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Category: robotics/AI – Page 1,070

Google’s SayTap allows robot dogs to understand vague prompts

SayTap uses ‘foot contact patterns’ to achieve diverse locomotion patterns in a quadrupedal robot.

We have seen robot dogs perform some insane acrobats. They can lift heavy things, run alongside humans, work in dangerous construction sites, and even overshadow the showstopper at the Paris fashion show. One YouTuber even entered its robot dog in a dog show for real canines.

And now Google really wants you to have a robot dog. That’s why researchers at its AI arm, DeepMind, have proposed a large language model (LLM) prompt design called SayTap, which uses ‘foot contact patterns’ to achieve diverse locomotion patterns in a quadrupedal robot. Foot contact pattern is the sequence and manner in which a four-legged agent places its feet on the ground while moving.

Here’s how to stop Meta from using your data for AI training

Meta has launched a new privacy setting that allows users to request the company not to use their data from public or licensed sources for training its generative AI models.

Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, has launched a new option for users who do not want their data to be used for training its artificial intelligence (AI) models. The new privacy setting, announced on Thursday, allows users to submit requests to access, modify, or delete any personal information that Meta has collected from public or licensed sources for generative AI model training.

Derick Hudson/iStock.

Generative AI

China approves home-grown ChatGPT-like bots for public use

Tech stocks saw a jump after 11 companies received the necessary clearances to offer services to more than a billion potential users.

The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) has officially given its approval to multiple tech firms, allowing them to offer their artificial intelligence (AI) powered chatbots on a large scale, Reuters.

Chinese tech firms have spent billions on developing AI models after the resounding popularity of OpenAI’s ChatGPT last year. The US-based company is estimated to rake in a billion dollars in revenue over the next year, a recent report from The Information said.

Energy Vault’s First Grid-Scale Gravity Energy Storage System Is Near Complete

The system is like a solid version of pumped hydro, which uses surplus generating capacity to pump water uphill into a reservoir. When the water’s released it flows down through turbines, making them spin and generate energy.

Energy Vault’s solid gravity system uses huge, heavy blocks made of concrete and composite material and lifts them up in the air with a mechanical crane. The cranes are powered by excess energy from the grid, which might be created on very sunny or windy days when there’s not a lot of demand. The blocks are suspended at elevation until supply starts to fall short of demand, and when they’re lowered down their weight pulls cables that spin turbines and generate electricity.

Because concrete is denser than water, it takes more energy to elevate it, but that means it’s storing more energy too. The cranes are controlled by a proprietary software that automates most aspects of the system, from selecting blocks to raise or lower to balancing out any swinging motion that happens in the process.

Superintelligence Rising — Are We Prepared for Artificially Created Minds?

In 1993, acclaimed sci-fi author and computer scientist Vernor Vinge made a bold prediction – within 30 years, advances in technology would enable the creation of artificial intelligence surpassing human intelligence, leading to “the end of the human era.”

Vinge theorized that once AI becomes capable of recursively improving itself, it would trigger a feedback loop of rapid, exponential improvements to AI systems. This hypothetical point in time when AI exceeds human intelligence has become known as “the Singularity.”

While predictions of superhuman AI may have sounded far-fetched in 1993, today they are taken seriously by many AI experts and tech investors seeking to develop “artificial general intelligence” or AGI – AI capable of fully matching human performance on any intellectual task.

GR-1 general-purpose humanoid robot will carry nearly its own weight

Chinese company Fourier Intelligence says it plans to manufacture 100 of its GR-1 general-purpose humanoid robots by the end of 2023, making the remarkable promise that they’ll be able to carry nearly their own weight. They also have a unique focus.

Fourier seems to specialize mainly in rehabilitation technologies; its RehabHub platform offers a series of integrated physical therapy devices for treating various issues, from wrist strength games to hand and finger grip training, all the way up to lower-body exoskeletons for training people to walk, sit, stand, balance and climb stairs.

As such, the GR-1 humanoid project, launched back in 2019, might seem a little out of left field. But on the other hand, a lower-body physical therapy exoskeleton probably uses a lot of the same hardware, and needs to solve a lot of the same problems, as a robot’s legs.

OpenAI-backed language learning app Speak raises $16M to expand to the US

Speak, an English language learning platform backed by OpenAI’s startup investment fund, the OpenAI Startup Fund, today announced that it raised $16 million in a Series B-2 funding round led by angel investor Lachy Groom.

The co-founders of Dropbox, Drew Houston and Arash Ferdowsi, also participated in Speak’s tranche, which brings the startup’s total raised to $63 million. CEO Connor Zwick says that it’ll be used to support Speak’s launch in more markets, including in the U.S. by the end of the year. (Speak is currently live in around 20 countries including Japan, Taiwan, Germany, France, Brazil and Mexico.)

“It’s been incredible to see that the learning experience we spent years honing in a single market, South Korea, has proven to resonate with almost no modifications needed in markets and cultures across the globe,” Zwick said in a press release. “Looking ahead, we plan on bringing our AI-powered tutor to most major markets around the world by the end of this year, and are gearing up for a launch in the U.S., offering English speakers the ability to learn other languages.”

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