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☆ OpenAI chief Sam Altman just showed he has what Tim Cook really wants — but Apple still has one big advantage
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-13 | by ( Katie Notopoulos | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Read previewAfter OpenAI unveiled its latest ChatGPT iteration, one tech executive is probably super jealous: Apple's Tim Cook. as you do with Apple's assistant. The comparisons to the female voice assistant from the movie "Her" were so obvious even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman tweeted about it. OpenAI clearly has made a voice assistant chatbot that is way more advanced than Siri currently is, and Tim Cook must be sweating a little. But Apple still has a big advantage whenever it updates Siri with an AI makeover: It's already the voice assistant on your iPhone — and that's huge.

Persons: —, OpenAI, Tim Cook, Siri, Alexa, Mira Murati, It's, Sam Altman, Apple's Siri, it's, Amazon's, chatbot Organizations: Service, Business, Apple, New York Times, Spotify Locations: ChatGPT

☆ ChatGPT just made AI more human, and it should make its rivals nervous
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-13 | by ( Ana Altchek | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

The AI company basically planted a flag in the sand emblazoned with two words aimed at its Big Tech rivals: your move. The newest version of the AI chatbot, powered by OpenAI's new flagship AI model GPT-4o, can reason across audio, vision, and text in real time. AdvertisementAll the while, the voice assistant maintained a lighthearted and cheerful tone. In another instance, ChatGPT said the researcher was making it blush when he said he was talking about how "useful and amazing" ChatGPT was. Meanwhile, Amazon had plans to release an "Alexa Plus" paid version of the voice assistant that's powered by generative AI, Business Insider's Eugene Kim first reported.

Persons: —, Sam Altman, Mira Murati, Scarlett Johansson, Spike, Mark, ChatGPT, OpenAI, Alexa, Apple's Siri, Siri, There's, Insider's Eugene Kim Organizations: Service, Big Tech, Business, Warner Bros, Google, Apple, Amazon Locations: ChatGPT

☆ Sam Altman may have Siri and Alexa in his sights after OpenAI filed a 'digital voice assistant' trademark application
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-23 | by ( Jyoti Mann | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

OpenAI filed a trademark application for a "voice engine" and to build "digital voice assistants." OpenAI also filed trademark applications in October for future models like GPT-6 and GPT-7. OpenAI has filed a trademark application to build "digital voice assistants" and a "voice engine", which signals that it may be set to release a new product. It also has a general-purpose speech recognition model called Whisper. OpenAI also filed trademark applications for its future models, including GPT-6 and GPT-7 in October.

Persons: OpenAI, Sam Altman, —, Apple's Siri, Amazon's Alex, Lex Fridman, Altman, OpenAI's, it's, didn't Organizations: Service, US, Business, GPT

☆ Amazon's secret war on Android: The company has a plan to cure Alexa's addiction to Google's operating system.
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-06 | by ( Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

Amazon's Alexa division is cutting costs across the board, having laid off thousands of employees and reshuffled projects over the past 18 months. Vega is a "new portable operating system for consumer electronics developed by Amazon," the document explained. Tech newsletter Lowpass previously reported on some parts of the new Vega OS. Feature parity gapThe feature parity gap between Amazon's own Alexa devices and third-party voice-assistants using Alexa has long been a problem, both internally and externally, according to the people familiar. Not off Android entirelyWith the new Vega OS, Amazon is reducing its reliance on the Android-based Fire OS.

Persons: Panos Panay, Andy Jassy, Jeff Bezos, Vega, Dave Limp, Alexa, It's Organizations: Alexa, Business, Software, BI, Amazon, Amazon's, Tech, Google, Blue, Washington Post, Vega

☆ How Google lost its way
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-29 | by ( Hugh Langley | Lara O'Reilly | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +17 min

Just two months after Google launched Gemini, its flashy new AI model, the company revealed that it had already built a better version. AdvertisementThen, days later, Google scrambled to explain why its image generation tool spit out racially inaccurate depictions of historical figures. Users have long bemoaned — and researchers recently found — a decline in the quality of Google Search results. The fact that Google is not far and away the self-driving-car leader, it's, like, a total joke," the former Google director said, adding that the problem of Google's lost supremacy is "maybe impossible to solve, frankly." Google now is reminiscent of the Steve Ballmer-era Microsoft, which missed the smartphone, search, and cloud waves and was overtaken by Apple, Google, and Amazon.

