Microsoft is previewing GitHub Copilot for Azure in an ambitious expansion of its AI app development toolkit that some say could fundamentally change how developers build software for the AI era. The new premise is that switching from one software to another, as developers often do, should be seamless, not disruptive — sort of a real-time language translation and integration system for code. To fend off the move by Microsoft, AWS announced it is making its Q Developer AI code assistant available as an inline chat add-on accessible from IDEs like JetBrains and Microsoft’s own Visual Studio. Continue reading Microsoft, Amazon Jockey for Lead Among AI Code Assistants

OpenAI has announced Swarm, an experimental framework that coordinates networks of AI agents, and true to its name the news has kicked over a hornet’s nest of contentious debate about the ethics of artificial intelligence and the future of enterprise automation. OpenAI emphasizes that Swarm is not an official product and says though it has shared the code publicly it has no intention of maintaining it. “Think of it more like a cookbook,” OpenAI engineer Shyamal Anadkat said in a social media post, calling it “code for building simple agents.” Continue reading OpenAI Tests Open-Source Framework for Autonomous Agents

Microsoft has released a suite of “Trustworthy AI” features that address concerns about AI security and reliability. The four new capabilities include Correction, a content detection upgrade in Microsoft Azure that “helps fix hallucination issues in real time before users see them.” Embedded Content Safety allows customers to embed Azure AI Content Safety on devices where cloud connectivity is intermittent or unavailable, while two new filters flag AI output of protected material. Additionally, a transparency safeguard providing the company’s AI assistant, Microsoft 365 Copilot, with specific “web search query citations” is coming soon. Continue reading New Microsoft Safety Tools Fix AI Flubs, Detect Proprietary IP

Alibaba Cloud last week globally released more than 100 new open-source variants of its large language foundation model, Qwen 2.5, to the global open-source community. The company has also revamped its proprietary offering as a full-stack AI-computing infrastructure across cloud products, networking and data center architecture, all aimed at supporting the growing demands of AI computing. Alibaba Cloud’s significant contribution was revealed at the Apsara Conference, the annual flagship event held by the cloud division of China’s e-retail giant, often referred to as the Chinese Amazon. Continue reading Alibaba Cloud Ups Its AI Game with 100 Open-Source Models

Amazon is transferring its OpenSearch platform to the Linux Foundation’s new OpenSearch Software Foundation. By handing a third-party the open-source project it has developed internally since 2021, Amazon hopes to accelerate collaboration in data-driven search and analytics, an area of focus due to the proliferation of model training. Not to be confused with commercial search (Google, Bing), engines like OpenSearch are geared toward enterprise and academia. Because it is licensed under Apache 2.0, OpenSearch is a viable starting point for organizations that customize internal platforms for searching, monitoring and analyzing large volumes of data. Continue reading AWS Transfers OpenSearch Stewardship to Linux Foundation

In its ongoing effort to strike the right balance between ad targeting and consumer data collection, Google Ads is introducing a new process it calls “confidential matching.” Relying on the hardware and software used for confidential computing in Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs), Google says this new approach allows businesses to securely manage their first-party data. They’ll still be able to use it to reach customers and measure the impact of their digital ad campaigns, but the information will be isolated “during processing so that no one — including Google — can access the data being processed.” Continue reading Google Ads Adopts Open-Source TEE Setup for Data Privacy

OpenAI is previewing a new series of AI models that can reason and correct complex coding mistakes, providing a more efficient solution for developers. Powered by OpenAI o1, the new models are “designed to spend more time thinking before they respond, much like a person would,” and as a result can “solve harder problems than previous models in science, coding, and math,” OpenAI claims, noting that “through training, they learn to refine their thinking process, try different strategies, and recognize their mistakes.” The first model in the series is being released in preview in OpenAI’s popular ChatGPT and in the company’s API. Continue reading OpenAI Previews New LLMs Capable of Complex Reasoning

Anthropic has launched the Claude Enterprise subscription plan to compete with OpenAI’s ChatGPT Enterprise business solution. Focused on security and administrative controls, Claude Enterprise is designed to help organizations securely collaborate with artificial intelligence using proprietary internal data. Pricing will vary based on the number of seats and how Claude is used but is expected to be more expensive than Claude Pro and Claude Teams ($20 and $25 per month, respectively). An expanded 500K context window, more usage capacity, and a native GitHub integration for work on entire codebases are advantages Anthropic touts for Claude Enterprise. Continue reading Anthropic Announces Enhanced Claude Enterprise Plan for AI

