KC DEBRIEF WEEK 44, FRIDAY 2023/11/04

DIGITAL TITANS

_Apple sales have continued to fall, despite strong demand for its iPhones and services like streaming platform Apple TV+. The tech giant says revenues dipped 1% to $89.5bn (£73.3bn) in the three months to 30 September when compared with the same period last year. Sales of its Mac computers and iPads struggled after a post-lockdown surge in interest.

_Tech billionaire Elon Musk has predicted that artificial intelligence will eventually mean that no one will have to work. He was speaking to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak during an unusual "in conversation" event at the end of this week's summit on AI. The 50-minute interview included a prediction by Mr Musk that the tech will make paid work redundant. He also warned of humanoid robots that "can chase you anywhere". The pair talked about how London was a leading hub for the AI industry and how the technology could transform learning. But the chat took some darker turns too, with Mr Sunak recognising the "anxiety" people have about jobs being replaced, and the pair agreeing on the need for a "referee" to keep an eye on the super-computers of the future.

_Facebook and Instagram launch ad-free subscription tier in EU. Facebook and Instagram are launching subscriptions in most of Europe that will remove adverts from the platforms. People using the Meta-owned platforms will be able to pay €9.99 (£8.72) per month for an ad-free experience. It will not be available in the UK. In January, Meta was fined €390m for breaking EU data rules around ads. The regulator said at the time the firm could not "force consent" by saying consumers must accept how their data is used or leave the platforms. The subscription tier will be exclusive to people in the EU, European Economic Area and Switzerland from November. But it will only be accessible for people aged over 18 at first, with the firm looking into how it can serve ads to young people in the EU without breaking the rules. Meta said its new subscription was about addressing EU concerns, rather than making money. "We believe in an ad-supported internet, which gives people access to personalised products and services regardless of their economic status," the firm wrote in a blog. "The option for people to purchase a subscription for no ads balances the requirements of European regulators while giving users choice and allowing Meta to continue serving all people in the EU, EEA and Switzerland. "We respect the spirit and purpose of these evolving European regulations, and are committed to complying with them." Users will be given the choice either to continue using the platforms for free - and have their data collected - or to pay and completely opt out of targeted ads by removing them. But they could end up paying more than the initial monthly fee. The service will cost an additional €3 per month if paid for on iOS or Android, to account for the additional fees taken by these platforms. But this extra charge can be avoided by paying for the platform via the Facebook and Instagram websites, rather than the mobile apps. Meanwhile, from March 2024, users must pay more money for each additional account they have on the platforms - such as having both a business and personal account. The announcement comes after Elon Musk's X, formerly Twitter, introduced an ad-free Premium+ service priced at £16 per month. There is also a much cheaper subscription tier on X that will still feature ads but give people the option to edit posts, as well as the standard premium tier that grants people a blue checkmark amongst other benefits. TikTok has also been testing a monthly subscription to remove ads - priced at $4.99 - but there is no indication yet that this will be rolled out globally.

ALSO

Meta is about to roll out ad-free subscriptions on Instagram and Facebook. But critics say privacy should not be turned into a luxury.

Instagram tests collaborative carousels your friends can add to. Instagram’s new test will let followers add photos or videos to your posts. Instagram is testing a new feature that will let your friends add to your posts. When you’re about to post a carousel, Instagram will give you the option to let followers submit their own photos and videos that they want to include.The submissions won’t get added to your post by default, as you’ll have to approve each photo and video before they’re added. In a screenshot of the feature shared by Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri, collaborative carousels will have an “add to post” button in the bottom-left corner.

