Not all generative AI models are created equal, particularly when it comes to how they treat polarizing subject matter.
They found that the models tended to answer questions inconsistently, which reflects biases embedded in the data used to train the models, they say.
“Our research shows significant variation in the values conveyed by model responses, depending on culture and language.”Text-analyzing models, like all generative AI models, are statistical probability machines.
Instrumental to an AI model’s training data are annotations, or labels that enable the model to associate specific concepts with specific data (e.g.
Other studies have examined the deeply ingrained political, racial, ethnic, gender and ableist biases in generative AI models — many of which cut across languages, countries and dialects.
Read MoreAI Models Have Conflicting Opinions on Contentious Topics, Study Reveals
Greptile, an early stage startup from a group of recent Georgia Tech grads, decided to take a different approach: using AI to help developers understand the code base.
Greptile CEO and co-founder Daksh Gupta says the Greptile bot is like having a highly experienced coworker who has a deep understanding of your code.
“So we’re building AI tools that understand large code bases at companies because as time goes on, and multiple programmers work on the codebase, it tends to get very difficult to understand,” Gupta told TechCrunch.
Once the repositories have been indexed by the system, you add a natural language query such as, how does the authentication work in this code base,” he said.
The startup launched last July after the founders came up with the idea for the company at a hackathon.
Read More“Greptile Secures $4M Funding to Pioneer AI-Driven Code Mastery”
That means that they first need an eye exam from an optometrist to receive that prescription.
But, due to a nationwide shortage of eye care practitioners, it may take weeks, especially in rural areas, to get an appointment.
Eyebot, a new startup coming out of stealth on Thursday, wants to reduce the time it takes to receive an eye exam to about 90 seconds without the direct involvement of an optometrist.
But if they purchase glasses from one of Eyebot’s partner brands, the eye exam is free.
The company hopes that major eyeglass brands will rent Eyebot terminals and put them in the retail locations of their choice.
Read More“Revolutionary Eyebot Secures $6M Investment to Offer AI-Powered Kiosks for 90-Second Optometry-Free Eye Exams”
Google on Thursday said it is rolling out NotebookLM, its AI-powered note-taking assistant, to over 200 new countries, nearly six months after opening its access in the U.S.
The list of countries that NotebookLM now supports includes Australia, Brazil, Canada, India, and the U.K., as well as 208 other countries and territories.
It uses AI to help generate summaries and answer questions from documents, transcripts, notes and other sources that users can upload.
Some early users of NotebookLM in the U.S. anticipated it would support traditional note-taking apps, including Evernote and Google Keep.
Gemini 1.5 Pro also lets NotebookLM have up to 50 sources in each notebook, with 500,000 words per source.
Read MoreGoogle’s Improved NotebookLM, Enhanced by AI Technology, Launches in Over 200 Countries: India and UK Included
For them, the difficulty hasn’t been opening local USD accounts; it’s been cost-effectively facilitating payments from international employers and online platforms.
“Using local products meant many remote workers had large chunks of their earnings eaten away with excessive fees.
The USD products couldn’t be local,” said Oudjidane, who is also the founding partner of emerging markets fintech fund Byld Ventures.
“The product would need to move to offering U.S.-based USD accounts,” accounts that, critically, would facilitate ACH payments to enable those freelance payments and came with the security that you get with U.S. banking, such as FDIC assurance.
“Freelancers and remote workers in these markets will undoubtedly be a critical source of foreign income to help rebuild,” Oudjidane said.
Read MoreElevate: Fintech for Freelancers – A YC-Backed Success Story from Sudan’s War-Torn Beginnings
Amazon is acquiring some assets of MX Player, but not the entire firm, which also counts Tencent among its backers.
TechCrunch reported in February last year that Amazon and MX Player were engaging for a deal.
MX Player is especially popular among such demographic groups, and Amazon’s e-commerce service has long only been popular among the urban city consumers.
An Amazon spokesperson confirmed it has agreed to purchase some assets of MX Player after publication of this story.
Following the acquisition, Times Internet made strategic moves to transform MX Player from a local video playback app into a comprehensive video streaming platform.
Read MoreAmazon Acquires MX Player, a Leading Video Streaming Platform in India
The company first started working with Mr. Bricolage, a popular DIY retailer in France.
Dealt operates a white-label platform for Mr. Bricolage so that it can upsell its own clients with services.
After that, retailers like Mr. Bricolage can provide services and generate new revenue lines as they take a cut on each transaction.
Other Dealt clients include Fnac-Darty, Orange, E.Leclerc, Conforama, Boulanger, 3Suisses and Rue du Commerce.
Some of these retailers work with Dealt to provide services that aren’t necessarily related to a new purchase.
Read MoreTransforming Retailers into Service Providers: The success of pivoting in Dealt’s case study.
Google has acquired Cameyo, a company developing virtualization tools to run Windows apps on ChromeOS devices, for an undisclosed amount.
Cameyo CTO Eyal Dotan founded the startup in 2018, aiming to create a platform to virtualize Windows apps so that they could run on non-Windows machines and even within web browsers.
Last year, perhaps foreshadowing the acquisition, Google partnered with Cameyo to launch features including Windows app local file system integration and the ability to deliver virtual Windows apps as progressive web apps, or apps hosted in datacenters that run in browsers.
With Cameyo’s tech, organizations looking to move away from Windows — or work with both Windows and ChromeOS — have a potentially more appealing avenue, particularly as more and more apps move to the cloud and web-based technologies.
Indeed, Cameyo claims on its website that hundreds of organizations, including school districts and financial institutions, already rely on its software.
Read MoreGoogle purchases Cameyo, expanding Windows application availability on ChromeOS
Last week, Australian authorities sounded the alarm saying they had become aware of “successful compromises of several companies utilising Snowflake environments,” without naming the companies.
TechCrunch has this week seen hundreds of alleged Snowflake customer credentials that are available online for cybercriminals to use as part of hacking campaigns, suggesting that the risk of Snowflake customer account compromises may be far wider than first known.
When we checked the web addresses of the Snowflake environments — often made up of random letters and numbers — we found the listed Snowflake customer login pages are publicly accessible, even if not searchable online.
In our checks, we found that these Snowflake login pages redirected to Live Nation (for Ticketmaster) and Santander sign-in pages.
There is some evidence to suggest that several employees with access to their company’s Snowflake environments had their computers previously compromised by infostealing malware.
Read MoreInfo-stealing malware connected to Snowflake customer passwords leaked online in staggering numbers
WWDC is for developers, and much of the focus will be on iOS 18.
As the big event nears, all sorts of leaks have emerged about what iOS 18 and its rumored AI-powered apps and features have in store.
AI recaps of missed texts will also be available.
Users will also be able to change the color of app icons, perhaps as Apple’s answer to Google’s Material You.
Maps with route creationMaps will support custom route creation in iOS 18, which lets users design their own routes for a trip.
Read MoreApple’s AI-infused iOS 18: What’s in Store for WWDC 2024?
