Techmeme
November 5, 2023, 12:35 PM

Top News

xAI:
Elon Musk's xAI releases its AI model Grok, which it says surpasses other models in its compute class, including ChatGPT-3.5, to a “limited number” of US users  —  Grok is an AI modeled after the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, so intended to answer almost anything and, far harder, even suggest what questions to ask!
New York Times:
Sources: GM spent an average of $588M a quarter on Cruise in the past year, up 42% YoY, and staff intervened to assist Cruise's vehicles every 2.5 to five miles  —  Cruise has hired a law firm to investigate how it responded to regulators, as its cars sit idle and questions grow about its C.E.O.'s expansion plans.
Mike Young / AIModels.fyi:
Researchers say AI models like GPT-4 respond with improved performance when prompted with emotional context, because of how such models handle nuanced prompts  —  Researchers show LLMs respond with improved performance when prompted with emotional context  —  In the grand narrative …
TechCrunch:
Hands-on with Google's real-time scanning in Play Protect for sideloaded apps: it didn't restrict five predatory loan apps and two fake apps from installing  —  Here's our hands-on review of the new Android security feature  —  Android's in-built security engine Google Play Protect …
Alex Konrad / Forbes:
Emails: X has begun work on an account handle marketplace for purchasing handles left unused, requesting a flat fee of $50K from potential buyers in some cases  —  Rumored to be in the works for the past year, the initiative appears to have begun rolling out recently, with email solicitations being sent to potential buyers.
David Streitfeld / New York Times:
A look at the disparity between Amazon's drone delivery claims and the mundane reality, as only some small objects are delivered in perfect weather conditions  —  Amazon's much-hyped drone project is dropping small objects on driveways.  Some customers are not sure what it delivers beyond minestrone.
Wall Street Journal:
Q&A with Adobe General Counsel and Chief Trust Officer Dana Rao on the Content Authenticity Initiative, content credentials, deepfake detection issues, and more  —  Instead of detecting fakes, this effort aims to authenticate and track online images from the start; Adobe's chief trust officer on the strategy
Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:
Okta's autopsy report on its support system breach understated the role of a badly configured service account, the biggest contributing factor to the breach  —  If a transgression by a single employee breaches your network, you're doing it wrong.  —  Identity and authentication management provider Okta …
Andrew Hayward / Decrypt:
NFT marketplace Magic Eden and Yuga Labs plan to launch an Ethereum platform that will be “contractually obligated” to honor creator royalties on NFT sales  —  Magic Eden's new Ethereum NFT marketplace will be “contractually obligated” to pay royalties.  What does that mean for traders?
Christopher Mims / Wall Street Journal:
How chip companies are experimenting with obscure materials, like synthetic diamonds and ultrapure glass, to improve performance and combat heat in microchips  —  To beat the heat that our devices throw off, engineers are experimenting with synthetic diamonds, ultrapure glass and other obscure materials

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Featured Podcasts

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BG2 Pod:
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Open-source podcast on all things tech, markets, investing, and capitalism, hosted by Brad Gerstner.
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More News

Jason Schreier / Bloomberg:
Alex Cranz / The Verge:
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:

Earlier Picks

Gabor Cselle / Gabor Cselle on Medium:
Andrew Hayward / Decrypt: