Stability.AI Introduces a Research Model for Generative Video

stability.ai released this week Stable Video Diffusion, a foundation model for generative video based on the image model Stable Diffusion. Adaptable to numerous video applications, the released model is intended for research but not for real-world or commercial applications at this stage. Stable Video Diffusion was released in the form of two image-to-video models, capable of generating 14 and 25 frames at customizable frame rates between 3 and 30 frames per second. "Stable Video Diffusion is a proud addition to our diverse range of open-source models. Spanning across modalities including image, language, audio, 3D, and code, our portfolio is a testament to Stability AI’s dedication to amplifying human intelligence," said the company. In addition, stability.ai opens up a waitlist to access a new upcoming web experience featuring a Text-To-Video interface. This tool showcases the practical applications of Stable Video Diffusion in numerous sectors, including Advertising, Education, Entertainment, and beyond. .   Stability just released Stable Diffusion Video this week. It's quite something. The text-to-video model is fully open source and let's you generate 14 or 25 frames at 576 x 1024. It can also do do multi-view generation, 3D scene understanding, and camera control via LoRA.… pic.twitter.com/Ic1KARd40q — Lior⚡ (@AlphaSignalAI) November 23, 2023

A Year of the Huge Hit of OpenAI's ChatGPT

OpenAI’s New Board Takes Over, With Microsoft As a Non-Voting Observer

The US, UK, and 18 Countries Agree on Guidelines to Keep AI Systems Safe

AI Agents, the Second Phase of Generative AI

After the release of the bot ChatGPT a year ago, the second phase of personalized, autonomous AI agents is emerging. These agents can perform complex tasks, such as sending emails, scheduling meetings, booking flights or tables in a restaurant, or even complex tasks like buying presents for family members or negotiating a raise. Personalized chatbots, programmed for specific tasks, that GPT creators will be able to release through the upcoming OpenAI’s GPT Store, are a prelude. For now, these custom GPTs are easy to build without knowing how to code. Users just answer a few simple questions about their bot — its name, its purpose, the tone used to respond — and the bot builds itself in just a few seconds. Users can upload PDF documents they want to use as reference material or easily look up Q&A. They can also connect the bot to other apps or edit its instructions. Although these custom chatbots are far from working perfectly, they can be useful tools for answering repetitive questions in customer service departments. Some AI safety researchers fear that giving bots more autonomy could lead to disaster, The New York Times reported. The Center for AI Safety, a nonprofit research organization, listed autonomous agents as one of its “catastrophic AI risks” this year, saying that “malicious actors could intentionally create rogue AI with dangerous goals.” For now, these agents look harmless and limited in their scope. Its development seems to be dependent on gradual iterative deployment, that is, small improvements at a fast pace rather than a big leap. In the last OpenAI developer conference, Sam Atman built on stage a “start-up mentor” chatbot to give advice to aspiring founders, based on an uploaded file of a speech he had given years earlier. The San Francisco-based research lab envisions a world where AI agents will be extensions of us, gathering information and taking action on our behalf. .   This is really worth your time – a very solid technical introduction to LLMs, great if you've not been paying close attention but I picked up quite a few useful details from it too https://t.co/eOfOyWSxC5 — Simon Willison (@simonw) November 23, 2023 The most clearest and crisp explanation, I've ever heard, of how large language models compress and capture a "world-model" in their weights simply by learning to predict the next word accurately. Furthermore, how the raw power of these base models can then be tamed by teaching… pic.twitter.com/0g7Z5wXOlc — Zain Hasan (@ZainHasan6) November 21, 2023

Google's Bard Now Understands YouTube's Videos Offering to Have a Richer Conversation

Google's Bard announced this week that it will offer an understanding of YouTube videos so that users can have a richer conversation. "We're taking the first steps in Bard's ability to understand YouTube videos. For example, if you’re looking for videos on how to make olive oil cake, you can now also ask how many eggs the recipe in the first video requires," said the company in a post. In addition, Google reported that Bard can help with math equations, as well as with data visualization, as it's able to generate charts from prompts. .