Persons: OpenAI, Sora, Sam Altman, Sundar Pichai's, Pichai, —, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Lea Suzuki, Getty Brin, Page, Google, Googlers, Axel Springer, Diane von Furstenberg, Giovanni Giannoni, Michael Avrukin, Vuk Valcic, wouldn't, Patrick Mork, Eric Lehman, Lehman, ChatGPT, Caesar Sengupta, Sengupta, Alexa, Google's, Steve Ballmer, Satya Nadella, Hugh Langley, Lara O'Reilly Organizations: Google, Hollywood, Industry, San Francisco Chronicle, Business, Penske Media, Microsoft, Amazon, The New York Times, Oracle, YouTube, Apple, IBM, Meta Locations: Silicon Valley, Silicon, —

☆ The generative AI future will not be free
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-19 | by ( Alistair Barr | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Our paid AI futureToday, we're at the start of a similarly exciting new technology wave with generative AI. Even Google, the master of free online services, is considering paid subscriptions for some of its new AI offerings. So, why will generative AI offerings be paid from the start? One possible answer is that ads may not work as well in this new generative AI future. Charging for new generative AI services is one way to create new earnings.

Persons: —, Chris Anderson, Stephen Colbert, Colbert, Alexa, Insider's Eugene Kim, Sundar Pichai, Bard chatbot, Oren Etzioni, Dave Limp, Etzioni, Goldman Sachs, Goldman Organizations: Service, Business, Facebook, YouTube, Google, Engadget, Alexa, Big Tech, Apple, Microsoft, Meta Locations: Silicon, we're

☆ Amazon is working on a new 'Remarkable Alexa' but internal politics and technical issues plague the project
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-17 | by ( Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

The team is working towards a June 30 launch deadline, and has been testing the underlying voice technology, dubbed "Remarkable Alexa," with 15,000 external customers, these people said. Internally, however, Amazon isn't satisfied with the performance of the new Remarkable Alexa yet. But the new Remarkable Alexa follows a more centralized structure, where language understanding and response generation use a single language model. The Classic Alexa team, for example, wants to protect their work by insisting on using what they built for the old Alexa, one of the people said. In addition to the subscription-based Alexa, Amazon is also working on a new Alexa product that can be used within a web browser, people familiar with the project told BI.

Persons: Alexa, Dave Limp, Rohit Prasad Organizations: Business, Alexa, Google, Apple, Intelligence, Amazon, Alexa Plus, Reuters

☆ Leaked email outlines Amazon's big plans for 'AGI,' the AI tech all of Silicon Valley is chasing
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-21 | by ( Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

"I am very proud of what this organization has already delivered for Alexa and AGI," Prasad added. Amazon's AGI team wasn't launched in response to this drama. The change also follows last week's job cuts within the AGI team, as BI previously reported . The cuts were part of a broader layoff that primarily affected Amazon's Alexa team. These are the six new teams formed within the AGI unit, as per the internal email:• AGI Product: defines AGI services and engages with internal customer teams to ensure end-to-end success.

Persons: Amazon's, Rohit Prasad, Prasad, Sam Altman, that's, Altman wasn't, didn't, wasn't, Andy Jassy, AGI, It's, • Organizations: Alexa, Devices, Business, Microsoft, Google, AGI, Amazon, TV

☆ Leaked email shows Amazon is cutting 'several hundred' jobs across Alexa business, including the newly launched Artificial General Intelligence team
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-17 | by ( Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Amazon's Alexa business is laying off "several hundred" employees, including those on its recently launched artificial general intelligence team, Business Insider has learned. Rohit Prasad, SVP of the Artificial General Intelligence team, followed up with a separate email, saying his team, which launched in July, would be impacted as well. "While this was a hard decision to make, we remain very optimistic about the future of Alexa," an Amazon spokesperson told BI. The move continues to impact Amazon's Alexa unit, which has suffered from slow growth and low morale in recent years. The move continues to impact Amazon's Alexa unit, which has suffered from slow growth and low morale in recent years.

