... Based on Jim Henson’s 1987 live-action/puppet folk tale series and narrated by Neil Gaiman (creator of Coralineand The Sandman), The Storyteller‘s tale follows a courageous young girl as she sets out on an adventure to save her seven brothers from a curse that turned them into ravens. Bringing this intriguing immersive project to life were Felix & Paul co-founders Félix Lajeunesse (Chief Creative Officer), Stéphane Rituit (Executive Producer/CEO) and Paul Raphaël (Chief Innovation Officer), who took us behind the AR visions to answer a few questions. ...
Overall, 52% of Americans say they feel more concerned than excited about the increased use of artificial intelligence. Just 10% say they are more excited than concerned, while 36% say they feel an equal mix of these emotions. ...
Concern about AI outweighs excitement across all major demographic groups. Still, there are some notable differences, particularly by age. About six-in-ten adults ages 65 and older (61%) are mostly concerned about the growing use of AI in daily life, while 4% are mostly excited. That gap is much smaller among those ages 18 to 29: 42% are more concerned and 17% are more excited. ...
Despite growing public concern over the use of artificial intelligence in daily life, opinions about its impact in specific areas are more mixed. There are several uses of AI where the public sees a more positive than negative impact. ...
... AI researchers Maggie Harrison and Jathan Sadowski have each drawn attention to what the latter cleverly termed “Habsburg AI,” which appears when AI-generated information is fed back into another AI program on a loop. What results is a sort of information “inbreeding” that drives the AI mad, causing it to spew abominations of data. Yet even absent these conditions, human influence on the information filtering process creates opportunities for additional forms of distortion. ...
Earlier this month, I published a study describing how disinformation made its way into trusted sources and shaped the consensus to invade Iraq in 2003. If available at the time, AI-powered news filters could have further reinforced that narrative and stifled or altogether silenced opposition. Such a predicament emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 presidential election, as social media platforms banned what they considered suspect reports that wound up being true. Society’s insatiable demand for rapid and continuous information access has also become a lucrative market that large language models are perfectly suited to exploit. ...
AI’s threat to society therefore looks less like James Cameron’s vision of a cyborg Armageddon and more like a hopelessly polluted information environment in which everything is disputed and meaningful communication is impossible. ...
If Washington and Silicon Valley wade into the age of artificial truth without a clear strategy for managing its risks, America could end up drowning in a sea of incoherence.
This cyberpunk headset keeps you in touch with actual reality
Meta’s latest prototype headset, Flamera, looks ripped straight from a sci-fi action flick—and it quickly turned heads at SIGGRAPH 2023, where Flamera won the coveted Best in Show award.
The Flamera headset, bug-eyed and glowing ominous red, is an intimidating piece of kit that looks radically different from its peers. And the look is not just for show. The headset debuts a new lens design that could solve augmented reality’s most pressing problem: “passthrough,” or the use of external cameras to provide a headset user with a view of the world around them. ...
Meta’s bug-eyed Flamera presents a novel solution. It ditches the array of external cameras favored by current headsets for a unique “lightfield passthrough” design that pairs image sensors with apertures that physically control the light reaching the sensors. Light that would contribute an incorrect perspective is blocked, while light that provides an accurate perspective is allowed to reach the sensors.
The result is strange when viewed directly through the lens: It’s a bit like watching the world through holes poked through paper. The headset rearranges the raw image to remove gaps and reposition the sensor data. Once complete, the headset delivers an accurate view of the world around the user. ...
“There was no latency, and no differences between what my eyes would see and where my hand was positioned, verses where my hand was really located.” ...
But that’s not to say Meta has cracked passthrough AR wide open. Flamera’s technology is a long way from shipping in a headset available for purchase, and currently suffers some drawbacks relative to traditional passthrough AR. ...
PhilNote: given how many years heads-up windshield displays have been discussed, it is hard to imagine what is original and non-obvious to this patent.
... Today the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that relates to what's beyond the CarPlay instrument cluster system.Apple is working on a next-generation augmented reality display system included in a vehicle that generates information unto an augmented reality display such as a windshield (or on other windows in the vehicle).
