Daily Archives: June 1, 2023
Artificial Intelligence Will Entrench Global Inequality
The debate about regulating AI urgently needs input from the global south.
The artificial intelligence race is gathering pace, and the stakes could not be higher. Major corporate players—including Alibaba, DeepMind, Google, IBM, Microsoft, OpenAI, and SAP—are leveraging huge computational power to push the boundaries of AI and popularize new AI tools such as GPT-4 and Bard. Hundreds of other private and non-profit players are rolling out apps and plugins, staking their claims in this fast-moving frontier market that some enthusiasts predict will upend the way we work, play, do business, create wealth, and govern.
Amid all the enthusiasm, there is a mounting sense of dread. A growing number of tech titans and computer scientists have expressed deep anxiety about the existential risks of surrendering decision-making to complex algorithms and, in the not so distant future, super-intelligent machines that may abruptly find little use for humans. A 2022 survey found that roughly half of all responding AI experts believed there is at least a one in 10 chance these technologies could doom us all. Whatever the verdict, as recent U.S. congressional testimony from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman reveals, AI represents an unprecedented shift in the social contract that will fundamentally redefine relations between people, institutions, and nations. — Read More
MyHeritage debuts Reimagine, an AI app for scanning, fixing and even animating old photos
AI is impacting the realm of photography, ranging from tools for professionals like Adobe Photoshop’s new generative AI, to those for consumers, like Google Photos’ forthcoming Magic Editor. Now, genealogy company MyHeritage is turning to AI to make it easier for families to preserve their memories with the launch of its latest app, Reimagine. The new mobile app’s main focus is to help users easily import printed photos stored in albums, then touch them up by improving their resolution, fixing scratches and creases, and even restoring color in black-and-white photos and animating faces — the latter, a technique that went viral in prior years with MyHeritage’s launch of “Deep Nostalgia.” — Read More
The Roll iOS app uses AI to simulate crane and dolly shots on iPhone footage
Roll uses generative AI to simulate a 3D environment, allowing users to create panning or close-up shots without needing to move their iPhone camera.
Roll AI is a new video creation and collaboration platform for iOS and web that allows users to add simulated video effects to iPhone footage that would typically require professional camera equipment to achieve, such as stabilized pan or crane shots. It’s one of the latest examples in a boom of new apps and services that utilize AI to simplify technical creative processes like photo and video editing.
Roll AI uses its proprietary generative AI models to recreate the filming environment in iPhone footage as a 3D space, allowing users to add text overlay effects and simulate side-panning, dolly, and crane camera movements in postproduction and apply various studio effects like bokeh (background blur). The service also uses AI to automatically edit your footage for publishing. Roll captures metadata from audio and video recordings that the Roll editor later uses to reframe hosts and create scene changes based on any on-screen conversations. — Read More
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