artificial intelligence Archives - Boardroom https://boardroom.tv/tag/artificial-intelligence/ Sports Business News Tue, 09 Apr 2024 19:50:06 +0000 en-US hourly 1 ChatGPT, Voice Engine, Sam Altman & More Updates from OpenAI https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-openai-chatgpt-sam-altman/ Sun, 07 Apr 2024 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=89284 Breaking down updates at OpenAI, the NFL launches a new mobile game, the latest from Apple Vision Pro, and much more in this week's Tech Talk.

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]]> Google‘s flagship email service, Gmail, turned 20 years old this week, marking two decades since the Big Tech giant introduced it on April Fool’s Day in 2004. Initially, people thought it was a joke since Google offered 1 gigabyte of storage at launch, a massive offering that was unusual at that time.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Updates at OpenAI
  • The NFL launches new mobile game
  • Apple Vision Pro digital personas are here

OpenAI Shakeups and Updates

OpenAI’s ChatGPT will no longer require users to make an account to use its platform, though those who don’t won’t be able to save or share chats. Essentially, without an account, users will be able to access a limited version of the conversation AI chatbot.

Elsewhere, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has stepped back from overseeing the OpenAI Startup Fund, the company’s venture arm that invests in early-stage AI companies. Ian Hathaway, an executive who has helped manage the fund since its inception in 2021, will succeed Altman.

More updates from OpenAI:

  • Users can now edit DALL-E images directly in ChatGPT by selecting parts of images and texting out the changes they want to make.
  • OpenAI teased its new AI-powered voice cloning tool, Voice Engine, to a select group of businesses.
  • Microsoft and OpenAI are teaming up to build a $100 billion supercomputer coined Stargate

A16z to Invest $30M in Tech & Gaming Startups

A16z general partner Andrew Chen announced via X that he’s investing $30 million in startups building at the intersection of tech and gaming, specifically across the web3, AI, and augmented reality industries. The $30 million fund is part of the venture capital firm’s Speedrun program, which is an early-stage accelerator for startups at the intersection of tech and games. Accepted startups will receive a $750,000 investment and participate in a 12-week intensive program running between July and October in LA later this year.

The deadline to apply is May 19, and selected startups will be notified in June.

  • Apple officially launched Spatial Personas from beta for the Vision Pro to help solve the device’s isolating experience. This new offering allows users to display digital versions of themselves in SharePlay-enabled apps to interact with other Apple Vision Pro users.
  • Three TikTok-fueled trends are coming together as one. Alo, the omnipresent sportswear company, is teaming up with Beats by Dre for a special edition headphone drop. The campaign features singer Tyla and is soundtracked by her song Safer. The collaboration is a “celebration of the rhythm of life and the practice of being present.”
  • Stevie Wonder, Nicki Minaj, Billie Eilish, and more than 200 other artists signed an open letter penned by the Artist Rights Alliance that calls on AI developers and digital music services to stop using AI to infringe on artists’ rights.
  • In an effort to bring more educational content to its platform globally, TikTok is expanding its dedicated STEM feed to Europe after first launching it in the US last year.
  • It’s been a busy week over at Microsoft. As the US House of Representatives announced that it’s banning the Big Tech company’s AI chatbot, Copilot, on government devices, Microsoft also announced that it’s unbundling Teams from the rest of its Office subscription services following complaints from the European Union and rivals like Slack.
  • Google has agreed to delete millions of users’ web browsing data as part of a settlement for a 2020 class action lawsuit that alleged the Big Tech giant wasn’t being honest about how Chrome tracks web activity.
  • AT&T is investigating a widespread data leak that resulted in sensitive information from 73 million of its current and former customers being released on the dark web a few weeks ago.
  • Popular NFT collection Doodles is expanding its range with an animated special featuring Pharrell, Lil Wayne, and Coi Leray. The campaign, titled “Project Grey,” will begin its rollout this summer. This isn’t the first time Doodles and Pharrell have linked up, having been named the company’s Chief Brand Officer in 2022.

Tesla‘s annual sales are down for the first time since 2020 due to increased competition. To entice interested buyers, I’m going to bet that Tesla will kick down prices for its EVs at least one more time this year.

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]]> WEEK-IN-TECH-3 IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) Tech Talk Reviews: Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-reviews-ray-ban-meta-smart-glasses/ Thu, 28 Mar 2024 19:56:14 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=89100 Boardroom reviews the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses and how the updated device captures content in different environments.

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]]> In this latest edition of Tech Talk Reviews, Boardroom reviews the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses and how the updated device captures content in different environments.

This story is part of Tech Talk Reviews, a series highlighting tech reporter and digital creator Michelai Graham’s experience testing new tech gadgets, emerging platforms, apps, games, and more. Find more reviews here.

The Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses have been on the market for about five months, but the second-generation device is outpacing its predecessor, and for good reason: It’s a much better upgrade.

In this latest edition of Tech Talk Reviews, I tell you everything you need to know about the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses and how I used them in different environments.

The Specifics

(Photo courtesy of Audrey Blackmore)

Meta announced the release of the second generation of Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses during Meta Connect in September 2023. Meta Connect is the Big Tech giant’s two-day virtual summit focused on AI and virtual, mixed, and augmented realities. Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg unveiled the new device during a keynote, which was developed in collaboration with EssilorLuxottica, a company that owns eyewear brands and retailers, including Ray-Ban, Oakley, EyeMed, LensCrafters, and Sunglass Hut.

The second generation of the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses, which hit shelves on Oct. 17, 2023, didn’t just get a new look and higher quality; they also got a new name and design. The first iteration of the smart glasses was known as Ray-Ban Stories, but that version was discontinued in November 2023 after about two years on the market. The device’s successor improves on all core features, which include open-ear audio and the ability to capture photos and videos with the click of a small button on the glasses.

The smart glasses feature directional audio, two custom ope-ear speakers, extended bass, and a higher maximum volume that allows users to listen to music, answer phone calls, or even listen to podcasts more comfortably in any environment. The glasses also feature five microphones, including two in the left arm, two in the right arm, and one near the nose pad.

(Photo courtesy of Audrey Blackmore)

The newest and most unique addition to the glasses is Meta AI, a feature that lets users leverage AI to find out more information about the images they take, take photos and create captions, translate words viewed in environments, and much more. Users can also tap into the conversational assistant to make calls and send messages hands-free by using the “Hey Meta” command. Ultimately, this new offering lets users control features using their voices.

Meta reduced the weight and slimmed down the profile of their new smart glasses compared to the previous version, and the device is now water-resistant. The second-generation Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses come in two designs: Headliner, which features a rounded, more retro aesthetic, and Wayfarer, which features the classic Ray-Ban look. The device comes in an array of colors with a shiny or matte finish, including black, caramel, and a bluish jean color. The lenses come in clear, green, brown, black, blue, red, and amber, and some are polarized. Meta also developed the smart glasses to be prescription-lens compatible. Users can customize their frames and lenses on the Ray-Ban Remix platform.

As for the cameras, there are two featured on each corner of the glasses, one being an ultra-wide camera. The glasses can capture endless photos and videos up to 60 seconds. Video length is set to 30 seconds by default, but this default can be shortened to 15 seconds or extended to a minute. Users can tap into the “send a photo” voice command to share images with contacts directly. Another cool feature: users can live stream from the glasses straight to Facebook or Instagram and see comments in preview or hear them out loud via using a Meta AI voice command.

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The Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses are powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon AR1 Gen1 Platform, which was built exclusively for smart glasses that capture photo and video content. When it comes to battery life, Meta redesigned the charging case for the glasses, which can hold up to 36 hours of use. The charging case is USB-C compatible. Another power source for the smart glasses is the Meta View app. All content captured on the smart glasses can be downloaded and viewed in the app, which is downloadable on smartphone devices. Users need the app to set up Bluetooth capabilities with the device, and the app can be used to update settings and navigate other features of the glasses.

The Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses cost $299 to $379 and are available for purchase on Meta and Ray-Ban’s websites.

Michelai’s Review

(Photo courtesy of Audrey Blackmore)

I spent the past month playing around with my smart glasses and I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised by the experience. I have the Wayfarer design in black matte with black lenses. They are the standard frame size, but this version and all other versions also come with large frames at request.

For starters, I love how simple the branding is on the glasses. My favorite part is that they have the classic Ray-Ban logo in the corner of the right lens and on both arms. On the exterior, it doesn’t have a Meta logo anywhere, but it can be found on the interior on the right side where the frame and arm meet. On the opposite side in the same area lives the on/off switch. It’s very small and subtle, and truthfully, I often forget to power my glasses off, yet they still keep a good charge since they are in my charging case when I’m not wearing them.

The arms of the glasses are, of course, a little thicker than your typical glasses arms, but that’s because that’s where the bulk of the tech lives. I was surprised by how sleek the frames were, even with the camera positioned in the corner. The speakers are virtually undetectable, and I like that, yet the audio is very clear. Another favorite aspect of the smart glasses for me is that I can hear different commands when I snap a photo and start a video. The classic lens flutter sound is used for photo capture, and the video start and end sound is a subtle ding.

I’ve used my glasses in various environments throughout New York, including the subway, crowded bars, outside in the daylight and at night, inside coffee shops, at the office, at brunch, and many more places. The photo and video quality was top-tier when I was shooting in natural lighting or bright lighting.

If you didn’t know, the subway has the best lighting for an impromptu photo shoot. Check out these images of my beautiful friend, Yesenia Ramos, captured by the train and inside a crowded subway with my smart glasses.

Going back to the open audio, it’s truly a treat to be able to hear sound with the glasses on, though I’m sure others around me could hear my sound too, which wasn’t the most ideal. Unlike open audio earbuds, the smart glasses sort of create a mini surround sound experience for its user, which is both great yet sometimes unwanted when I want to answer private calls with other people around. Plus, no one wants to be that person awkwardly playing loud music or audio on the subway — at least, I don’t want to be that person.

An interesting observation I noticed: When I was recording video content, I could take the glasses off and the recording would continue going. I subconsciously did this in the middle of recording to pass the glasses to a friend, and we were able to capture the seamless transition, which was impressive. When it comes to audio, on the other hand, the glasses would pause whatever I was listening to or doing on my phone when I removed the glasses from my face.

Aside from that, my main critique is the fact that the quality of content goes way down in low light, as expected. The glasses aren’t equipped with any flashes, but maybe we can expect that upgrade in the next iteration. The quick solution my friends and I found was to raise a camera flashlight, which created some interesting lighting effects.

Overall, I loved testing out this product, and I’ll likely continue using the glasses to capture content. While I mainly used the glasses around New York, I’ll be taking my Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses on vacation soon, and I’m excited to capture the tropical and warm environments around me.

As always, I hope you learned something new from my experience with this new tech device. I’ll have more reviews coming soon.

More Tech:

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]]> TT_GLASSES-19 (Photo courtesy of Audrey Blackmore) TT_GLASSES-15-1 (Photo courtesy of Audrey Blackmore) Loading TT_GLASSES-6 (Photo courtesy of Audrey Blackmore) senia-one senia-two Reddit TikTok Everything You Need to Know About AI Chipmaker Nvidia https://boardroom.tv/nvidia-ai-chipmaker-everything-you-need-to-know/ Tue, 26 Mar 2024 16:50:26 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=87635 Boardroom details Nvidia's origin story and highlights why the AI computing leader has been taking up the limelight in recent months.

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]]> Boardroom details Nvidia’s origin story and highlights why the AI computing leader has been taking up the limelight in recent months.

There has been a lot of buzz about Nvidia this past year as far as what the company does and why it’s having a meteoric rise to the top.

The tech company designs and manufactures graphics processing units (GPUs) that have driven advancements across AI, gaming, robotics, and other tech-focused industries. Nvidia also develops wireless communication devices, computing chips, and other tech systems, services, and software that power artificial intelligence. The company hit a $1 trillion valuation in May 2023 for the first time, marking the first of many milestones for the company in this past year.

The AI computing leader might be in the limelight right now, but Nvidia has been building its tech offerings for more than 30 years. Here is a quick rundown of Nvidia’s origin story and what the company is building.

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Nvidia’s Founding

Nvidia was founded on April 5, 1993, by Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowsky, and Curtis Priem. All three founding men have extensive engineering backgrounds, with Priem formerly working at IBM as a graphics chip designer. Huang, Malachosky, and Priem decided to launch Nvidia after projecting an uptick in the need for advanced GPUs, which are specialized devices for processing graphics and images on computers at accelerated rates.

The Nvidia founders specifically saw an opportunity to infuse the gaming and multimedia industries with the tech it was building. They didn’t just want to tackle a graphics processing challenge; they wanted to bring a higher level of realism to computer screens. Huang, Malachosky, and Priem started to solve this problem by developing various graphics processing devices. They started Nvidia with $40,000 of their personal funds before raising millions of dollars in venture capital from notable investment groups, including Sequoia Capital, SoftBank, and TriplePoint Capital.

Nvidia was deep in the developmental stages in the late 1990s, and the company even went through layoffs and almost went bankrupt before it created its flagship product: the graphics processing unit. Nvidia was the first company to bring GPUs to market. Huang, Malachosky, and Priem believed a dedicated GPU was vital to advancing computer graphics because, before this, the majority of graphics were processed via the central processing unit (CPU). Nvidia invented the GPU in 1999, recalibrating the computing industry and the quality of graphics, specifically 3D graphics at the time.

Going Mainstream

Nvidia went public on Jan. 22, 1999, and by the end of that year, its flagship GPU, the GeForce 256, was released. The company’s success skyrocketed after this, and Nvidia won the contract to develop the graphics hardware for Microsoft‘s first Xbox console that later launched in November 2001. In 2004, Nvidia inked a deal with Sony to design the graphics processing unit for the PlayStation 3.

Everything seemed to be going well for Nvidia, but with great success comes great failure. In mid-2008, the company faced a class action lawsuit that included some of its shareholders accusing it of selling faulty graphics chips that were failing at abnormally high rates. Nvidia settled the suit with the Securities and Exchange Commission in 2010 and agreed to allot $200 million to cover customer warranty, repair, and replacements for any faulty chips.

In the midst of that, Nvidia continued its rise and fine-tuned its GPU offerings. Here are some of the company’s big wins over the years:

  • February 2008: Nvidia announced its Tegra chip series, which are specialized GPUs for mobile devices and smartphones. These chips also power tablets and Nintendo‘s Switch console.
  • January 2011: Inked a six-year, $1.5 billion licensing agreement with Intel that has since been expanded to other partnerships.
  • May 2020: Scientists at Nvidia developed an open-source ventilator to address the shortage during the pandemic.
  • July 2021: Nvidia launched the Cambridge-1 supercomputer, the company’s first supercomputer for external research access to solve medical challenges using AI.
  • Sept. 26, 2023: Nvidia celebrated hitting the $1 trillion valuation mark by adding a plaque to its birthplace, a Denny’s in East San Jose. The Nvidia founders conceptualized the company at the popular diner back in the early 90s before launching it. Denny’s CEO, Kelli Valade, joined Huang at the local Denny’s to unveil the plaque.
  • March 1, 2024: Nvidia becomes the third company in US history to surpass a $2 trillion market cap.

Once upon a time, Nvidia almost bought one of its competitors, Arm Holdings, from Softbank in a deal valued at an estimated $40 billion, Boardroom previously noted. The deal ultimately fell through in February 2022, and Arm went public in September 2023 as it also caught the wave of the AI revolution.

The AI Revolution

Nvidia reports that more than 40,000 companies are using its AI technologies worldwide. It’s no secret that AI has been the hottest topic since the end of 2022, when the AI chatbot boom began, thanks to OpenAI. Virtually every major tech company, including Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and Meta, uses Nvidia’s computing chips to power parts or all of their businesses.

Nvidia is headquartered in Santa Clara, Calif., and has nearly 30,000 employees today and counting since now, more than ever, everyone wants to get in on the AI movement.

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]]> Loading Jessica Gelman: The Woman Behind the Most Influential Conference in Sports https://boardroom.tv/jessica-gelman-mit-sloan-sports-kraft-analytics/ Fri, 01 Mar 2024 17:18:59 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=87507 The Kraft Analytics Group CEO and Sloan Sports Conference Co-chair chops it up with Boardroom about the ongoing conference, helping the NCAA, and the future of live sports.

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]]> The Kraft Analytics Group CEO and Sloan Sports Conference Co-chair chops it up with Boardroom about the ongoing conference, helping the NCAA, and the future of live sports.

Early Thursday morning, Jessica Gelman‘s vibrant energy was palpable over the phone as she prepared for what could be her biggest professional weekend of the year.

The CEO of Kraft Analytics Group, the analytics and consulting firm under the auspices of the Kraft family that owns the New England Patriots and Revolution, was preparing last-minute notes for a major work meeting. The next day, the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference— which Gelman and now-Philadelphia 76ers team president Daryl Morey conceived of and co-founded at the 2006 Women’s Final Four— was set to kick off its 18th two-day edition at the Boston Convention Center.

Jessica Gelman
(Photo courtesy of Sloan Sports)

“The overarching focus of the conference is how analytics continues to evolve and help change sports both on the business and the on-field or on-court,” Gelman told Boardroom, adding that more than 45% of this year’s speakers are women. “That’s really the cornerstone of it. It’s more like a festival where we have these very entertaining concurrent channels.”

Themes for this year’s Sloan Conference, the annual event Bill Simmons lovingly coined “dork-a-palooza,” include sports’ increasing globalization, streaming content, AI, the growth of women’s sports, and the changing college sports landscape. Gelman described the conference as more of a festival with interesting and entertaining panels taking place at multiple venues at once under the same roof.

In addition to the talks, there’s a hackathon, a startup competition, a research paper competition, and a pitch contest for graduate students, along with an element of fun. Last year, the conference featured live pickleball; this year, chessboxing takes center stage.

A major conference element Gelman takes great pride in is that it’s a student-run nonprofit.

“I love seeing how the students who we’ve been working with over the past 10 months getting to experience what they’ve built and created,” she said, “bringing the ideas they’ve had to life that make the conference unique each year.”

Another unique element is a mentorship program, now in its fourth year, geared toward people who normally wouldn’t have access to the sports industry. They receive crucial access early on in their academic or professional careers, and Gelman said it’s at the point now where former mentees are now in the position to pay it forward.

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Is it a coincidence that Gelman joined Kraft Sports Group just as the Patriots’ dynasty began? After working her way up the organization, including a six-year tenure as Vice President of Customer Marketing and Strategy, the analytics group idea came together as a technology, analytics, and strategic services company in 2016 following a two-year incubation period.

Now, KAGR helps clients ranging from the NFL, NCAA, NASCAR, and the UFC to the Los Angeles Rams, Minnesota Timberwolves, and Carolina Panthers optimize their operations and fan engagement and interactions through a data-driven, customer-focused approach. Like almost every industry, AI will have a huge impact on analytics, Gelman said. Her job and focus with KAGR is to ensure the data that AI may eventually use is accurate and from the right place, guiding clients on proper AI use and application.

“Our goal is that everyone from the LA Rams to NASCAR to the NCAA can better understand their fans through data and apply it in the right way to drive fan engagement and a love of sports,” Gelman said.

The NCAA partnership announced in January aims to build the largest college sports fan database to optimize future college sports champions and events to draw the most fans and cultivate new followers. It’s the main element of a new digital strategy initiative embraced by new president Charlie Baker, who celebrates his one-year anniversary in charge on March 1.

“Kudos to the leadership of Charlie Baker and understanding the opportunity that they have,” Gelman said, “which is to ensure that fans are the ones who are actually getting to the championships that they run and host. We’re really excited to be supporting the NCAA and helping them create these more personalized experiences through better data.”

Jessica Gelman
(Photo courtesy of Dilip Vishwanat)

KAGR aids the NFL in a similar way, helping the league understand who the fans coming to its games are, especially what Gelman called “non-home fans.” That’s a mix of casual fans and those traveling for games who aren’t those die-hard supporters. How to reach beyond those avid fans beyond football and basketball is what she believes is critical for college sports. Beyond tournaments like softball and baseball that are held in the same location, Gelman and company are helping the NCAA find the right venues to attract and build fans in fast-rising collegiate sports like volleyball, wrestling, and gymnastics.

Gelman’s expertise in live sports makes her uniquely equipped to discuss where she thinks it’s headed over the next 12-24 months. It’s something she’ll get to apply IRL as a minority partner and alternate governor for the Utah Royals, a new NWSL expansion team beginning play this month.

“If you’ve been tracking what Steve Ballmer is doing with Intuit Dome,” Gelman said, “he’s basically not going to have TVs in suites, and they’re streamlining very few food options because they don’t want people to be in line. They want to make it flow as quickly as possible.”

That’s been the opposite of the trend over the last few years, where teams have focused arenas and venues on the communal aspects, creating more common meeting places where fans can connect in person and through social media.

“I’m very intrigued by the approach Ballmer is taking, and obviously he’s had a lot of success,” Gelman continued. “It just seems so counter to what the rest of the sports industry has done since the pre-COVID time period, where it’s been about creating more places for people to meet and convene within the venue.”

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Many teams are taking a two-pronged approach to bringing in different types of fans. There are more premium and luxury areas and offerings than ever before, but there’s also an increasingly popular plan to cheaply bring in younger fans by buying a ticket without a seat and having them hang out in communal, standing-only areas or being assigned a seat when they get to the ballpark.

Gelman recently toured the Sphere in Las Vegas, the prime example of a larger overarching effort to bring more visual, immersive experiences to live sports. That will include virtual elements to help fans feel as close to the action as possible. The question the industry will face is how it can continue to create those memories and experiences while keeping the fans present, enjoying themselves, and in the moment rather than being distracted on social media and feeling like they’re in two places at once.

“The worry for all of us is our ability to disconnect from always being on and enjoying the experience itself, which is really what I think Ballmer is going for,” Gelman said. “I look at my kids who are often watching something, and then they’re also on devices doing something else, and they probably learned that from me and my wife, who do the same thing. So that divided attention and being in two places will increasingly be what we’re trying to figure out as an industry.”

Regardless of where the future of sports is headed, Gelman has positioned herself at KAGR to be uniquely equipped with data, analytics, and industry know-how to be ready for whatever will come next.

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]]> IMG_6027 (Photo courtesy of Sloan Sports) Loading DV624534 (Photo courtesy of Dilip Vishwanat) Loading Nvidia Revenue Surges to $22B as AI Chip Biz Booms https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-nvidia-revenue-surges-ai-chip/ Sun, 25 Feb 2024 20:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=87241 Nvidia revenue is up 265% year-over-year, AT&T hit with service outage & Google pauses Gemini AI image generator in this week's Tech Talk.

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]]> Happy (almost) birthday, Tech Talk! The first edition of this remodeled newsletter shipped on Feb. 26, 2023, and I had no idea then how much this project would impact my life, career, and growth trajectory. Writing this newsletter is undoubtedly one of my proudest accomplishments, and I’m grateful my Boardroom family has entrusted me to do so each and every week. From interviewing Tim Cook and Adam Silver to getting in front of the camera, doing tech product reviews, following new social media app launches, detailing the SBF trial, and making tech gift guides, I never get enough of diving into tech and sharing all of my learnings and analyses in this here newsletter.

This past year was only the beginning. Let’s see what I can do with the next 365 days.

Alright, let’s get into it.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Nvidia revenue is up 265% year-over-year
  • Google pauses its Gemini AI image generator
  • AT&T hit with nationwide service outage

Nvidia Revenue Surges to $22B as AI Chip Biz Booms

AI chipmaker Nvidia generated $22.1 billion in revenue in its most recent quarter, up a whopping 265% year-over-year due to the increased demand for its tech across the AI sector. The company beat analysts’ expectations across the board, driving its shares up as much as 10% in after-hours trading. Most notably, Nvidia’s data center division saw a big boost, with sales up 409% year-over-year to $18.4 billion. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang doubled down on the company’s growth trajectory to investors who have fears about demand decreasing over the years.

Huang said demand for the company’s AI chips will remain high due to the generative AI buzz. On top of all its success, Nvidia is reportedly developing a new AI chip to deploy in China that will comply with US export rules.

Nvidia expects to generate $24 billion in sales at the end of the next quarter, while analysts predict it’ll bring in around $22.17 billion. Nvidia has come a long way since it hit a $1 trillion market cap for the first time in May 2023. Last week, Nvidia surpassed Amazon and Alphabet in market capitalization, making it the third most valuable tech company behind Microsoft and Apple. On Feb. 22, Nvidia added $277 billion to its market cap in one day, overtaking Meta to claim the top spot for the biggest single-day market cap surge in stock market history.

Google Pauses Gemini AI Image Feature, Announces New AI Model Gemma

Google announced on Thursday that it’s pausing AI image generation of people on Gemini after the platform developed inaccurate historical pictures of people and their races and genders. Gemini is allegedly doing this in an effort to erase discrimination across history, but the facts are the facts, and it’s obvious Google trained Gemini to curve some of the truth.

“We’re already working to address recent issues with Gemini’s image generation feature,” Google detailed in its statement on X. “While we do this, we’re going to pause the image generation of people and will re-release an improved version soon.”

Elsewhere in Google news, the Big Tech firm announced a family of new AI models called Gemma that were built for responsible AI development. Google wants AI developers and researchers to tap into the new AI platforms via laptops and desktops for “responsible commercial usage and distribution for all organizations, regardless of size.”

OpenAI and Match Group Announce Partnership as ChatGPT Glitches Again

Match Group and OpenAI announced a new partnership that grants 1,000 enterprise licenses to the dating app maker’s employees. This means that Match Group employees will be able to leverage ChatGPT for an array of business tasks like communications, building templates, coding, and much more. Match Group’s team will be able to access ChatGPT-4, and only trained and licensed employees will gain access to the AI tool.

While OpenAI was locking in a new partnership, ChatGPT seemingly malfunctioned earlier this week after it began responding to queries with incomprehensible responses Tuesday night. OpenAI didn’t catch wind of it right away but reported that it’s currently investigating the glitch. For now, ChatGPT seems to be operating in its right mind.

  • AT&T customers were hit with nationwide outages on Thursday, and some Verizon and T-Mobile customers were mildly affected. Cellular service and internet access were unavailable across the board, while AT&T spent the majority of Thursday getting back online. It’s unclear what caused the outages.
  • Reddit inked a $60 million deal with an unnamed AI company to give it access to its content for training purposes, Bloomberg reports. The partnership came just before the popular website filed to go public on Thursday, and Reddit plans to reserve some shares for 75,000 of its most loyal users.
  • Livestream shopping platform NTWRK acquired Complex from BuzzFeed for $108.6 million, the companies announced on Wednesday. BuzzFeed also announced that it will continue cutting expenses by laying off 16% of its workforce.
  • Arc Boat Company, an electric boat maker that includes backing from Kevin Durant, Rich Kleiman, and Klay Thompson, announced the launch of its second fully electric model, dubbed the Arc Sport. The new e-boat designed for wake sports is 23 feet long and can carry 15 passengers, and Arc expects to start delivering its newest model to customers later this year.
  • The European Commission is applying pressure on social media giants once again. This time, the foreign agency is looking into TikTok for potentially breaching its Digital Service Act for its alleged addictive algorithms. Apple may be facing a $539 million fine in the EU, and a ban on some of its App Store restrictions focused on music streaming platforms following a 2019 complaint filed by Spotify.
  • Walmart has entered an agreement to acquire smart TV maker Vizio for $2.3 billion to advance its advertising revenue through the ability to display more ads on streaming devices.

This week, Apple announced a new free app for sports fans called Apple Sports, which will deliver real-time scores, stats, and more across NBA, MLS, NCAA basketball, and many other leagues currently in season. I’m going to bet that Apple’s new app will become the ESPN app’s biggest competitor, driving it to either rebrand or partner with another company to stay afloat.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) Big Tech is Strong in Indy for 2024 NBA All-Star Weekend https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-big-tech-nba-all-star-weekend-2024-meta-google/ Sun, 18 Feb 2024 20:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=87013 Tech companies like Meta & Google are going big for NBA All-Star Weekend. Also, Bitcoin's surge, Nvidia outpaces Amazon, more in Tech Talk.