The augmented reality display can include display elements which simulate one or more particular environmental objects in the environment, based on monitoring manual driving performance of the vehicle by a driver.
Apple notes in their patent application that in many situations, a graphical overlay can be provided on an environment that is perceived through a transparent surface, including a window or windshield of a vehicle. A graphical overlay can provide information to an observer, including information which is relevant to one or more portions of the perceived environment. ...
FaceTime Calls on the AR Display
Another feature buried in the patent filing under patent point #092 we learn that Apple is working on involves FaceTime between vehicle occupants and another vehicle. Apple specifically notes that "In some embodiments, an augmented reality display system included in a vehicle enables visual communication between an occupant of the vehicle and a remotely located user, including an occupant of a separate vehicle." ...
People with vivid imaginations are more likely than others to believe they truly inhabit the worlds they visit in virtual reality (VR) according to new research led by the University of Bath. ...
There has been a long-held assumption that the quality of a user's VR equipment directly improves the quality of their VR experience. In other words, the better and more expensive the VR headset and screen, the more convincing the experience.
However, the new Bath study suggests that when it comes to feeling present in a virtual world, the nature of an individual's imagination may be just as important as, if not more important than, the quality of equipment. ...
... Per an update from Starship today, it is now offering its robotic delivery service to a total of 50 college campuses across the US, including its most recent additions – Wichita State University, Boise State University, and The University of New Orleans.
Starship relayed that its autonomous delivery fleet now has 2,000 robots operating in half of the US states and around the globe, providing access to its service to 1.1 million students. Those pupils should have some fire new content to post to their social media pages as Starship is rolling out new customizable features to the delivery robots. ...
Some worry that the people lowest on the hierarchy will pay the highest price when things go wrong: “In the event of an accident—regardless of whether the human was wrong, the computer was wrong, or they were wrong together—the person who made the ‘decision’ will absorb the blame and protect everyone else along the chain of command from the full impact of accountability,” Holland Michel writes.
The only ones who seem likely to face no consequences when AI fails in war are the companies supplying the technology. ...
Amid early signs that people are starting to lose interest in the technology, companies might find that these sorts of tools are better suited for mundane, low-risk applications than solving humanity’s biggest problems.
Applying AI in, for example, productivity software such as Excel, email, or word processing might not be the sexiest idea, but compared to warfare it’s a relatively low-stakes application, and simple enough to have the potential to actually work as advertised. ...
Boring AI is not morally complex. It’s not magic. But it works. ...
The report, which drew data from 25 countries, found that Singapore has the highest “diffusion rate” — the share of members adding AI skills to their profiles grew 20 times from January 2016.
That’s significantly higher than the global average of eight times, LinkedIn told CNBC Make It.
Finland (16x), Ireland (15x), India (14x), and Canada (13x) round out thetop five countries with the highest rates of AI skills diffusion, according to the report. ...
Share of skills potentially augmentable by generative AI
Software engineer: 96%
Customer service rep: 76%
Cashier: 59%
Salesperson: 59%
Teacher: 45%
Event manager: 39%
Just 3% of software engineers’ skills need to be performed by humans. ...
“You still have to use those judgment skills when thinking about when to use AI and making those calls — that’s really where the human agency comes into it.”
Emotional intelligence is also crucial in helping to “determine when to leverage an AI capacity instead of a human capability,” Microsoft added.
In the town of Paestum, Italy, a unique theatrical experience is taking place. Directed by Chris Salter, the play Animate combines analog theater with immersive virtual reality to explore the tension between the physical and digital worlds in the context of climate change.
The play begins with a simple reading by two actors in front of a small audience. The story follows a young woman and man on a blind date to the Tablelands of Gros Morne National Park in Newfoundland, a landscape that dates back 450 million years. As the play progresses, the audience is handed VR glasses and guided through the transformed warehouse. They experience a virtual version of the Tablelands, complete with rocks and vegetation.
The purpose of the play is to immerse the audience in a physical experience of climate transformation, blurring the lines between reality and digital space. Salter, known for his multimedia art installations, wanted to extend the reach of his work and create a physically immersive experience of climate change. He chose the short story “Animate” by Kate Story, which focuses on the relationship between humans and the planet, as the narrative foundation for the play. ...
