“This is moving so fast, by the time you write this article, there could be something different.”
Hassabis, who runs the AI unit of Alphabet Inc.’s Google, told Bloomberg Television that DeepSeek “seems to have only reported the cost of the final training round, which is a fraction of the total cost.”
The executive also shot down the idea that DeepSeek’s emergence upends the economics of AI development. “We don’t see any new silver bullet technologies,” Hassabis said on Monday, in Paris, at the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit. “DeepSeek is not an outlier on the efficiency curve.”
But in Paris, the doomers have been sidelined in favor of a sunnier, more optimistic vision of the technology’s potential. Panelists and speakers were invited to talk up A.I.’s ability to accelerate progress in areas like medicine and climate science, and gloomier talks about A.I. takeover risks were mostly relegated to unofficial side events. And a leaked draft of the official summit statement, which was expected to be signed by some of the attending nations, was panned by A.I. safety groups for paying too little attention to catastrophic risks.
This is a general audience deep dive into the Large Language Model (LLM) AI technology that powers ChatGPT and related products. It is covers the full training stack of how the models are developed, along with mental models of how to think about their "psychology", and how to get the best use them in practical applications. I have one "Intro to LLMs" video already from ~year ago, but that is just a re-recording of a random talk, so I wanted to loop around and do a lot more comprehensive version.
Alongside the chance to buy and sell memecoins and NFTs, Crypto.com added markets for “yes” or “no” positions on the outcome of the NFL playoffs and college football bowl games. Technically, these are “swaps” contracts: For every “yes,” there was a corresponding “no,” with prices constantly moving. In late January, for example, a “yes” for the Kansas City Chiefs to win the NFL championship cost $56.75 and would paid $100 if they do; the “no” side cost $46.75 and would pay $100 if the Philadelphia Eagles win. (Crypto.com keeps the extra $3.50.)
On the 25-minute call, Mr. Altman appealed to Mr. Trump’s love of a big story and of a big deal. Mr. Altman told the president-elect that the tech industry would achieve artificial general intelligence — the hypothetical moment when technology matches human intelligence — during the Trump administration, according to three people familiar with the call. And to get there before competitors from China, OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank had completed a $100 billion deal to build data centers across the country.
Trump, meantime, has tasked Vice President JD Vance with overseeing negotiations, with the hope Vance’s background in venture capital and Silicon Valley ties can facilitate a deal.
“There is now a process to be followed that will ensure a resolution to any concerns, while maintaining the operability of the TikTok platform,” a TikTok spokesman said in a statement Saturday, adding that TikTok is committed to that effort.
The top official at the US AI Safety Institute is stepping down, raising new uncertainty about the future of a key government group focused on artificial intelligence under the Trump administration.
Elizabeth Kelly, the director of the safety institute and a face of US AI policy on the world stage, is set to leave her position by the end of the week, according to people familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private information.
Sonos will release a streaming player that sources tell me could cost between $200 and $400 — a truly staggering price for its category.
I’ve seen images of the upcoming product, which is deep into development, and it’s about as nondescript as streaming hardware gets. Viewed from the top, the device is a flattened black square and slightly thicker than a deck of trading cards.
But the Android-based streamer, codenamed Pinewood, is designed to be more than just another competitor to the Apple TV 4K, Nvidia Shield, or Roku Ultra. Don’t get me wrong: streaming is a huge focus for the product. Sources familiar with Pinewood tell me it has a “beautiful” interface, despite the software being developed in partnership with a digital ads firm.
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The Tyson-Paul fight in November was the most-streamed sporting event ever, leading to a surge in new Netflix subscribers, while two NFL games at Christmas — one featuring a half-time performance by Beyoncé — generated up to $180mn in US advertising, according to Bernstein.Jian Kunyi, deputy dean of the School of Law and Political Science at Yunnan University of Finance and Economics, told the Global Times the networks appeared to be broadening to target celebrities and intellectuals for greater profit. The China Federation of Radio and Television Association warned members to be wary of fake job offers, saying “many” had been tricked “resulting in significant damage to their personal and financial safety”.
The 31-year-old Chinese actor had flown to Bangkok for what he expected to be a movie casting call. Instead, he was picked up at the airport and driven to a scam center in Myanmar’s Myawaddy, a notorious cyber-fraud hub across the border from Thailand.
Wang is among hundreds of thousands of people who have been trafficked into scam compounds – many run by Chinese crime syndicates – that have proliferated in civil war-torn Myanmar and other parts of Southeast Asia in recent years. Often lured by the promise of well-paying jobs or other enticing opportunities, victims are held against their will and forced to carry out online fraud schemes in heavily guarded compounds, where former detainees say beatings and torture are common.
Thailand cut off electricity, internet access and fuel supplies to some areas in Myanmar suspected to house cyber scam operations, widening a crackdown after a high-profile trafficking of a Chinese actor put the spotlight on criminal activities across the Thai borders.
Popular Roblox life simulation game “Brookhaven” has been acquired by game developer Voldex in a deal funded by Raine Partners and Shamrock Capital.
Created by Roblox user Wolfpaq in 2020, “Brookhaven” is described as a place to “hang out, roleplay, interact, craft unique narratives, live in big houses, drive fun vehicles and explore the city.”