Persons: Amazon's, Daniel Rausch, it's, Rausch, Rohit Prasad, Prasad, Geekwire, Dave Limp, Alexa, Panos Paney, OpenAI's ChatGPT, Andy Jassy, Eugene Kim Organizations: Alexa, Business, Fire, BI, Artificial General Intelligence, Amazon, Microsoft

☆ Amazon to sell Hyundai vehicles online starting in 2024
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-16 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A Hyundai Elantra N is displayed at the Auto Shanghai show, in Shanghai, China April 18, 2023. REUTERS/Aly Song/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsLOS ANGELES, Nov 16 (Reuters) - Amazon (AMZN.O) will begin selling Hyundai (005380.KS) vehicles online in the U.S. starting next year, the two companies said on Thursday. Customers will be able to shop for, equip and buy a car at Amazon.com and schedule delivery through a local Hyundai dealer, the companies said. Hyundai set up its first digital showroom on Amazon in 2018. The new agreement also will enable buyers of new Hyundai vehicles in 2025 to access Amazon's Alexa voice assistant from their cars.

Persons: Aly, ”, Jay Chang, Paul Lienert, Bill Berkrot Organizations: Hyundai, Auto, REUTERS, Amazon.com, Los Angeles Auto, Thomson Locations: Auto Shanghai, Shanghai, China, KS, U.S, Detroit

Amazon next year will allow auto dealers to sell cars through its site, starting with South Korean automaker Hyundai, the company said Thursday. Beginning in 2024, Amazon will let shoppers purchase a new car online, then pick it up or have it delivered by their local dealership. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said the partnership with Hyundai will change "the ease with which customers can buy vehicles online." Shares of used car dealers such as Carmax and Carvana as well as the country's largest publicly traded new car dealers Lithia Motors and AutoNation fell following the announcement. Tesla and other electric vehicle startups such as Rivian have developed workarounds in many states to sell vehicles directly online to consumers.

Persons: Andy Jassy, Alexa, AutoNation Organizations: Amazon, South, Hyundai, Consumers, Lithia Motors, CNBC PRO Locations: Amazon, Michigan

☆ Amazon's Alexa fumbles its facts by falsely claiming the 2020 presidential election was stolen
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-09 | by ( Beatrice Nolan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Amazon's Alexa has been falsely claiming the 2020 election was stolen. AdvertisementAdvertisementAmazon's Alexa has made false claims about the 2020 presidential election. The Washington Post reported that the voice assistant cited Rumble, a YouTube alternative popular with rightwing commentators, to claim the 2020 election was "stolen by a massive amount of election fraud." President Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in the November 2020 presidential election with 306 electoral college votes. After The Post approached Amazon for comment, Alexa began to decline to answer if the 2020 election had been stolen, the publication said.

Persons: —, Alexa, Joe Biden, Donald Trump, Trump baselessly Organizations: Alexa, Washington Post, Amazon, Service, Post, Social

☆ Google supercharges its Assistant voice app with AI, hinting at how the company sees the future of chatbots
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-04 | by ( Hugh Langley | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Google is supercharging its Assistant app with Bard's capabilities. The new "Assistant with Bard" is designed to merge the voice assistant with the chatbot. The company announced Wednesday that it was planning to bring its Bard AI chatbot into the Assistant app and experience, starting on mobile devices. The result, a new experience Google has named "Assistant with Bard," sees Google making its existing voice assistant more personalized by effectively placing Bard inside it. If users opt in, Assistant with Bard is expected to become the new experience when interacting with Assistant on Android or when using the Google app on iPhone.

Persons: Bard, Sissie Hsiao, —, chatbot, Hsiao, Alexa, Apple's Siri, Satya Nadella, It's Organizations: Google, Service, Android, Apple, LLMs

Limp joins Blue Origin at a key phase of the company's multiple space projects. Earlier this year Blue Origin won a $3.4 billion NASA contract to build a lunar lander for the agency's astronauts. However, Blue Origin has since hired aggressively. Read Bezos' message to Blue Origin employees on Monday:I'm excited to share that Dave Limp will join Blue starting December 4th as CEO, replacing Bob, who has elected to step aside on January 2. JeffRead Smith's message to Blue Origin employees:Team Blue, It's been about six years since I joined Blue Origin.