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]]> If you haven’t heard the news, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew will be an honorary chair at the Met Gala 2024, and TikTok is the lead sponsor for the annual fashion and charity event. This is a different spotlight for Chew compared to his time testifying on the Hill last year.

A peek into today’s edition:

  • Big Tech’s strong presence at NBA All-Star 2024
  • Bitcoin surpasses $51K
  • OpenAI announces a new text-to-video platform

Big Tech is Strong in Indy for NBA All-Star Weekend 2024

Big Tech and the NBA go hand-in-hand as the league continues to implement creative ways to bring tech into the popular sport.

The NBA hosted its 24th annual NBA All-Star Technology Summit on Friday, where it brought together leaders across tech, sports business, and media to have off-the-record dialogues about trends and innovations across their industries. The NBA is undoubtedly the most tech-focused league out there, in my opinion, and that’s because it consistently goes above and beyond to implement and showcase its new tech innovations. IIt did so again at the Tech Summit on Friday as Spurs rookie sensation Victor Wembanyama joined Adam Silver to unveil NB-AI, an NBA-trained voice assistant that leverages AI tech to personalize the live game viewing experience for fans. The league didn’t announce when the new offering will launch or if it will cost at this time.

Outside of the summit, Big Tech giants like Meta and Google had a strong presence throughout the weekend, with tech-focused activations and exclusive programming. One of my favorite events of the weekend was the Google Pixel Combine, which featured interactive stations to showcase its latest device in action. Foot Locker also got in on some tech action with an interactive LED half-court.

Check out my story, All Things Tech at NBA All-Star Weekend 2024, for a full download on what some of the top tech brands have planned for the big game.

Bitcoin Surpasses $51K as Next Halving Event Nears

Bitcoin surpassed the $51,000 threshold earlier this week for the first time since December 2021, marking a new two-year high for the world’s most valuable digital asset. This pushed the token’s market cap back over $1 trillion, which is also the first time this has happened since late 2021. So far, my crypto predictions for the year are coming true since the SEC approved spot Bitcoin ETFs, and Bitcoin breezed past $40,000. ETFs are driving the current rally behind Bitcoin as the token’s price continues to drive up. Remember, Bitcoin’s highest value per token was $69,000 in November 2021. It’s too soon to tell if it will reach that threshold again, but you can expect I’ll make a bet on it soon.

It’s also important to remember that Bitcoin’s next halving can occur as soon as April 17, which is roughly two months away. Check out my explainer on what a Bitcoin Halving is to learn more.

Elsewhere in the crypto world, the sentencing for Binance founder Changpeng Zhao has been rescheduled for April 30. CZ’s sentencing was initially scheduled for Feb. 23, and he is facing up to 10 years in prison for pleading guilty to anti-money laundering charges.

Nvidia’s Market Cap Outpaces Alphabet & Amazon as AI Chip Market Booms

Nvidia won this week after it surpassed Amazon in market capitalization on Tuesday for the first time since 2002, but the AI chipmaker didn’t stop there. The company went on to overtake Alphabet on Wednesday as well, becoming one of the top three most valuable tech companies on the market behind Microsoft and Apple. Nvidia’s stock has risen more than 200% in the last 12 months as demand for its AI chips continues to rise. The company’s chips power popular AI models from OpenAI, Amazon, Google, and others.

Nvidia will share its next earnings report on Wednesday, Feb. 21. Stay tuned for an explainer of the AI chipmaker and why it’s having a meteoric rise right now.

  • OpenAI announced a new text-to-video AI platform called Sora, which lets users create realistic or animated videos up to 60 seconds from simple text prompts. The generative AI company showcased its new tech offerings through a thread of posts on X featuring different prompts and the videos they created.
  • Elon Musk is moving all of his businesses out of Delaware after a judge in the state rejected his Tesla pay package reportedly worth more than $55 billion. Musk filed to move SpaceX and Tesla to Texas and Neuralink to Nevada.
  • Google Pixel inked a deal to become the official mobile phone of the NWSL to further media coverage of women’s sports through exclusive behind-the-scenes access to game highlights, teams, and players. Elsewhere, Verizon and the NHL renewed their multi-year partnership to bring more 5G connectivity to arenas.
  • New York City and a few agencies are suing TikTok, Meta, Snap, and YouTube, alleging that the tech companies intentionally implement tactics to get young users hooked on their platforms. NYC Mayor Eric Adams said the state is seeking a jury trial, policy changes, and financial damages.
  • President Joe Biden‘s re-election campaign launched a TikTok account to attract younger voters on the platform, and the account has already attracted more than 145,000 followers (as of Friday afternoon).
  • The European Union ruled that Apple won’t be forced to make iMessage interoperable with other messaging platforms, and Microsoft won’t have to tighten restrictions on its Bing search engine. The EU concluded that the services don’t meet designation under its Digital Markets Act, which is a win for the Big Tech giants.

The US Patent and Trademark Office shared new guidance that says AI systems cannot be named inventors in applications, but humans can leverage AI tools to create patented works as long as they disclose that they do. I’m going to bet that as AI systems get smarter, these rules will change to allow AI platforms to be named inventors.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) All Things Tech at NBA All-Star Weekend 2024 https://boardroom.tv/all-things-tech-at-nba-all-star-weekend-2024/ Fri, 16 Feb 2024 18:10:54 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=87072 Boardroom highlights tech-focused activations and experiences from Foot Locker, Meta, Google, and more that are bringing fans closer to the game.

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]]> Boardroom highlights tech-focused activations and experiences from Foot Locker, Meta, Google, and more that are bringing fans closer to the game.

NBA All-Star Weekend 2024 is upon us in Indianapolis, and once again, the technology presence is stronger than ever, with artificial intelligence securing the spotlight as expected.

To kick off the busy weekend, the NBA hosted its 24th annual NBA All-Star Technology Summit, bringing together leaders across tech, sports business, and media to have off-the-record dialogues about trends and innovations across their industries. On the record, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver and San Antonio Spurs superstar Victor Wembanyama unveiled NB-AI, an NBA-trained voice assistant that leverages AI tech to personalize the live game viewing experience for fans. The new platform uses generative AI to recreate live games as fans see fit, even if that means watching games in the form of dramatic films.

Take a look at NB-AI in action.

https://twitter.com/NBA/status/1758528912609468454?s=20

There are a lot of tech-focused happenings slated over All-Star Weekend, but here are a few that stand out from big-name brands, such as the NBA itself, Meta, Foot Locker, and more.

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NBA All-Star LED Court

The NBA unveiled a video-enabled LED court that will be used for the main NBA All-Star events hosted at Lucas Oil Stadium over the weekend. The tech-focused court features interactive displays, full-color changes, live replays and game stats, and interactive games to engage fans in-arena.

Google Pixel Combine

Google is stepping out of the box once again with its Google Pixel Combine activation, where it transformed a space into the ultimate hoops heaven.

The activation has many fan engagement stations, from a rookie photo moment to skills training sessions, an open court, and a vintage locker room setup packed with NBA All-Star memorabilia. Throughout the venue, fans can find Google Pixel 8 Pro devices to capture fun moments throughout the experience. Throughout the weekend, Google is also hosting daytime programming and musical performances during the evening.

Ticketmaster’s Game and Go Arcade

Ticketmaster created an NBA arcade experience at NBA Crossover that will draw fans to play NBA Jam, compete in hoops trivia, and test their skills on pop-a-shot. Each fan who stops by will be awarded a scratch-off ticket revealing Ticketmaster prizes. Taylor Rooks, Dominique Wilkins, Joakim Noah, and Jamie Jacquez Jr. are expected to make appearances in the space throughout the weekend.

The Puma x Cheetos Interactive Experience

Puma is syncing up with Cheetos to immerse fans in a 3D larger-than-life Cheetos bag featuring a live mazze, basketball court, and more. Puma and Cheetos linked up for this activation to highlight the cross-section of hoops and snacks, and of course, fans who visit the experience will get a chance to win some giveaways and prizes. Puma and Cheetos’ activation also comes as they drop their sneaker collaboration on Feb. 16.

Coinbase Moonshot

Coinbase constructed a 29-foot-tall geodesic dome at NBA Crossover with one goal: to challenge fans to score a basket at the speed of crypto. To accomplish this, the crypto leader is using a panoramic screen to take guests into space as a basket loaded with high-tech sensors determines the speed and precision of their shot. Participants will have a chance to win limited-edition gear, NFTs, and a meet-and-greet with Indiana Pacers‘ Tyrese Haliburton.

Foot Locker’s Home Court

Foot Locker is taking over downtown Indianapolis with its custom 50,000-square-foot Home Court activation. The unique space features engaging experiences, events, and an interactive LED half-court. The sneaker company will host daily basketball clinics, sneaker trialing, customization stations, exclusive product releases, athlete appearances, and more in the space.

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The Meta Quest Suite

The Meta Quest 3 is the official virtual reality headset of the NBA, so it’s only right the brand is showing up in various places throughout NBA All-Star Weekend 2024. Meta is hosting invite-only experiences during the main events of All-Star Weekend to welcome select guests to get hands-on with Quest 3 devices and see how VR is bringing more fans closer to the game in a unique way. Invited guests can experience a variety of basketball and entertainment apps, including watching courtside NBA games in VR via Xtadium and getting shots up in Gym Class VR Basketball during the Panini Rising Stars and the All-Star game events.

AT&T at NBA Crossover

AT&T is hosting a few activations at NBA Crossover with different tech twists. Here is a rundown of each:

  • AT&T Dribble Town: this immersive gameplay experience features NBa avatars who will act as guides for participants through a dribbling game. Guests get to select who they want their NBA motivator to be to offer real-time feedback and commentary.
  • AT&T Splashville: this activation features a virtual court where fans can compete as their favorite Western Conference player and ace against the clock to make it into the NBA All-Star game.
  • All-Star Mural: AT&T sponsored an interactive mural that lets fans get creative and make their own digital painting that can transform with augmented reality.

Read More:

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]]> Loading unnamed Loading Samsung Unveils Mobile AI Tech With New Galaxy S24 Series https://boardroom.tv/samsung-unveils-mobile-ai-tech-with-new-galaxy-s24-series/ Wed, 17 Jan 2024 22:21:23 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=86000 Samsung teased its new AI tech platform, Galaxy AI, at its latest Galaxy Unpacked event, along with three new Galaxy smartphones. Samsung debuted three new smartphones and introduced its new artificial intelligence tech at

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]]> Samsung teased its new AI tech platform, Galaxy AI, at its latest Galaxy Unpacked event, along with three new Galaxy smartphones.

Samsung debuted three new smartphones and introduced its new artificial intelligence tech at its latest Galaxy Unpacked event.

The electronics leader’s new Galaxy S24, Galaxy S24 Plus, and Galaxy S24 Ultra come in various sizes and storage capacities spanning 128 GB to 1 TB, and each is equipped with the usual upgrades like enhanced camera capabilities and slimmer displays.

The Galaxy S24 Ultra is the first mobile device from Samsung to feature a titanium frame, which reduces the smartphone’s weight. The Ultra also has five cameras, as the S23 version did, including a main camera, ultrawide camera, and telephoto camera. The Galaxy S24 Ultra will be available in titanium black, titanium gray, titanium violet, and titanium yellow. The Galaxy S24 and Galaxy S24 Plus both come in onyx black, marble gray, cobalt violet, and amber yellow.

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Samsung’s new lineup of mobile devices is impressive, but of course, one new feature stole the show. The biggest announcement coming out of the event was the unveiling of Galaxy AI, the bespoke new AI platform that operates on S24 devices and is accessible via the cloud. Galaxy AI enables live text and call translations, enhanced search, and more.

“The Galaxy S24 series transforms our connection with the world and ignites the next decade of mobile innovation,” TM Roh, President and Head of Mobile eXperience Business at Samsung Electronics, said in an official news release. “Galaxy AI is built on our innovation heritage and deep understanding of how people use their phones. We’re excited to see how our users around the world empower their everyday lives with Galaxy AI to open up new possibilities.”

Galaxy S24
Galaxy S24+
Galaxy S24 Ultra

Here is a breakdown of some of what Galaxy AI can do, per Samsung’s press release:

  • Live Translate: enables real-time voice and text translations of phone calls within a native app.
  • Interpreter: live conversation translation on a split-screen view with both transcripts.
  • Chat Assist: AI built into Samsung Keyboard allows users to get help with their conversational tones and develop different messages like social media captions.
  • Note Assist: this feature syncs with Samsung Notes and creates AI-generated summaries of content.
  • Android Auto: while in a car, this feature will automatically summarize incoming messages and suggest replies and actions.
  • Edit Suggestions and Generative Edit: Galaxy AI can suggest photo tweaks while Generative Edit can fill in image backgrounds.

These are just a few examples of how Samsung is integrating Galaxy AI, and it’s clear that the new tech will touch every aspect of the company’s mobile devices for the foreseeable future. Samsung’s new line of mobile devices comes as Apple beat it for most smartphone shipments last year.

Boardroom will continue to watch if this new AI tech will bump Samsung back up to the top.

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]]> Loading 001-galaxy-s24-amberyellow-front 001-galaxy-s24plus-cobaltviolet-front 001-galaxy-s24ultra-titaniumgray-device-spen-front 5 Tech Trends That Took Over Headlines in 2023 https://boardroom.tv/5-tech-trends-2023-ai-vr-bitcoin-crypto-layoffs/ Sun, 31 Dec 2023 20:00:37 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=85164 From further development of AI and VR to the return of crypto, Boardroom breaks down some of the biggest tech trends of 2023.

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]]> Happy Holidays to all who celebrate!

I’m back in your inbox after a short Christmas hiatus to highlight five tech trends and some of my favorite headlines from 2023. I’m not sure about you, but it seems so surreal to be wrapping up another year. I’ve been looking back at all of my reporting and Tech Talk editions from this year, and I’m in awe at all that has happened in the industry. Recently, I recapped 10 of the biggest tech moments in 2023, and I noticed that many of the big headlines touch on the same themes.

Many new tech trends arose this year, but these stood out to me the most. Here are five tech trends that took over headlines in 2023.

AI Overtook Blockchain as Biggest Emerging Tech

Artificial intelligence quickly became the top emerging tech this year, and experts expect it to have the most impact on the industry in the coming years. In 2021, we’d easily say the blockchain would be the tech to change the world, and that still may be true, but AI is running the game right now.

There was always skepticism about the blockchain, and the tech’s primary use cases in the last two years were NFTs and cryptocurrencies. The unpredictableness of the digital assets market stirred people away from it. I still truly believe the possibilities are limitless on the blockchain, a technology simply built on creating decentralized digital ledgers for any and every transaction that happens on enabled networks. I think the difference with AI is that it’s not a new type of technology; it’s just being leveraged and implemented in new and different ways.

AI’s impact has already spanned various industries this year alone, and I have no doubt it will continue to expand and impact everything we do in the years to come.

The Race for Best AI Chatbot Took Shape

We’ve all likely interacted with AI chatbots before when using online customer service systems, but those are nothing like the AI chatbots we can access today. To think, around this time last year, all people could talk about was a new AI chatbot called ChatGPT that could only be used on a desktop. So much has changed since then.

Here’s a snippet of some of the AI chatbots on the market racing to be the best and favorite among everyday people:

  • ChatGPT: OpenAI‘s flagship AI-powered and text-generated chatbot has attracted 100 million monthly users since it launched in late November last year. ChatGPT has expanded with free, premium, and enterprise versions.
  • Microsoft Copilot: Microsoft was the first to follow in OpenAI’s footsteps in February by overhauling its search engine Bing and implementing an AI chatbot function. The chatbot was originally named Bing Chat before rebranding as Microsoft Copilot.
  • Bard: Google entered the race in March when it launched Bard, a conversational generative AI chatbot equipped with Googling capabilities.
  • Claude: Anthropic, an AI startup founded by ex-OpenAI employees, also launched the first version of its AI chatbot in March. Claude is available through open beta and has pro and enterprise versions as well.
  • Grok: Elon Musk‘s xAI unveiled a conversational AI chatbot that responds humorously, for lack of better terms. Grok launched in November exclusively for verified X Premium Plus subscribers. `

It’s easy to say ChatGPT is the most popular or best because it was the first, but I have no doubt Big Tech companies will continue to give OpenAI a run for its money next year.

New VR and AR Headsets Emerged

The competition for the best mixed-reality headset also kicked off this year. Apple, Meta, and Sony have risen as the biggest players in this race, with all three companies either releasing or announcing new headsets this year.

Sony released the PlayStation VR2 in February for $549, but users can only use this headset if they already have a PS5. The PlayStation VR2 is not a standalone headset and requires a PS5 to set up and function. Conversely, you can play PlayStation titles in VR, which isn’t doable with any other headset on the market.

Meta is bullish on VR headsets, and it made that clear when it launched another new one this year. The Big Tech giant now has three headsets on the market. Its most popular headset, the Quest 2, launched in October 2020 and retails for $249.99. Meta has shipped an estimated 20 million Quest 2s since launch. The company launched the Quest Pro in October 2022 and initially sold the high-end headset for $1,499.99 before knocking the price down to $999.99 in March. Consumers don’t seem to be that into the Quest Pro, and rumors are circulating that Meta will discontinue it soon. But it doesn’t stop there. Meta released the Quest 3 in October for $499.99, an updated and much slimmer version of the Quest 2.

Apple has officially entered the mixed-reality headset chat with the Vision Pro. The tech company’s augmented reality and virtual reality headset won’t come with controllers and is equipped with 4K displays, a 3D interface, spatial audio, and eye-tracking tech. Apple’s first headset is slated to hit the market in early 2024, and it will (allegedly) retail for $3,499.

Bitcoin’s Resurgence Put Crypto Back on the Map

Bitcoin is back on the rise as the volatile digital assets market shakes off some of that snow from the longest crypto winter ever. One thing to know about crypto is that when one asset is doing well, the entire market reaps some of the benefits in one way or another. Bitcoin averaged around $20,000 in January and even went as low as $16,600 to kick off the year. Bitcoin’s average has more than doubled since the token is trading above $43,000 as of December and crossed the $40,000 threshold in recent weeks for the first time in over a year and a half.

Bitcoin has been up and down all year, but since Q4 hit, the cryptocurrency has been climbing at a steady pace. There can be many reasons for this, but two that have a high impact include fodder around an impending Spot Bitcoin ETF approval and the next Bitcoin halving event that is estimated to happen between April and May 2024.

Bitcoin didn’t start 2023 strong, so I’ll be paying close attention to how the token performs at the top of the year.

Tech Layoffs Plagued the Industry

Thousands of tech workers were laid off this year as companies attempted to adjust and reset after overhiring staff during the pandemic. It seemed like every other week, there was news of another tech company cutting employees. The media industry was hit pretty hard, too.

Here is a short recap of Big Tech layoffs that came this year:

  • Alphabet/Google: Laid off 12,000 employees in late January in a mass restructuring of business focus.
  • Amazon: Laid off 9,000 more employees in March after announcing in November 2022 that it was cutting 18,000 workers. The Big Tech company cut another 180 gaming employees in April.
  • Meta: Cut 11,00 jobs in fall of 2022 before laying off another 10,000 employees in March to further cut costs and operate more efficiently. Meta’s recruiting, technology, and business divisions were most affected by the cuts.
  • Microsoft: Laid off 10,000 workers between January and March to trim costs. The Big Tech company’s subsidiary, LinkedIn, laid off 716 workers in May before letting go of 668 employees in October.
  • Spotify: Cut 600 employees in January, 200 more in June, and another 1,500 workers in December to round out three rounds of layoffs this year.
  • ByteDance: Cut hundreds of jobs across its gaming division in November as it pulled back its aggressive push into the market.

Other Big Tech players like Apple and Tesla carried out smaller rounds of layoffs throughout the year, but not big enough to make headlines. On the other hand, Nvidia didn’t make any cuts this year and hasn’t made a formal round of layoffs in 15 years, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said at a recent internal meeting.

15 of My Favorite Headlines from 2023

In no particular order, here are 15 stories I wrote this year that I’m really proud of.

  1. ‘Queen Charlotte’ Gives Black Women the Limelight
  2. Boardroom Q&A: Latasha Gillespie, Amazon Studios Head of Global DEI
  3. This Song Is No Longer Available: Forecasting the Future of Music and AI
  4. The Business Behind VeeCon
  5. Omar Bailey’s FCTRY LAb is More Than a Sneaker Innovation Hub
  6. Black Women in Tech Don’t Owe You Anything
  7. NBA Threads: A Guide to the Thriving Hardwood Community
  8. Tennis & Tech: Inside IBM’s Artificial Intelligence Evolution at the 2023 US Open
  9. Cole Anthony & Crystal McCrary McGuire Want to Make Your Kid into an NBA Player
  10. Key Facts You Need to Know About the Sam Bankman-Fried Trial
  11. Tech Talk Reviews: WHOOP Coach, Powered by OpenAI
  12. Boardroom Q&A: Pauliina Törnqvist, Senior Producer of VR Games at Meta
  13. Forecasting the Future: Predictions for Crypto in 2024
  14. 10 Must-have Tech Gadgets For Your 2023 Holiday Wish List
  15. ChatGPT Turns 1: A Timeline of Events From a Monumental First Year

I (risk-free) gambled on movements in the tech industry over 40 times this year in this little section. I won’t be placing a new bet today. Instead, let’s take a look back at all of the bets I made this year and how some of the big ones landed.

Now, let’s raise a glass and cheers to making it through another year. I hope you enjoyed this last edition of 2023. Tech Talk will be back in 2024!

The post 5 Tech Trends That Took Over Headlines in 2023 appeared first on Boardroom.

]]> IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) Michelai’s Bet of the Week: A 2023 Rundown of Every Odd https://boardroom.tv/bet-of-the-week-2023-rundown-tech-talk/ Fri, 29 Dec 2023 16:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=85102 Boardroom recaps Michelai's Bet of the Week Presented by FanDuel Sportsbook, a tech hot takes section in our Tech Talk newsletter.

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]]> Boardroom recaps Michelai’s Bet of the Week, presented by FanDuel Sportsbook, in Tech Talk to see how dialed in on the industry our resident tech reporter really is.

This year, I made over 40 bets focused on things I predict will happen across the tech industry.

When Boardroom’s weekly newsletter, Tech Talk, got a makeover in February, I started making bets on happenings across the tech industry. “Michelai’s Bet of the Week Presented by FanDuel Sportsbook” holds space at the bottom of the newsletter, and it easily became my favorite place to share my real and sometimes unhinged tech hot takes.

Now, I wasn’t making any wagers or putting up money for these bets, but some came true, and some didn’t.

Here is a rundown of every bet I made this year on tech, with some small updates on the big ones that have had movements.

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February

  • Feb. 12: Calling it now: Twitter’s verified badge pricing model will fall apart in the next year because people won’t care enough to pay for a blue check.
  • Feb. 19: As the SEC cracks down on crypto, lawmakers will attempt to implement widespread crypto regulations within the next year.
  • Feb. 26: After steady progress with AI-powered chatbots, there will be talks of at least one AI-scripted film at the Tribeca Film Festival this summer.
    • Unfortunately, this didn’t come true.

March

  • March 5: Since Yuga Labs is the top household name in Web3, I predict that TwelveFold NFTs will sell out in four hours max when they drop.
    • TwelveFold NFTs sold out in minutes when the auction concluded on March 6.
  • March 12: Since Meta plans to release three more headsets before 2027, I think the big tech company will knock those Quest prices down again before the year is up to make space in the market for the new products.
    • Meta knocked down the Meta Quest 2 price by $50 to $249, while the Meta Quest Pro is still $999.
  • March 19: Even though lawmakers are scrutinizing President Joe Biden for not banning TikTok by now, I bet a deal will be reached very soon, and a complete barring of the social media won’t be necessary.
  • March 26: If ByteDance puts a real deal on the table to sell TikTok, I’m going to bet that Oracle will arise as an early contender to buy the company.

April

  • April 2: I’m going to go big here and say Twitter removing legacy blue checks will backfire tremendously, causing the platform to move back to a more traditional verification process.
    • After discontinuing the Legacy Blue Check program on April 20, X began reinstalling them on accounts for deceased individuals and many celebrities by April 24.
  • April 9: I’m going to bet that NFT.NYC will look a lot different next year, or not happen at all since it’s really just a week of hundreds of community events that can run throughout the year.
  • April 16: I’m going to bet that Adidas will follow in Nike and RTFKT’s steps and release some exclusive ALTS apparel tied to the blockchain.
  • April 23: I’m going to bet that streaming platforms will not ban AI services from using copyrighted music in favor of imposing some restrictions instead.
  • April 30: This is a big one, but I’m going to bet that Microsoft won’t be able to close its acquisition deal with Activision Blizzard this year.
    • This is probably the biggest bet I lost on this year since Microsoft closed the deal in October.

May

  • May 7: Super hot take alert: I’m going to bet that more tech workers will push to unionize in the coming years as AI continues to disrupt the workforce.
  • May 14: Since Twitter/X Corp is getting a new CEO, I’m going to bet that investors will begin talking about how to buy Musk out to push him out of the company.
  • May 21: I am going to confidently bet that Montana’s TikTok ban will not hold up. I’m sure the ACLU is already drafting a lawsuit to detail how this ban violates freedom of speech.
    • In November, a federal judge blocked Montana’s TikTok ban from going into effect.
  • May 28: Following FaZe Clan’s latest round of layoffs, I’m going to bet that the once-beloved esports brand is going to file for bankruptcy or merge with another company pretty soon.

June

  • June 4: This seems like a no-brainer, but since AI leaders are warning that AI will overtake humans in the future, I’m going to bet that investors, consumers, and maybe even Congress will begin to question what they are actually building.
  • June 11: After watching Meta knock down its Quest Pro price by $500, I’m going to bet that Apple will chip a little off the Vision Pro’s expensive price tag before the device goes to market later this year.
    • Unfortunately, this didn’t come true.
  • June 18: After finally watching Ready Player One for the first time (I know, I’m sorry) following the film’s tech comparisons to Apple’s new AR headset, I’m going to bet that streams of the movie will skyrocket as Apple shares more of its plans.
  • June 25: Since President Joe Biden met with AI experts this week, I’m going to bet that we’ll see some joint AI regulations in the near future before we see any real crypto regulations.
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July

  • July 2: Google seems to be a bit confused about how to build around emerging technologies right now, and after its recent job cuts at Waze, I’m going to bet we will see another big staffing restructure at the company in the next year.
    • Google cut at least 40 jobs in its news division in October, but no big restructuring.
  • July 9: Since there has been fodder about OpenAI getting acquired by Microsoft in its lifetime, I’m going to bet that we’ll see rumors of a deal on the table in the next year after the big tech giant sorts out its Activision Blizzard merger deal.
  • July 16: While everyone is focused on generative AI, I always think about humanoids, aka robots. I’m going to bet that a new robotics and AI company building bots will arise soon.
  • July 23: Since Amazon is bringing its pay-by-palm tech to all Whole Foods stores by the end of the year, I’m going to bet that another company will do the same with iris tech. (Kind of surprised Amazon didn’t try that first!)
  • July 30: I’m going to bet that Xbox will end up selling its Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle-inspired pizza-scented controllers after Aug. 13. For now, fans can only grab one as part of a marketing campaign to promote Paramount’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem film.
    • Unfortunately, this didn’t come true.

