Paragraphica is a camera that creates AI-generated “photos” using your location data. We spotted this on Twitter yesterday, loved it, saw it explode, and were exceptionally pleased to learn that it’s powered by Raspberry Pi.

Bjørn’s goal with Paragraphica was to “question the role of AI in a time of creative tension”. He also managed to send the internet into meltdown, with tens of thousands of views on every single tweet in a long thread showcasing his invention.

What does it do?

Data from the location of the photographer is scraped with open APIs. The weather, street address, time of day, and local points of interest all are combined to compose a short paragraph describing the scene. Text-to-image AI then converts the words into a “photo”.

While it’s not traditional photography created by a human, the result is an abstract interpretation of how an AI model “sees” where you are.

Let’s see some examples

You can see Bjørn in real life taking the “photo” on the left of the next three images. The API-composed paragraph is in the centre, and the resulting AI-generated image on the right.

Hardware

• Raspberry Pi 4

• Touchscreen

• 3D printed enclosure

The special spray-painted spiky red thing on the front is designed to look like a star-nosed mole. The animal is a metaphor for the project as it lives and hunts underground, with no need for light. It “sees” through these finger-like antennae:

Analogue design, futuristic intentions

The dials on top of the camera let the “photographer” set data ranges and AI image settings. We like the analogue look of such a futuristic interpretation of photography.

You’ll notice there is no lens on Paragraphica as it doesn’t need any light to operate, just like the star-nosed mole. Raspberry Pi provides internet access to allow GPS to read the photographer’s location and scrape the data needed to determine the time of day, weather, etc. before feeding the information into the software that conjures up the descriptive paragraph, then spits it out as a “photograph”.

Play with Paragraphica

The camera doesn’t just exist as the one physical prototype you see in Bjørn’s hands, there’s a virtual version you can play with online. Below is a screenshot of all the images that have been created and submitted from all over the world.

The internet explosion yesterday crashed the server:

But hopefully you’ll be able to get on and generate photos for yourself, wherever you are in the world, soon. Excellent innovation Bjørn, and thanks for making Raspberry Pi part of it.

The post Paragraphica creates “photos” based on your location appeared first on Raspberry Pi.

A startup called Telly is planning to give away a whopping half million 55-inch TVs to consumers — but with one huge catch.

As if annoying commercial breaks on cable weren't enough, the sleek TV set will come with a second screen that will show you a nonstop stream of ads while you're catching up on your favorite shows. This second "Smart Display" will also show other widgets, like the weather or stocks.

To hammer the model home, Telly's chief strategy officer Dallas Lawrence told The Verge that both screens might even show ads at the same time when not in use.

In other words, it's a dystopian ad-supported streaming TV nightmare: a transaction-based ecosystem that turns you and your viewing habits into the product.

Telly is calling its invention the "ultimate free TV upgrade" on its website. The company was created by Ilya Pozin, who also co-founded the add-supported app Pluto TV, an entirely ad-supported streaming service.

Beyond its two displays, the Telly also has a camera — including a privacy shutter, to be fair — to enable things like "free advanced motion-tracking fitness programs" or conference calls, as well as a microphone and motion sensor.

In other words, it has plenty of ways to track you in your living room.

And that all raises the question: how will Telly make sure that you're actually viewing its ads instead of just pushing a piece of furniture in front of the Smart Display?

According to its typo-riddled activity data policy — get ready for "mayenhance video content" and "contentrecommendations" — the company reserves the right to track a wide swathe of metrics including "search queries, settings preferences, applications you open, purchases or other transactions you make, buttons you select, the time, frequency, and duration of your activities, the physical presence of you and any other individuals using the TV at any given time, and other usage data."

The company may also "share your Viewing and Activity Data with third-party data partners and advertisers who use it to show you relevant ads and provide you with customized content."

To even get on the company's waitlist for a free ad-viewing experience, you'll have to live in the US and fill out a lengthy questionnaire on the company's app, including what your favorite TV shows are and who your cell phone provider is, according to Ars Technica.

In case all of these terms feel just a little too invasive, you can opt out of tracking for a hefty price. According to The Verge, the company previously said its TV set would cost $500.

Otherwise, of course, you could also just buy a regular TV, which are often way cheaper than that.

All in all, Telly's "free" TV feels like a pretty invasive piece of tech. Sure, not having to splurge on a fancy TV might be a great way to save some cash upfront, but the experience clearly comes with a pretty substantial cost.

In other words, Telly is making a pretty huge bet. To be successful in the long term, the company is incentivized to squeeze as much data out of its customers, and ad dollars out of their eyeballs, as possible — and that doesn't exactly sound like it will make for a pleasant viewing experience.

More on TV: Screenwriter Union Reportedly Proposes Allowing AI-Written Movies and TV Shows

The post Company Giving Away TVs With Second Screen That Shows Constant Ads appeared first on Futurism.