A consistent top-three title in terms of concurrent users on Roblox, “Brookhaven” boasts 60 billion visits and more than 120 million monthly active players, per Voldex data.
Banks wrapped up the sale of $5.5 billion in debt backed by Musk’s social-media company on Wednesday, people familiar with the matter said. The banks had originally planned to sell around $3 billion at around 95 cents on the dollar, The Wall Street Journal had reported. They upsized the deal after seeing demand from investors, the people said.
Black and Latino people have long been underrepresented in the tech industry. Google’s 2024 diversity report said 5.7% of its U.S. employees were Black and 7.5% were Latino. Four years earlier, those figures were 3.7% and 5.9%, respectively.
Google said it was evaluating whether to continue releasing annual diversity reports, which it has done since 2014. The evaluation is part of a broader review of DEI-related grants, training and initiatives, including those that the email said “raise risk, or that aren’t as impactful as we’d hoped.”
“Lately we’ve let too many projects run under a cloud of half-commitment,” Conrad added. “We’re going to fix this too.”
"Arm recently notified us that it was withdrawing its October 22, 2024 notice of breach, and indicated that it has no current plan to terminate the Qualcomm architecture license agreement," Amon told analysts on conference call on Wednesday, discussing the company's first-quarter results. In December, Qualcomm won key aspects of a trial in the underlying dispute, with a jury finding that Qualcomm's personal computer chips are properly licensed under its license agreement with Arm.
OpenAI, the artificial-intelligence company behind ChatGPT, is expected to air its first TV commercial during Sunday’s Super Bowl, according to people familiar with the matter.
The Senate Commerce Committee approved legislation Wednesday to ban children under 13 from social media. By limiting access, the bill hopes to address youth anxiety and depression linked to social media.
The panel approved the Kids Off Social Media Act — sponsored by the panel’s chair, Texas Republican Ted Cruz, and a senior Democrat on the panel, Hawaii’s Brian Schatz — by voice vote, clearing the way for consideration by the full Senate. Only Ed Markey (D-Mass.) asked to be recorded as a no on the bill.
Among the notable updates includes a feature called Vision for Copilot, which allows users to attach a screenshot, photo, or diagram to a chat, with Copilot generating the interface, code, and alt text to bring it to life.
Employees at the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA, were initially excluded from broader government offers to take deferred resignation offers, in part due to their role in national security and defending critical infrastructure.
However, on Wednesday, some CISA staffers were given the offer and just hours to decide whether to accept it, according to three sources who spoke to NPR on condition of anonymity.
The DOGE team is using AI software accessed through Microsoft’s cloud computing service Azure to pore over every dollar of money the department disburses, from contracts to grants to work trip expenses, one of the people said. Lower-level department staffers were directed by agency leadership to let Musk’s teams access the sensitive financial data, the person said.
Lawmakers announced Thursday they planned to introduce a bill to ban DeepSeek’s chatbot application from government-owned devices, over new security concerns that the app could provide user information to the Chinese government.
The legislation written by Reps. Darin LaHood, an Illinois Republican, and Josh Gottheimer, a New Jersey Democrat, is echoing a strategy that Congress used to ban Chinese-controlled TikTok from government devices, which marked the beginning of the effort to block the company from operating in the U.S.
“I write to let you know that I have decided to resign from USDS and today will be my last day,” Carstensen said in an internal memo to colleagues that was obtained by The Verge. “I am not taking the fork, but after discussions with my family and other trusted advisors I decided that it is time for me to pursue a different path.”
As previously spotted, Google Search is working on a new “AI Mode” that offers a “persistent place” to ask more “open-ended / exploratory questions” and get generated AI Overview-style responses. Powered by Gemini 2.0, Google has begun testing this experience with employees.
9to5Google today saw an internal email that invites Google employees to dogfood (test) this “AI Mode.” Google describes the new experience as “Search intelligently research[ing] for you – organizing information into easy-to-digest breakdowns with links to explore content across the web.”
It remains unclear why Schulman chose to leave Anthropic so soon after joining, as well as what his role will be at Murati’s company. The startup has not yet announced a name or a clear product direction, though it has already made headlines for poaching employees from OpenAI, Character AI, and Google DeepMind. Schulman’s departure from Anthropic was first reported by The Information, but his move to Murati’s startup has not yet been reported.
The company expects to announce the device as early as next week, ahead of it going on sale later in the month, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Apple is unlikely to hold a launch event for the device, opting to reveal it on its website instead, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans are private.
On Thursday, President Trump asked Republican lawmakers to end tax breaks on carried interest.
The tax break allows private equity and venture fund managers to treat their earnings from investments at a lower capital gains rate, rather than as ordinary income.
Newly unsealed emails allegedly provide the "most damning evidence" yet against Meta in a copyright case raised by book authors alleging that Meta illegally trained its AI models on pirated books.
Last month, Meta admitted to torrenting a controversial large dataset known as LibGen, which includes tens of millions of pirated books. But details around the torrenting were murky until yesterday, when Meta's unredacted emails were made public for the first time. The new evidence showed that Meta torrented "at least 81.7 terabytes of data across multiple shadow libraries through the site Anna’s Archive, including at least 35.7 terabytes of data from Z-Library and LibGen," the authors' court filing said. And "Meta also previously torrented 80.6 terabytes of data from LibGen."