Amazon Unveiled 'Q', an AI-Powered Chatbot for AWS Customers

AI Developments Will Speed Up with the Defeat of Anti-Altman Allies

Anthropic Introduced an Upgraded Version of Its Conversational AI Assistant

OpenAI Researchers Warned the Board of an AI Discovery that Could Threaten Humanity, Reuters Says

Four days ahead of Sam Altman‘s ouster, several staff researchers wrote a letter to the board of directors warning of a powerful AI discovery, called Project Q*, that they said could threaten humanity. Reuters reported yesterday about it quoting as sources two people familiar with the matter. This unreported letter was a key development for Altman’s firing, the poster child of Gen AI who would triumphantly return late Tuesday. This letter was one factor among a longer list of grievances of the board which reflected the concerns over commercializing advances before understanding the consequences. Some at OpenAI believe Q* (pronounced Q-Star) could be a breakthrough in the startup's search for what's known as artificial general intelligence (AGI), one of the people told Reuters. OpenAI defines AGI as autonomous systems that surpass humans in most economically valuable tasks. Researchers consider math to be a frontier of generative AI development. Currently, generative AI is good at writing and language translation by statistically predicting the next word, and answers to the same question can vary widely. But conquering the ability to do math — where there is only one right answer — implies AI would have greater reasoning capabilities resembling human intelligence. This could be applied to novel scientific research, for instance, AI researchers believe. Unlike a calculator that can solve a limited number of operations, AGI can generalize, learn, and comprehend. There has long been discussion among computer scientists about the danger posed by highly intelligent machines, for instance, if they might decide that the destruction of humanity was in their interest. Altman has drawn investment and computing resources from Microsoft to get closer to AGI. Now he is back some analysts say that he may have fewer checks on power.   Please ignore the deluge of complete nonsense about Q*.One of the main challenges to improve LLM reliability is to replace Auto-Regressive token prediction with planning. Pretty much every top lab (FAIR, DeepMind, OpenAI etc) is working on that and some have already published… — Yann LeCun (@ylecun) November 24, 2023

Sam Altman Reinstated as OpenAI’s CEO

Sam Altman will be reinstated as OpenAI's CEO, successfully reversing his ouster by the company's board last week after a campaign waged by employees and investors. Yesterday, OpenAI said it had reached a deal in principle for Sam Altman to return as CEO, with a new board chaired by former Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor. The board will be remade without several members who had opposed Mr. Altman. "We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board of Bret Taylor (Chair), Larry Summers, and Adam D’Angelo," OpenAI said in a post to X. "We are collaborating to figure out the details. Thank you so much for your patience through this." Altman's return should quell what was an all-out revolt by OpenAI employees against his removal and mark the beginning of the end of one of the most-watched corporate sagas in tech history. Adam D’Angelo, the CEO of the website Quora and a former early Facebook employee, was already a member of the OpenAI board, but other previous board members will not remain. The outgoing members include tech entrepreneur Tasha McCauley, OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, and Helen Toner, director of strategy and foundational research grants at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology. On Tuesday, The New York Times reported that the board had been bickering for more than a year on questions about the safe development of AI, including how quickly to roll out the technology while ensuring humans do not lose control of it. Altman was on the side of moving quickly, the newspaper reported. Altman said in a separate statement on X that he was happy to return as CEO. “i love openai, and everything i’ve done over the past few days has been in service of keeping this team and its mission together,” he wrote, eschewing traditional punctuation. Altman added that, with the new board in place, he was “looking forward to returning” and “building on our strong partnership” with Microsoft. OpenAI and Microsoft have a longstanding partnership, with Microsoft having invested in the startup and OpenAI using Microsoft's cloud computing services. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in a post on X that Microsoft is “encouraged by the changes to the OpenAI board. We believe this is a first essential step on a path to more stable, well-informed, and effective governance.” Other OpenAI executives celebrated the decision. Mira Murati, who was briefly interim CEO after Altman’s ouster, reposted the OpenAI announcement late Tuesday with a simple blue heart emoji. Greg Brockman, the startup’s president, and a co-founder, wrote on X, “Returning to OpenAI & getting back to coding tonight.” Elon Musk, the tech billionaire who was among the first donors to OpenAI when it was a nonprofit, said that Altman’s return was better than one alternative: Altman and most of OpenAI’s employees going to work for Microsoft. “Less concentration of power,” Musk wrote on X. Meanwhile, the company rolled out a new voice feature for ChatGPT on Tuesday with a subtle joke about the situation. We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam Altman to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board of Bret Taylor (Chair), Larry Summers, and Adam D'Angelo. We are collaborating to figure out the details. Thank you so much for your patience through this. — OpenAI (@OpenAI) November 22, 2023   OpenAI is nothing without its people https://t.co/XYKLQ61e6l — OpenAI (@OpenAI) November 22, 2023   i love openai, and everything i’ve done over the past few days has been in service of keeping this team and its mission together. when i decided to join msft on sun evening, it was clear that was the best path for me and the team. with the new board and w satya’s support, i’m… — Sam Altman (@sama) November 22, 2023

......

The AI-Native University

Blueprint for the Institution of the Future

A practical guide for leaders reimagining higher education with AI at the core — not as an add-on, but as the foundation for how students learn, faculty teach, and institutions govern.

By Mikel Amigot

Read the book