August

  • Aug. 6: An unopened, first-generation Apple iPod sold for $29,000 via Rally this week, and I’m going to bet that, unlike cassette and CD players, these devices will continue to hold high value due to extreme scarcity.
  • Aug. 13: Despite the Detroit Police Department’s trouble with facial recognition tech, I’m going to bet that more law enforcement agencies will adopt the tech, leading to more false arrests.
  • Aug. 20: VinFast will go the way of Rivian, facing an extreme challenge (and plummeting stock prices) as it is unable to keep up with the sky-high demand for its EV offerings.
  • Aug. 27: Despite the desirable $130 price point, I’m going to strongly bet that the new Atari 2600+ dropping in November won’t sell even half the units that the Atari 2600 sold, which was about 30 million.
    • The console just released a month ago, so sales numbers haven’t been reported yet.

September

  • Sept. 3: Amazon is pushing forward with its return-to-office policy, requiring employees to report to an office three days a week, just as Meta recently implemented. I’m going to bet that tech workers will begin to push back on Big Tech companies to fight the crackdown on in-office policies in favor of remote work.
  • Sept. 10: Warner Music Central Europe signed a record deal with AI pop singer Noonoouri, and while this is a first for Warner Music, I’m going to bet that we won’t see a deal of this nature in the US anytime soon.
  • Sept. 17: With Hulu and Disney Plus price hikes on the way next month, I’m going to bet that a tech company like Roku, for example, will offer a bundle deal of all the major streaming platforms in the next year. It’s like we’re headed back to the cable era of television all over again.
  • Sept. 24: Snapchat+ hit a new milestone with 5 million paying subscribers, and while this is impressive, I’m going to bet that the subscription program will see a massive dip in interest by next summer.

October

  • Oct. 1: Samsung is targeting content creators through a new sponsorship with MrBeast. I’m going to bet that this deal won’t drive significant sales for the Galaxy Z Flip 5 as the mobile brand expects it to.
  • Oct. 8: Meta is testing a $14-a-month subscription service in the UK for users who want an advertisement-free Instagram or Facebook experience. TikTok is also internationally testing a similar feature for $4.99 a month. Since social networks don’t operate like streaming services, I’m going to bet that this offering won’t thrive in the US.
  • Oct. 15: Joby Aviation Founder JoeBen Bevirt said his company can deliver on launching a commercial air taxi service in 2025. We didn’t get flying cars in 2000 as promised, so I’m going to bet that flying taxis won’t arrive in 2025 or this decade.
  • Oct. 22: After years of delays, Tesla will reportedly start delivering its much-anticipated Cybertruck vehicle to select customers on Nov. 30. I’m going to place a hot bet that we’ll see at least one recall or some sort of design change on the luxury electric SUV before the year is up.
    • Unfortunately, this didn’t happen for the Cybertruck, but Tesla did do a big recall of 2 million of its flagship vehicles recently.
  • Oct. 29: Shazam, the music identification app owned by Apple, announced a new feature called Concerts, which will recommend music events to customers based on their Shazam queries. With this expansion, I’m going to bet that Shazam will add a concert ticket-purchasing feature as well, or maybe Apple will build its own internal ticket sales tech.
Everything You Need to Know About the Tesla Cybertruck
The Tesla Cybertruck has officially entered the automotive market, so Boardroom breaks down what to expect from the new electric-powered vehicle, now and in the future.
Check it out!

November

  • Nov. 5: The Information reported that TikTok users sent over $250 million to livestreamers on the platform by way of tips and digital gifts. With the potential to generate tipping revenue, I’m going to bet that TikTok Live will give other platforms like Twitch a run for their audiences pretty soon.
  • Nov. 12: Despite Epic Games losing in a similar antitrust case with Apple back in 2021, I’m going to bet that the video game developer will prevail with a few wins in its antitrust trial against Google since the Big Tech giant is fighting multiple court battles right now.
  • Nov. 19: Indie studio A24 was granted the rights to make a movie based on Walter Isaacson’s biography of Elon Musk. I can’t pinpoint who I think will play the controversial tech tycoon, but I am going to bet that Musk will put his bid in to play himself in the highly-anticipated film.
  • Nov. 26: Elon Musk confirmed that Grok will be available to all X Premium+ subscribers as soon as next week, but I’m going to bet that he’ll expand the AI chatbot to more consumers by Q1 2024 to compete with other AI chatbots on the market.

December

  • Dec. 3: Lapse, a photo-sharing app that skyrocketed from No. 118 to No. 1 in Apple’s App Store in September, saw downloads drop as much as 70% in recent months. I’m going to bet that we’ll see an uptick in activity once Lapse opens up invites to the masses instead of only allowing users to join by invite codes from friends.
  • Dec. 10: I recently shared some of my crypto predictions for 2024, and while I predicted that Bitcoin would break the $40,000 threshold in the new year, it already did that. I want to up that prediction and bet that Bitcoin will break the $50,000 threshold before May.
  • Dec. 17: Nearly 20% of teens said they are almost constantly visiting or using YouTube and TikTok, a new report by the Pew Research Center found. As more kids get online to learn, play, and create, I’m going to bet that that figure will double by this time next year.

Be sure to subscribe to Tech Talk to stay current on all my Bets of the Week — right and wrong — heading into 2024.

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]]> Loading Loading Reddit TikTok Apple, Google, & Meta Lead the 10 Biggest Tech Moments of 2023 https://boardroom.tv/10-biggest-tech-moments-2023/ Tue, 26 Dec 2023 15:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=85054 From CEO oustings to new market capitalizations, the text-based app war, and much more. Boardroom runs down 10 of the biggest tech moments, announcements, and headlines from 2023. Another year is coming to a

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]]> From CEO oustings to new market capitalizations, the text-based app war, and much more. Boardroom runs down 10 of the biggest tech moments, announcements, and headlines from 2023.

Another year is coming to a close, and now, more than ever, the tech industry is moving and shaking things up. New tech companies are rising to the top, and the Big Tech giants are expanding with new tech and products to stay in the race.

To cap off another eventful year, Boardroom details 10 of the biggest tech moments, announcements, and headlines from 2023. In no particular order, here we go.

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10 of the Biggest Tech Moments of 2023

OpenAI fired Sam Altman, then hired him back in a week.

OpenAI‘s board fired its CEO and co-founder Sam Altman in mid-November in an unexpected coup before rehiring the AI tycoon less than a week later. Altman’s return came with a new board and little to no confirmed explanation from OpenAI as to why he was ousted in the first place. The entire debacle from bizarre, and every day for a week, it seemed like more and more tea was getting spilled.

Microsoft finally got clearance to acquire Activision Blizzard.

In October, Microsoft officially got the green light to acquire video game giant Activision Blizzard for $69 billion. The Big Tech leader first bid to acquire Activision in January 2022, with its biggest hurdle being UK regulators. After negotiating some changes to the costly contract, Microsoft moved closer to pulling off its biggest deal yet. The acquisition deal closed the same day both parties signed the contract.

Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty.

Nearly a year after getting arrested in the Bahamas and extradited to the US, disgraced ex-FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty of multiple charges of fraud and conspiracy at the top of November. SBF spent five weeks in court trying to convince a jury that he didn’t steal billions of dollars and defraud FTX customers. The former crypto leader will be sentenced on March 28, 2024; he’s facing a maximum of 115 years in prison.

Guilty on All Counts
SBF was convicted of stealing billions of dollars from FTX customers in one of the biggest financial frauds in US history.
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Google launched an AI chatbot called Bard.

In March, Google opened public access to Bard AI, its flagship competitor to OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Google’s conversational and generative artificial intelligence-enabled chatbot hasn’t risen to popularity like ChatGPT has, but it’s still in the early days of the AI chatbot race.

Twitter officially became X while legacy users flocked to other apps.

Elon Musk officially rebranded Twitter as X in July, sunsetting the icon blue bird logo we’ve known and loved for over a decade. X has been pushing hard to become the “everything app” this year but has steep competition now. As X continues to make changes, there has been a surge in other text-based apps like Bluesky, Spill, and Meta’s newest app.

Meta launched a new text-based app called Threads.

Meta once again shocked the social media world when it launched a new text-based conversation app called Threads in July.  The primary purpose of Threads is to be an app more focused on text and dialogue, modeled after what Instagram has done for photos and videos. Since its launch, the new app has attracted approximately 100 million monthly active users. Threads came in a “year of efficiency” for Meta, which also saw its stock surge as much as 176% in 2023.

Introducing NBA Threads
Boardroom breaks down the thriving & growing community on the text-based app, where users have been organically fostering conversation around the global sport.
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Apple hit a historic milestone with a $3 trillion market cap.

Apple made history in July when it again hit a $3 trillion market capitalization. The Big Tech giant is the first public company to reach that milestone and has done it twice. The accolade came a month after Apple announced that it would release its first virtual reality and augmented reality headset, the Apple Vision Pro. The headset is set to launch in early 2024.

Google loses to Epic Games in court.

A jury unanimously sided with Epic Games over Google in an antitrust case that started three years ago when the Fortnite creator filed a lawsuit against the Big Tech company for charging higher than normal app store fees and restricting payment systems. Epic Games hopes this court decision will force Google to allow app developers to use alternative payment systems within their apps or run their own app stores on Android. Right now, Google gets a 30% cut of in-app purchases. We’ll know more about Google’s app store changes in January.

AI-generated “Heart on My Sleeve” song goes viral.

An AI-generated song featuring vocals from Drake and The Weeknd went viral in April, sparking a larger discussion about the use of AI across the music industry. Drake and The Weeknd didn’t agree to let their voices be featured on the song “Heart on My Sleeve,” anonymously produced by TikToker Ghostwriter977. After a short viral stint, major social media and streaming platforms removed Ghostwriter’s original posts for infringing content creation with generative AI.

Tesla’s Cybertruck finally hit the road.

Tesla began delivering the first round of its much-anticipated Cybertrucks at the end of November, two years after it originally planned to roll them out. The new electric-powered vehicle with a futuristic trapezoid-like design is Tesla’s first new model in three years. The electric automotive maker plans to produce 250,000 Cybertrucks a year once it reaches full production mode.

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]]> Loading Meta, IBM Lead More Than 50 Tech Companies Launching AI Alliance https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-ai-alliance-meta-ibm-tech/ Sun, 10 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=84628 The AI Alliance includes organizations across the tech industry, academia, and more that have teamed up to share AI tech & reduce risk.

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]]> Things are looking up for Bitcoin holders after the cryptocurrency briefly surpassed $44,000 this week. The token’s uptick comes as investors grow optimistic about the likelihood of a spot bitcoin ETF approval in the US. Stay tuned for more on that later, and check out the rest of my 2024 crypto predictions while you’re at it.

A peek into today’s edition:

  • Tech companies band together for new AI Alliance
  • Spotify lays off 17% of its staff, CFO exits
  • Meta launches AI image generator

Meta, IBM Lead More Than 50 Tech Companies Launching AI Alliance

Meta and IBM are leading the charge on a new global alliance for open-source AI development called the AI Alliance. The group includes organizations across the tech industry, academia, research, and government that have banded together to share AI tech and reduce risk across the emerging sector. The AI Alliance’s most significant focus is open-source AI development to further advancements. Some other notable members in the new AI alliance include Cornell University, Dell Technologies, Intel, Oracle, NASA, Sony, and Yale University. The AI coalition will establish a governing board and technical oversight committee in the near future.

Some notable generative AI heavy hitters, including OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic, aren’t a part of the alliance. These companies haven’t been as susceptible to the open-source approach with their AI models, though Google and OpenAI have made some strides in that arena. Anthropic, on the other hand, hasn’t created any open-source AI models.

Spotify Cutting 1,500 Jobs, CFO to Exit in March 2024

After a fun week of celebrating Spotify Wrapped content, the Swedish company announced it was laying off 17% of its staff. A few days after that news dropped, the music streaming giant also announced that its CFO, Paul Vogel, is departing in March 2024. This marks Spotify’s third round of layoffs this year following letting go of 600 staff members in January and another 200 in June. Spotify CEO Daniel Ek broke the news to employees on Monday in a memo, attributing this latest round of layoffs to overhiring in 2020 and 2021. Vogel joined Spotify in 2016, when the company expanded into podcasting and audiobooks. Ek said Vogel will be departing because he doesn’t have the skills to pull Spotify through expansion and meet market expectations. The company hasn’t named a successor at this time.

Google Shares Another Preview of Gemini AI Model

Google is ready to share Gemini with the masses after first teasing its largest AI model at its developer conference in June. The Big Tech giant is dubbing Gemini its “most capable” AI model yet, and it’ll be releasing it in three tiers: Gemini Ultra, Gemini Pro, and Gemini Nano. Ultra is the most capable category at the highest tier, while Pro can scale across various tasks, and Nano will be used for specific tasks and mobile devices. Google will license Gemini to customers through Google Cloud. Gemini Pro will be available to developers and enterprises via an API as soon as Dec. 13. Android developers will also get access to Gemini Nano next week.

As expected, Gemini will be used to power Google’s flagship AI chatbot, Bard. Gemini Ultra is set to launch sometime next year.

  • Meta is ready to rival DALL-E and Midjourney by launching a standalone generative AI image generator called Imagine with Meta AI. Users can create images by describing via text what they want Meta AI to generate.
  • Verizon will soon offer some customers a bundled Netflix and Max subscription for $10 a month. This week, the wireless network operator announced that it’s also opening two cashier-less retail stores at Lincoln Financial Field powered by Verizon 5G and AI-powered computer vision technology.
  • Rockstar Games released a 90-second trailer for Grand Theft Auto VI, with a rare feature of a woman in one of the leading roles for the much-anticipated game. The video game publisher promises that GTA VI will be released in 2025. The trailer has already garnered more than 129 million views on YouTube at the time of this writing.
  • Sports Illustrated publisher The Arena Group has fired the sports magazine’s COO Andrew Kraft and President Rob Barrett following recent news that SI was publishing AI-generated content under fake author names. The Arena Group told Futurism that the firings aren’t related to the recent events but are part of a reorganization plan.
  • TikTok shared a report detailing some of its most trending content in 2023, and this year’s top video in the US features makeup artist Nyadollie doing a simple bright pink makeup routine. Food critic Keith Lee was crowned the top breakthrough creator of the year.
  • Wikipedia released its top 25 most-viewed pages of 2023, and ChatGPT‘s page was the most viewed on the website this year, with 49.4 million views.

I recently shared some of my crypto predictions for 2024, and while I predicted that Bitcoin would break the $40,000 threshold in the new year, it already did that. I want to up that prediction and bet that Bitcoin will break the $50,000 threshold before May.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) OpenAI Preps for a Major Transition as ChatGPT Turns 1 https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-chatgpt-openai-2024/ Sun, 03 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=84215 Looking back on one year with ChatGPT & OpenAI, AI fakes rising, new tech from Amazon, and much more in this week's Tech Talk.

The post OpenAI Preps for a Major Transition as ChatGPT Turns 1 appeared first on Boardroom.

]]>
If you haven’t checked on your Google account in two years, now is a good time to do so since the Big Tech giant is deleting inactive accounts. The Gmail Armageddon began on Dec. 1. Is your account safe?

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Happy first birthday, ChatGPT!
  • AI fakes are back on the rise
  • Amazon announces new tech at AWS conference

OpenAI Preps for a Major Transition as ChatGPT Turns 1

ChatGPT turned 1 this week, so I penned a story highlighting some of the monumental moments the viral AI chatbot had this past year. OpenAI‘s flagship conversational AI platform quickly and easily took the world by storm last fall, mainly because no one else was doing it yet. ChatGPT walked so Google’s Bard, Microsoft’s Bing, Snap’s My AI, and all the other countless AI chatbots on the market right now could run.

Still, it’s hard to commemorate ChatGPT’s success without also mentioning OpenAI’s recent turmoil. As of this past week, OpenAI’s board has fully made its transition as founder Sam Altman prepares to take back over. Microsoft has adopted a non-voting observer seat, and three of the four members who suddenly fired Altman are now gone. I have been wondering if Altman’s ousting, return, and board changes are the reasons Apple and Google didn’t honor ChatGPT as their apps of the year. ChatGPT’s mobile app has attracted more than 110 million downloads and generated nearly $29 million in consumer spending since it launched on iOS in May and on Android in July.

Despite the commotion, the platform’s impact is undeniable, and I can’t wait to see how ChatGPT progresses in the next year.

ByteDance Downsizes Gaming Division, Announces Virtual TikTok Open House

ByteDance announced that it’s restructuring its gaming business and cutting hundreds of jobs. This decision will mainly affect Nuverse, a video game publisher and subsidiary of ByteDance, an anonymous source told CNBC. ByteDance also halted work on unreleased games after aggressively pushing into the gaming industry in the past few years. A ByteDance spokesperson told CNBC that the company made this decision “to center on long-term strategic growth areas.” Nuverse will continue to operate at a smaller capacity.

Elsewhere in ByteDance’s business world, TikTok announced that it’s hosting a virtual open house on Dec. 12 to showcase its new and evolving augmented reality development tools.

It’s been a whirlwind of a week for AI fakes.

Firstly, Microsoft and Amazon executives backed out of speaking at a software developer conference called DevTernity after one of its organizers, Eduards Sizovs, admitted that one of the featured speakers was an AI-generated woman with a fake job title. To make matters worse, 404 Media revealed that Sizovs is also behind a popular Instagram account, @Coding_Unicorn, that was supposed to be run by a woman named Julia, who is a coder. The account boasts 115,000 followers, but in 404 Media’s investigation, the outlet found countless pieces of evidence that point to Sizovs running the page.

Sports Illustrated is also under fire for allegedly publishing AI-generated articles authored by AI-generated writers, Futurism uncovered. Yes, you read that right. Both the articles and author images were created with AI. SI has since taken down the stories pending an investigation, and its publisher, The Arena Group, claimed in a statement that Futurism’s findings are false. The Arena Group said that the articles in question were product reviews from an external partner, AdVon Commerce. The Arena Group’s shares plunged nearly 30% on Tuesday, knocking $20 million off its market cap.

  • OpenAI’s ChatGPT isn’t the only one celebrating a birthday this week — Nov. 28 marked 11 years since the first Bitcoin halving event took place, a time when the cryptocurrency cost $12 per coin. Bitcoin has surpassed $37,500 as of this week.
  • Amazon announced at its AWS re:Invent 2023 Conference that it’s releasing an AI-powered image creator called the Tutan Image Generator. The e-commerce giant also unveiled an AI chatbot for businesses called Q.
  • Google‘s new geothermal energy project is officially operational in Nevada, becoming a new clean energy power source for two of the Big Tech giant’s data centers.
  • Post headlines are back on X, though URLs still won’t have further preview text. Elsewhere, the New York Times reported that X could lose up to $75 million in revenue by the end of the year as more advertisers pull out. Elon Musk‘s response? He told advertisers, including Disney, NBCUniversal, and Warner Bros Discovery, to “go fuck yourself. Go. Fuck. Yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is.”
  • FTX investors are targeting Major League Baseball, Formula 1, Mercedes-Benz Group AG’s racing team, and other high-level entities in a newly filed lawsuit this week, accusing them of participating in FTX’s $11 billion scheme to defraud investors.
  • YouTube is further breaking into the gaming industry with the launch of more than 30 mini-games for its YouTube Premium subscribers. Coined Playables, the portfolio of games are both mobile and desktop-friendly.

Lapse, a photo-sharing app that skyrocketed from No. 118 to No. 1 in Apple’s App Store in September, saw downloads drop as much as 70% in recent months. I’m going to bet that we’ll see an uptick in activity once Lapse opens up invites to the masses instead of only allowing users to join by invite codes from friends.

The post OpenAI Preps for a Major Transition as ChatGPT Turns 1 appeared first on Boardroom.

]]> IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) ChatGPT Turns 1: A Timeline of Events From a Monumental First Year https://boardroom.tv/chatgpt-first-birthday-milestones-openai/ Thu, 30 Nov 2023 19:10:32 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=83502 To commemorate ChatGPT’s birthday, Boardroom highlights 10 milestones that the viral AI chatbot hit in its first year on the market. One year ago today, OpenAI publicly launched ChatGPT. If you didn’t know, ChatGPT

The post ChatGPT Turns 1: A Timeline of Events From a Monumental First Year appeared first on Boardroom.

]]> To commemorate ChatGPT’s birthday, Boardroom highlights 10 milestones that the viral AI chatbot hit in its first year on the market.

One year ago today, OpenAI publicly launched ChatGPT.

If you didn’t know, ChatGPT stands for Chat Generative Pre-Trained Transformer, and this is the company’s flagship AI-powered and text-generated chatbot, created to engage in a range of general topics with users. It feels like the AI chatbot and its parent company have taken over headlines for much longer than a year, yet at the same time it feels like yesterday that OpenAI shocked the world when the conversational AI platform went viral almost instantly.

Happy first birthday, ChatGPT.

Though much could be said about OpenAI at this time, Boardroom will celebrate ChatGPT’s birthday by highlighting 10 milestones that it hit in its first year on the market. And remember, all of this happened in a year. Where do you think the chatbot will be next year or in the next decade?

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ChatGPT Year 1 Milestones

Nov. 30, 2022: Launch

OpenAI announces the public launch of ChatGPT in a blog post on Nov. 30, 2022. This free version is powered by GPT-3.5 and is only accessible through its website. To start, it is only trained on data up until September 2021. The AI chatbot becomes an overnight success, attracting 1 million users in its first five days on the market. By December 2022, it surpasses 100 million monthly active users, becoming the fastest-growing consumer internet application ever.

Like many other new tech services, ChatGPT launched with a waiting list that granted people access over time.

Feb. 1, 2023: OpenAI Launches ChatGPT Plus

OpenAI launches a subscription service called ChatGPT Plus to monetize a higher tier of its AI chatbot. The subscription plan pilots at $20 per month and includes access to experimental versions of ChatGPT.

Most notably, at this time, subscribers could access to ChatGPT during peak times when the AI chatbot is otherwise not available to users accessing it for free.

March 1: An API Arrives

OpenAI releases an API for ChatGPT that allows any business, organization, or developer to integrate its tech into their already-developed apps and products. One of the first API adopters includes Snap, which used ChatGPT’s API to create its own AI chatbot offering within Snapchat called My AI.

March 14: GPT-4 Launches

OpenAI launches GPT-4, its newest AI model, which the company continues to fine-tune throughout the year. This AI model can analyze text, images, and voice commands. GPT-4 is available at a limited capacity to ChatGPT Plus users and via the API. GPT-4 does come with a message limit, though. At launch, ChatGPT Plus subscribers were limited to 100 messages every four hours, but that has been changed to 50 messages every three hours as of November 2023.

GPT-4’s biggest distinction from GPT-3.5 is that it’s trained on data up until April 2023.

May 18: iOS Launch

OpenAI launches its ChatGPT mobile app in the US for iPhone users. The app later expands to iPad users as well. The app version of the AI chatbot is free to use, doesn’t have any advertisements, and includes voice-to-text capabilities. The app has now expanded to allow users to carry out voice conversations with the product using a speech recognition system called Whisper, which responds in a handful of voices. The app can also sync users’ history across devices.

By the end of May, ChatGPT’s app expands to nearly 50 more countries. In September, ChatGPT’s mobile app hits $4.6 million in revenue and 15.6 million downloads.

Learn More About the ChatGPT App
Boardroom has what you need to know about the free mobile app featuring ChatGPT, OpenAI’s mega-popular artificial intelligence chatbot.
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July 25: App Access Rolls out on Android

OpenAI expands its mobile ChatGPT app to the Google Play store and Android users. The Android-based app first launches in the US, India, Bangladesh and Brazil before expanding to more regions.

August 28: ChatGPT Enterprise arrives

OpenAI launches ChatGPT Enterprise, a new offering that grants enterprises unlimited access to GPT-4 with extra layers of security and privacy. This is a more business-focused version of ChatGPT, and it comes with data analysis capabilities. ChatGPT Enterprise also comes with more customization options.

October 18: Internet Browsing Returns

Earlier this year, OpenAI released a plugin that connects ChatGPT to the internet to extend its capabilities to third-party knowledge. API developers and ChatGPT Plus users were the first to gain access before the AI company took the feature offline to address some glitches. OpenAI regranted ChatGPT’s browser access, this time for everyone.

With this new feature, OpenAI says ChatGPT’s data no longer caps at September 2021, as it can access real-time data via the web. OpenAI beta tested its internet-browsing feature with select users in September before expanding it.

Oct. 19: AI Image Generator Dall-E 3 is integrated into ChatGPT

OpenAI announces that it’s integrating its AI image generator Dall-E 3 into ChatGPT, allowing users to have simple conversations with ChatGPT to guide it to create images. Users can describe their vision using text or audio, and the chatbot can create it using Dall-E’s capabilities. It can even handle edits.

The feature is only available to ChatGPT Plus and Enterprise users.

Nov. 6: OpenAI Introduces Custom GPTs

OpenAI hosts its first developer’s conference in San Francisco, where it announces a slew of new offerings, including the ability to create custom versions of ChatGPT. OpenAI dubs these custom versions of its AI chatbot “GPTs,” and they can be designed with instructions, custom knowledge and other skills. GPTs can be used for various offerings like website creation, automating tasks, data analysis, and more.

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]]> Loading Jessica Gelman Everything You Need to Know About Grok, Elon Musk’s New AI Chatbot https://boardroom.tv/grok-ai-chatbot-x-elon-musk-explainer/ Fri, 17 Nov 2023 15:42:13 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=83769 Boardroom breaks down what Grok is, how it'll be integrated into X's platform, and how it differs from other AI chatbots on the market.

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]]> Boardroom breaks down what Grok is, how it’ll be integrated into X’s platform, and how it differs from other AI chatbots on the market.

Elon Musk unveiled a new artificial intelligence system called Grok, a conversational AI chatbot that responds humorously.

Musk’s AI company, xAI, developed the new generative AI product, which is the first tech prototype the startup has built. Grok is only in its first two months of training and is currently in a beta testing phase with a small group of users.

Musk has some work to do if he plans to put Grok up against flagship platforms like OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Here’s everything you need to know about Grok and what’s planned for the new AI chatbot.

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How Grok Works

In xAI’s announcement, the company said it modeled Grok after “the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” and gave it a bit of Musk’s personality to answer queries with sarcastic responses that he might say himself. The AI startup aims to build a “powerful research assistant for everyone” by providing relevant information, new ideas, and data. Grok-1 is the AI chatbot’s first public-facing product, but xAI had an earlier model called Grok-0 that was developed just for training purposes.

Much like other AI chatbots on the market, users have to prompt Grok with questions to illicit AI-powered replies. Grok is trained on various datasets, including real-time information from X, even though the platform is infested with misinformation. It’s unclear what Grok’s fact-checking process is, but like other AI chatbots, xAI lets users know that Grok “can still generate false or contradictory information.”

Musk has been previewing what the AI chatbot could do. In this particular post, the tech CEO was trying to demonstrate how Grok is ahead of the game by leveraging real-time data, but his post was quickly tagged with a community note about how the varying platforms were prompted.

Here is another example Musk shared on how Grok responds.

Grok’s early launch comes as Musk announced that xAI will fold into X, bringing his AI operation under the social media network’s umbrella. xAI only launched earlier this year with a mission “to advance our collective understanding of the universe” by “building artificial intelligence to accelerate human scientific discovery,” the company’s website reads. The AI startup’s merger with X brings former employees from DeepMind, OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, and Tesla to the platform.

As for the platform’s name, the term Grok was created by science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein and first used in his novel Stranger in a Strange Land in 1961. Heinlein didn’t officially define the term in his book, but the term was used in the Martian language to describe someone who is deeply intuitive and understanding. xAI filed a trademark application for the term Grok at the beginning of November, but it’s unclear if the company was granted the trademark and if Heinlein’s estate has any say in the matter.

What’s Next?

Grok won’t be available to the masses once it hits a wider release. For now, interested users have to be verified on X to gain access to the beta version, and this requirement will likely carry over once Grok officially rolls out. Grok is still accepting users on its waiting list for its beta testing period. xAI will be taking feedback from users testing Grok-1 and implementing changes before doing a wider launch.

