Hello there, and welcome to another round of the Global Roundup. This week’s instalment features product launches and updates to big tech platforms like ChatGPT, Spotify and Amazon.
Amazon was the dominant player in the news this week. First, the tech company said it was going to invest up to $4 billion in artificial intelligence firm Anthropic and take a minority ownership position in the company for $1.25 billion.
Then, the company was hit by a major lawsuit by America’s Federal Trade Commission for wielding its “monopoly power” to inflate prices, degrade quality for shoppers and unlawfully exclude rivals, thereby undermining competition. The company also said it was going to use some user voice interactions with Alexa to train its AI model.
In other news, Reddit announced a contributor program this week. The program awards users actual, real money for their fake internet points. Now, eligible users will be able to convert their Reddit gold and karma into fiat currency (no, not crypto), which is disbursed once per month.
Popular chatbot, ChatGPT is on course to becoming one of the most used and sophisticated generative AI tool, if it continues with the constant rollout of new features that it has started recently. Last week, it was the infusion of the image generator, DALLE-E. This week, the platform has rolled out a new feature that will allow users to have voice conversations with the artificial intelligence solution.
Still in the AI space, Getty Images is now partnering with Nvidia to launch Generative AI by Getty Images, a new tool that lets people create images using Getty’s library of licensed photos.
We will share details of these news items and more in this week’s global roundup. Here is a summary of the bulletin.
- Amazon‘s Prime Video to roll out new package
- ChatGPT rolls out new features
- Getty Images partners with Nvidia to launch AI-generated images
- Spotify introduces AI-powered voice translation feature
- Reddit announces a paid contributor program
Read also: Best-selling novelists sue OpenAI for copyright infringement
Amazon’s Prime Video to roll out new package
Amazon announced on Friday that its streaming service — a part of Prime subscriptions that cost $14.99 a month — will now have limited ads in its TV series and movies. Advertising on Prime Video, known for shows such as “The Boys” and “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” will roll out in the U.S. and other cities in early 2024, with other countries to follow later in the year.
If U.S. customers don’t want commercials, they will have to pay an additional $2.99 a month. Live events and sports will continue to feature ads in this tier, the company said in its announcement.
“To continue investing in compelling content and keep increasing that investment over a long period of time, starting in early 2024, Prime Video shows and movies will include limited advertisements,” the company said in a post on Friday.
Amazon said it plans to have “meaningfully fewer ads than linear TV and other streaming providers.”
The e-commerce giant was also in the news for several reasons this week, including its planned investment to the tune of $4 billion in artificial intelligence firm Anthropic and taking a minority ownership position in the company for $1.25 billion.
Also, the company would be facing an antitrust lawsuit filed by America’s Federal Trade Commission. The FTC and attorneys general from 17 American states are accusing Amazon of wielding its “monopoly power” to inflate prices, degrade quality for shoppers and unlawfully exclude rivals, thereby undermining competition.
ChatGPT rolls out new features
In continuity of its plan to make the popular chatbot an all-around generative AI for human consumption, OpenAI’s ChatGPT is now launching is now rolling out a new feature that will allow users to have voice conversations with the artificial intelligence solution.
This development is coming just weeks after it emerged that the AI platform has lost traffic for the third straight month.
The AI company said it is beginning to roll out new voice and image capabilities in ChatGPT. It said these capabilities offer a new, more intuitive type of interface by allowing users to have a voice conversation or show ChatGPT what they are talking about.
“You can now use voice to engage in a back-and-forth conversation with your assistant. Speak with it on the go, request a bedtime story for your family, or settle a dinner table debate,” the blog post reads in part.
The new voice capability is powered by a new text-to-speech model which Open AI says is capable of generating human-like audio from just text and a few seconds of sample speech. Users can decide to use the pre-recorded voices or record their own voices which the system would train itself to use in a short time.
“The new voice technology is capable of crafting realistic synthetic voices from just a few seconds of real speech. We collaborated with professional voice actors to create each of the voices. We also use Whisper, our open-source speech recognition system, to transcribe your spoken words into text,” Open AI said.
Also, the company announced this week, that the chatbot can now browse the internet providing users with up-to-date information and direct links to the sources. Read mr=ore here.
Getty partners with Nvidia to launch AI-generated images
Getty Images is now partnering with Nvidia to launch Generative AI by Getty Images, a new tool that lets people create images using Getty’s library of licensed photos.
Generative AI by Getty Images is trained only on the vast Getty Images library, including premium content, giving users full copyright indemnification. This means anyone using the tool and publishing the image it created commercially will be legally protected, promises Getty. Getty worked with Nvidia to use its Edify model, available on Nvidia’s generative AI model library Picasso.
According to a review by the Verge, the Stock photos have an artificial, soulless quality to them, and are devoid of feelings.
Getty’s tool did well at rendering realistic-feeling human figures. I prompted it to create a photo of a ballerina in an arabesque position (standing on one leg with the other lifted behind) on a stage with a slightly blurred background.
“The photos I got felt more human than when I tried the same prompt with Stable Diffusion, and the Getty image fooled my friends when I texted it to them,” the review added.
Spotify introduces AI-powered voice translation feature
Global streaming platform Spotify has introduced an AI-powered voice translation feature that allows podcasters to effortlessly expand their reach to foreign-language audiences. This innovative tool leverages the power of artificial intelligence to seamlessly translate podcast episodes into different languages while preserving the podcaster’s voice, ensuring an authentic listening experience for audiences worldwide.
Spotify has initially partnered with a select group of podcasters to test this transformative and pioneering feature. Currently, the tool is available for translating episodes into Spanish and French, with plans underway to introduce German translations in the near future.
The core technology behind this innovation is OpenAI’s voice transcription tool known as Whisper, which excels in transcribing English speech and translating various languages into English. However, Spotify’s tool takes it a step further by not merely transcribing speech, but also by translating and reproducing the entire podcast in a synthesized version of the podcaster’s distinctive voice.
Ziad Sultan, Spotify’s Vice President of Personalization, expressed the significance of this development, stating, “By matching the creator’s own voice, Voice Translation gives listeners around the world the power to discover and be inspired by new podcasters in a more authentic way than ever before.” You can read more here.
Reddit announces a paid contributor program
Reddit announced a contributor program on Monday, which awards users actual, real money for their fake internet points. Now, eligible users will be able to convert their Reddit gold and karma into fiat currency (no, not crypto), which is disbursed once per month.
So far, the Reddit contributor program is limited to users in the United States (to start, at least) who are over the age of 18 and can verify their identity via Persona and Stripe. Accounts must have existed for over 30 days, and only safe-for-work posts can be monetized.
This feature was leaked about two months ago in Android Authority when a reverse engineer found data about the program in an APK teardown.
A user’s Reddit karma (or number of upvotes received) dictates how much money they can earn. To withdraw money, redditors need to earn at least 10 gold within a 30-day period — if they don’t reach the threshold, the balance rolls over. For users with between 100 and 4,999 karma, they will receive $0.90 per 1 gold. Once you earn more than 5,000 karma, you can earn $1 per gold. Read more here
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