Month: September 2024
Meta’s AI can now talk to you in the voices of Awkwafina, John Cena, and Judi Dench
Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge Meta is adding conversational voices by celebrities to its AI chatbot in Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook. The company announced at its Connect event today that you can now talk to Meta AI and hear it respond in one of several voices, including celebrity soundalikes such as Awkwafina, John … Read more
Meta’s going to put AI-generated images in your Facebook and Instagram feeds
Image: Meta If you think avoiding AI-generated images is difficult as it is, Facebook and Instagram are now going to put them directly into your feeds. At the Meta Connect event on Wednesday, the company announced that it’s testing a new feature that creates AI-generated content for you “based on your interests or current trends” … Read more
Meta AI can now understand and edit your photos
Meta announced that Meta AI will now be able to help you edit photos using AI technology as well as answer questions about the photos you share. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Meta AI’s genAI ‘Imagine’ features expand across Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger
With the update, users will be able to use prompts to generate AI photos directly in their feed, Stories, and for their Facebook profile pictures. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Meta lets businesses create ad-embedded chatbots
Meta is now allowing businesses to create ads that, when clicked, bring up a chatbot customers can speak with about common topics. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Meta AI gets celebrity voices and lip-synced translations
Meta is bringing a voice mode to its AI assistant, Meta AI, along with an Meta AI-powered translation feature for Instagram Reels. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Meta releases its first open AI model that can process images
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Just two months after releasing its last big AI model, Meta is back with a major update: its first open-source model capable of processing both images and text. The new model, Llama 3.2, could allow developers to create more advanced AI applications, like augmented reality apps that provide … Read more
Meta discontinues Quest 2 and Quest Pro
With the budget Quest 3S now up for preorder, Meta will no longer sell the Quest 2 and Quest Pro once back stock is deleted. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Meta announces $300 Quest 3S, a cheaper take on mixed reality
The Meta Quest S3 is up for preorder Wednesday. It starts shipping October 15. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Meta is discontinuing the Quest Pro two years after launching it
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Meta is discontinuing the Quest Pro, its high-end VR headset launched in 2022 that we said “isn’t very good.” The company plans to sell its remaining Quest Pro headsets through the end of the year or “until they’re gone, whichever comes first,” according to a blog post. … Read more
Meta’s cheaper Quest 3S might just be an upgrade
The Verge’s Alex Heath wearing a Quest 3S. Meta finally announced the very heavily leaked Quest 3S VR headset, and the leaks were right: it’s a $299.99 headset that looks like a mix of the Quest 2 and Quest 3. But now that the specs are official, I can tell you that it’s a lot … Read more
The best free or low-cost photo storage services
Photo by Vlad Savov / The Verge In November of 2020, Google — which had offered unlimited storage for what it called “high quality” (read: compressed) photos — announced that, as of June 1st, 2021, “unlimited” was being changed to “up to 15GB on your Google account.” Since then, photo and video storage has counted … Read more
Convergence AI played with agents ‘for years’ until raising $12M to give them long-term memory
The strategy is to create consumer agents, but then use those to inform how they train agents in the enterprise. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Fictitious Play for Mixed Strategy Equilibria in Mean Field Games: Convergence of Fictitious Play
:::info Authors: (1) Chengfeng Shen, School of Mathematical Sciences, Peking University, Beijing; (2) Yifan Luo, School of Mathematical Sciences, Peking University, Beijing; (3) Zhennan Zhou, Beijing International Center for Mathematical Research, Peking University. ::: Table of Links Abstract and 1. Introduction 2 Model and 2.1 Optimal Stopping and Obstacle Problem 2.2 Mean Field Games with … Read more
South Korean foundation to recover funds from defunct crypto exchanges
The Digital Asset User Protection Foundation will be set up by the DAXA self-regulatory organization and receive support from financial authorities.
Diagrid launches Catalyst to help enterprises build their microservices
Back in 2019, Microsoft launched Dapr, a new open-source project that made building event-driven distributed applications easier for developers. Like so many popular open-source projects, Dapr spawned its own ecosystem, especially after Microsoft donated it to the Linux Foundation. And as is also so often the case, some of the creators of Dapr — and … Read more
Ubisoft delays Assassin’s Creed Shadows to February 2025
Image: Ubisoft Ubisoft is delaying Assassin’s Creed Shadows from its planned November 15th release to February 14th, 2025. After showing off 12 minutes of gameplay in June, it looked like Ubisoft was set to deliver its next Assassin’s Creed installment in the usual holiday period, but now the publisher says it needs more time to … Read more
Amazon employees beg management to reverse 5-day RTO mandate
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy announced to employees last week that they will be expected to work from the office five days a week, starting in 2025. Employees who have grown accustomed to a hybrid work structure are “strongly dissatisfied,” according to an anonymous survey created by Amazon employees. As Fortune reports, hundreds of employees responded … Read more
Telegram Wallet temporarily blocked for UK users due to restructuring
Telegram users in the United States are also restricted from using the platform’s in-app wallet due to financial regulations.
Longshot Space closes over $5M in new funding to build space gun in the desert
Why use a rocket when you could use a giant, miles-long “gun” instead? That’s the question posed by Longshot Space, a company that’s completely rethinking how to send mass to orbit. The company is developing a kinetic launch system that will gradually accelerate payloads to hypersonic speeds before launching them to orbit. While Longshot’s full-scale … Read more
Are The New iPhone and PS5 Pro Dead on Arrival?
Apple‘s big bet that consumers would splurge on artificial intelligence doesn’t seem to be paying off. Earlier this month, the world’s most valuable company announced the latest iteration of its iPhone, and the reaction was largely… mixed. Report after report on memes and reactions, and how the new iPhone was essentially just a slightly better … Read more