Once Grok rolls out, the AI chatbot will become a feature of X Premium+, X’s highest-tiered subscription service that costs $16/month.

Since Grok isn’t going to have a version available to everyone, it’ll be interesting to see if the AI chatbot can attract as many users as ChatGPT, which has an open-access free version.

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]]> Loading Samsung, Amazon, and X Unveil New AI Models and Offerings https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-samsung-amazon-x-ai-models-offerings/ Sun, 12 Nov 2023 20:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=83491 Will new AI models from Samsung, Amazon, and X rival ChatGPT? More on that, Yuga Labs, Google vs. Epic Games, and more Tech Talk.

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]]>
This is the first Tech Talk edition in a while that won’t have a section dedicated to SBF but don’t hold your breath because he might be heading back to court to face additional fraud charges. Regardless of that, SBF will be sentenced in March 2024.

A peek into today’s edition:

  • New AI models at Samsung, Amazon, and X 
  • Google vs. Epic Games heads to court
  • Bad news from Yuga Labs‘ Ape Fest

Samsung, Amazon, and X Unveil New AI Models and Offerings

There was a lot of news coming out of the generative AI sector this week. Most notably, Samsung, Amazon, and X all announced that they are internally developing models to integrate into their flagship products and platforms.

Samsung unveiled Samsung Gauss, a three-pronged AI model equipped with language, coding, and image generation capabilities. The tech giant announced its latest foray into AI at the Samsung AI Forum earlier this week, and we could see Samsung Gauss integrated into future products, including the Galaxy S24 mobile device slated to drop in early 2024.

Reuter’s Krystal Hu broke the news that Amazon is spending millions of dollars to train and build an AI model codenamed Olympus. Former Alexa lead Rohit Prasad is spearheading the team behind Olympus and is working on incorporating the new AI model into Alexa products.

Elon Musk’s AI company, xAI, unveiled a new AI system called Grok that only X Premium+ subscribers can access when its beta phase ends. Grok is a conversational AI chatbot weaved with responses that mirror Musk’s own humor. The platform will also have real-time access to content on X’s platform.

The real question here is, which one of these platforms will rival OpenAI, if at all? I’ll be testing them out, reporting my findings, and watching to see who moves up in the generative AI race.

Google vs. Epic Games

While Google continues to fight an antitrust lawsuit filed by the Department of Justice, the Big Tech company entered another courtroom to defend its Android Play Store practices against more antitrust claims from Epic Games. Google and Epic Games’ face-off began on Monday in a federal court in San Francisco after game developers accused Google of taking too much revenue from in-app payments and making it hard for app creators to connect with customers. Google tacks on a 15% to 30% fee to in-app purchases, so Epic Games is pushing to allow app creators to handle direct billing, essentially overriding those high fees.

The trial is expected to last a few weeks, and if Epic Games wins, Google will be forced to restructure its app store offering on Android devices.

OpenAI’s ChatGPT Hit New Milestones and Experienced an Outage

OpenAI experienced some gains and some setbacks this week with ChatGPT. The AI company hosted its first in-person event, the OpenAI DevDay conference, on Nov. 6 in San Francisco to announce new platform offerings. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman delivered a keynote where he unveiled GPT-4 Turbo, the company’s latest AI model that’s trained on data up to April 2023 and can handle a lot more input. Altman also announced a new offering that lets developers build custom ChatGPT bots, and the company is opening a GPT-specific app store for developers to make their AI chatbots available for public download. Eventually, OpenAI will begin paying developers based on how much traction their versions of ChatGPT gain.

Coming off a successful event, ChatGPT went dark for as long as 90 minutes on Wednesday due to an API glitch. OpenAI’s DALL-E 3 platform also glitched earlier this week following an upgrade.

By the numbers, ChatGPT attracts an estimated 100 million users a week. I’ll have more on ChatGPT soon as the platform comes up on its first birthday on Nov. 30.

  • Yuga Labs is under fire after several Ape Fest attendees left the Hong Kong event with severe eye-burning conditions from excessive exposure to UV lights. The prominent Web3 brand likely installed the wrong type of light bulbs, sending over a dozen of its holders to the ER.
  • TikTok is shuttering its $2 billion creator fund on Dec. 16 in favor of creating a more robust ecosystem of monetization offerings for creators. The TikTok fund launched in 2020 with a commitment to disperse $1 billion over three years to micro-influencers with at least 10,000 followers and who accumulate at least 100,000 views each month.
  • Meta announced a new policy that requires advertisers to disclose when they use AI or other similar digital methods in political and social issue ads on Facebook or Instagram. The global policy goes into effect in 2024.
  • Microsoft announced a multi-year partnership with Inworld AI to develop tools to bring AI-powered characters, storylines, and quests to Xbox consoles. The deal includes an AI design copilot system for Xbox developers.
  • CBS is launching a fact-checking news unit called “CBS News Confirmed” to examine misinformation and AI deepfakes. The unit will produce segments on its findings and inform its audience about the evolving role of generative AI in media.
  • Rockstar Games is celebrating 25 years in business next month by debuting the trailer for the next chapter of the Grand Theft Auto franchise. GTA 6 still has no release date, even though it’s been a decade since Grant Theft Auto V dropped.

Despite Epic Games losing in a similar antitrust case with Apple back in 2021, I’m going to bet that the video game developer will prevail with a few wins in its antitrust trial against Google since the Big Tech giant is fighting multiple court battles right now.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) President Joe Biden Signs Executive Order to Address AI Concerns https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/10-31-2023-joe-biden-ai-executive-order/ Tue, 31 Oct 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=80975 President Joe Biden Signs Executive Order to Address AI Concerns President Joe Biden signed a sweeping executive order on artificial intelligence (AI) on Monday, focused on regulating the emerging technology and managing its risks. Per Forbes, the order includes several new actions, which focus

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]]> President Joe Biden Signs Executive Order to Address AI Concerns

President Joe Biden signed a sweeping executive order on artificial intelligence (AI) on Monday, focused on regulating the emerging technology and managing its risks. Per Forbes, the order includes several new actions, which focus on areas like safety, privacy, protecting workers, and protecting innovation. Although 15 major American tech companies have agreed to enforce voluntary AI safety measures, a White House official argued that it is “not enough,” and this proposal is a step toward concrete regulation for AI’s evolution.

Read more on the announcement from Boardroom’s Michelai Graham.

Elon Musk Values X at $19B a Year After Buying Twitter for $44B

X, formerly Twitter, is reportedly offering staffers a stock compensation plan that values the social media platform at $19 billion, or $45 a share, reports The Verge. The assessment represents a 55% drop in the company’s market value since CEO Elon Musk bought the social media company in an all-cash deal last year. The SpaceX founder paid $44 billion in October 2022 for Twitter, or $54.20 per share, which was nearly 40% higher than the company’s stock price. In July, Musk wrote that X was “still negative cash flow, due to ~50% drop in advertising revenue plus heavy debt load,” but did not provide any additional context.

Lionel Messi Takes Home Eighth Ballon D’Or

The stars of the football world dressed up and showed out in Paris on Monday. With the sport’s brightest stars in one room, Lionel Messi became the first MLS player to secure the coveted Ballon D’Or. The award is given to soccer’s best player over a 12-month period. Messi, who currently plays for Inter Miami CF, also led Argentina to the World Cup title. He was presented the award — the eighth of his career — by David Beckham, who is a co-owner with the Miami franchise. Aitana Bonmatí took home the prize for the women’s game, having led her club and country teams to victory in the Champions League and the World Cup, respectively.

Nebraska’s Lexi Rodriguez Becomes Panini’s First Female NIL Athlete

On Monday, Panini announced it signed Nebraska volleyball star Lexi Rodriguez to a trading card partnership. The junior makes history as Panini’s first-ever female NIL partner athlete. As part of the collab, Rodriguez will participate in Panini NIL marketing initiatives, and her first trading card will launch with Panini Instant, Panini’s real-time direct-to-consumer product that highlights key sports moments. She joins the likes of Texas quarterbacks Quinn Ewers and Arch Manning, Washington’s Michael Penix Jr. and Rome Odunze, among others in the Panini NIL family. Earlier this year, the Nebraska volleyball team set the world record for highest attendance at a women’s sporting event when 92,003 packed Memorial Stadium to watch the five-time NCAA champions beat Omaha.

McDonald’s, Chipotle to Raise Menu Prices in California Next Year

In order to offset the minimum wage increase for fast-food workers, McDonald’s and Chipotle Mexican Grill will raise their menu prices in California next year, CNBC writes. Chipotle, which is headquartered in Newport Beach, has increased prices four times since June 2021. The most recent price increase of 3% was earlier this month. McDonald’s has not decided how much it will hike prices, but Chipotle, while not yet decided, expects a “mid-to-high single-digit” percentage surge. Chipotle shares rose 3.8% in pre-market trading on Friday, and profits grew 11% to $2.47 billion as same-store sales rose 5%, which is slightly higher than estimates of 4.37%.

All 30 NBA Teams Get New Court Designs for In-season Tournament

The NBA‘s new in-season tournament will feature new court designs to highlight all 30 teams. The league shared all the designs on X, and the looks match each team’s City Edition jerseys, some of which still have not officially dropped. They also feature the In-Season Tournament trophy, the NBA Cup, at center court and on both sides in the paint. The inaugural NBA competition begins on Friday, Nov. 3. Group play games will be played on Tuesdays and Fridays before the quarterfinals begin on Dec. 4-5. From there, the tournament will head to T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas for the semifinals on Dec. 7 and the championship on Dec. 9.

Kendrick Lamar’s pgLang Unveils Limited-edition Cell Phone

Kendrick Lamar and Dave Free‘s creative brand, pgLang, has partnered with tech company Light on a new phone. A limited, one-time drop of 250 devices will be available for purchase at pgLang’s website on Nov. 2. The 4G LTE mobile provides calling and texting. It can also function as a hotspot but doesn’t have the capacity for emails, internet browsing, or social media. This is a part of pgLang’s intention to “embrace the present with less distractions,” the company says. It’s unclear how much the phones will cost.

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]]> Security & Innovation at the Center of White House AI Executive Order https://boardroom.tv/white-house-joe-biden-ai-executive-order/ Mon, 30 Oct 2023 21:38:33 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=80777 In the first executive order of its kind, the Biden Administration laid out eight key components to establish nationwide AI standards.

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]]> In the first executive order of its kind, the Biden Administration laid out eight key components to establish nationwide AI standards.

President Joe Biden issued the White House’s first artificial intelligence-focused executive order on Monday. The order attempts to establish standards for AI safety and security, consumers’ privacy, equity, civil rights, research, and the advanced tech’s effect on the labor market.

This is the first action of its kind from the Biden Administration. The executive order comes after Biden met with top tech leaders over the summer to discuss AI regulations, research, and development. One major directive from the order: AI developers will now have to share internal testing data from AI systems with the government. Until now, AI companies have kept sensitive testing information private.

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Here is a summary of the eight key components in the executive order. Short descriptions come from the White House fact sheet:

  • Creating new standards for AI safety and security, including requiring developers to share test results and other critical information from AI systems with the federal government, developing tools and tests for AI systems, protecting consumers against AI-enabled fraud and deception, and working with the Department of Commerce to develop guidance around content authentication and watermarking.
  • Protecting consumer privacy, including evaluating how agencies collect and use commercially available information, developing privacy-preserving techniques, and pushing Congress to pass bipartisan data privacy legislation.
  • Advancing equity and civil rights by addressing algorithmic discrimination and developing best practices for the use of AI across the criminal justice system.
  • Standing up for consumers, patients, and students by advancing the responsible use of AI in healthcare and shaping how AI can potentially transform the education system by creating resources to support educators.
  • Supporting workers by producing a report on AI’s potential impacts on the labor market, studying options to strengthen federal support for workers experiencing labor disruptions, and developing principles to avoid harm and maximize the benefits of AI for workers.
  • Promoting innovation and competition by providing AI resources and data to researchers and students, expanding grants for AI research, and expanding abilities for immigrants and nonimmigrants to study and work in the US.
  • Advancing US leadership abroad by working with international partners to develop and implement AI standards.
  • Ensuring responsible and effective government use of AI by issuing guidance for federal agencies’ use of AI, helping agencies acquire AI products and services, and accelerating the hiring of AI professionals to work for the government.
Keep up with the AI Arms Race
Amazon is investing $4 billion in Anthropic, a generative AI startup.
Check it out!

The Biden Administration has already engaged with other countries, including Canada, Nigeria, the UK, and Brazil, to begin building an international framework to govern AI development. The government will publish federal AI jobs on AI.gov moving forward

The Biden Administration will continue to roll out the framework for how this executive order will come into play. As it does, Boardroom will continue to follow and report the news.

More AI:

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]]> Loading Jessica Gelman Big Tech Earnings From Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, Snap, and Amazon https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-big-tech-earnings-meta-alphabet-microsoft-snap-amazon/ Sun, 29 Oct 2023 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=80073 Google’s federal antitrust trial revealed that it paid $26B to be the default search engine on mobile phones and web browsers in 2021, and it’s likely a big portion of that money went to Apple. Something

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]]> Google’s federal antitrust trial revealed that it paid $26B to be the default search engine on mobile phones and web browsers in 2021, and it’s likely a big portion of that money went to Apple. Something about this doesn’t seem ethical, but I can’t lie: Chrome is superior.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Meta, Microsoft, Snap, Alphabet, and Amazon report earnings
  • Apple to host Mac event next week
  • Elon Musk‘s Twitter purchase anniversary is here

Big Tech Earnings From Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, Snap and Amazon

Artificial intelligence and cloud infrastructure were the main topics of discussion across Big Tech earnings calls this week. Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, Snap, and Amazon reported earnings and updated financial outlooks this week.

Here are some key revenue highlights, but check out my story on Amazon’s earnings and Boardroom’s latest Big Tech Earnings Roundup for more in-depth details:

  • Amazon generated $143.1 billion in revenue, a 13% increase year-over-year. The big tech firm beat analysts’ projections across the board, and thanks to the holiday season, Amazon expects sales to land in the $160 billion to $167 billion range.
  • Alphabet’s revenue increased to $76.7 billion, up 7% year-over-year. The company’s Google Cloud division produced $8.41 billion, and despite missing projections, revenue for Alphabet’s Google Cloud biz grew 22% year-over-year.
  • Meta generated $34.15 billion in revenue, a 23% increase year-over-year, marking the company’s fastest rate of growth since 2021. Daily active users across Meta’s family of apps topped 3.14 billion, an increase of 7% year-over-year.
  • Microsoft generated $56.5 billion in revenue, an increase of 13% year-over-year. Its biggest revenue win came from its cloud business, which produced $24.26 billion in revenue, up 19%.
  • Snap’s revenue rose 5% year-over-year to $1.19 billion, and its Snapchat+ monthly subscription service surpassed five million subscribers. The company returned to positive growth in the third quarter, boosting its stock by as much as 20% on Tuesday.

Apple Set to Announce New Line of iMacs Ahead of Releasing Q3 Earnings

Apple swiftly announced an unexpected event set for Monday, Oct. 30, at 5 p.m. PT. The Big Tech giant will likely announce a new line of Macs, and the event will be completely streamed virtually. Apple knew what it was doing when it dubbed this keynote its “Scary Fast” event since it usually has an IRL crowd for big product announcements. The company took the play on Halloween words to the next level when it updated its event page with its logo transformed into a spooky Finder face. Apple hasn’t launched a new line of iMac desktop computers since April 2021.

This isn’t the only order of business Apple is getting to before its next earnings report comes out on Nov. 2. The company is also upping the Apple TV+ monthly subscription fee from $6.99 to $9.99 and said it will honor California’s new right to repair initiative nationwide. In the midst of this, Taiwan-based Foxconn, Apple’s biggest product maker and supplier, will cooperate with the Chinese government in potential tax and land-use investigations.

Meta Hit With Lawsuits, Alleging Facebook and Instagram Features Are Addictive to Kids

Meta is facing lawsuits from a bipartisan group of 42 attorney generals, alleging that it knowingly developed addictive features on Instagram and Facebook to keep young users engaged on its platforms longer. The lawsuits span 41 states and DC and even include Meta’s home state of California. One of the filings runs 233 pages long and accuses Meta of altering the psychological and social realities of young users and refusing to implement age verification parameters. CNBC reported that one of the suits accuses Meta of violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act by collecting personal data on users under 13 without parental consent.

The Big Tech firm hasn’t responded to the lawsuits yet, but we can expect to see Meta CEO Mark Zuckerburg in many courtrooms across the nation very soon.

Sam Bankman-Fried Trial: What We Learned from Week 4

Something surprising happened this week after the court took a break until Thursday: Sam Bankman-Fried decided to testify in his own trial, where a jury will decide if he’s guilty on 12 counts of financial-related fraud charges. Up until this point, SBF’s defense hadn’t decided if he was going to take the stand or not, but the former FTX leader spent Thursday answering some questions in a mock testimony.  Judge Lewis Kaplan dismissed the jury for the day, so they didn’t get to hear SBF’s testimony while the court ruled on which parts of SBF’s testimony were admissible in court.

Judge Kaplan said SBF had an interesting way of answering questions and even begged him at one point to listen to inquiries before speaking and to answer questions directly. SBF official took the stand on Friday in front of jurors, where he told them he told them he didn’t defraud FTX customers. SBF answered questions about his vision for FTX, the company’s early days in Hong Kong, and his initial plan to sell FTX to Binance before it took off. From the sounds of it, SBF will be back on the stand next week as the defense calls an estimated six witnesses to testify.

While SBF prepped to take the stand, his bankrupt crypto exchange narrowed down its list of bidders interested in reviving the platform, MilkRoad reports. Soon after FTX filed for bankruptcy last November, talks began about restarting the exchange under new management.

  • Elon Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion on Oct. 27, 2022, before rebranding it as X and losing about 13% of the platform’s daily active users. Former employees are calling Musk’s leadership style “ruthless and clumsy” as they fear for X’s future.
  • TikTok is testing out 15-minute uploads, an increase of 5 minutes from its previous video cap. The company also announced its first live music event headlined by Cardi B that will broadcast on its platform with highlights.
  • Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg shared that Threads is nearing 100 million monthly active users. The Big Tech company is also testing a verified-only feed for paying Meta Verified customers.
  • Bitcoin briefly breached the $35,000 threshold for the first time since May 2022, marking a new 16-month high amid the expected approval of a Bitcoin ETF soon. This ETF would give financial institutions a smoother bridge into crypto investing that mirrors how they typically buy stocks.
  • Spotify‘s monthly active users increased by 26% to 574 million, marking its second-largest Q3 net addition performance in its history. The streaming service posted $3.55 billion in revenue for the quarter.
  • Sony sold 2.5 million copies of Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 game in the US in the first 24 hours of its release, making the PlayStation 5 exclusive Sony’s fastest-selling gaming title to date.

Shazam, the music identification app owned by Apple, announced a new feature called Concerts, which will recommend music events to customers based on their Shazam queries. With this expansion, I’m going to bet that Shazam will add a concert ticket-purchasing feature as well, or maybe Apple will build its own internal ticket sales tech.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) IN OTHER NEWS (2) Inside the Charlotte Hornets’ Hive of Innovation https://boardroom.tv/charlotte-hornets-mr-beast-virtual-team-store/ Fri, 27 Oct 2023 14:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=79958 From a jersey sponsorship deal with MrBeast to the NBA’s first virtual team store, the Charlotte Hornets continue to break ground under new ownership. Since Michael Jordan agreed to sell a majority stake in

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]]> From a jersey sponsorship deal with MrBeast to the NBA’s first virtual team store, the Charlotte Hornets continue to break ground under new ownership.

Since Michael Jordan agreed to sell a majority stake in the Charlotte Hornets to a group led by Gabe Plotkin and Rich Schnall in June, the team has unveiled innovations from a jersey patch to the team store, aimed at engaging younger fans around the world.

Charlotte signed a multi-year jersey patch sponsorship deal with MrBeast’s Feastables, joining forces with a native and burgeoning entrepreneur who happens to have the world’s largest YouTube following (204 million subscribers). The Hornets also partnered with conversational AI company MeetKai to build the NBA‘s first shoppable virtual team store that’s an exact digital replica of the team store inside Spectrum Center.

photo by David Jensen/Getty Images

These two initiatives both launched prior to the team’s season-opening win at home earlier this week against Atlanta.

“With new ownership, there’s a new energy,” Hornets’ chief marketing officer Seth Bennett told Boardroom. “And we’re excited about that.”

MrBeast’s Feastables line of chocolate bars is an upstart brand targeting Gen-Z and Generation Alpha, looking for market share in an ultra-competitive legacy landscape.

The Hornets have worked with MrBeast before on local activations, and they thought it made perfect sense for both companies to reach fan bases they otherwise wouldn’t.

One of the Hornets’ responsibilities, Bennett said, was to bring in generational fans who will support the team for decades.

He believes the Feastables relationship will help accomplish that, with hopes that the jersey patch could become a new fashion status symbol along with their new throwback uniforms.

“Back In the ’90s, you had that purple and teal Starter jacket that was iconic and everybody wanted it. It didn’t matter if you were in North Carolina or not,” Hornets Chief Revenue Officer Jacob Gallagher told Boardroom. “As we’ve seen this launch and the interest around the jersey, this could be the next iteration of that Starter jacket.”

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A modern icon with an even more modern patch partner.

“MrBeast is obviously a big fan who wants to both support the team and see the success of the Feastables brand,” Gallagher said, adding there are ongoing conversations on how the Hornets and MrBeast can further collaborate. “He understands the value he brings to the table paired up with our brand.”

The Virtues of Virtual Venues

After being one of the first NBA teams to mint NFTs, the Hornets’ strategy and innovation arm considered a few options for its next digital campaign.

Charlotte’s first priority was enhancing the Spectrum Center experience. Ideas included getting fans different views of the arena, or a sales tool for people to look at seats. Ultimately, the team decided that building out an exact digital replica of the arena’s team store provided the best of both worlds.

The Hornets first needed to have discussions and debates over their collective comfort with stepping foot into the AI space, given its inherent risks. But Bennett said the Charlotte brass trusted MeetKai’s track record on this cutting-edge technology. And so the process began in February, with the team working with MeetKai to build this store out.

via Charlotte Hornets

Plotkin and Schnall’s overarching message as new majority stakeholders centered on making the business better, improving the fan experience, growing the fan base globally, and changing the game within the industry.

The virtual team store checked all those boxes.

About a dozen Hornets staffers from different team departments contributed to ensure that the look, feel, and design of the team store was a twin experience with the physical Spectrum Center location. The Hornets and MeetKai then worked with e-commerce partner Fanatics to ensure each virtual purchase could be physically delivered to fans’ homes.

Through the first 10 days of the virtual fan shop’s opening on Oct. 9, more than 3,100 unique users from more than 60 different countries — led by the US, Mexico, and the UK — perused its digital shelves, per a Hornets spokesperson. The Hornets proved to have national reach as well, with Raleigh the only North Carolina city other than Charlotte among the top 10 to visit the site the most.

More than 60% of visitors clicked on at least one item, and more than 7% clicked the “Buy Now” button that directed them to the Fanatics site for checkout.

Brandon Miller #24 of the Charlotte Hornets looks into the distance during the second half of a basketball game against the Atlanta Hawks at Spectrum Center on Oct. 25, 2023 in Charlotte, NC. (Photo by David Jensen/Getty Images)

“Not only does it fit into our strategy of the development of our younger generational fans, it fits into the NBA as an international global brand,” Bennett said. “And the new ownership group has really provided a new energy that has opened up the door for us to think differently and to be aggressive and a disruptor in some of the spaces we’re operating in.”

The Hornets aren’t done innovating, with plans to soon bring hologram technology to further improve the in-arena experience. They’re also working on more digital partnerships as they seek to grow their revenue, brand, and fan base.

In the post-Michael Jordan era, the Hornets have a new innovative energy, and Plotkin and Schnall seem ready to spread their wings.

Want more NBA?

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]]> Atlanta Hawks v Charlotte Hornets LaMelo Ball #1 of the Charlotte Hornets looks into the distance during the first half of a basketball game against the Atlanta Hawks at Spectrum Center on October 25, 2023 in Charlotte, North Carolina. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by David Jensen/Getty Images) Loading Screenshot-2023-10-26-at-3.43.41-PM Atlanta Hawks v Charlotte Hornets Brandon Miller #24 of the Charlotte Hornets looks into the distance during the second half of a basketball game against the Atlanta Hawks at Spectrum Center on October 25, 2023 in Charlotte, North Carolina. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, User is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by David Jensen/Getty Images) Big Tech Earnings Roundup: Alphabet Wins Q3 Revenue Race With $76B https://boardroom.tv/big-tech-earnings-q3-microsoft-google-meta/ Thu, 26 Oct 2023 19:08:11 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=79973 In today’s roundup, Boardroom breaks down the financial outlooks for Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Snap based on their latest earnings reports. Artificial intelligence and cloud infrastructure were the top business sectors that affected revenue

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]]> In today’s roundup, Boardroom breaks down the financial outlooks for Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Snap based on their latest earnings reports.

Artificial intelligence and cloud infrastructure were the top business sectors that affected revenue for Big Tech companies this week.

Meta, Microsoft, Alphabet, and Snap all posted positive revenue growth and were trading in the green after recent earnings reports. Some businesses took a hit as stocks took a downward turn due to an ad spending slowdown related to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Overall, growth and competition across the AI and cloud computing industries affected revenue the most this quarter.

Let’s take a look at some Big Tech earnings highlights from Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Snap.

Amazon and Apple earnings are on deck next — stay tuned.

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Big Tech Earnings: Q3 2023

Alphabet

Google’s parent company won some and lost some after posting its third-quarter earnings report on Tuesday. Alphabet’s revenue increased to $76.7 billion, up 7% year-over-year. While Alphabet’s sales and profit beat analysts’ projections, the company’s stock fell as much as 7% in after-hours trading upon reporting lower-than-expected revenue from its cloud division.

The company’s Google Cloud division produced $8.41 billion compared to the expected $8.64 billion. Google Cloud has steep competition with Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure, but the biz unit has been a key area that investors want to continue pouring dollars into.

Key takeaways from Alphabet’s recent earnings report:

  • Despite missing projections, revenue for Alphabet’s Google Cloud biz grew 22% year-over-year.
  • Alphabet generated $7.95 billion in YouTube advertising revenue, and overall ad revenue was $59.65 billion.
  • During Q3, Alphabet continued cutting jobs after laying off 45 workers in its news division and several across its self-driving car business, Waymo. These cuts come as part of the company’s larger decrease of 12,000 jobs, first announced in January.
  • YouTube Shorts now boasts 70 billion daily views, up 20 billion from the start of the year.
  • CEO Sundar Pichai said he’s pleased with Alphabet’s Q3 financial results after success integrating AI across search, YouTube, Cloud, and Pixel hardware devices.
What We Learned at Amazon’s “Delivering the Future” Event
From robotics to sustainability to electric vehicles and beyond, here’s what you need to know about what Boardroom saw on the ground in Seattle.
Let’s Go!

Meta

Facebook parent company Meta announced big releases in Q3, including the launch of the Quest 3, new Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses, and a consumer-facing AI studio. Meta generated $34.15 billion in revenue, a 23% increase year-over-year. The tech giant’s stock rose more than 4% before dropping more than 3% after Meta CFO Susan Li said ad spending on its platforms had scaled back amid the conflict in the Middle East. Still, Meta met or beat expectations across multiple key areas of its business.

Key takeaways from Meta’s recent earnings report:

  • Meta’s 23% increase in revenue marks the company’s fastest rate of growth since 2021.
  • Daily active users across Meta’s family of apps topped 3.14 billion, an increase of 7% year-over-year. Facebook alone attracted 2.09 billion daily active users on average, up 5% compared to this time last year.
  • Monthly active users across the company’s family of apps hit 3.6 billion, an increase of 7% year-over-year.
  • Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg teased that the company’s newest platform, Threads, is nearing 100 million monthly active users.
  • Meta’s headcount decreased 24% year-over-year to 66,185 employees.
  • Meta expects its Q4 revenue to land between $36.5 and 40 billion, which would be approximately a 2% revenue growth year-over-year.