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AI Me This

A one-time OpenAI safety researcher is sounding alarm bells about the decidedly grim-sounding prospect that artificial intelligence may, eventually, bring about the end of humanity.

"I think maybe there's something like a 10-20 percent chance of AI takeover, [with] many [or] most humans dead," former OpenAI-er Paul Christiano told the "Bankless" podcast earlier this week. "I take it quite seriously."

When discussing the possibility of AI annihilation, Christiano said that unlike infamous "doomer" Eliezer Yudkowsky, who's been shouting from the rooftops about an AI-powered "Terminator" scenario, he thinks that our end by AI will come more gradually.

"I tend to imagine something more like a year's transition from AI systems that are a pretty big deal, to kind of accelerating change, followed by further acceleration, et cetera," he told the podcast.

Bad Wager

Once AI passes the human sentience threshold, however, all bets are off.

"Overall, maybe you're getting more up to a 50/50 chance of doom shortly after you have AI systems that are human level," Christiano said.

The former OpenAI safety team member's new nonprofit, the Alignment Research Center, is based on the concept of AI alignment, which Christiano broadly defined back in 2018 as having machines' motives align with those of humans.

While OpenAI pays lip service to alignment, claiming that it "aims to make artificial general intelligence (AGI) aligned with human values and follow human intent," just the concept of AGI itself is enough to give researchers like Christiano pause.

Rather than AI coming "out of the blue" and killing everyone, Christiano said that "the most likely way we die" entails all the AI deployed in everyday life coalescing to kill us.

"If for some reason, God forbid, all these AI systems were trying to kill us, they would definitely kill us," he concluded.

All in all, that kind of admission doesn't exactly inspire confidence — but hey, at least someone's saying it, right?

More on AI doomsday: IBM Replacing 7,800 Human Jobs With AI, Including Human Resources

The post Ex-OpenAI Safety Researcher Says There’s a 20% Chance of AI Apocalypse appeared first on Futurism.

Twitter CEO Elon Musk has long had an axe to grind with OpenAI and ChatGPT.

After insinuating that he thinks the bot is "woke" and teasing his own "anti-woke" AI, Musk has finally revealed that he's working on "TruthGPT," a brazenly named alternative to the popular chatbot that will serve as a "maximum truth-seeking AI," in an interview with Tucker Carlson on Fox News.

"I'm going to start something which I call 'TruthGPT' or a maximum truth-seeking AI that tries to understand the nature of the universe," Musk told an incredulous-looking Carlson.

But whether Musk, who already has a lot on his plate, will be able to pull off the establishment of a successful AI product when competitors like OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google already have a massive foothold is anything but certain.

For one, his eccentric vision is anything but tangible, and dare we say, a little out there.

In Musk's mind, an AI that "understands" the universe is the "best path to safety." His reasoning for this verges on the metaphysical, asserting that "an AI that cares about understanding the universe is unlikely to annihilate humans because we are an interesting part of the universe."

His supposed proof of this is humans' desire to protect chimpanzees, when we could easily "hunt down" and "kill them."

"We're actually glad that they exist, and we aspire to protect their habitats," Musk said, as quoted by The Verge. Though, if Musk were really interested in their protection, he might want to disclose how his company Neuralink has been treating other primates.

While Musk has name-dropped "TruthGPT" before, it's the first time that he's publicly announced his intentions of building a bot by that name on his own.

And as the name suggests, Musk's latest venture is a direct response to the perceived political correctness and censorship of ChatGPT.

"What's happening is they're training an AI to lie," Musk said of OpenAI in the interview.

"To comment on some things, not comment on other things," he added. "Not to say what the data actually demands that it says."

Sure, OpenAI is a patently sleazy company whose own CEO Sam Altman is prone to spouting nonsense himself, but an AI truth crusade is pretty rich coming from Musk, who doesn't even seem to be standing by his own convictions on AI.

On one hand, Musk has long warned of the dangers of AI, calling for further regulation of the rapidly advancing technology. In the recent Fox News interview, Musk stated that he believes it has the "potential of civilization destruction."

He's seemingly backed up these fears by recently signing a letter calling for a moratorium on developing AI more advanced than OpenAI's GPT-4 model.

Yet, now it appears that Musk has no qualms about developing a universe-understanding AI, which could potentially surpass the very limits on AI he called for.

So which is it? Was he supporting the letter's sentiment in good faith, or was he buying himself time to catch up with his already well-established competition?

Besides, we have no idea if Musk's TruthGPT even exists at this point beyond the recent establishment of an AI company called X.AI.

At the end of the day, we'll believe that Musk is creating an AI in the name of the truth as much as we'll believe his claims that Tesla vehicles will be fully driving themselves by "next year" — a promise he's made since 2014.

More on AI: CEO of OpenAI Says Making Models Bigger Is Already Played Out

The post Elon Musk Says He's Building a "Maximum Truth-Seeking AI" appeared first on Futurism.

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