Persons: Limp, Shepard, Smith, Panos Panay, Bezos, Alexa, Limp's, Andy Jassy, Jeff Bezos, Blue, Bob Smith, Origin's, Glenn, –, Read, Dave Limp, Bob, I'd, we've, We've, I've, Dave, Jeff Read, It's, Jeff, I'm, Ferociter, Dave Limp's Organizations: Amazon, Alexa, CNBC, NASA, Blue Origin, Bloomberg, Microsoft, Billionaire, Blue Origin's, Origin, Honeywell, Shepard, Pentagon, U.S . Space Force, Elon, SpaceX, Blue, Amazon Devices, Services, Apple Locations: Van Horn , Texas, U.S, Alabama, Florida, California , Arizona, Colorado, Kent

☆ Google reshuffles Assistant unit, lays off some staffers, to 'supercharge' products with A.I.
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-01 | by ( Jennifer Elias | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Google CEO Sundar Pichai speaks on-stage during the Google I/O keynote session at the Google Developers Conference in Mountain View, California, on May 10, 2023. Google wants to "supercharge" its seven-year-old smart assistant using new advancements in generative artificial intelligence, as part of the latest major reorganization of the Assistant unit. A portion of the Assistant team has already started working on the efforts, Ranjan added. As a part of the reorganization, executives announced a dozen changes to the company's "Speech" team, which oversees voice commands. Some members of the Speech team will focus their efforts specifically on Bard, she wrote.

Persons: Sundar Pichai, Peeyush Ranjan, Ranjan, Apple's Siri, Alexa, We've, Axios, Francoise Beaufays, Sissie Hsiao, Bard, Beaufays, Jennifer Rodstrom, we're, It's, Hsiao, OpenAI's, Microsoft Bing Organizations: Google, Google Developers, CNBC, Employees, Microsoft Locations: Mountain View , California

"High level, we want this to become something like your personal AI friend," said developer Div Garg, whose company MultiOn is beta-testing an AI agent. The race towards increasingly autonomous AI agents has been supercharged by the March release of GPT-4 by developer OpenAI, a powerful upgrade of the model behind ChatGPT - the chatbot that became a sensation when released last November. GPT-4 facilitates the type of strategic and adaptable thinking required to navigate the unpredictable real world, said Vivian Cheng, an investor at venture capital firm CRV who has a focus on AI agents. OpenAI itself is very interested in AI agent technology, according to four people briefed on its plans. There are at least 100 serious projects working to commercialize agents, said Matt Schlicht, who writes a newsletter on AI.

Persons: Siri, Alexa, Tony Stark's, Kanjun Qiu, Reid Hoffman, Mustafa Suleyman, Qiu, OpenAI, Vivian Cheng, CRV, Aravind Srinivas, Jarvis, Yoshua Bengio, Satya Nadella, Apple's Siri, it's, Google, Edward Grefenstette, Jason Franklin, WVV Capital, Hesam Motlagh, Matt Schlicht, Anna Tong, Jeffrey Dastin, Kenneth Li Organizations: Microsoft, Google, U.S . Federal Trade Commission, Reuters, FTC, OpenAI's, Financial Times, Amazon, Alexa, Investors, WVV, Google Ventures, Entrepreneurs, Thomson Locations: Silicon, Jarvis, GPT, Cognosys, San Francisco, Palo Alto

Fitbit's Versa line of wearables remains some of the best fitness trackers on the market. Because Fitbit stopped selling the Versa 3, you may even consider a refurbished model of the device instead of upgrading to the Versa 4. Fitbit Versa 4 vs. Fitbit Versa 3: Smartwatch performanceOne of our biggest gripes about the Fitbit Versa 4 is its lack of support for third-party apps. Fitbit Versa 4 vs. Fitbit Versa 3: Health and fitness trackingRick Stella/InsiderTracking features are roughly identical for the Versa 3 and 4, which means there isn't much of an upgrade. Fitbit Versa 4 vs. Fitbit Versa 3: Battery lifeFinally, the Versa 4 can boast one advancement: The battery life is markedly better than the Versa 3's.

Persons: we've, Fitbit, Pink Clay, Rick Stella, it's, we're, hasn't, we'd Organizations: Google, Amazon Alexa, iOS Battery, Versa, Spotify, Walgreens, Fitbit, Apple

☆ Data scientists describe the arduous, AI-powered task of getting Amazon's Alexa to speak in an Irish lilt
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-04 | by ( Hannah Getahun | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Two scientists at Amazon used artificial intelligence to help them make Alexa Irish. The team trained Alexa on accents generated by text-to-speech models. This then helped them identify distinctive aspects of the Irish accent to train Irish Alexa. Using an already existing Alexa model that speaks in a British accent as a baseline, the data scientists trained it on the Irish accents provided by text-to-speech models as well as voice recordings, the Times reported. They later zeroed in and modified certain sounds — for example, emphasizing the "r" sounds in words much like an Irish person would — to create the voice that eventually accompanied Irish Alexa.