Microsoft

Microsoft beat estimates and boosted its profit in its most recent quarter, which is the first quarter of fiscal year 2024, after lowering its operational expenses and doubling down on AI. The tech giant’s shares rose as much as 6% after hours on Tuesday, and its biggest revenue win came from its cloud business. Microsoft generated $56.5 billion in revenue, an increase of 13% year-over-year.

The company’s biggest move of the quarter was undoubtedly its $69 billion purchase of gaming giant Activision Blizzard, but it will likely take a couple of quarters to see just how the mega-deal evolves Microsoft’s business.

Key takeaways from Microsoft’s recent earnings report:

  • Microsoft’s Intelligent Cloud division produced $24.26 billion in revenue, up 19%, with most of the boost in revenue coming from Azure platform.
  • Revenue from Azure alone rose by 29% this quarter, and the Azure OpenAI Service added more users with 18,000 total customers now.
  • Revenue for Microsoft’s Productivity and Business Processes unit, which includes Microsoft 365 productivity app subscriptions, LinkedIn, and Dynamics enterprise software, increased by 13% to $18.59 billion.
  • Revenue for the Big Tech company’s Personal Computing business, which includes
  • The company estimates that revenue will land in the range of $60.4 billion to $61.4 billion for its next quarter.

Snap

Snapchat‘s parent company returned to positive growth in the third quarter, boosting its stock by as much as 20% on Tuesday. Snap’s revenue rose 5% year-over-year to $1.19 billion, an accomplishment CEO Evan Spiegel said in a statement came from major cost-cutting efforts. Despite posting some positive numbers, Snap’s shares declined after the platform’s CEO also shared that some advertisers halted spending after sharing concerns about the effect the war in the Middle East will have on advertising, a business sector on which Snap is hyperfocused right now.

Key takeaways from Snap’s recent earnings report:

  • Snap’s $3.99-per-month subscription service, Snapchat+, surpassed five million subscribers, which is up one million from the previous quarter.
  • Snap laid off 170 employees and cut its augmented reality enterprise business in September as part of a larger layoff plan first announced last summer. The company will still develop AR-focused tech in other areas of its business.
  • Snap’s COO Jerry Hunter announced his retirement after seven years in the role.
  • The company launched a common stock repurchase program of up to $500 million and will use its existing cash and cash equivalents to fund the buybacks. As of Sept. 30, Snap had $3.6 billion in cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities.
  • Snap’s net losses were up 2% to $368 million year-over-year.

More Tech Talk:

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]]> Loading Reddit Tech Talk Reviews: WHOOP Coach, Powered by OpenAI https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-reviews-whoop-coach-openai/ Thu, 12 Oct 2023 15:43:40 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=78820 In the first edition of Tech Talk Reviews, Boardroom tests out WHOOP's new generative AI feature powered by ChatGPT maker OpenAI.

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]]> In the first edition of Tech Talk Reviews, Boardroom tests out WHOOP’s new generative AI feature powered by ChatGPT maker OpenAI.

WHOOP is elevating its portfolio of offerings after introducing a new generative artificial intelligence feature powered by OpenAI.

WHOOP, the Boston-based wearable health and fitness tracker developer, is on a mission to revolutionize the wearables market through health and fitness trackers that monitor a range of metrics, including heart rate, sleep performance, supplement intake, stress and anxiety levels, and dietary restrictions. The company then uses these metrics to provide daily feedback and recommendations for improving sleep, recovery, and strain. WHOOP was already leveraging AI and machine learning across its offerings, but its new generative AI plugin powered by ChatGPT brings a more all-access conversational appeal to the company’s membership-based app that pairs with its wearables.

Boardroom’s resident tech reporter, AKA me, got early access to WHOOP Coach, and honestly, it’s easier to show you than tell you about the experience. I also get into more specifics about the wearable itself and supplemental products.

WHOOP Coach was developed to reshape how users get their health and fitness recommendations. Users can “ask WHOOP anything” via a chat plugin within the app, and much like ChatGPT, OpenAI archives each conversation for a short time.

As for privacy, OpenAI does not store any conversational data that it collects with WHOOP Coach. The new feature is still in beta as WHOOP rolls out some enhancements over time. WHOOP Coach works hand-in-hand with other features within the iOS and Android-friendly app. The more data users log while wearing their WHOOP 24/7 and using features like the Journal, the more in-depth the AI coach will get with its answers.

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“We aspire to build a 24/7 health and fitness coach, and what does that mean? It means that at any time, anywhere, you can ask questions and get guidance on your health and fitness,” WHOOP Founder and CEO Will Ahmed told Boardroom in an exclusive interview. “What previously would have required a human being and a bunch of medical technology is not at your fingertips for a fairly low cost, and that’s because of the advancements in artificial intelligence and how WHOOP has woven this technology together.”

Even though WHOOP Coach can’t build out specific workout plans down to the exercise, Ahmed all but confirmed that the feature will be able soon. For the most part, WHOOP Coach offers direct answers, especially when users are asking questions about anything pertaining to the metrics WHOOP tracks.

“I anticipate that WHOOP will be able to build out workout plans for anyone who joins the platform,” Ahmed said. “I imagine the coaching feature will evolve to be more actionable and proactive. Today, a lot of the back and forth with the WHOOP Coach begins with you asking a question. I imagine WHOOP will be the one starting the conversation more [in the next year].”

WHOOP Coach is not an upsell for members already on the company’s platform; it’s already included in the subscription-based membership program. WHOOP subscriptions are available at $30 monthly, $239 annually, or $399 for a 24-month period.

Read More:

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]]> Loading Reddit TikTok Tom Brady, Snoop Dogg Securing Major Payday for Meta AI Integration https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/10-07-2023-tom-brady-snoop-dogg-meta-ai/ Sat, 07 Oct 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=79069 Tom Brady, Snoop Dogg Among Celebrities Securing Major Payday for Meta AI Integration Last week, Meta unveiled a number of new innovations at the 2023 Meta Connect event. Among those was a series of new partnerships with

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]]> Tom Brady, Snoop Dogg Among Celebrities Securing Major Payday for Meta AI Integration

Last week, Meta unveiled a number of new innovations at the 2023 Meta Connect event. Among those was a series of new partnerships with top celebrity talent, including Tom Brady, Paris Hilton, and Snoop Dogg. Pretty soon, users will be able to opt to have them take over chatbots. The Information uncovered that Meta will pay the selected talent handsomely for their likeness. The stars have allowed Meta to use their likeness for fictional AI characters Facebook and Instagram users to interact with in exchange for licensing deals worth up to $5 million. The functionality dropped across Meta properties, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, on Oct. 4.

Taylor Swift Eclipses $100M in Eras Tour Film’s Global Presales

Before making its cinematic debut, Taylor Swift’s “Eras Tour” concert film has been breaking records. Set for an Oct. 13 release date across 100 countries, the movie has already garnered over $100 million worldwide in advance ticket sales, according to AMC Theatres, the film’s official distributor, putting it on track to take over the top spot for highest-grossing concert films of all-time soon after its release. Not only that but if Swift‘s film continues on the same trajectory, “Eras Tour” will secure its spot as one of the biggest debuts of 2023 next to Barbie and The Super Mario Bros. Movie.

WNBA Finals: Aces vs. Liberty Tickets Set New Sales Record

The WNBA Finals tip off Sunday in Sin City. In the battle of two superteams, the Las Vegas Aces and New York Liberty are bringing out fans from east to west for what looks to be a veritable battle for the title. According to data from StubHub, this year’s Finals have commanded the highest ticket sales in WNBA history, outpacing last year’s numbers by more than 30%. The two teams, the only squads in the league to have single-digit regular-season losses, enter the matchup having each taken two victories ahead of the postseason.

Drake Announces Music Hiatus Following ‘For All the Dogs’ Drop

Drake finally gave fans what they wanted with the release of his studio album For All The Dogs. Shortly after, however, the Toronto rapper shocked his following by announcing his intentions to take a temporary leave of absence from the music industry. While speaking on Table For One on SiriusXM’s Sound 42, the 6 God revealed that he would be taking a break for “maybe a year” due to the “craziest” issues with his stomach. Although he did not completely divulge the complications, Drake noted that he wants to shift his focus to his health “first and foremost.” The news comes in the immediate aftermath of his eighth solo studio album, which features SZA, J. Cole, and the first feature from his young son Adonis.

‘Suits’ Sets New Nielsen Record with 12-week Run at No. 1

Everyone’s favorite binge-worthy series has once again landed the top spot on the overall Nielsen Streaming Top 10 for the 12th week. Suits, which hit Netflix in June, has held steady to the top spot. In the most recent cycle, it logged 2.36 billion viewing minutes. The series’ new milestone for most overall No. 1 finishes surpasses Jason Bateman-fronted Ozark. According to Deadline, only 11 streaming titles have topped Nielsen’s Top 10 for five weeks or more.

X Previews 3-tier Paid Subscription Structure

X CEO Linda Yaccarino spoke to the company’s debt holders this week to help forecast the future. Yaccarino previewed a three-tier subscription model for the social media platform, which would start at $7.99. Bloomberg reports that the premium product will have Basic, Standard, and Platinum options. Each will have different levels of features for users, but precise details are not yet known. A timeline for release is unknown at this time.

Tom Brady, Snoop Dogg Among Celebrities Securing Major Payday for Meta AI Integration

Last week, Meta unveiled a number of new innovations at the 2023 Meta Connect event. Among those was a series of new partnerships with top celebrity talent, including Tom Brady, Paris Hilton, and Snoop Dogg. Pretty soon, users will be able to opt to have them take over chatbots. The Information uncovered that Meta will pay the selected talent handsomely for their likeness. The stars have allowed Meta to use their likeness for fictional AI characters Facebook and Instagram users to interact with in exchange for licensing deals worth up to $5 million. The functionality dropped across Meta properties, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, on Oct. 4.

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]]> Coinbase Stands with Crypto at the Capitol https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-coinbase-stand-with-crypto-day/ Sun, 01 Oct 2023 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=78403 It’s October, which officially means we’re in the final stretch of the year. Welcome to Q4, folks. A peek into today’s edition:  Coinbase Takes DC Same Day Gary Gensler Testifies Before Congress Coinbase mobilized the crypto community,

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]]> It’s October, which officially means we’re in the final stretch of the year. Welcome to Q4, folks.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Coinbase in the nation’s capital
  • The download on Meta Connect
  • The end of Google Podcasts

Coinbase Takes DC Same Day Gary Gensler Testifies Before Congress

Coinbase mobilized the crypto community, welcoming leaders from more than 50 crypto companies to join it in DC on Wednesday, Sept. 27 for the inaugural Stand With Crypto Day. Coinbase’s head of US policy, Kara Calvert, spearheaded the effort, which coincided with SEC Chair Gensler testifying in front of the House Financial Services Committee about his ambitious rulemaking proposals. Coinbase conceptualized Stand With Crypto Day to advocate for pro-crypto policies as regulators inch closer and closer to implementing more laws and regulations around digital currencies. Some crypto leaders met with Congress members to advocate for clear legislation for crypto operations. Stand With Crypto also operates as an independent nonprofit to mobilize the crypto community year-round for different actions, programs, and events. Coinbase capped off the day with a moderated fireside chat with CEO Brian Armstrong who discussed why Coinbase is stepping up to challenge lawmakers to act.

This event comes a month after Coinbase won approval from the Biden Administration’s CFTC National Futures Association to list crypto futures. The move made the exchange the first crypto platform to offer regulated and leveraged crypto futures alongside traditional spot trading.

The Download on Meta Connect 2023

The annual Meta Connect 2023 conference wrapped this week. It included two days of new AI product reveals and updates on Meta’s augmented reality and virtual reality landscape. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the tech giant is “focused on building the future of human connection” during his keynote. Here are some of the key announcements and takeaways from the event:

  • Meta Quest 3: Since debuting the new mixed-reality headset in June, Meta announced that preorders for the Quest 3 are now open, and the headset will be available on Oct. 10. Quest 3 models range in price from $500 to $650 depending on storage capacity.
  • Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses: Meta and Ray-Ban debuted their second generation of smart glasses that are equipped with cameras, spatial audio, and video capture and photo capabilities. This product succeeds Ray-Ban Stories, which was released in 2021.
  • Meta AI: The Big Tech leader showcased its new AI chatbot personality tech with a couple dozen different celebrity voices. Meta AI is the company’s new generative AI assistant that will be available in Meta’s family of apps, including Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp. Generative AI image editing is also being developed for Instagram.

Amazon’s $4B Investment in Anthropic and an FTC Lawsuit

Amazon announced that it will invest up to $4 billion in generative artificial intelligence startup Anthropic as part of a larger strategic collaboration. This deal makes Amazon Web Services the primary cloud provider for Anthropic, which is building AI systems set to rival OpenAI. Within days of that good news, bad news followed when the US Federal Trade Commission and attorney generals from 17 states filed an antitrust lawsuit against the e-commerce giant. The suit alleges that Amazon is illegally maintaining monopoly power to inflate online prices and overcharge sellers. Ultimately, the agency is concerned about Amazon using interlocking anticompetitive and unfair strategies. The FTC has been investigating Amazon for years. However, the lawsuit comes after the company allegedly failed to offer concessions to settle some of these claims in closed meetings last month.

I’ll surely be following this case closely.

Updates from OpenAI

OpenAI is reportedly seeking a new valuation between $80 billion and $90 billion through a sale of some of its shares. The AI company’s rapid success is undeniable, so reaching this new height wouldn’t surprise me one bit. Here are some more updates from OpenAI’s world:

  • OpenAI debuted a new internet browsing feature for ChatGPT users to surf the web.
  • OpenAI’a Sam Altman is reportedly working with iPhone designer Jony Ive to conceptualize and develop a new AI hardware device, The Information reported.
  • Tubi announced the release Rabbit AI, the streamer’s new AI-enabled recommendations feature powered by OpenAI’s ChatGPT AI chatbot.
  • OpenAI responded to author and comedian Sarah Silverman‘s lawsuit against ChatGPT that she filed earlier this year. The AI company’s legal team filed motions to dismiss some of the counts in the lawsuit. It expects to fight the copyright infringement allegation head-on in court.
  • ChatGPT can now understand spoken words and respond with a synthetic voice.
  • Google Podcasts is shutting down this year. However, it’s not the end of the podcast era for the Big Tech, which is adding podcast tools and features to YouTube Music instead. Also, Google Bard got a significant update last week after users discovered that Google Search was indexing conversations with the AI chatbot.
  • I’m not sure what MicroStrategy‘s master plan is. he data analytics firm acquired 5,445 more Bitcoin tokens, taking its holding up to 158,245 Bitcoins.
  • Web3 brand Yuga Labs announced a partnership with A BATHING APE. They will design apparel collection that will be first available to Bored Ape Yacht Club holders before hitting stores in December. The collection will debut in Hong Kong in November during BAYC’s annual ApeFest community event.
  • The Central Intelligence Agency is developing an AI chatbot for other US intelligence agencies. The new tech offering will be trained on publicly available data and is being created to assist users in sifting through public data.
  • Tinder officially rolled out its new exclusive subscription program, Tinder Select, which will cost $500 a month and offer users more unique features to find love connections. Tinder is accepting applications for the program on a rolling basis.
  • Move over Dall-E 3 and Midjoirney, there’s new competition in town. Getty Images is developing an AI tool that will be able to generate images from its library of work.

Samsung is targeting content creators through a new sponsorship with MrBeast. I’m going to bet that this deal won’t drive significant sales for the Galaxy Z Flip 5 as the mobile brand expects it to.

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]]> IN-OTHER-NEWS-4 IN-OTHER-NEWS-2-3 BET-OF-THE-WEEK-4 Here’s What the Official End of the WGA Strike Means for the Business of Hollywood https://boardroom.tv/wga-strike-provisional-agreement/ Wed, 27 Sep 2023 19:37:57 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=78380 The writers’ strike officially ended on Wednesday, Sept. 27 at 12:01 a.m. with a tentative WGA deal with Hollywood — here’s what it actually says. After the second-longest strike in its history — all

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]]> The writers’ strike officially ended on Wednesday, Sept. 27 at 12:01 a.m. with a tentative WGA deal with Hollywood — here’s what it actually says.

After the second-longest strike in its history — all told, a 148-day work stoppage — the Writers Guild of America officially reached a tentative labor agreement with production companies and streamers under the banner of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) after countless meetings and tense contract negotiations. Combined with the SAG-AFTRA strike that started on July 14, television and film studios and streamers alike have been met with adversity surrounding rollouts, marketing, live show tapings, and the definitions of what does or doesn’t constitute crossing a picket line.

From minimum staffing requirements to the growth of artificial intelligence in Hollywood writing rooms, some scores have been settled after countless contract talks to create a clear deal and comprehensive language for all parties to agree on.

So, what’s the gist of this agreement, and how does it change the business of film and TV? We’ve got your need-to-know facts on the terms of this three-year WGA deal and the AMPTP, officially known as a minimum basic agreement (MBA), as of Sept. 24, 2023 covering everything from staffing and pay structure to the emerging tech elephant in the room known as artificial intelligence.

Click here to read the agreement in its entirety.

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Key Details from the the WGA Deal with the AMPTP

Compensation & Staffing

Key wins regarding pay structure include:

  • Increased minimum compensation rates and defined weekly and annual bumps
  • Screenwriters earning flat rates will be paid faster
  • New pay tier for writer-producers with higher minimums
  • More guarantees and protections for writers on pre-greenlit projects (“development rooms”)
  • More guarantees and protections for writers hired to draft screenplays or write spec scripts purchased by a studio
  • Raised salary limit for writers working under options and exclusivity agreements
  • Expanded healthcare and pension contributions

Here’s what’s new regarding staffing standards:

  • The minimum number of staff writers and writer-producers on a television series is expanded and based on a season’s episode order
    • Three writers and three writer-producers for six episodes or fewer, five and three for up to 12 episodes, six and three for 13 or more episodes
  • Employment guarantees for a minimum number of writer-producers in “development rooms”

Artificial Intelligence

@boardroom The end of the second-longest strike in Hollywood history could prove to be the beginning of the AI era of film and television. #hollywood #movies #wgastrike #sagaftra #blackmirror #greenscreen ♬ Cute Retro Lounge Music(879857) – Kenji Ueda

New measures regarding the expanding relationship between Hollywood and AI:

  • Protections against AI creating or writing original content in place of guild writers
  • AI-generated material cannot supplant or supersede a writer’s credit or their related rights, including a rule that work generated by artificial intelligence shall not be regarded as “source material” for future adaptation
  • Writers can use AI as a tool to aid their creative process, but this requires studio approval and compliance with set rules
  • Production companies cannot compel writers to use AI platforms like ChatGPT or Bard to perform creative services
  • Studios must disclose if and when they furnish writers with material generated via artificial intelligence tools

Equity in the Streaming Era

  • Enhanced residual and bonus structure for streaming projects, including a viewership-based model alongside the existing fixed residual
    • Specifically regarding foreign residuals, production companies agreed to reform how these audiences are calculated; the WGA anticipates this will lead to a 76% increase in these payments
  • Various scriptwriter guarantees for streaming and video-on-demand (VOD) programs will align with rates for traditional televised programming
  • Writer pay structure for ad-supported streaming platforms (Freevee, Tubi, etc.) will align with that of subscription-based streamers (Netflix, Prime Video, etc.)
  • To ensure equity, studios will provide the WGA with viewership data for programs produced by streaming platforms that exceed specific budget thresholds

And with that, Hollywood is one step closer to getting back to work.

Now, onto SAG-AFTRA. Union strong!

MORE TV & FILM:

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]]> Loading SNL Among Shows Planning Return with End of Writers Strike Looming https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/09-26-2023-snl-return-writers-strike-amazon-ai-mlb-knicks/ Tue, 26 Sep 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=78286 SNL Among Shows Planning Return with End of Writers Strike Looming The long-running sketch comedy program Saturday Night Live could be on its way to a full 49th season after the writers and the studios reached a

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]]> SNL Among Shows Planning Return with End of Writers Strike Looming

The long-running sketch comedy program Saturday Night Live could be on its way to a full 49th season after the writers and the studios reached a tentative agreement to end the strike. According to Variety, the show is rumored to return on either Oct. 7 or 14, pending a vote by the WGA. The WGA negotiating group is expected to recommend the approval and send it to the WGA West Board and WGA East Council for a vote, likely scheduled for Tuesday. This could potentially lift the restraining order and allow writers to return to work as they await for the deal to be approved. Season 48 was shortened by three episodes when the writers walked out at the beginning of May.

Boardroom’s D’Shonda Brown has more on the agreement that should bring an end to the 146-day strike.

Amazon Eyes AI with Reported $4B Anthropic Investment

E-commerce giant Amazon announced that it will invest up to $4 billion in generative artificial intelligence startup Anthropic as part of a larger strategic collaboration. Essentially, Amazon Web Services (AWS) will become Anthropic’s primary cloud provider, and Amazon is acquiring a minority ownership stake in the two-year-old AI firm. The Wall Street Journal reported that Amazon is kicking off its alliance with Anthropic with an initial investment of $1.25 billion, but the $4 billion cap will likely be hit over time.

Boardroom’s Michelai Graham has more details on Amazon’s latest foray into AI.

Foot Locker Gets In on Taylor Swift-Travis Kelce Buzz on Social Media

With rumors flying left and right, Taylor Swift surprised the masses Sunday when she appeared at Arrowhead Stadium to cheer on Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. Donning a Chiefs jacket over a white tank with shorts, the “Tolerate It” singer rocked a pair of New Balance 550s in a red and white colorway. Swift‘s outfit left many wondering how to replicate it, so Foot Locker got in on the fun. The company “unveiled” its “Swiftie Starter Pack” on Monday, which was just a picture of the shoes Swift wore alongside Kelce’s No. 87 home jersey. We’ll be waiting on bated breath to see what the 12-time Grammy winner wears the next time she’s spotted watching Kelce and Co.

Boardroom’s Sam Dunn has more on the numbers and impact behind Kelce-Swift, Inc.

Pitch Clock Significantly Cuts MLB Game Time in 2023

Last year, Major League Baseball announced three rule changes — headlined by the pitch clock — that the league’s Competition Committee approved to help combat long-running games. Not even a full season later, the pitch clock is proving to be a resounding success. According to MLB PR, the 2021 season had 390 games that clocked in at 3 hours and 30 minutes or longer, which was the most ever. In 2022, there were 231. This season, with the new rules in place, that number has been reduced down to nine. In turn, MLB has opted to keep the pitch clock rules during the postseason games. After initial adjustments, players have seemingly gotten used to the changes throughout the season, with nearly two-thirds of regular-season games concluding sans any pitch clock infractions.

Nipsey Hussle’s impact continues to be felt long after his March 2019 death. On Monday, The Hollywood Reporter revealed that the late emcee’s Neighborhood Nip Foundation will join the 2024 Los Angeles Marathon as an official charity partner. Hussle‘s beloved The Marathon Clothing company will submit a team of 15 or more in the race, and all proceeds raised by each participant will go toward the non-profit. For those who cannot afford the marathon fees, the Neighborhood Nip Foundation plans to sponsor runners.

Knicks Reportedly Promoting Gersson Rosas in Front Office Move

The New York Knicks made a big front-office move on Monday, promoting Gersson Rosas to Senior VP of Basketball Operations, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reports. Rosas had been a team consultant for the past year and now will be among the organization’s senior decision-makers. Prior to this appointment, the Colobian-born exec was previously president of the Minnesota Timberwolves, the Dallas Mavericks’ GM, and a Houston Rockets executive. The Knicks are coming off their best campaign record-wise since 2012-13, making it to the Eastern Conference semifinals before falling in the postseason.

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]]> Amazon to Invest Billions in OpenAI Rival Anthropic https://boardroom.tv/amazon-anthropic-openai-rival-investment/ Mon, 25 Sep 2023 19:35:40 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=78283 Generative AI startup Anthropic inked a long-term deal with Amazon, and AWS will become the company’s official cloud and computing chip provider. Big Tech and e-commerce giant Amazon announced that it will invest up

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]]> Generative AI startup Anthropic inked a long-term deal with Amazon, and AWS will become the company’s official cloud and computing chip provider.

Big Tech and e-commerce giant Amazon announced that it will invest up to $4 billion in generative artificial intelligence startup Anthropic as part of a larger strategic collaboration.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) will become Anthropic’s primary cloud provider, and Amazon is taking on a minority ownership stake in the two-year-old AI company. Launched in 2021 by former OpenAI research executives, Anthropic is a San Francisco-based AI safety and research company building AI systems. The company’s flagship product, Claude, launched in March as a generative AI assistant primarily focusing on sharing helpful and harmless information.

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There are many moving parts in Amazon and Anthropic’s new partnership. One of which is that Anthropic has agreed to use custom AWS chips to build, train, and deploy its AI models. The companies will also collaborate on future computing chip developments. Since Anthropic is building on the AWS infrastructure, AWS customers can build with Anthropic’s AI offerings through Amazon Bedrock, the e-commerce firm’s platform that lets its customers safely build cloud-based generative AI applications using existing AI models on the market. Amazon developers and engineers can access Anthropic’s AI models via Amazon Bedrock as well.

Anthropic has been an AWS customer since its inception in 2021, though the company did have a deal with Google that it announced earlier this year. That deal came with up to $400 million in funding and a cloud computing partnership. It’s unclear if Athropic is still partnering with Google to use the Big Tech company’s cloud computing services, but the AI startup officially closed its $450 million Series C in June, and Google was named as a top investor in the funding round.

The race for AI has been on, but all eyes aren’t just on OpenAI and ChatGPT anymore, with various competitors popping up on the market. Anthropic’s decision to go with Amazon’s computer chips as opposed to the typical choice, Nvidia, also shows that there are alternatives in the AI market.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Amazon is kicking off its partnership with Anthropic with an initial investment of $1.25 billion, but the $4 billion cap will likely be hit over time.

Read More:

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]]> Loading Jessica Gelman Writers Guild of America Announces Tentative Agreement to End Strike https://boardroom.tv/wga-writers-strike-agreement/ Mon, 25 Sep 2023 14:40:22 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=78051 After 146 days, the WGA, AMPTP, and Hollywood studios have come to an agreement to end the writers strike. It appears that the writers strike is finally coming to an end. The Writers Guild

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]]> After 146 days, the WGA, AMPTP, and Hollywood studios have come to an agreement to end the writers strike.

It appears that the writers strike is finally coming to an end.

The Writers Guild of America has reached a tentative deal with Hollywood studios that the WGA says provides “meaningful gains” for its members.

The WGA, which represents approximately 11,500 screenwriters, has raised countless issues impacting the television and film industry. Such concerns included, but were not limited to, new minimum staffing formulas, generative AI for screenwriting, the right for its members to honor strikes and picket lines of other unions, streaming transparency, and viewership-based compensation.

Why Did the WGA Strike?

Though the strike may have seemed abrupt, it was anything but an out-of-the-blue scandal. With negotiations beginning on March 20 between the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), the sparked labor debates surrounding reasonable compensation, residuals, staffing requirements, and protections from artificial intelligence job interference began to catch fire.

The strike officially began on May 2 with 97.9% of the WGA voting to approve. While only 79% of eligible WGA members cast their ballots, 9,020 ruled in favor and 198 opposed.

“These results set a new record for both participation and the percentage of support in a strike authorization vote,” WGA said in a statement. “Our membership has spoken. You have expressed your collective strength, solidarity and the demand for meaningful change in overwhelming numbers. Armed with this demonstration of unity and resolve, we will continue to work at the negotiating table to achieve a fair contract for all writers.”

