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Welcome back!
New AI tools are popping up left and right this week.
Canva just released Magic Studio in hopes of automating boring design tasks, while Google is aiming to give everyone a personal AI assistant. Let’s dive in.
In today’s Daily Update:
🗞️ AI creates a robot from scratch in seconds
🤖 Canva releases Magic Studio
📸 Google to launch Assistant with Bard
🚨 AI Roundup: Four quick hits
Read time: 2 minutes
🗞️ AI creates a robot from scratch in seconds
Source: Northwestern University
Researchers at Northwestern University have developed an AI that can design a robot completely by itself.
The details:
Researchers prompted the AI to “design a robot that can walk across a flat surface.”
Seconds later, the AI created the purple block pictured above. Pumping air into the robot causes it to move.
“It’s interesting because we didn’t tell the AI that a robot should have legs,” lead researcher Sam Kriegman said. “It rediscovered that legs are a good way to move around on land.”
The team calls the new AI algorithm “instant-evolution.”
Why it matters: Although this simple “robot” might not seem impressive at first glance, the instant-evolution algorithm successfully designed a walking robot in just ten attempts. More impressively, it taught itself that legged locomotion is the most efficient form of terrestrial movement. Northwestern’s new algorithm is an early indicator that AI robots will eventually be able to learn basic skills on their own.
Watch this two-minute video to see how instant-evolution works.
🤖 Canva releases Magic Studio
Canva just released Magic Studio — a new suite of AI-powered design tools that aim to make content creation more accessible to anyone. Magic Studio offers a plethora of AI tools, but I’ll just be sharing three free features here.
Magic Design: Describe your design in 5+ words and upload your own media. Canva’s AI will then create an array of unique templates.
Screenshot
Magic Design for presentations: Start by describing your presentation in a few words. Magic Design will lay out a professional presentation based on what you told it.
Screenshot
Magic Design for video: Upload images, videos or both. Then select your clips and enter a short description about your video. Magic Design will generate the rest and sync a soundtrack.
Screenshot
50-word review: Canva’s new AI tools are top-tier. Everything offered by Magic Studio is on par with other top-of-the-line AI tools like Microsoft Designer and Adobe Express. Definitely recommend giving Magic Studio a try for yourself.
📸 Google to launch Assistant with Bard
Source: Ideogram
Google just announced that it’s launching Assistant with Bard, a generative AI-enhanced version of Assistant that will provide personalized assistance to users.
Key points:
Google says the new Assistant can plan your next trip, find details buried in your inbox, create a grocery list, send a text and more.
Assistant with Bard will be available on Android and iOS mobile devices. It integrates with other Google services like Gmail and Docs.
Users can interact with the new Assistant through text, voice or images. Techcrunch reports that it can also speak to users through voice output.
Google promises that Assistant with Bard will be built with privacy in mind. It will be rolled out to early testers for feedback before releasing to the public in the next few months.
Why it matters: Google is unsurprisingly tapping into personalized AI as the industry moves in that direction. A key distinction here is that Assistant with Bard will be native to iOS and Android devices. It’s far more likely that AI will integrate into everyday life as a built-in smartphone feature rather than a wearable device.
🚨 AI Roundup: Four quick hits
Source: DALL-E 3
Smart Shopping: Walmart experiments with generative AI tools that can help you plan a party or decorate.
Meta Marketing: Meta debuts generative AI features for advertisers.
Synthetic Social Media: X competitor Artifact lets users generate AI images for their posts.
Made by Google: Google makes several big announcements at product launch event.
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Jack
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