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Chinese companies 'resurrect' the deceased with AI
Spotlight: Google becomes official AI sponsor for Team USA
Jack Shields
July 22, 2024
Welcome back!
The 2024 Olympics are kicking off in Paris on Friday, and Google is hoping to capitalize on one of the world’s largest sporting events. That and more…
In today’s Daily Update:
🗞️ Chinese companies ‘resurrect’ deceased loved ones with AI avatars
🤖 News readers are open to AI-assisted journalism but not replacing humans
📸 Google becomes official AI sponsor for Team USA
🚨 AI Roundup: Four quick hits
Read time: 2.5 minutes
TOP STORY
🗞️ Chinese companies ‘resurrect’ deceased loved ones with AI avatars
DALL-E 3
Several Chinese tech companies are building digital clones to help customers cope with the loss of loved ones.
What you should know:
Standard services require less than one minute of high-quality video and audio of a person while they were living to create a digital avatar.
Companies then feed information about a person’s life (key memories, experiences, etc.) into chatbots that power each avatar’s conversations with clients.
Super Brain founder Zhang Zewei says a truly life-like digital clone would require at least 10 years of data.
In response to the rise of the “digital afterlife industry,” academics are calling these avatars “deadbots.”
Ethical dilemma: Yang Lei, a resident of Nanjing, feared that his grandmother might not survive the shock of learning about her son's death. To protect her, Yang created a digital avatar of his late uncle, maintaining the illusion that he was still alive. Since Yang had limited knowledge of his uncle's life, he enlisted a company employee to impersonate him, using AI technology to recreate his uncle's likeness. This scenario highlights one of several ethical dilemmas emerging from the rise of the “digital afterlife.”
RESEARCH INSIGHT
🤖 News readers are open to AI-assisted journalism but not replacing humans
Source: CRAFT & Reuters Institute
A new study by CRAFT and the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism finds that consumers are open to AI in journalism, but not replacing human reporters entirely.
Key points:
The researchers surveyed news readers in Mexico, the U.S. and the U.K.
Roughly 40% of respondents from each country are comfortable with “mainly human” news production with “some help from AI.”
Many respondents see benefits in presenting the news in new formats, such as personalized summaries.
The study finds that people are still skeptical of fully-automated content. Respondents say this could remove human perspectives and emotion.
Key takeaways: Based on the results of this study, the researchers recommend five principles for the use of AI in news production. These most notably include human review of all content, limiting the use of AI to simple tasks and not using image generators to create realistic depictions of people or events.
BUSINESS SPOTLIGHT
📸 Google becomes official AI sponsor for Team USA
DALL-E 3
Google is partnering with NBCUniversal and Team USA ahead of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris.
The details:
Google is bringing several AI-powered features to NBC’s Olympic coverage.
“Explain the Games” will showcase Google’s AI Search Overviews to explain different competitions.
NBCUniversal’s anchors will use these overviews to help viewers understand a wide range of sports down to their most intricate details.
NBC is also launching personalized daily recaps of the Games that will feature AI versions of popular commentators like Al Michaels.
Why it matters: This is an interesting play to try to attract young viewers and audiences who don’t watch live television. This partnership might not yield immediate results, but it could be an early preview of modernized broadcasting.
MORE TRENDING NEWS
🚨 AI Roundup: Four quick hits
Source: Mistral
Internet Watch Foundation reports increasing amounts of AI-generated child sex abuse material online.
Mistral releases three new LLMs for math, coding and general tasks.
Paris will leverage AI-equipped surveillance technology during the Olympics.
Alcoholic beverage brands tap into AI to predict weather patterns and create new flavors.
THAT’S A WRAP