Back in 2017, guild members voted 96% in favor of a strike authorization, but did not move forward with the strike. Just ten years prior, 90% voted for a strike authorization, and the guild proceeded with striking.

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How Did It Escalate?

Almost immediately, the work stoppage kicked in and late-night shows including Saturday Night Live, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and The Late Show With Stephen Colbert halted production. Major Hollywood studios such as HBO, Apple, Hulu, Amazon Studios and ABC Signature began to suspend TV overall deals and first-look agreements amid the strike.

Other notable names in Hollywood — as well as public figures in politics, civil engagement, and entertainment — who demonstrated their support on the picket line include Tina Fey, Quinta Brunson, Pete Davidson, Flavor Flav, Susan Sarandon, Colin Farrell, Cynthia Nixon, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Mark Ruffalo, Jamie Lee Curtis, Kerry Washington, America Ferrera, Mariska Hargitay, Lil Wayne, Chris Pine, and Barack Obama.

“Hopefully, it’ll provide more opportunities,” Insecure star Issa Rae told Elle.com. “And that Black creators are being kept in mind. I remember the last strike [of 2007-2008], that was my biggest fear. [Because] post that strike, we just had a dearth of Black content.”

In support of her fellow creatives on strike, Rae has postponed the second season of her HBO show Rap Sh!t.

“I think what’s admirable about this strike and strikes of the past is that they have literally set the precedent for how the industry appreciates us monetarily. There are so many things that, even [in] the ’07 [and] ’08 strikes, they fought for, that they had the foresight to see, in terms of internet royalties that are obviously compounded now,” she said during a Teen Vogue interview in August. “What they’re fighting for now, we don’t even have the capacity to understand how much it’s going to impact our industry and how necessary it is. So I hope that people understand that this fight is necessary and it’s only for their benefit to be respected as writers and to make a living as writers in the future.”

What’s Next?

Excitement began to rise recently after word spread of Hollywood’s biggest CEOs, senior leaders, and executives appearing at negotiations. Those names included leaders from Disney (Bob Iger), Netflix (Ted Sarandos), NBCUniversal (Donna Langley), and Warner Bros. Discovery (David Zaslav).

The WGA has not yet disclosed the details of the agreement, which is still subject to a board vote before officially passing. It did, however, confirm in a press release that the deal has been reached and the organization feels it will benefit every writer in its membership.

Read More:

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]]> Loading Microsoft Announces New Products Following Major Data Leaks https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-microsoft-new-products-chatgpt-apple-google/ Sun, 24 Sep 2023 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=78043 The tech giant recently unveiled the Surface Laptop Studio 2, Surface Laptop Go 3, Surface Go 4, and Surface Hub 3, all hitting the market on Oct. 3.

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]]> Neuralink, the Elon Musk-owned biotech startup building brain implants, opened recruitment for its first human trial, even though an investigation revealed multiple animal deaths due to the company’s implants. If you haven’t looked into Musk’s biotech venture yet, now would be a good time to start learning.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Microsoft‘s new products and data leaks
  • Another lawsuit and new crypto token at ChatGPT
  • Apple tops list of most future-proof brands

Microsoft Announces New Products Following Major Data Leaks

Microsoft showcased the next generation of its Surface computers, the new Windows 11 operating system, and shared updates on its Microsoft 365 Copilot AI tool at an event in New York. The tech leader unveiled the Surface Laptop Studio 2, Surface Laptop Go 3, Surface Go 4, and Surface Hub 3, all of which will hit the market on Oct. 3. Microsoft also announced enterprise availability for Microsoft 35 Copilot, its supplemental AI tool that can embed with Word, Excel, and other productivity apps. The new offering will be available to businesses starting Nov. 1 and will cost $30 per person per month on top of the existing Microsoft 365 monthly fee.

Microsoft’s legacy product chief, Panos Panay, was missing from the event, and that’s because he announced his departure from the business on Monday. He is headed to Amazon to run the division that oversees Alexa and Echo devices. Panay was with Microsoft for 20 years and is most known for leading the Microsoft Windows team and helping push the tech firm’s Surface computers to market.

Microsoft is also one step closer to closing in on acquiring Activision Blizzard after Britain’s antitrust regulator signed off on the deal. Amid all these new updates this week, news of two separate data leaks at Microsoft took over top headlines, as well.

First, AI researchers at the Big Tech firm accidentally exposed 38 terabytes of sensitive data, including private keys and passwords, while trying to publish some other data on GitHub. Secondly, leaked court documents detailed Microsoft’s plans for an all-digital Xbox Series X refresh that is expected to hit the market next year. The cylindrical device has a new look, lower power usage, expanded internal storage, and no disc drive. The documents came from Microsoft’s trial with the FTC over the summer, but the commission said Microsoft accidentally uploaded these docs to the court itself, and someone got ahold of them.

OpenAI Hit With Another Lawsuit, Plus More Updates From ChatGPT

OpenAI was hit with another copyright infringement lawsuit filed by 17 authors claiming ChatGPT is using their copyrighted works without permission. Game of Thrones creator George R.R. Martin, novelist Josh Grisham, and My Sister’s Keeper author Jodi Picoult are some of the top names in the claim organized by the Authors Guild. OpenAI responded to the lawsuit and said it has been working with authors and creators to understand their concerns about AI and misconceptions around the scope of copyrighted works. The lawsuit comes after a string of similar complaints filed against OpenAI earlier this year.

Despite the legal troubles, OpenAI is rolling out new tech after unveiling Dall-E 3 earlier this week. The latest version of OpenAI’s text-to-image tool that leverages ChatGPT comes with more safeguards and an easier process for users to turn their ideas into images. The AI giant will allow creators to decide if they want their work to be a part of this new offering. The possibilities seem endless with ChatGPT, and an anonymous Ethereum developer proved that when he combined his code with ChatGPT’s API to create a real digital coin named AstroPepeX. ChatGPT suggested all aspects of the coin’s creation, down to its name and imagery. AstroPepeX is available for trading on Uniswap’s exchange, and the memecoin generated $12.9 million on its opening day.

Google is Making Strides With AI

It’s been a busy week for Google. The Big Tech firm is inching closer to releasing its enterprise conversational AI system named Gemini, Jon Victor at The Information reported. Gemini is a collection of large language models that can perform various tasks, and it will be available to businesses through Google Cloud. Google has reportedly given a group of companies access to an early version of the platform with select offerings.

Now, Gemini is completely different from Google’s consumer AI chatbot, Bard, which will stay on the market when Gemini launches. To continue expanding Bard, Google is connecting the AI chatbot to its flagship consumer services, including YouTube and Gmail. YouTube Shorts is getting a generative AI feature called Dream Screen, allowing users to create AI-generated videos and image backgrounds using text descriptions. This new feature comes nearly a month after Snapchat launched a generative AI feature called “Dreams” that allows users to turn photos into more imaginative backgrounds. Coincidence or?

X Shares More on Vision For ‘Everything App’ Plans

X CEO Linda Yaccarino and the platforms management team shared an overview of X’s latest developments and plans on its road to becoming the everything app, which is something I’m still trying to wrap my head around understanding. Yaccarino and her team laid out these updates at X‘s newly reformed Client Council earlier this week. Some of these features have already been released, but X highlighted long-form blog posts, video calls, creator subscriptions, and product and job listings. X still has some work to do on the in-app payments system mentioned, and I’ll be the first to tell you the mock-up images were not good.

Elsewhere in X’s sphere, in an interview with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Elon Musk teased new X Premium (formerly Twitter Blue) tiers to attract more users to the program. While some outlets report that Musk said X will be completely paywalled, the platform’s owner denied that he made such remarks.

  • As Apple rolls out an iPhone 12 software update to address radiation concerns, the Big Tech giant topped the 2023 FutureBrand Index as the most future-proof brand over top tech competitors like Samsung, Microsoft, Intel, and Amazon.
  • Amazon announced a slate of new software and devices at its annual fall event, including the addition of generative AI in its voice assistant Alexa.
  • Airbnb listings will get a verification symbol as the platform launches a process to shake out fake listings in the US, Canada, Australia, the UK, and France to start. Airbnb is also using an AI system to flag users who may be booking a property for a party.
  • As TikTok rolls out its new AI-generated content label, the social network will also use AI to detect AI content to slap a label on. The new update comes as TikTok is working to bring its employees back into the office, and the company is using an app to track attendance.
  • Square CEO Alyssa Henry will depart the Block-owned financial services platform on Oct. 2 following an outage that spanned two days and didn’t allow sellers to process payments. Block Co-founder Jack Dorsey will take over as CEO after Henry’s exit.
  • Run Tech Club Foundation hosted a gala celebrating the impact of sports and projects launched by athletes, entrepreneurs, and creatives. Angel City FC‘s Kara Nortman, Trevor McFedries of Friends With Benefits, and Saysh’s Wes Felix are some honorees awarded at the event.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS The Apple Event Unveiling: iPhone 15, Apple Watch Upgrades, and More https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-apple-event-iphone-15-apple-watch/ Sun, 17 Sep 2023 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=77719 Before jumping in today, I want to express my sincerest gratitude to everyone subscribing to, sharing, and faithfully reading Tech Talk. It means the world to me and the team at Boardroom. Let’s get to it.

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]]>
Before jumping in today, I want to express my sincerest gratitude to everyone subscribing to, sharing, and faithfully reading Tech Talk. It means the world to me and the team at Boardroom. Let’s get to it.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Apple unveils iPhone 15 and more
  • Cyberattack at MGM Resorts
  • Copyright infringement trouble at OpenAI and Meta

The iPhone 15 and New Apple Watch Models are on the Way

Apple unveiled its iPhone 15 line with USB-C charging ports and new Apple Watch devices at its fall product demo earlier this week. The Big Tech giant also shared updates on its sustainability plans, featuring a rare skit with Apple CEO Tim Cook and Academy Award-winning actress Octavia Spencer as Mother Nature. As expected, there will be an iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus, iPhone 15 Pro, and iPhone 15 Pro Max ranging in price from $799 to $1,199. The Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch SE, and Apple Watch Ultra are also on the way with a notable new feature coined the double-tap gesture, which allows users to tap their index finger and thumb together twice to perform most of the common Apple Watch actions.

Preorders for Apple’s newest products kick off on Sept. 22. Here’s a full recap of everything you need to know from Apple’s fall event.

More updates from Apple:

  • Apple extended its partnership with Qualcomm to obtain 5G modems from the wireless tech software company for at least the next three years.
  • A French watchdog is working to halt sales of iPhone 12 models, claiming that Apple breached European Union radiation exposure limits.
  • Michael Lewis’ book focused on FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried‘s life will hit shelves on Oct. 3, and Apple already acquired the rights to it for $5 million.

MGM Resorts Is Under Cyberattack in Las Vegas

A ransomware group using multiple code names is claiming responsibility for a cyberattack that forced MGM Resorts to shut down some of its internal and external systems sporadically throughout the week in Las Vegas. A Russia-based operation called ALPHV/BlackCat guided a native English-speaking group of hackers called Scattered Spide through the attack, which started with a 10-minute call to MGM’s help desk. While MGM said via tweets that its dining, lodging, entertainment, and gaming offerings were operational throughout the week, casino goers reported that slot machines, payment systems, including ATMs, sports books, and other tech-enabled offerings, were down.

It gets worse. Caesars Entertainment reported on Thursday that it was also hit with a cyberattack at the hands of the same cyber attackers. The ransomware group told Reuters via Telegram that it stole six terabytes of data from MGM and Caesars. Caesar claims that the attack did not hault its casino and online operations, and maybe that’s because the entertainment giant paid a $15 million ransom to the group, CNBC reported.

Big Tech CEOs Head to Capitol Hill for AI Insight Forum

On Wednesday, the Senate held a three-hour closed meeting with Big Tech CEOs, including X’s Elon Musk, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, Microsoft’s Bill Gates, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Google’s Sundar Pichai, and many others, to discuss artificial intelligence regulation efforts. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., is calling the meetup the AI Insight Forum, with more sessions scheduled throughout the fall. The tech leaders discussed civilizational risks, transparency with AI systems, how AI can impact economic problems, and much more.

The inaugural forum comes as eight tech companies, including Adobe, IBM, and Nvidia, committed to following a standard of safety and security rules for their AI tools and systems. Meta, Google, OpenAI, Salesforce, and Stability AI have made similar commitments to the White House, which is also expected to release an AI-focused executive order before the year is over.

Chipmaker Arm Debuts on the Public Market With $65B Valuation

British software design company and computer chipmaker Arm made its public debut on the stock market with a boost to a $65 billion valuation. The chip design company hit the Nasdaq at a $54.5 billion valuation before its market cap jumped up $11 billion. Arm’s stock soared as much as 25% to $63.59 on opening day on Thursday. Now, the company’s shares are trading at around $60.75 at the time of this writing. Forbes marked Arm’s public debut as the largest IPO in 22 months. SoftBank maintains its 90% stake in the company.

I’ll be writing a breakdown soon of everything you need to know about Arm, a tech giant you want to know in the AI developmental race. As I prep to write this, I wonder if Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang regrets backing out of a $40 billion deal to buy Arm in September 2020. The companies had to fight regulatory concerns, but now, Arm is primed to be a worthy competitor for Nvidia in the chip-making market.

  • Another group of writers is suing OpenAI for copyright infringement, claiming that the AI leader illegally used their work to train the AI models powering ChatGPT.
  • While OpenAI defends its flagship platform, Meta is building data centers to create an open-source AI model that could launch as early as next year. The big tech giant is building a system that could rival the model that OpenAI built to power ChatGPT.
  • Binance.US lost its CEO. Brian Shroder has departed the crypto exchange and more than 100 jobs were cut. The Wall Street Journal reported that top legal and risk executives have also stepped down from their roles following mass job cuts at the company.
  • TikTok and Billboard announced a new weekly music charting system coined TikTok Billboard Top 50, which will track the most popular songs on the social network in the US. This week, Irish Data Protection Commission hit TikTokwith a $367 million fine, which alleges that the platform violated data privacy laws and mishandled children’s data.
  • It’s been a rough week for Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher. Stoner Cats, an animated web series starring the couple, agreed to pay a $1 million fine to the SEC for NFT sales, which the commission deemed as unregistered security offerings. The crypto crackdown isn’t just happening in the US, though, since the CEO behind Turkey-based defunct Thodex received an 11,000-year prison sentence for his involvement in the crypto exchange’s collapse in 2021.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS IN OTHER NEWS (2) Web3 & Tech VC Roundup: Databricks Hits $43B Valuation https://boardroom.tv/web3-tech-vc-roundup-databricks-hits-43b-valuation/ Sat, 16 Sep 2023 15:31:32 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=77776 Boardroom’s latest roundup of Web3 and tech venture capital deals includes new investments for Mighty Buildings, Animoca Brands, Druid, and more. Data and AI company Databricks closed a $500 million investment round, boosting its

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]]> Boardroom’s latest roundup of Web3 and tech venture capital deals includes new investments for Mighty Buildings, Animoca Brands, Druid, and more.

Data and AI company Databricks closed a $500 million investment round, boosting its valuation up to $43 billion.

T. Rowe Price Associates led Databricks’ Series I investment round, which also included new investors Nvidia and Capital One Ventures. Existing investors, including Andreessen Horowitz, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Tiger Global, and more, also participated in the round.

Founded in 2103, Databricks is an enterprise software developer building a cloud platform to simplify the data management process. The company’s flagship platform, Databricks Lakehouse, brings data, analytics, and AI under one platform for companies to manage and track enterprise data insights.

“The commitment from long-term focused strategic and financial partners reflects Databricks’ continued momentum, the rapid customer adoption of the Databricks Lakehouse, and the success customers are seeing from moving to a unified data and AI platform,” Databricks co-founder and CEO Ali Ghodsi said in a statement. “Databricks and NVIDIA are building transformative AI technology, and we’re excited about the business value and innovation we can bring to our customers.”

Here’s a recap of more Web3 and Tech VC deals closed in recent weeks.

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Mighty Buildings: $52M to Build 3D-Printed Homes

Mighty Buildings, a tech startup developing prefabricated and environmentally friendly homes, closed a $52 million funding round co-led by Waed Ventures and Bold Capital. Khosla Ventures also participated in the round. The new raise values Mighty Buildings at about $350 million.

Founded in 2017, Might Buildings is on a mission to automate the home construction process by leveraging 3D printing. Prices for the company’s homes start at $115,000.

Mighty Buildings will use the new funding to expand in North America and the Middle East, with a larger focus on expanding more into Saudi Arabia. Some of the funding will also go toward launching a new-age modular homebuilding kit.

Animoca Brands: $20M to Build The Mocaverse

Animoca Brands raised $20 million to build out its new metaverse project called the Mocaverse. CMCC Global led the funding round, which also included investments from a group of investors, including Kingsway Capital, Liberty City Ventures, and GameFi Ventures.

The new project includes a collection of 8,888 NFTs linked to exclusive access to the platform. The blockchain and gaming leader is building the Mocaverse to bring its ecosystem under one umbrella. Mocaverse holders will maintain their identities using a Moca ID, which can also be used to authenticate holders’ blockchain identities.

With this fresh raise, Animoca also expanded in the Japanese market and acquired six unnamed enterprises.

More Notable Investments

  • Google is investing $20 million into building a responsible AI fund focused on gathering research on AI’s impact on society.
  • Defense AI startup Helsing raised a $223 million Series B, becoming one of Europe’s larges AI companies.
  • Europe-based Druid closed a $30 million Series B to build out its conversational business applications that can integrate with ChatGPT.
  • Anna Wilding, a photographer best known for capturing former president Barack Obama, launched a production company and is working on raising $50 million for a content fund.
  • AI networking chipmaker Enfabrica raised $125 million in Series B funding from Nvidia, Liberty Global Ventures, Atreides Management and others.
  • Pahdo Labs raised $15 million to create an anime-style game and user-generated content platform.
  • Cendana Capital raised $470 million to invest in and support seed-stage managers.
  • Battery recycling company Ascend Elements closed a $542 million Series D led by Decarbonization Partners.
  • Rascal Games closed a $4.2 million funding round to build a social-focused multiplayer adventure game dubbed Project Wayward.
  • India-based fintech company Perfios, a developer of credit underwriting solutions, raised $229 million to expand into Northern American and European markets.
  • Imbue‘s valuation hit $1 billion after the AI startup closed a $200 million funding round led by Astera Institute, NVIDIA, Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt, Notion co-founder Simon Last, and other investors.

Want More Tech News?

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]]> Loading Reddit Cole Anthony & Crystal McCrary McGuire Want to Make Your Kid into an NBA Player https://boardroom.tv/cole-anthony-crystal-mccrary-mcguire-gameup-nba/ Tue, 12 Sep 2023 14:45:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=77351 Orlando Magic point guard Cole Anthony and his mother, Crystal McCrary McGuire, are scaling the youth basketball ecosystem through an app. Here’s what they hope GameUp can bring to the industry.

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]]>

Cole Anthony & Crystal McCrary McGuire
Want to Make Your Kid an NBA Player

Published: 09/12/23
By Michelai Graham

Orlando Magic point guard Cole Anthony and his mother, Crystal McCrary McGuire, are scaling the youth basketball ecosystem through an app. Here’s what they hope GameUp can bring to the industry.

There is no easy path to success in sports, but Orlando Magic point guard Cole Anthony and his mother, Crystal McCrary McGuire, are looking to ease the burden. The pair have created a mobile app to help clear the way for youth basketball players with plans to expand to other sports soon.

“The ultimate goal of GameUp, beyond matching kids and parents with teams, is to be the youth basketball destination for all things basketball,” McCrary McGuire told Boardroom. “We’re looking at GameUp to be the spot for parents to come to get everything they need on the basketball front.” 

Anthony’s own winding road toward becoming a first-round NBA Draft pick in 2020 was the main inspiration behind developing GameUp, the parent resource app designed to transform youth basketball development. McCrary McGuire — a New York Times Best-Selling author and filmmaker known for her work in media and Nickelodeon’s docuseries Little Ballers — was the perfect person to build the app alongside Anthony since she had to navigate the youth sports landscape from the parent’s perspective.

Prior to GameUp’s Sept. 10 launch, Boardroom sat down with the mother-son duo to discuss building a business, how Anthony’s experience shaped GameUp’s mission, their thoughts on working together, an unlikely transition into tech entrepreneurship, and more.

Their Matchup 

McCrary McGuire knows that navigating the youth basketball ecosystem in the tri-state area is not easy. She learned early on that it is complex, and programs are warped with disorganization and unreliability. 

She saw the need for parents to have more resources in one place. In 2022, parents spent over $30 billion alone on youth sports and extracurricular activities in the US. GameUp’s platform aims to give them a full picture of what their child needs, identify the best teams for them to play on, and provide ways to maximize the return for the expenses they dish out. The app is not meant to solve every pain point in the youth sports ecosystem, but to smooth the process. 

McCrary McGuire started her entrepreneurial career after leaving her law firm to write books and create TV shows. She’s been a basketball mom to her three kids throughout her career, putting them through various basketball programs and teams at all levels. Through her experience, McCrary McGuire said she became that mom that all other parents and families came to for advice on which programs and teams to invest in. McCrary McGuire eventually decided it was time to aggregate this information and put it into an app. 

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“I love collaborating. So many of my businesses have been collaboration,” she said. “It’s so gratifying to actually be able to have an endeavor with my son.”

Just as Anthony leans on McCrary McGuire for her experience as a parent, she relies on him to bring the player’s perspective. Anthony said working with his mother and learning the tech space together has been great. 

“She’s extremely smart, one of my best friends, and just has a phenomenal mind,” Anthony said about his mother. “On this entrepreneurial side, she just thinks about stuff that I wouldn’t even think about. [I’m] just super glad to be working with her on this side of things and enjoying the process.”

McCrary McGuire and Anthony financially seeded GameUp themselves and were involved in the design process every step of the way. Anthony said basketball is his top priority, and with the next NBA season around the corner, he knows GameUp is in good hands as his mom runs the show while he’s on the court. 

“I’m from Detroit, so I’ve had a whole different hustling experience than he has in this entrepreneurial space,” McCrary McGuire said.

Anthony considers himself more laidback and cool, while his mom can sometimes be the opposite. Suffice it to say they balance each other.

“I tell her when she’s bugging [and] she tells me when I’m bugging,” Anthony jokingly said. “I think it’s a lot more fun working with people you like. I like her. So we can get some work done [and] I’m cool with that.”

Anthony said he’s been itching to get back in touch with the youth basketball world since he moved on from it, so between building GameUp and watching his little brothers play in different leagues, he’s locked in on it for years to come.

GameUp’s Mission and Future 

GameUp is on a mission to reshape how families navigate the youth sports world. Technology is already evolving the sports industry, and with GameUp, Anthony and McCrary McGuire hope to stay ahead of the curve and bring tech more into the fold. 

Some of GameUp’s core features include team and personalized matching processes, a database of developmental programs and trainers, a concierge service that guides users through the platform, and more. The platform leverages artificial intelligence tech in its matching process and aggregates a full listing of youth programs and teams across the New York area from crowdsourcing information. Anthony and McCrary McGuire hired developers to build a one-stop-shop solution, which McCrary McGuire stamps as their commitment to empowering the next generation of athletes, starting with basketball. 

GameUp officially launched in the tri-state area Sunday with an event in Harlem called City Assist that celebrates youth basketball. Empire Invitational, GameUp, and Anthony’s 50 Ways Foundation hosted City Assist to bring together young ballers and their families, basketball enthusiasts, emerging talent, and other community members for a day of skills clinics, games, basketball program introductions, and information surrounding scholarship opportunities. 

Now that GameUp is live, McCrary McGuire and Anthony are focused on bringing parents and youth athletes onto the platform. The app’s first regional expansion is coming in the first quarter of 2024. Users can also expect to see baseball, football, and other sports on GameUp in the near future.

“There is never a shortage of parent resources in the youth sports space, which is a continually growing business in the United States of America,” McCrary McGuire said. “We see this as a market and a niche. There’s nothing like this in the marketplace that actually helps parents get matched with teams for their kids. We see this as the perfect model to expand to other parents that need it worldwide.”

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]]> Cole Anthony Wants To Make Your Kid An NBA Player Cole Anthony and his mother, Crystal McCrary McGuire, are scaling the youth basketball ecosystem through their app, GameUp. artificial intelligence,Cole Anthony,Orlando Magic,Tech,youth sports,cole anthony ca4 Meta Is Developing an AI System to Rival OpenAI https://boardroom.tv/meta-artificial-intelligence-open-ai/ Mon, 11 Sep 2023 21:36:04 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=77504 Meta is building data centers to create an open-source artificial intelligence model that could launch as early as next year.

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]]> Meta is building data centers to create an open-source artificial intelligence model that could launch as early as next year.

Meta put its ambitious metaverse plans on ice this year, and now we know why. The Big Tech giant is developing an artificial intelligence system that could rival the model that OpenAI built to power ChatGPT, the Wall Street Journal reported.

This new development comes after Meta announced the release of Llama 2 alongside Microsoft in July. Llama 2 is the tech giant’s open-source large language AI model, free for research and commercial use. The Facebook and Instagram parent company wants to build something even more powerful than that. WSJ reports that Meta is developing an open-source AI system that could launch as early as next year. The new tech would allow companies to build AI tools that could produce various content, such as high-level text and analyses.

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WSJ got the scoop from a couple of sources close to Meta, who also said the tech firm is building data centers that can handle the significant amount of computing power it will need to create a new AI system. The data centers will be equipped with Nvidia’s H100 semiconductor chips, AI-enabled chips tailored for generative AI outputs due to their quick processing power. Training on Meta’s new large language model could start in early 2024, ahead of its release. The AI system was built by a special core team that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg put together earlier this year.

Despite partnering with Microsoft to develop Llama 2 — which seems a bit conflicting since Microsoft is also heavily invested in OpenAI — Meta plans to develop and push out the new AI system on its own. Meta is hoping to build a system as powerful as OpenAI’s ChatGPT-4, but by the time it releases next year, we can guess that OpenAI will drop a few more new models. This doesn’t necessarily mean Meta is behind the wave, but it definitely has some competition in the generative AI arena.

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]]> Loading Happy 25th Birthday, Google https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-google-25th-birthday/ Sun, 10 Sep 2023 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=77240 As Google hits a milestone, let's look back at all the company has accomplished and what's in store for the next 25 years.

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]]> TIME published its inaugural TIME100 Most Influential People in AI, which includes big names such as Sam Altman, Elon Musk, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. At first glance, the list lacks diversity, but that’s no surprise in the tech industry.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Happy 25th birthday, Google!
  • Ghostwriter is back with another AI hit
  • TikTok Music expands internationally

Google Celebrates a Quarter Century in Business

Google was founded on Sept. 4, 1998, marking 25 years in business. I don’t know about y’all, but I feel like Google has been around much longer than that because it’s so deeply ingrained in my daily digital interactions. But that’s the point. Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin set a big goal to organize the world’s information and make it more accessible and searchable online. They did just that, plus much more over the years, but search is still at the nucleus of the Big Tech company’s mission. Google has expanded with 15 core products, including YouTube, Google Maps, and Gmail, which will turn 20 years old next year.

So, what does Google have planned for the next 25 years? Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet, detailed the company’s hopes and dreams in a blog post, which mainly includes finding its lane in the artificial intelligence landscape. Speaking of AI, the Big Tech giant will soon require political advertisers to disclose whether AI was used in the development of their ads.

Pichai said in the blog post that “AI will be the biggest technological shift we see in our lifetimes,” and I have to say I agree. What do you think?

Ghostwriter Drops AI-powered Travis Scott & 21 Song While Chasing a Grammy

Anonymous artist Ghostwriter told the New York Times that they are chasing a few Grammy Awards for their viral AI-generated song “Heart on My Sleeve” featuring Drake and The Weeknd’s vocals, even though the song was pulled from streaming platforms for copyright infringement claims. There have been conflicting reports about whether this is even possible, so Harvey Jay Mason Jr., CEO of The Recording Academy, which produces the Grammy Awards, shut all rumors down and said this version of “Heart on My Sleeve” is not eligible for an award. While a human wrote the song, the vocals were illegally used, and the song is not commercially available.

