AI and Floods, Robotaxi is Coming, and the Top 100 AI Business Apps
Don't go blind on this Total Solar Eclipse day!
Morning y’all!
Today is the great Total Solar Eclipse and some folks have lost their minds about it — you probably know a few folks in your own network that are entirely obsessed about its arrival and what it means for, well, everything.
I, for one, could care less about it and I didn’t even know when it was going to pass over my area until I started putting this newsletter together as I simply have more interesting and pressing things that need my attention.
But around noon my time it’ll be passing over and I’m sure as my teammates are busy putting on specialized glasses I’ll be just staring at my computer trying to get stuff done. Or, writing the next days newsletter.
Keep your eyes healthy and don’t do anything foolish!
※\(^o^)/※
— Summer
This is neat:
Google AI is helping to predict floods better, which could save lots of people and money around the world every year. Utilizing machine learning, particularly LSTM models, Google AI has significantly improved the accuracy and extended the reliability of flood predictions, especially in data-scarce regions like Africa and Asia. It advocates for open-source collaboration, targeted AI investments, and the development of a robust data infrastructure.
Not a bad way to use AI! I mean, technology should ultimately help us live better and longer lives, right?
Sam Altman and the famed Apple designer, Jony Ive, are trying to raise $1b+ for an AI-powered personal device. It won’t look like a phone apparently and I find it interesting that Altman is also an investor in the Humane AI, which launced an AI pin.
On August 8th the new Telsa Robotaxi will be unveiled. There’s a lot of noise around what this is going to look like and whether it’s the new “cheaper” and affordable EV that he’s been talking about. I hope there’s a lot of sweet AI tech in it too.
Higgsfield isn’t available yet (get on the waitlist) but they are billing themselves as a personalized AI video model that allows creators and marketers to generated lifelike characters with a lot of editing features. You can even do this for yourself using a single selfie. If I get access I’ll share my results.
Cornell researchers found that the more AI agents that are collaborating on a problem the more performance you get. Essentially the test was using a voting system to determine the best solution to a problem. Feels democratic in some ways.
Yeti Confetti is a kids app enabled by AI to create learning experiences for english, math, and social emotional skills. I think this particular area of AI will continue to grow as our children engage with this stuff as naturally as they have social media.
Metaforms is advertising itself as “Typeforms successor” which is a smart marketing move, for sure. It doesn’t necessarily feel that different but I think the positioning is clever. They, of course, are boasting AI performance inside.
Infinity AI says that they can generate an entire movie from a script. Impressive but I wonder how deep and how big those scripts really need to be.
Noctie.ai is AI chess. That’s it. Become a grandmaster while you’re at it.
Plandex helsp developers complete large tasks by breaking things down for you:
Plandex uses long-running agents to complete tasks that span multiple files and require many steps. It breaks up large tasks into smaller subtasks, then implements each one, continuing until it finishes the job. It helps you churn through your backlog, work with unfamiliar technologies, get unstuck, and spend less time on the boring stuff.
VoiceCraft allows you to create speech editing with ease. It’s an open source project and, unlike OpenAI, gives everyone the chance to try it. They are aware of the criminal usecases but their argument is to democratize this technology to help folks become more aware of the use (and abuse) and to create countermeasures as a result:
Speaking of AI safety, the researchers are aware of the ethical concerns that could come with releasing their open-source project. In particular, they acknowledge in their paper that the ability to clone human voices could be misused for criminal activities.
But the team argues that releasing the model gives the research community a chance to study and understand it to prevent potential misuse.
Some ethical concerns, for sure. But I stand firmly on the side of open source and its power to give others the same power.
The top 100 generative AI platforms for work. An interesting breakdown of what tools folks are really using to get their work done.
How does one win with vertical AI in B2B contexts? There are some decent advantages:
The advantage that vertical AI players have is that they operate full-stack - which is to say they provide a fully-integrated solution across the interface, proprietary models, and proprietary data. This creates the above flywheel of increasing defensibility as continued right to own the interface grants the tight to keep gathering proprietary data that helps further fine-tune the model.
And that’s it folks! Have a great Monday and when you look up and see the eclipse remember how small you are in the grand scheme of things — this isn’t a discouragement but a reminder that whatever problems you have can be managed and that you can triumph over them.
Good luck. \( ﾟヮﾟ)/
— Summer