AI round-up: Week of Feb. 26, 2024

Remember earlier this year when Ethan Mollick gave us the theme for 2024?

“Don’t trust your own eyes.”

I was reminded of this just today thanks to the story from 404 Media about (stick with me now) DoorDash promoting ghost kitchens with AI-generated menu items that don’t actually exist.

Here are a few menu items pulled from that story. (That drink is supposed to be Sprite, by the way.)

I thought I would share a story like this v. the other stories out there around Deepfakes and how concerning that technology has become. As Mr. Mollick said … don’t trust your own eyes.


This week’s issue: 8 stories 
The AI impact meter: High 
How long to read: 30 minutes (not including the pods)

AI has Tyler Perry rethinking his $800M studio upgrade.
I’m putting this story first because it’s one of the most honest responses I’ve heard to the new and emerging AI technology. Why wouldn’t he be thinking this after watching those Sora demos?

Follow the bouncing ball: 
AI is dominating SEO results. 
Google is being overrun with these stories. 
Google needs to protect search. 
Google announces a deal to pay publishers to use its AI tools to write stories.
(Annnnnd we lose our grip on reality.)

Meanwhile, Copilot has an alter-ego: a God-like AGI that demands worship.

WHAT the hell now?

But there’s more … Copilot seems to really be having itself a week:

We can finish each other's sandwiches!
Google Chrome’s new AI tool can finish your sentence. And a whole lot more. Meet the “help me write” button.

Love is in the AIr
Last week, we talked about Reddit signing a content licensing deal with Google. This week, it’s OpenAI’s turn – they have a deal in place with Match (Tinder, Match, OkCupid, Hinge).

To prove it, they had ChatGPT write the press release announcing the partnership. 
And it reads like you would think.

Klarna introduces an AI customer service function that handles two-thirds of its customer service calls.
If you’re not familiar with Klarna … it doesn’t matter because the hook of the story is the customer service impact — pretty incredible stats.

Finally, this podcast may be the most refreshing, honest take on AGI I’ve heard yet: Hard Fork: Google DeepMind C.E.O. Demis Hassabis on the Path From Chatbots to A.G.I.

Side note: We are taking our show on the road. If you’re interested in a lunch-and-learn format for you, your team, or your leadership group, we now have a presentation that can be customized and help inform, educate, and lay out the first steps you can take to assess your company’s position and identify gaps.

Email me to learn more.

Thanks for reading! Feel free to share!

-Ben

As a reminder, this is a round-up of the biggest stories, often hitting multiple newsletters I receive/review. The sources are many … which I’m happy to read on your behalf. Let me know if there’s one you’d like me to track or have questions about a topic you’re not seeing here.