
DoorDash has added an AI feature designed to detect and prevent verbal abuse or harassment on the platform. The new SafeChat+ is meant to protect both customers and delivery drivers, the on-demand ordering and delivery platform.
If the feature detects inappropriate conversation between a customer and a driver, it will give the driver the option to cancel the order, according to the release. Doing so will not impact the driver’s rating. If an inappropriate conversation happens after the order has been completed, the feature will end any further chat.
At the Frontier of AI
Apple Is Testing An AI-powered Ad Product Similar to Google's Performance Max
Apple is taking a cue from Google and Meta by experimenting with a new AI-powered way to buy its App Store ads, according to two people familiar with the matter. Apple has begun testing a product with a small group of advertisers that automatically decides where to place ads within its App Store, much like Google's Performance Max and Meta's Advantage+.
Wearable AI Market to be Worth $138.5 Billion by 2029
The wearable AI market is projected to grow from USD 62.7 billion in 2024 and is estimated to reach USD 138.5 billion by 2029; it is expected to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 17.2% from 2024 to 2029 according to a new report by MarketsandMarkets™.
The growth of the wearable AI market is driven by growing awareness regarding health and fitness among general population and technological advancements in wearables, seamless integration with smartphones and Internet of Things (IoT).
Figure + OpenAI Robot Demonstration Wows
Brett Adcock, co-founder of Figure, recently announced a collaboration between Figure and OpenAI to develop advanced AI models for humanoid robots. The partnership combines OpenAI's expertise in visual reasoning and language understanding with Figure's neural networks, which enable fast, low-level, and dexterous robot actions.
In a new video demonstration, Figure showcased the progress made within just 13 days of the collaboration. The video features end-to-end neural networks controlling a humanoid robot without teleoperation, filmed at normal speed and shot continuously.
Brand Versus AI: The Heavyweight Battle for Mental Availability
In 2024, the Rabbit R1, a $200 AI-powered gadget, simplifies task completion using large action models (LAMs) that interact with software and apps. As AI becomes more integrated into our lives, brands must adapt their marketing strategies to win over both humans and AI.
Mental availability is crucial, and brands need to be discovered and remembered by both human intelligence and AI. With the increasing prevalence of video content and AI-generated media, brand marketing through advertising and publicity is expected to become even more important. To stay relevant, brands must focus on being featured on authoritative websites and maintain a strong presence through PR, advertising, and organic content.
Google AI Learns to Play Open-World Video Games by Watching Them
A Google DeepMind artificial intelligence model can play different open-world video games, such as No Man’s Sky, like a human just by watching video from a screen. This could be a huge step towards generally intelligent AIs that operate in the physical world.
“It’s worth remembering that for companies like DeepMind, this research isn’t really about games, it’s about robotics,” says Michael Cook at King’s College London. “Navigating 3D environments is a means to an end, and these companies are keen to make AI systems that can perceive and act in the world. So I don’t see this having a large impact on video games, but it might have a lot of unknown impacts on our life outside in the real world.”
GOT 15 SECONDS?
Thanks for reading.
Until next time!
The AI Marketers
P.S. Want to automate your marketing with AI? Let us know what problems you want us to solve with AI and we’ll put our dedicated team to solving it. If we make the code, we’ll share it with you.
Just fill out this form here: https://bit.ly/3Smsvcy