Ghostwriter submitted “Heart on My Sleeve” in the Best Rap Song and Song of the Year categories. The anonymous artist also got busy this week with the drop of a new track called “Whiplash” featuring Travis Scott and 21 Savage’s AI-generated vocals. This time, though, Ghostwriter is calling on the artists to collaborate on an official release and promising they will get the royalties.

Chipmaker Arm’s Valuation Up to $52B Following Apple Deal

British software design company and computer chipmaker Arm inked a deal with Apple that will run through 2040 and “beyond” to license its chip tech to the Big Tech firm for the foreseeable future. The details of the deal were laid out in Arm’s initial public offering documents filed on Tuesday. The Softbank-backed company hopes to enter the public market with a $52 billion valuation, marking the largest tech IPO in the US this year. Arm is a leader in developing mobile phone chips, which Apple already uses across some of its products, including the iPhone. The chipmaker said roughly 250 billion of its chips have shipped to power smartphones since it started developing them decades ago.

Along with Apple, Google, Nvidia, Samsung, Intel, and other notable tech companies have expressed interest in buying Arm shares as part of its public offering in the coming weeks.

FTC Inches Closer to Filing Amazon Antitrust Lawsuit

The US Federal Trade Commission could file an antitrust lawsuit against Amazon as soon as later this month after the e-commerce giant failed to offer concessions to settle claims in closed meetings last month. The FTC is most concerned about Fulfillment by Amazon, the company’s logistics program, and third-party sellers’ prices since regulators believe Amazon favors its own products on its platform over outside sellers. If filed, the lawsuit could force Amazon to break up some of its business practices.

This isn’t the first time the FTC is going after Amazon. The Big Tech firm agreed to pay $25 million in May to settle claims that Alexa devices illegally collected children’s data. The FTC turned right around in June and sued Amazon again, this time claiming that the e-commerce giant deceived customers into signing up for its Prime subscription service and making it hard for them to cancel it.

In Other News: Tik Tok Music, COD Brings in AI Cops, & More

  • TikTok is slowly but surely clearing the way for TikTok Music to enter the US market after retiring its Resso brand in Indonesia and Brazil in favor of its flagship music streaming platform. To jog your memory, TikTok filed a patent in the US for TikTok Music in May 2022.
  • An AI-powered moderator dressed up as a robot cop will debut with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 to identify and flag toxic speech such as hate speech, discriminatory language, harassment, sexism, and bullying in multiplayer games. The moderator won’t flag specific words but will instead focus on the intent behind a player’s communication.
  • Meta is getting rid of Facebook’s News tab in the UK, France, and Germany in early December, though it will still honor its existing news deals with publishers in those areas until they expire. To soothe regulators’ worries, the Big Tech giant is also considering offering paid versions of Facebook and Instagram in the European Union so users can avoid advertisements.
  • OpenAI CEO Sam Altman received the first Indonesian golden visa, which grants him access to the country for 10 years with priority security screening, longer stays, a smoother entry and exit process, and more. Altman got the honor as Indonesia seeks to draw foreign investors with positive international reputations.
  • Former FTX executive Ryan Salame pleaded guilty to fraud charges and agreed to forfeit more than $1.5 billion. He is the fourth executive from the fallen crypto exchange to plead guilty, while disgraced former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Friedm will go on trial on Oct. 3 to fight wire fraud and securities fraud charges.
  • A software update caused a slowdown in United Airlines‘ tech systems, resulting in the Federal Aviation Administration grounding the airline’s departures for as long as an hour earlier this week. United is still investigating the incident.

Warner Music Central Europe signed a record deal with AI pop singer Noonoouri, and while this is a first for Warner Music, I’m going to bet that we won’t see a deal of this nature in the US anytime soon.

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]]> IN OTHER NEWS BET OF THE WEEK The NFL’s Artificial Intelligence Era Kicks Off https://boardroom.tv/nfl-ai-technology-ian-trombetta/ Sat, 09 Sep 2023 16:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=77195 Boardroom exclusively spoke with Ian Trombetta, the league’s Senior VP of Social, Influencer, and Content Marketing about the growing relationship between the NFL and emerging tech. While its general rules largely remain the same,

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]]> Boardroom exclusively spoke with Ian Trombetta, the league’s Senior VP of Social, Influencer, and Content Marketing about the growing relationship between the NFL and emerging tech.

While its general rules largely remain the same, it only takes a quick glance to understand that football doesn’t resemble the sport that first played organized contests in the late 1800s. Today, however, the NFL looks different than it did even a decade ago, particularly as it relates to how fans consume the game.

As technological advancements redefine what’s possible, all corners of the culture and entertainment economy are doing their best to stay at the top of trends while balancing the need to stay true to what drew us all to them in the first place. As the most profitable sports league on earth, the NFL is among the organizations making significant investments of late in emerging tech to find more ways to engage a truly global audience.

Notably, at this year’s NFL Draft in Kansas City, the league partnered with up-and-coming AI artist Adrian Curiel to create first-of-its-kind artificial intelligence-powered artwork for incoming rookies based around the new cities they call home.​​ As draftees graced the league’s new and immersive LED stage, they were photographed as part of a complex, AI-driven process.

The result was a series of bespoke art pieces that established a powerful visual connection from player to city to fans mere seconds after each athlete’s name was called.

“AI is my visual co-pilot, a tool that supercharges my creative thinking and helps me see outside the box,” Curiel said of the activation. “It is a unique medium because I can create shock value on a dime, but using AI to produce commercial work, you need to have your taste and style dialed in. It’s like taming a wild horse — full of boundless energy and potential, yet needing direction to achieve a result that fits the vibe.”

“What truly distinguishes AI for me is the depth it adds to my storytelling,” Curiel continued. “As a creative, I’m both an artist and a narrator. AI empowers me to blend these roles seamlessly, adding dimension to help shape the story I’m trying to tell. Sometimes, it feels like AI is as eager to bring my imagination to life as I am.”

In-house, the project was led by Ian Trombetta, the NFL’s Senior VP of Social, Influencer, and Content Marketing. He spoke to Boardroom about the opportunities of the NFL AI era, the story behind the decision to go big on emerging technology, and how the league intends to put it all together to maintain its prime positioning as a business and a content brand in the years to come.

VINCIANE NGOMSI: As we transition into a more digital-heavy society, what was the motivation when you were brainstorming how to bring AI technology to a sports audience?

IAN TROMBETTA: We see technology as really fundamental to what we do, both from a marketing perspective and just overall fan development. We think it’s really important that we continue to push, whether that’s on existing social platforms like Meta or X, Snapchat, etc. We always want to be kind of at the forefront of what’s happening from a technology perspective to help engage, especially younger fans.

With AI, there are just so many opportunities that are springing up everywhere and enabling us to deepen the storytelling, but also to reach more fans in ways that we hadn’t been able to before. The way that we’re really thinking about AI across our team is experiential learning. It offers a lot of advantages and we want to be really sensitive to the idea that we’re taking the learnings in and continuing to provide safeguards where we need to and not getting too far out over our skillset.

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VN: It’s unfair to call AI “trendy,” but for right now, it’s a seriously trending topic and has certainly piqued the interest of people across the country and globally. How do you determine the attention the league gives to something that risks the chances of being irrelevant in a matter of years?

IT: I think if you think about it, last year it seemed like everyone was talking metaverse. This year, it seems like AI has now taken over the sort of lexicon of what marketers especially are talking about. For us, we want to be present in this space that is emerging certainly, but we also have a very scaled operation. We can’t just turn the keys over and forget about the things that our fans are engaging with day-to-day. I have a gaming background, and that’s something I think we were rightfully cautious about in terms of some of the things that we were willing to do and not do.

I think a smart approach is that we’re going to test and learn and we’re going to continue to be clear about what we think are the opportunities, especially internally with our stakeholders here at the league. Hopefully, it’s something that our fans enjoy and we continue to expand over time.

VN: Do you credit your gaming background to helping you better understand AI, the metaverse, etc.?

IT: I think it helps expose you to things that really enable this idea of testing quickly and driving storytelling through emerging platforms and not being afraid to take some calculated risks — and gaming really is about that. You have to move forward, you have to progress the game year over year, and the storytelling has got to be attached to that. I think it does a couple of things in that you’re becoming comfortable with technology and the way consumers are maybe interacting with your content in different ways. Two, it’s also deepening the character storytelling in many cases, and the same thing here with our helmets-off strategy. We’re really trying to find new ways to communicate not just who the players are on the field, but particularly off the field.

VN: Regarding everything the NFL has accomplished in the AI space so far, how has the feedback been?

IT: Honestly, it’s been super positive. I mean, our future is so bright here at the NFL. What’s been really nice to see is just the way fans of all demographics are responding to the game. It’s moving in the right direction. We’re getting younger, we’re getting more diverse, [and] we’re also maintaining some of our older fans as well.

If you think about the opportunities for us to now grow the game with flag football and communicate with young girls, especially to have them now participating in the game in ways they hadn’t before and also internationally, there’s a tremendous opportunity. I would say it’s really exciting to be with a very well-established league, but we’re certainly not complacent, and we see opportunity everywhere in terms of ways in which we can grow the game and connect it to communities.

VN: In the five years you’ve been with the league, what has been the most rewarding part of implementing these AI and emerging tech efforts?

IT: I couldn’t imagine a better scenario for me being able to work in sports and at the NFL. That alone is a dream job, but I think going beyond that, it’s working across content marketing. From advertising to our digital products to some of our NFL Network shows, to getting into social media where we’ve got millions of fans who are clamoring for the next piece of news. It really goes back to benefiting the fans, bringing communities together, and building excitement for the game that we all love. It’s super exciting given the impact that football has, particularly in this country.

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]]> Loading TikTok Tennis & Tech: Inside IBM’s Artificial Intelligence Evolution at the 2023 US Open https://boardroom.tv/ibm-ai-2023-open-tennis/ Thu, 31 Aug 2023 15:52:59 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=76818 As it celebrates more than 30 years partnering with the USTA, learn more about the AI-powered commentary and analysis features IBM rolled out for the final Grand Slam of the year. To enhance the

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]]> As it celebrates more than 30 years partnering with the USTA, learn more about the AI-powered commentary and analysis features IBM rolled out for the final Grand Slam of the year.

To enhance the digital experience at the 2023 US Open Tennis Championships in New York, IBM announced new artificial intelligence-powered features for the more than 10 million fans who use USOpen.org and the US Open app.

The tech giant’s work at the annual tennis event at Flushing Meadows has come a long way since USOpen.org first launched in 1995, followed by the tournament’s mobile app launch in 2009, and IBM has been there the whole way through as the official technology partner of the United States Tennis Association (USTA) for more than 30 years. For 2023, IBM debuted generative AI spoken commentary and AI Draw Analysis to US Open digital platforms.

The company first introduced similar AI-powered offerings at the 2023 Masters in April and has since updated these features to offer the same across tennis to bring fans closer to the game.

“Many people will say, ‘Why are you guys sponsoring a tennis tournament or doing technology at a tennis tournament?’ The reality is it’s a business just like every other business on the planet,” Noah Syken, IBM’s VP of Sports and Entertainment Partnerships, said during an exclusive media roundtable. “We think of these relationships as delivering mission-critical capabilities.”

I was fortunate enough to tour the IBM Data Center at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center during the US Open this year. Joining the tour were Syken; Monica Ellingson, who leads the Sports and Entertainment Practice within the IBM iX studio; Brian Ryerson, USTA senior director of digital strategy; Maria Sharapova, 2006 US Open champion; and more IBM experts.

Here’s what Boardroom learned about IBM’s new digital offerings at the US Open.

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IBM at the US Open

IBM has long-standing partnerships with The Masters, Wimbledon, and the US Open to bring emerging tech to the forefront of these major events and enhance the fan experience. This includes providing player data, rankings, predictions, highlights, and, most recently, AI-powered commentary. IBM’s data operations behind these annual events are massive and require significant computing power in order to deliver experiences almost in real time.

Each year, IBM works closely with its partners to add new layers to these evolving digital experiences, capturing and analyzing millions of data points to power them — IBM’s data center at the US Open collects 56 data points alone for every single point of a tennis match. The company operates across a hybrid cloud infrastructure in a bunker-like room on the bottom level of Arthur Ashe Stadium staffed by a team of experts and endless computer screens streaming live match feeds.

AI on the Court

One of IBM’s newest offerings at the US Open includes an AI commentary feature powered by IBM watsonx, their flagship AI and data platform that automates the production of detailed audio narration and caption that pair with highlight videos.

IBM worked closely with the USTA to build and train AI models primed to output true tennis language. During the media tour, Ellingson said AI commentary is produced within 10 to 15 minutes for all match highlights distributed across the US Open’s digital platforms. Each highlight is queued up with AI commentary and captions, is matched with accompanying graphics, and goes through a final spot check before hitting the platform. IBM leaders said it used to take hours to pull this content together, and only for select highlights.

Now, all of that has changed.

Unlike some sports commentators you’re liable to witness on television, IBM’s AI commentary is designed to be fully unbiased, sticking purely to the facts of what’s happening on the court. Still, Ellingson noted that IBM isn’t working to phase out the iconic voices fans are familiar with, but is rather focused on making commentary more accessible across all matches. Most importantly, IBM is solving a “problem of scale,” Ellingson said, in providing commentary on highlights that otherwise wouldn’t have them.

“The AI Commentary feature was developed based on the watsonx enterprise-ready data and AI platform, designed to enable businesses to accelerate generative AI work by leveraging foundation models and machine learning in one place, with their own data,” Jonathan Adashek, SVP of Communications and Marketing at IBM, said in a press release.

IBM also brought back its Power Index this year, a platform that uses advanced data analytics and AI to analyze recent player performance metrics and expert opinion to create a mass rankings index. IBM’s Power Index varies from ATP and WTA rankings because it follows player momentum from every tournament to every match, while those traditional global rankings only account for 52 weeks of data at a time.

Image via IBM

IBM launched its Power Index to provide a new perspective on the sport while leveraging AI to pull in data and information from various sources, including the news. For instance, IBM’s Power Index puts Coco Gauff at No. 1, while her WTA Ranking is #6. Similarly, Ons Jabeur is ranked No. 2 on the index, while her WTA rank is No. 5. On the men’s side, Novak Djokovic is ranked No. 1 in the Power Index and No. 2 in the ATP Ranking. Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner take over the top three at No. 2 and No. 3 on the index, respectively, while Alcaraz is No. 1 on the ATP Raking and Sinner is sixth.

Also powered by IBM watsonx, IBM’s AI Draw Analysis feature leverages data from the IBM Power Index and Likelihood to Win features to determine the level of advantage or disadvantage for all players in the singles draw across all seventeen courts. This feature leverages both structured and unstructured data that will change as the tournament progresses and players’ matchups are set. The IBM AI Draw Analysis is updated daily through the tournament, which runs through Sept. 10.

“Over the process of the US Open Tournament, we will process 2.7 million individual pieces of match data. Then, there’s unstructured data,” Ellingson said during the press tour. “We process millions of articles, blogs, [and] subtitles from a variety of different sports-related content sources, and we use AI to extract those insights.”

Image via IBM

One of the most notable new AI-powered features is IBM’s projected paths to the finals for each player. Users can view players’ respective likelihoods to advance past each round and their favorability to win against potential opponents.

Here’s a look at projected paths to finals for three top players on the tournament’s men’s and women’s sides, provided by IBM’s PR team:

  • Women’s draw: Jabeur has a favorable draw leading up to the quarterfinals, which lines up with the IBM Draw Analysis, where she’s ranked No. 2. However, the competition gets tougher in the quarterfinals. Similarly, Jessica Pegula is predicted to have a relatively easy path to the semifinals, with expected victories in all rounds leading up to that point, including a win over Marketa Vondrousova. However, she may face Jabeur in the semifinals and potentially Gauff in the finals.
  • Men’s draw: Djokovic has the most favorable draw to reach the finals, while Alcaraz faces a more challenging path to the final. He might have to compete against players like Sinner and Alexander Zverev, and then potentially Daniil Medvedev to reach the final.

The Power Index may have it right, but IBM knows there are always surprises and upsets at the US Open, so the tech giant leveraged its index data to create a pre-tournament list of players to keep an eye on. IBM’s Ones to Watch list calls out 10 players that are five or more positions higher on the Power Index than their current tour rank — from where the tournament stands at the time of writing, all of these players are still in the running. Here’s IBM’s Ones to Watch:

Women’s draw

  • Elina Svitolina
  • Linda Noskova
  • Elisabetta Cocciaretto
  • Liudmila Samsonova
  • Quinwen Zheng

Men’s draw

  • Max Purcell
  • Andy Murray
  • Grigor Dimitrov
  • Alex de Minaur
  • Tommy Paul

The Future of AI Tech in Sports

Tennis icon Maria Sharapova joined the press on the tour to talk about how AI tech, and emerging technology in general, is transforming access to sports data. She spoke about how different her game could have been if she and her team were able to comb through player data ahead of matches. IBM execs explained that today, athletes and coaches can not just access richer, more detailed data if they want to dive deeper into the numbers on their opponents, but can do so essentially in real time.

Sharapova, who competed professionally from 2001 to 2020, also touched on the overall digital transformation of the sport, noting an evolution far beyond the days in which fans couldn’t even watch practices. Now, these sessions are streamed online.

“I remember speaking to my manager on whether I needed a social media account at the time,” the career Grand Slam winner said. “There is a part of sport, and tennis in particular, where it’s down to heritage and tradition. Now, I’m on the other side from being a player to being a fan and loving the game so much and wanting more access than just the player’s plating the hour-and-a-half or two-hour match. By having these tools in front of me, it’s such a quick way of accessing information and just makes it a better experience.”

One thing IBM is working on mitigating in the months and years to come? How AI models “hallucinate” and drift from the tasks they should focus on. The company can do this by making sure input prompts are as clear and consistent as possible across the board and making sure data sets are updated often in order to correct errors. For instance, if there is a gap in information within a data set, the AI model only knows to pull from what it has, so it may come up with some output that doesn’t align with what a user is looking for. For this reason, IBM will continue to have human experts fact-checking and keeping up quality control as much as possible.

The tech company created its AI commentary platform specifically to celebrate the game and players, so you won’t find negative commentary here, but that doesn’t mean the goal is to sound emotionless or mechanical. In terms of evolving this feature, Ellingson said there are opportunities to bring celebrity personalities and tennis voices to the platform, and these efforts are currently in the works. Imagine watching tennis highlights voiced by your favorite tennis players — wouldn’t that be the dream? Sharapova joked that she’d be down to help train IBM’s platform on her voice for commentary purposes, all from her couch.

Tyler Sidell, Technical Program Director at IBM, said during the tour that the company is also working with the USTA to expand AI commentary and captions to more languages. Ellingson said it would be exciting if IBM could expand it into some sort of radio-style program to help fans follow along with what’s happening across all US Open courts simultaneously without even having to watch individual highlights.

Today, IBM’s AI-powered features are only available within the platforms they build in partnership with the sporting event organizers they work with. This means we may not see IBM’s cutting-edge offerings at the NFL or NBA Playoffs this season, but leaders at the company said it may be possible one day as they work to expand these sought-after features.

There is clearly a lot of wiggle room to fit AI tech into the growing sports landscape, especially at scale. It’s inevitable that similar tech and fan engagement offerings will be introduced across all sports, but for now, the US Open app and USOpen.org provide an intriguing glimpse into the future of fan engagement.

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]]> IBM AI Tech Levels Up at the 2023 US Open %%page%% %%sep%% %%sitename%% As it celebrates more than 30 years partnering with the USTA, learn more about the latest IBM AI features at the 2023 US Open in New York. artificial intelligence,Emerging Tech in Sports,Maria Sharapova,Tech,Tennis,US Open (tennis),IBM AI Loading IBM-Power-Index-J.-Pegula-—-US-Open-2023 IBM-Match-Insights-Likelihood-to-Win-—-US-Open-2023 Reddit Barbie On Track to Top Harry Potter as Highest-grossing Film in Warner Bros. History https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/08-29-2023-barbie-warner-bros-shakira-mitchell-ness-openai-ysl/ Tue, 29 Aug 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=76758 The post Barbie On Track to Top Harry Potter as Highest-grossing Film in Warner Bros. History appeared first on Boardroom.

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]]> Chipmaker Nvidia Beats Estimates With $13.5B in Q2 Revenue https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-nvidia-beat-estimates-q2-revenue/ Sun, 27 Aug 2023 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=76402 The strong second quarter for Nvidia comes on the heels of the company hitting a $1 trillion valuation in May.

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]]>
Guess who’s back? It’s me, Lady Cyborg, making a swift return during what seems like hell week for OpenSea following their policy update on creator royalties and a former product manager at the company landing a three-month prison sentence for NFT insider trading.

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Nvidia‘s big earnings wins
  • Threads’ web version has arrived
  • More (bad) updates from the world of X

Chipmaker Nvidia Beat Estimates With $13.5B in Q2 Revenue

AI computing leader Nvidia‘s stock soared as much as 6% earlier this week after the chipmaker beat revenue estimates in its Q2 earnings report. Nvidia generated $13.5 billion in revenue, and $10.32 billion of Nvidia’s Q2 revenue came from action in its data center, which is up 171% year-over-year. The tech company’s gaming sector attracted $2.5 billion of that revenue. Nvidia’s positive revenue track comes from a significant increase in business for chip buyers using its tech for generative AI purposes. Nvidia’s graphics processing units have been pivotal to the AI boom, especially for corporations investing in the tech giant’s supercomputers, which are powered by 256 of its chips.

The company’s success comes after it hit a $1 trillion valuation in May. Nvidia said it expects to attract about $16 billion in revenue for Q3, much higher than the $12.61 billion analysts estimate.

Threads Finally Gets a Web Version

Meta finally launched the web version of Threads this week, letting users access the new microblogging platform from any web browser. Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram, shared the news in a Threads post (thread?) and stated that the website was available to everyone. Loads of users flocked under the post to report that they were having trouble logging onto the web version. Users should know some functions aren’t available outside of the mobile app, like editing your profile. Meta is working out the kinks and improving Threads web features.

More Meta news bites:

  • Meta updated its return-to-office mandate, requiring employees to work onsite three days a week.
  • The Big Tech giant agreed to comply with European laws, which require chronological order offerings for content on Facebook and Instagram.

SoftBank-Owned Chipmaker Arm is Going Public

It’s been a slow run for tech IPOs in 2023, but this company is coming in to try to change the narrative with the biggest IPO of the year thus far. Arm, a British computer chip maker and software design company, filed for a Nasdaq listing. Softbank bought the company in 2016 for $32 billion, and it’s expected to retain voting control over Arm after it goes public. Arm reported $2.68 billion in revenue in its most recent earnings report, and the company is expected to go into its IPO with a $60 billion to $70 billion valuation. Arm’s share price will be set in mid-September ahead of its public offering.

The public offering comes after Softbank’s deal to sell Arm to Nvidia early last year fell through due to antitrust concerns.

X is Getting Rid of News Headlines and Snippets

In his latest attempt to oppress journalism on X/Twitter, Fortune reported that Elon Musk has decided to remove headlines and text snippets from news articles when shared via links on the platform. Articles will now only appear with their lead images. Musk confirmed the update to Fortune and said he’s bidding ado with news headlines and subtext “to help reduce the vertical pixel space that articles take,” cut down on clickbait, and improve the social network’s overall aesthetic. This is such a low blow in Musk‘s war on news outlets and gives them the extra work of having to type headlines and subheads out now.

Elsewhere in X’s ecosystem, a temporary glitch on the platform broke all links and images posted before December 2014. X is still working to fix the bug and claims no images or data were lost in the process, but we won’t know that for sure until after the weekend concludes. The platform is also still experiencing backlash after Musk tweeted that X/Twitter is removing the block feature in favor of a mute function only for feeds, though the block button will still be functional for DMs. There is an interesting note under Musk’s tweet now that says X would be in violation of app store policies if the feature is removed, which could result in the app being taken down. Let’s keep an eye on that.

In Other News: PlayStation Get Portable, YouTube Tackles AI Music, & More

  • Sony‘s new remote handheld player, dubbed the PlayStation Portal, will arrive later this year with a $200 price tag and be able to stream PS5 games.
  • Since sharing a set of principles for AI-generated music on its platform, YouTube announced an AI Music Incubator with Universal Music Group to gain input from the record label’s network. Elsewhere, YouTube is also testing a search function that lets users hum to identify songs. Watch out, Shazam.
  • Charles Martinet, the video game voice actor behind Mario since Nintendo’s Super Mario 64, is retiring after 27 years and pivoting to the role of Mario Ambassador to travel and promote the popular character.
  • In an effort to clear its merger forward in the UK, Microsoft cut a 15-year deal with Ubisoft to sell its cloud gaming rights for Activision Blizzard PC and console games. The proposal will only be approved if Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision goes through.
  • Snapchat is expanding with a generative AI feature called “Dreams” that allows users to upload photos to be generated into new images with fanciful or imaginative backgrounds.
  • IBM is selling off its weather unit to tech-focused private equity firm Francisco Partners, which includes The Weather Channel mobile app and websites, Weather.com, Weather Underground, and Storm Radar. As part of the deal, IBM can continue accessing the weather data to power some of its AI models.

Michelai’s Bet of the Week Presented By FanDuel

Despite the desirable $130 price point, I’m going to strongly bet that the new Atari 2600+ dropping in November won’t sell even half the units that the Atari 2600 sold, which was about 30 million.

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]]> WEEK IN TECH (1) IN OTHER NEWS Lauryn Hill Announces Tour for 25th Anniversary of Debut Album https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/08-23-2023-lauryn-hill-tour-the-fugees-steve-kerr-amazon-microsoft/ Wed, 23 Aug 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=76429 The post Lauryn Hill Announces Tour for 25th Anniversary of Debut Album appeared first on Boardroom.

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]]> Hackers Tackle AI at the 30th Annual Defcon Event in Las Vegas https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-hackers-ai-defcon-vegas/ Sun, 20 Aug 2023 19:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=76043 Over 2,000 hackers target the potential downfalls of AI. Plus, Bored Apes head to court and there's a new power player in the EV world.

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]]> This week, Michelai Graham is on a much-deserved vacation. Boardroom’s Bernadette Doykos is stepping in temporarily to dive into a big week of tech news. The Tech Talk queen will return next week.

A peek into today’s edition:

  • Google is looking to get into the life advice business
  • Vinfast is the newest name in the expanding EV market
  • Bored Ape Yacht Club owners are stepping up with a lawsuit

Hackers Assembled in Vegas for a White House-sanctioned Event to Break AI

More than 2,000 hackers gathered in Las Vegas for the 31st annual Defcon conference. This year, amidst the multiple stations, the ones that were dedicated to artificial intelligence drew huge crowds. Many attendees collectively tried to predict all of the darkest, least ethical capacities of and uses for artificial intelligence. As the group gathered, they had the blessing of both the White House and each of the biggest companies leading the AI revolution. By exposing the risks of AI technology, the hackers prepared companies with new questions to solve as they roll out the technology in new and innovative ways, staving off some of the more nefarious capabilities. Judges scored the efforts, and two of the peak performances came from Stanford student Cody Ho, who didn’t realize that he was a winner until contacted by a reporter from the New York Times.

Google is Prepping an AI Tool to Hand Out Life Advice

“Hey Google, what should I do with my life?”

The tech giant is reportedly working on building AI technology that will help users make sense of this crazy, mixed-up world. Google’s DeepMind project is testing technology that would enable artificial intelligence to give users life advice. Up until now, this use of AI has been expressly avoided. The technology fields prompts and hands out potential solutions in return, acting as a modern-day “Dear Abby.” But this is only one aspect of DeepMind’s potential, which spans 21 opportunities, including critical breakdowns of complex topics, fact-checking, and more.