Persons: Alexa, Georgi Tinchev, Marius Cotescu, disentanglement, disentangle, Irish Alexa Organizations: Alexa Irish, Morning, The New York Times, Times Locations: Irish

☆ Amazon's Alexa head says company is 'at the forefront of A.I.' as chatbots explode
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-17 | by ( Annie Palmer | In Annierpalmer | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

That's pressured companies like Amazon to showcase their own capabilities in generative AI. Amazon's biggest entry into the market thus far has been through an AI service for cloud customers. However, Rohit Prasad, Amazon's senior vice president and head scientist for Alexa, said it's wrong to think the e-retailer has missed out in generative AI, which allows people to convert text-based queries into creative and thorough answers. "Alexa has been and is at the forefront of AI for a long time," Prasad told CNBC in an interview. Large language models power generative AI, and Alexa is already powered by Amazon's LLM.

☆ Amazon VP in charge of the Astro home robot leaves after less than 2 years, leaked email shows
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-15 | by ( Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Ken Washington, VP of consumer robotics, is leaving Amazon. Amazon's VP of consumer robotics Ken Washington is leaving the company, according to an internal email seen by Insider. At Amazon, he was in charge of the consumer robotics unit, which oversees Astro, the home monitoring robot that remains invite-only 18 months after its launch. Amazon executive Dave Limp AP/Jeff ChiuIn an email to Insider, Amazon's spokesperson confirmed Washington's departure. Amazon's spokesperson told Insider the invite requests for Astro "remain strong" and it plans to add "even more new features."

☆ CEO of fitness band maker Whoop mocks the demise of Amazon's Halo health device
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Annie Palmer | In Annierpalmer | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

The CEO of Whoop, a fitness band favored by athletes, is claiming victory over Amazon after the e-retailer pulled the plug on its line of Halo devices. Amazon said last week it will discontinue its Halo health and fitness devices, and shut down the Halo program, resulting in some employees being let go. Whoop CEO Will Ahmed said he views the demise of Halo as a win for his startup. He claimed the Halo wristband, which tracks users' physical activity, sleep and mood, was a knockoff of Whoop's own device. Whoop launched its first product, the Whoop 1.0, in 2015.

☆ This former Tesla developer is reinventing the home electrical panel
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Diana Olick | In Dianaolick | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

One major component of that, however, is not very smart at all: the electric panel. The Span panel is capable of measuring every circuit in your home and giving you, as the homeowner, control over the dials. "The Span panel is increasingly becoming a default solution when paired with resiliency products." Buyers of the Span panel are eligible for tax incentives that apply to both the product and its installation. Some homebuilders are adopting the Span panel because it reduces the costs for new builds.

☆ I'm a Gen Z marketer who ditched my résumé and used my TikTok account to land a new job
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-30 | by ( Alexandra York | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

After graduating from the University of Virginia in May 2020, Dube spent 16 months building her personal brand online. Not only have I built an online brand as an entrepreneur, but my TikTok also helped me land a full-time job. But I knew that a social-media agency in Los Angeles would be much more open to this type of application. In LA, they want you to be on social media, to be creative, and to be out of the box. Growing up with social media has given many people in Gen Z the ability to be effective marketers.

Amazon will no longer sell its Halo health and fitness tracker, the company announced Wednesday. Amazon will stop supporting Halo devices and the Halo app on July 31. "At Amazon, we think big, experiment, and invest in new ideas like Amazon Halo in our efforts to delight customers," the company said. "While we are proud of what we built, we recently made the difficult decision to stop supporting Amazon Halo effective July 31, 2023." The company said it will refund any purchases made in the last year of Halo View, Halo Band, Halo Rise and Halo accessory bands.

☆ Amazon's Alexa down for thousands of users, Downdetector says
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-16 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: 1 min

April 16 (Reuters) - Amazon.com's (AMZN.O) voice assistant Alexa was down for thousands of users in the United States on Sunday, according to outage-tracking website Downdetector.com. More than 9,000 users reported issues with Alexa. Users also reported issues accessing Amazon's mobile app. Downdetector tracks outages by collating status reports from several sources, including user-submitted errors on its platform. Reporting by Jose Joseph in Bengaluru; Editing by Chizu NomiyamaOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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