VFusion3D is the latest AI model unveiled by Meta Platforms, which developed it in conjunction with the University of Oxford. The powerful model, which uses single-perspective images or text prompts to generate high-quality 3D objects, is being hailed as a breakthrough in scalable 3D AI that can potentially transform sectors including VR, gaming and digital design. The platform tackles the challenge of scarce 3D training data in a world teeming with 2D images and text descriptions. The VFusion3D approach leverages what the developers call “a novel method for building scalable 3D generative models utilizing pre-trained video diffusion models.” Continue reading Meta, Oxford Advance 3D Object Generation with VFusion3D

A new generative AI startup called Black Forest Labs has hit the scene, debuting with a suite of text-to-image models branded FLUX.1. Based in Germany, Black Forest was founded by some of the researchers involved in developing Stable Diffusion and has raised $31 million in funding from principal investor Andreessen Horowitz and angels including CAA founder and former talent agent Michael Ovitz. The FLUX.1 suite focuses on “image detail, prompt adherence, style diversity and scene complexity,” the company says of its three initial variants: FLUX.1 [pro], FLUX.1 [dev] and FLUX.1 [schnell]. Continue reading Black Forest Labs Announces Suite of Text-to-Image Models

Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled the latest version of computer vision platform SAM 2, an update on the company’s Segment Anything Model that automates for video what the original SAM did for still images — identifying the edges of an object and isolating it in the frame. Zuckerberg demonstrated SAM 2 as part of a SIGGRAPH 2024 keynote session in which he was interviewed by Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. “Being able to do this in video and have it be zero shot and tell it what you want, it’s pretty cool,” Zuckerberg said. Meta is sharing the code and model weights for SAM 2 with a permissive Apache 2.0 license. Continue reading Mark Zuckerberg Unveils SAM 2 AI Tech for Segmenting Video

The U.S. Commerce Department has issued a large package of material designed to help AI developers and those using the systems with an approach to identifying and mitigating risks stemming from generative AI and foundation models. Prepared by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the AI Safety Institute, the guidance includes the initial public draft of its guidelines on “Managing Misuse Risk for Dual-Use Foundation Models.” Dual-use refers to models that can be used for good or ill. The release also includes an open-source software test called Dioptra. Apple is the latest to join the government’s voluntary commitments to responsible AI innovation. Continue reading Apple Joins the Safe AI Initiative as NIST Amps Up Outreach

The world’s first AI-powered movie camera has surfaced. Still in development, it aims to enable filmmakers to turn footage into AI imagery in real time while shooting. Called the CMR-M1, for camera model 1, it is the product of creative tech agency SpecialGuestX and media firm 1stAveMachine, with the goal of providing creatives with a familiar interface for AI imagemaking. It was inspired by the Cine-Kodak device, the first portable 16mm camera. “We designed a camera that serves as a physical interface to AI models,” said Miguel Espada, co-founder and executive creative technologist at SpecialGuestX, a company that does not think directors will use AI sitting at a keyboard. Continue reading New Prototype Is the World’s First AI-Powered Movie Camera

Zeta Labs has raised $2.9 million in pre-seed round funding and launched JACE, an AI assistant that can autonomously complete complex tasks. The LLM-powered JACE agent executes in-browser actions on command. In fact, Zeta claims JACE is so autonomous that it eliminates the need to be sitting in front of a computer while it executes requests — just tell it what you’d like it to do and let it go. London-based Zeta says it will use the money to expand its engineering team, host training models and improve JACE’s speed and reliability. Continue reading UK’s Zeta Labs Unveils JACE, a Next Generation AI Assistant

A year after its announcement, Fable is launching Showrunner, a platform that lets anyone make TV-style animated content by writing prompts that are turned into shows by generative AI. The San Francisco company run by CEO Edward Saatchi with recruits from Oculus, Pixar and various AI startups is launching 10 shows that let users make their own episodes “from their couch,” waiting only minutes to see the finished result, according to Saatchi, who says a 15-word prompt is enough to generate 10- to 20-minute episodes. Saatchi is hoping Fable’s shows can garner an audience by self-publishing on Amazon Prime. Continue reading Fable Launches Showrunner Animated Episodic TV Generator