Vinfast Leaps into the Market with $18.5 Billion Valuation

The race for top market share in the electric vehicle world is heating up. Just this week, Tesla announced that it will reduce the price of its X and S models by nearly $10,000. However, it has a new competitor in the global market. Vietnamese company VinFast made its Nasdaq debut on Wednesday. Although the stock plummeted nearly 20% on its first day of trading, its market cap remained above $18.5 billion. This huge number placed it above legacy brands such as Ford and GM. Will the company keep up with the rising demand for EVs across the world? More on that in our Bet of the Week.

Bored Ape Owners Sue Sothebys, Paris Hilton, and More

Remember last year when every day there was a new celebrity scooping up a coveted Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT? From Justin Bieber to Snoop Dogg, anyone who was anyone was getting into the exclusive club. As NFTs have fallen out of favor, the value of the digital collectibles has plummeted. Now, a collective of Bored Ape owners is headed to court, suing Sotheby’s, Paris Hilton, and more for “misleadingly promot[ing]” the NFTs and artificially inflating the prices. Today, the average Bored Ape is valued at just over $50,000, whereas in May 2022 that number was 8x greater. Yuga Labs, the company behind the BAYC, responded to the claim, saying, “We believe that these new allegations, like those in the previous iteration of this opportunistic complaint, are completely without merit or factual basis.”

In Other News: Welcome to “Slivingland,” Reliable Service is Coming to FedEx Field, & More

  • Microsoft and OpenAI execs sat down and reflected on the current moment in AI, equating its potential impact to be as big as when Bill Gates called the internet at “tidal wave” in 1995. Meanwhile, chipmaker Nvidia saw its stock soar this week, as analysts got bullish on its potential role in the industry boom.
  • She may be named in the Bored Ape lawsuit, but she won’t let that bother her. Paris Hilton launched the entertainment hub “Slivingland” on Roblox this week. That’s hot, we guess.
  • There is a new ownership group in town in nation’s capital and sponsors are lining up to collab. Verizon announced a wide-ranging, two-year deal with the Washington Commanders this week. The partnership will focus on increasing connectivity at FedEx Field and improving the overall fan experience.
  • The 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup has come to an end after an incredible month. Despite breaking attendance and viewership records, Amazon’s Alexa couldn’t answer the simplest of questions about the competition. The technology encountered a system error when users asked who won the semifinal match between England and Australia, highlighting potential evidence of sexism embedded in the device’s programming and operation.
  • Netflix is bidding farewell to its DVD business by sending some keepsakes to diehard fans. Users will receive up to 10 DVDs when the streaming giant sends them out the final time during the week of Sept. 29. However, you have to wonder if DVDs will have a resurgence similar to records, as Gen Z’ers double down on tangible goods.
  • Bitcoin sank below $26,000 this week, marking its worst week since November 2022. The dip was motivated by a Wall Street Journal report that revealed that Elon Musk sold off a significant amount of SpaceX’s Bitcoin holdings in 2022.
  • TikTok launched its music streaming app in select markets last month; however, things may not be going according to plan. The app was expected to expand into the U.S. next month, but the company implemented layoffs in the music department this week that included both its heads of partnerships and strategy. The move throws the future of the streaming service into question.

VinFast will go the way of Rivian, facing an extreme challenge (and plummeting stock prices) as it is unable to keep up with the sky-high demand for its EV offerings.

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]]> WEEK IN TECH IN OTHER NEWS (1) BET OF THE WEEK Google Reportedly Developing AI That Gives Life Advice https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/08-17-2023-google-ai-advice-barbie-utopia-bad-bunny-adidas/ Thu, 17 Aug 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=76147 The post Google Reportedly Developing AI That Gives Life Advice appeared first on Boardroom.

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]]> The Age of AI-assisted Music is Here. What Happens Now? https://boardroom.tv/ai-generated-music-industry-benoni-tagoe/ Sat, 12 Aug 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=75444 Raedio President Benoni Tagoe explains the lay of the land for music’s brave new world and how artists and the industry are choosing to navigate this uncharted technological territory. In 2007, Deandre “Soulja Boy”

The post The Age of AI-assisted Music is Here. What Happens Now? appeared first on Boardroom.

]]> Raedio President Benoni Tagoe explains the lay of the land for music’s brave new world and how artists and the industry are choosing to navigate this uncharted technological territory.

In 2007, Deandre “Soulja Boy” Way released the hip-hop classic “Crank That (Soulja Boy).” The most intriguing conversation at the time, however, was how the song became a hit using a demo version of beat-making software, Fruity Loops. Following the release, the narrative around the growing feasibility of a DIY artist crashing the gates of the mainstream gained key momentum.

A few years later, Adam “Owl City” Young released the Billboard top-10 album Ocean Eyes, a record that he labeled an experiment and famously created in his parents’ basement.

Although makeshift studios in basements, closets, and even bathrooms were far from new even a generation ago, these moments reminded us that the music industry was evolving beyond the need for multi-million dollar studios and six-figure producers. Anyone could create a hit song for little to no money — and sometimes, in little to no time.

History has a tendency to repeat itself, and today, artificial intelligence is the latest trend to challenge the norms of how music is created, curated, and distributed. We’ve seen this pattern before: Expanded access to new technology has inevitably created a new crop of artists that couldn’t have existed several years ago.

Today, an increasing number of would-be stars are using AI for their gain.

Let’s explain what’s happening and the implications of AI-assisted and AI-generated music moving forward.

AI and Music: What You Need To Know

  • On average, 100,000 songs are uploaded daily to streaming platforms, and in the AI era, there is a new class of artists that will raise that number far higher. 
  • While there is spirited opposition to AI in music in many circles, artists like Grimes and FN Meka have used it in some form to unlock new success.
  • We’ve seen the playing field shrink in terms of how artists physically create music (e.g. no longer needing expensive studio spaces). Now, that playing field is evening out significantly more in that anyone with a perspective and access to AI can become an artist more or less immediately. Additionally, there are plenty of funding options outside of signing to a label to fund a new AI-assisted career. 
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With any emerging industry or technological phenomenon, there is always an adoption (or acceptance) stage within which the trend gains momentum. As expected, there has been a huge influx of AI-generated music that has saturated streaming platforms that are already gaining 100,000 songs daily without any special assistance from the bleeding edge.

In April, in response to the viral “Heart On My Sleeve” bop that featured AI-generated vocals that sounded an awful lot like Drake and The Weeknd, Universal Music Group sent an email to streaming platforms citing they have a “moral and commercial” responsibility to protect their artists’ rights. Major labels will always be expected to respond swiftly if they sense the slightest threat to their fortress of ownership, so it was inevitable that a spirited debate among record companies, artists, and fans was to emerge. All the while, a few entities have accepted this new reality more credulously and decided to play along with this new game.

When the Grammy Awards released their rules for eligibility, they stated in part, “Only human creators are eligible to be submitted for consideration for, nominated for, or win a Grammy Award. A work that contains no human authorship is not eligible in any Categories,” taking a direct shot at the new wave of AI and its creators like ghostwriter977, the TikTok user behind “Heart on My Sleeve.”

Soon after, Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr. clarified the Grammy stance. As he stated to Variety:

“What we intended to say was that material using AI can be submitted… but the human portion of the of the composition, or the performance, is the only portion that can be awarded or considered for a Grammy Award. So if an AI modeling system or app built a track — ‘wrote’ lyrics and a melody — that would not be eligible for a composition award. But if a human writes a track and AI is used to voice-model, or create a new voice, or use somebody else’s voice, the performance would not be eligible, but the writing of the track and the lyric or top line would be absolutely eligible for an award.”

While Mason may be adamant about what is and isn’t AI-generated music, the pop/R&B artist Grimes has openly accepted and allowed her fans to use her voice for AI-generated songs as long as a 50% royalty split is agreed, even giving fans access to the platform Elf Tech to make these new recordings. This approach screams “if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em,” and Grimes has leaned in much more resoundingly than the vast, vast majority of her peers.

In terms of platforms, Spotify is one of the few major entities that has similarly leaned in by launching an AI DJ earlier this year to help curate music based on your listening preferences. With the No. 1 threat accompanying so much new tech being the elimination of human-input jobs, this is a clear step toward a direction that, while presumably expedient for the company’s bottom line, is likely to be an uncomfortable topic for many with skin in the game.

It gets more fascinating when we analyze what these platforms are actually built on, which is ultimately human consumption. All streaming platforms need both content and for the end user to stay on their platform for an extended period of time. With artificial intelligence creating a new avenue for increased uploads from artists and non-artists alike, streaming platforms can publicly favor the stance of their label partners while still nodding to AI and the increased capacity for music output it enables.

So, should we actually be surprised at this new wave? Consider Gorillaz and FN Meka, both examples of virtual music artists — the latter specifically, explicitly created via AI — challenging the music industry through their approach to music creation. Gorillaz, formed in 1998 by Blur’s Damon Albarn and visual artist Jamie Hewlett, have criticized the use of AI tools but are nonetheless a virtual band whose “members” are depicted as animated fictional characters. FN Meka, meanwhile, is an AI-generated, human-voiced artist that debuted in 2019 and has 10.1 million followers on TikTok, arguably a spiritual offshoot of Albarn and Hewlett’s virtual concept.

With this in mind, the blueprint we’re watching play out today isn’t new. It’s just bigger, faster, and stronger than it used to be.

(The blueprint still has some flaws, however. FN Meka was “signed” to Capitol Records only to be dropped due to a controversy surrounding insensitive Instagram posts and racial appropriation. It was a poignant reminder that AI, due to being designed by humans, doesn’t truly have a mind of its own.)

The music industry is undergoing a transformative shift with the emergence of AI-generated songs and a new class of artists entering the marketplace. The influx of artists doesn’t guarantee a surge of successful stars; creating more songs in record time, however, is bound to have some stickiness. Traditional labels do still hold an advantage with their substantial funding capabilities, but alternative funding options like Beatbread and Duetti are providing opportunities for smaller players to compete. Plus, a new concept is gaining traction – the AI record label. This innovative approach allows a single person or entity to manage an entire roster of AI-assisted artists on a roster in a seamless fashion. 

Ultimately, this wave of AI-generated music and heavily AI-assisted artists flooding the marketplace raises questions about the balance between human emotion and machine-generated creativity in music consumers’ minds. While countless listeners value the inherently authentic emotional connection they have with their favorite music, platforms, and labels focused on maximizing consumption are already seeing the benefits of the cost-effective and rapid output that AI artists can provide.

And away we go.

The music industry is experiencing not a paradigm shift, but out-and-out paradigm disruption with the rise of AI-generated music and the new class of artists that perpetuates it. As these emerging technologies continue to advance, the line between human-led and AI-assisted artistry will inevitably blur, presenting new challenges and opportunities for both artists and the industry as a whole.

Love it or hate it, those who can comprehend the far-reaching implications of these dramatic shifts will be the ones less likely to be left behind.

—

Benoni Tagoe is a senior executive in the music industry. After getting his start working alongside the Jonas Brothers, Benoni currently serves as President at audio everywhere company Raedio, where he oversees the company’s label, podcasts, music supervision, and beyond.

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]]> AI-generated Music: What to Know & What Happens Next %%page%% %%sep%% %%sitename%% Raedio's Benoni Tagoe breaks down the brave new world of AI-generated music and how the industry can navigate this uncharted territory. artificial intelligence,Emerging Tech in Entertainment,Music,music business,Opinion,Tech,AI-generated music Loading Jessica Gelman Vanessa Bryant Shares Kobe 8 ‘Halo’ Silhouette Ahead of Nike Re-launch https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/08-10-2023-vanessa-bryant-kobe-8-halo-silhouette/ Thu, 10 Aug 2023 13:00:25 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=75498 The post Vanessa Bryant Shares Kobe 8 ‘Halo’ Silhouette Ahead of Nike Re-launch appeared first on Boardroom.

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]]> Apple & Amazon Beat Revenue Projections  https://boardroom.tv/tech-talk-apple-amazon-earnings/ Sun, 06 Aug 2023 19:00:12 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=75154 In today's edition, more Big Tech earnings, Meta’s AI chatbot plans, and Uber bringing AI to its app.

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]]> ScorePlay: AI-powered Digital Media Hub Announces Seed Round https://boardroom.tv/scoreplay-digital-asset-management-seed-round/ Wed, 26 Jul 2023 12:59:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=74587 Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian Seven Seven Six led the round alongside a group of investors including superstar footballers Raphaël Varane and Mario Götze. On Wednesday, sports-focused digital asset management company ScorePlay announced a $5

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]]> Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian Seven Seven Six led the round alongside a group of investors including superstar footballers Raphaël Varane and Mario Götze.

On Wednesday, sports-focused digital asset management company ScorePlay announced a $5 million seed round led by Alexis Ohanian’s Seven Seven Six and joined by an all-star cast that includes FIFA World Cup champions Mario Götze and Raphaël Varane.

Championed by sports teams like the Sacramento Kings, Atlético Madrid, West Ham United, and 16 NWSL and MLS clubs, ScorePlay is the first all-inclusive media operating system to use artificial intelligence to revolutionize the gathering, categorization, and distribution of digital assets like photos and highlight clips across owned and operated content platforms and media partners.

As for the days of a team or league’s photographers and videographers dumping all their visual assets into Dropbox or a Google Drive to be tagged and disseminated manually, well, ScorePlay envisions them as being over with thanks to the set-it-and-forget-it benefits of AI.

As Raphaël Varane, a decorated defender entering his third season with Manchester United, said on the occasion:

“Super excited to be able to join ScorePlay’s seed round. As an athlete, I’ve spent years thinking that getting my photos and videos was an incredibly difficult task. ScorePlay made it sound so simple. It just made sense. These days, our fans want to hear from us, they want quality content, quality stories. ScorePlay enables that.”

Among the investors joining the round include Kevin Durant and Rich Kleiman’s 35V, Philadelphia Union captain Alejandro Bedoya, US Open tennis champion Dominic Thiem, Eventbrite co-founder Renaud Visage, and Hexa co-founders Thibaud Elzière, Quentin Nickmans, and Amaury Sepulchre. To date, ScorePlay has generated $6.5 million in total funding.

ScorePlay reports its revenues expanding by 1000% between 2020 and 2022. Looking ahead, this latest fundraising will contribute to expansions to the company’s New York offices and further technological developments to help them stay ahead of the game.

Click here to learn more about ScorePlay.

Read More:

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]]> ScorePlay: AI-powered Digital Media Hub Announces Seed Round Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian Seven Seven Six led the round alongside a group of investors including superstar footballers Raphaël Varane and Mario Götze. On Wednesday, sports-focused digital asset management company ScorePlay announced a $5 million seed round led by Alexis Ohanian's Seven Seven artificial intelligence,Atlético Madrid,Big Tech,Investing,media,MLS,NWSL,Sacramento Kings,Tech,West Ham United,scoreplay 3 Ways Artificial Intelligence is Impacting Sports Betting https://boardroom.tv/artificial-intelligence-sports-betting-ai-technology/ Sun, 23 Jul 2023 16:00:04 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=72705 With AI seemingly all over the place, Boardroom breaks down a few ways in which the sports betting industry has incorporated the technology.

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]]> With AI seemingly all over the place, Boardroom breaks down a few ways in which the sports betting industry has incorporated the technology.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as a game-changer across various industries, and sports betting is no exception.

With the ability to process massive amounts of data, identify patterns, and make accurate predictions, AI is rapidly transforming sports betting and offering unprecedented opportunities for fans everywhere.

Boardroom breaks down three main ways AI is shaping the future of sports betting and revolutionizing the way users engage and play.

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No. 1 — Personalized Gambling Experiences

AI-driven technologies have opened up a realm of personalized gambling experiences for sports bettors. 

By leveraging machine learning algorithms, sportsbooks can analyze individual betting patterns, preferences, and historical data to create tailored recommendations for users. This helps bettors receive customized suggestions on events, odds, and strategies that align with their specific interests and preferences. 

“AI will allow for increasingly personal experiences for sports bettors, and customize quests for users, building upon the type of quests they tend to accept and complete,” Dan Taren, founder of the sports betting platform Scrimmage, told Boardroom. “This is powerful for operators we integrate with to help their users make their betting experience feel personalized to them.”

Through AI-powered systems, bettors can gain valuable insights, maximize their chances of success, and ultimately enhance their overall gambling experience.

On the flip side, AI can also help sportsbooks offer dynamic in-play betting options, where odds and betting opportunities are constantly updated in real time based on the unfolding events of a match, game, etc. This enables users to engage with the action as it happens, placing bets on specific outcomes or events during the game. 

AI algorithms can quickly analyze changing variables to ensure accurate and timely odds adjustments and provide bettors with an immersive and dynamic gambling experience.

No. 2 — Detecting & Reducing Fraud

The sports betting industry has always faced challenges related to fraud and match-fixing. However, AI can be a valuable ally in detecting and reducing such illicit activities. 

By analyzing data from various sources, including historical betting patterns, player performance, and social media sentiment, AI algorithms can identify suspicious betting behavior that may indicate fraudulent activities. Machine learning models can be trained to identify irregularities and anomalies in the betting market, alerting sportsbook operators to potential instances of match-fixing or insider trading. 

“The focus on spotting real-time behavior trends can start way before a bet is even made. It can start as soon as you connect with the platform,” E.J. Ayala, NFT Promo Lead for DraftKings, said to Boardroom. “If teams don’t use sophisticated real-time AI risk indicators in the future to help prevent or detect bad actors from transacting, colluding, or exploiting the platform you will simply fall behind and leave money on the table. AI can become a trusted brand that protects users, maintains platform integrity, and fosters safe betting.”

This approach allows prompt investigation and mitigation measures, protecting the integrity of sports and preserving the trust of bettors.

Moreover, AI-powered systems can monitor social media platforms and online forums for discussions related to betting fraud, providing valuable insights into potential threats. 

“We have developed our own AI chat filter that understands the content and context of messages and successfully removes unwanted messages and prevents hate speech,” Sofascore AI Team Lead Karlo Knezevic told Boardroom. “Also, in our Sofascore Editor application and during crowdsourcing, when users themselves enter the results of the matches they follow, the AI algorithm checks the entered data and gives them credibility or marks them as fake.”

By leveraging natural language processing, AI can gauge public sentiment and detect any indications of manipulation or misinformation that could impact betting outcomes.

Ethan Miller/Getty Images

No. 3 — Improving the Accuracy & Efficiency of Odds

The core of sports betting lies in odds calculation, where bookmakers look to balance risk and reward. AI is now playing a crucial role in enhancing the accuracy and efficiency of odds, benefitting both bettors and sportsbooks alike.

Using historical and real-time data, algorithms can analyze numerous variables such as team form, player injuries, weather conditions, and head-to-head statistics. By considering these factors, AI models can generate more precise predictions and calculate odds that reflect the true probabilities of specific outcomes.

Automated data scraping and processing techniques enable rapid assimilation of relevant information, ensuring up-to-date odds calculations and minimizing the time lag between event occurrences and odds adjustments. This real-time responsiveness allows sportsbooks and bettors to make informed decisions in an agile and competitive environment.

“Given that our partners collect statistical data from different sources, the AI algorithm really helps us to group them and filter out those that are repeated,” Zlatko Hrkac, CEO of Sofascore, told Boardroom. “A way we use AI is actually Sofascore’s most famous feature, our Sofascore statistical ratings. Sofascore ratings are generated by a sophisticated algorithm that translates hundreds of stats into one live number which quantifies a player’s performance.”

All in all, integrating AI-powered technologies not only enhances the overall betting experience for individuals but also safeguards the integrity of sports events, ensuring fair play and reducing fraudulent activities. 

As AI continues to evolve, sports betting enthusiasts can look forward to a future that combines data-driven insights and tailored recommendations.

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]]> Loading March Madness Viewing Party At The Westgate Las Vegas Ethan Miller/Getty Images Google Testing AI Tool for News Organizations https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/july-21-2023-google-testing-ai-tool-news/ Fri, 21 Jul 2023 13:00:59 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=74395 The post Google Testing AI Tool for News Organizations appeared first on Boardroom.

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]]> Boardroom Tech Talk: The Possibilities Are Endless With AI In The Mix  https://boardroom.tv/boardroom-tech-talk-artificial-intelligence-ai/ Sun, 16 Jul 2023 19:00:49 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=74012 In the latest edition of the Boardroom Tech Talk newsletter, Boardroom’s Michelai Graham discusses Reuters' AI summit, new milestones at Threads, an OpenAI lawsuit, and more.  

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]]> In the latest edition of the Boardroom Tech Talk newsletter, Boardroom’s Michelai Graham discusses Reuters’ AI summit, new milestones at Threads, an OpenAI lawsuit, and more.  

Amazon Prime Daze — I mean, Prime Day — has come and gone, and I’m still irked the annual two-day event doesn’t have a better name, but I have some ideas.  

A peek into today’s edition: 

  • Download on Reuters’ annual AI summit
  • Threads hits new milestones 
  • TikTok and Redbox ink unlikely deal

Subscribe to Boardroom Tech Talk to get the full tech download from the week in your inbox every Sunday at 1 p.m. ET.

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Sign up for Tech Talk, where Boardroom’s Michelai Graham breaks down the latest news from the world’s biggest tech companies and the future of industry-shaping trends like AI.

The Possibilities Are Endless With AI in the Mix 

This past week at Reuters’ MOMENTUM Summit focused on artificial intelligence, I learned that generative AI technology has existed since sound 2017. OpenAI didn’t invent it with the launch of ChatGPT; the company just figured out how to leverage it best for everyday consumers. That’s one of the biggest key takeaways discussed at the AI summit, which brought together AI leaders and tech executives from top brands, including PepsiCo, Reddit, Amazon, Tinder, eBay, Expedia, and many more. 

Here are some more key takeaways and trends discussed at the summit: 

  • AI leaders and litigation experts aren’t talking to each other enough. For real regulations to be set, both parties need to weigh in equally. 
  • AI can be used to break silos instead of replacing human expertise. Generative AI models could be most useful in providing foundational knowledge. 
  • Athina Kanioura, PepsiCo’s chief strategy and transformation officer, thinks AI can be used to conceptualize new products across the food and beverage industry far before the testing stage. Fun fact: The first ideation for Dorritos’ flaming hot flavor came from an AI model mixing ingredients. 
  • The biggest career opportunity in AI is in the cybersecurity field. 
  • Managing AI platforms can be expensive and brands need to start thinking about building for the future. Where will AI be in the next 10 to 15 years? Will consumers still be using platforms like ChatGPT? These are questions that need answers. 

This Week in Tech

Threads Hits 100 Million Sign-Ups

Twitter traffic continues to trend down as Instagram’s Threads app surpasses 100 million sign-ups since the platform launched a little over a week ago. The milestone comes ahead of Meta rolling out new features, including branded content tools that offer paid promotion. Analysts also predict that Threads will hit 200 million daily active users, driving $8 billion in annual revenue over the next two years. 

I think it’s officially time for Twitter to panic. 

Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard Merger Pushes Forward

Despite more staff cuts in its sales department, Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard will move forward after a judge threw out the Federal Trade Commission’s injunction request. If the FTC doesn’t make an attempt to delay the merger further, Microsoft could close the $69 billion deal within the next week. UK regulators could still fight against Microsoft and Activision’s partnership, but it looks like they’ll also consider proposals to see the deal go through soon. 

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]]> Loading WNBA and Mielle Organics Team up for Multiyear Deal https://boardroom.tv/headline-to-go/jul-13-mielle-organics-wnba-deal/ Fri, 14 Jul 2023 13:00:00 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?post_type=headline-to-go&p=73887 The post WNBA and Mielle Organics Team up for Multiyear Deal appeared first on Boardroom.

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]]> Web3 & Tech VC Roundup: Inflection AI Raises $1.3B from Microsoft and Nvidia https://boardroom.tv/web3-tech-vc-roundup-inflection-ai-typeface/ Sat, 01 Jul 2023 14:00:54 +0000 https://boardroom.tv/?p=73092 Boardroom’s latest Web3 & Tech VC Roundup includes deals from Typeface, Mythical Games, Scriptic, and more.

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]]> Boardroom’s latest rundown on venture capital at the cutting edge includes deals from Typeface, Mythical Games, Scriptic, and more.

California-based Inflection AI recently announced the closed of a $1.3 billion funding round led by Microsoft, Nvidia, Bill Gates, Reid Hoffman, and Eric Schmidt.

Launched in early 2022, Inflection AI has raised $1.525 billion in venture capital to date to make personal AI platforms available to every person in the world. The artificial intelligence studio partners with cloud provider CoreWeave and Nvidia, a longtime leading chipmaker, to develop AI tools and offerings, including Pi, Inflection AI’s flagship personal AI product powered by generative AI that it launched in May.

“Personal AI is going to be the most transformational tool of our lifetimes, Inflection AI Co-founder and CEO Mustafa Suleyman said in a press release. “This is truly an inflection point.”

Inflection AI’s Pi product was designed to be a friendly counterpart for curious users looking for helpful information and advice. The platform operates via text and voice conversations, and people can talk to Pi via the web, mobile, WhatsApp, Instagram, and on Facebook Messenger. Inflection AI plans to use its fresh funding to further build out Pi and more offerings.

Here’s the download on top Web3 and Tech VC deals announced recently.

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Typeface: $100M for Content Creation Powered By Generative AI

Typeface, a generative AI platform for enterprise content creation, closed an oversubscribed $100 million Series B round led by Salesforce Ventures.

The round included additional investments from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Madrona, Google Ventures, Menlo Ventures, and M12, Microsoft’s Venture Fund. Typeface has raised $165 million in VC to date at a $1 billion valuation.

“To make generative AI truly effective in an enterprise environment, it is essential to have a robust solution and a highly experienced team that understands the specific challenges faced by businesses,” John Somorjai, Chief Corporate Development and Investment Officer at Salesforce, said in a statement. “Typeface represents best-in-class enterprise generative AI with its unique focus on brand personalization, IP ownership, and seamless integration into existing workflows. We are thrilled to invest in Typeface’s talented team and their exceptional vision.”

Typeface publicly launched its products in February and plans to extend its reach through new partnerships with Salesforce and Google Cloud. The company’s AI tech can help personalize content at scale across various departments, including HR, sales, and marketing. Typeface recently launched new features, including video-to-text conversation, selective image editing, and an image studio for high-resolution product photography.

Mythical Games: $37M

Gaming studio Mythical Games raised $37 million as part of its Series C1 funding round, with $20 million to $30 million in funding expected to come through later this year to close the round. Scytale Digital led Mythical Games’ new investment round with participation from ARK Invest, Animoca Brands, PROOF, Stanford Athletics, MoonPay, Andreessen Horowitz, Gaingels, Signum Growth, Struck Capital, and WestCap.

The new funding comes after Mythical launched its Web3-powered NFL Rivals game on mobile in April. The game developer will use its new funding to continue building the Mythical platform’s infrastructure, reach profitability, and scale its gaming development.

More Notable Investments

  • Storytelling platform Scriptic secured $5.7 million to expand its phone-first generative AI tools, games, and content.
  • Runway, a developer of generative AI tools for content creators, closed a $141 million Series C extension with investments from Google, Salesforce, Nvidia, and others.
  • Austria-based One Trading closed a $33 million funding round to expand its offerings for retail and institutional investors who use its crypto exchange.
  • CalypsoAI, a developer of AI app testing tools, raised $23 million to extend its offerings to cover generative AI platforms.
  • Startale Labs secured $3.5 million to build a global infrastructure for mass Web3 adoption.
  • AI-powered crypto search engine Kaito closed a $5.3 million seed round led by Dragonfly Capital, with participation from Sequoia Capital China, Alpha Lab Capital, and others.

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