PEOPLE, MEDIA, CULTURE

_Social commerce app Flip emerges as the TikTok of online beauty shopping. While TikTok has been adding e-commerce functionality to its platform, beauty shopping startup Flip has gone all-in on bringing buying to the short video experience. Launched in 2019, U.S.-based Flip announced $28 million in Series A funding on August 30 as it attracts a growing number of beauty brands selling through its short videos. The app is similar to TikTok, but every video is focused on beauty and has a built-in shopping link for a featured product. It currently sells over 200 brands, including Fekkai, Kaja, Hourglass Cosmetics, RMS Beauty, Joanna Vargas, Dr. Jart+, Zitsticka, Coola, Lord Jones, Happy Dance and Jason Wu Beauty. On average, the platform is adding about 20 brands a week and hopes to have 500 by the end of October. “The most-watched type of content on almost every social platform, other than people dancing, is about beauty and skin care,” said Noor Agha, founder and CEO of Flip. Unlike TikTok’s nascent e-commerce offering, which has brands handling their own fulfillment, Flip functions as an e-tailer. The platform offers one-click checkout for multiple brands, storing items in its two warehouses and shipping them in its own branded packaging. It currently offers one-day delivery in some locations, which it plans to expand across the U.S. with the opening of an additional four warehouses in the next nine months.  It is currently purchasing products at wholesale prices from brands, but plans to eventually expand to an Amazon-style marketplace model. 

_Why a 'hologram revolution' could be on the way. At this zoo visitors dodge stampeding elephants, peer into the gaping jaws of a hippopotamus and pat friendly giraffes. Such thrills are possible at Australia's Hologram Zoo, which opened earlier this year, and features 50 lifelike displays from dinosaurs to gorillas crafted from lasers. Its creator says it's the world's most futuristic animal theme park, using technology that has never been used anywhere else. "There's lots of laughing, lots of screaming… but when the 30-metre whale goes by, for some reason, everyone goes silent like they are in awe and reverence of such a magnificent creature," explains Bruce Dell, the chief executive of Axiom Holographics and creator of Hologram Zoo. It is digital trickery, hoodwinking the brain into seeing something that isn't really there. "You are projecting an object in the air that appears to be real because as you walk around it you are seeing it from all sorts of different angles. So, you use laser light and we project these objects into the air," he tells the BBC. "The animals come into the room, they walk through the tunnel and you pat them just like in the movies. You're seeing an animal made of light in front of you. You'll go out and reach out your hand and pat a lion."

AI LA LA LAND

//28 Countries agree to safe and responsible development of frontier AI in landmark Bletchley Declaration. Leading AI nations have reached a world-first agreement at Bletchley Park establishing a shared understanding of the opportunities and risks posed by frontier AI. driving forward key summit objectives on understanding of the risks and establishing further global collaboration, crucial talks are underway at Bletchley Park with the Technology Secretary opening the 2-day Summit.

//Five takeaways from UK’s AI safety summit at Bletchley Park. Rishi Sunak hails conference as diplomatic coup after it produces international declaration to address AI risks Rishi Sunak has hailed this week’s artificial intelligence summit as a diplomatic breakthrough after it produced an international declaration to address risks with the technology, as well as a multilateral agreement to test advanced AI Models.

//Los Angeles-based model Shereen Wu is accusing American designer and former Project Runway contestant Michael Costello of using AI to replace her face in a runway photo with that of a white woman. The situation has raised questions about racism and the murky and evolving topic of AI in fashion. Wu, who is of Asian descent, shares that Costello, when confronted, blamed the photographer and claimed the edited photo was sent to him that way. Wu then confronted the photographer, who clarified that he did not edit the photo. In a now-viral TikTok, the 21-year old Wu goes on to bring up incidents in the past where Michael Costello has been accused of racist behavior, citing moments when allegedly called someone the N-word. Costello later deleted the edited photo and appears to have blocked Wu on IG. Shortly after the accusation, Costello began posting IG stories that featured AI art and AI models. Wu said this felt like he was implying she had no right to be angry since the use of AI is already so widespread in fashion. “In the end, I’m just another disgruntled model,” she says. As AI becomes integrated into our daily lives, the unsettling possibility that it will perpetuate racism by amplifying society’s persistent racial disparities feels like it is materializing. The ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike raises questions about the responsible use of AI in the entertainment industry, with instances of actors having had their likenesses used without permission. An AI of the late Robin Williams’ voice was discovered by his daughter, leading to her taking legal action and being outspoken about the AI in entertainment debate. Just yesterday Scarlett Johansson announced legal action against a company that used her likeness in a video. It’s interesting, in a Black Mirror sort of way, to be confronted with both wronged parties in the situation. Whether it’s worse to be digitally replaced, or digitally duplicated, who’s to say, but without regulation it’s likely to get worse before it gets better.

//Last Beatles song "“Now And Then” enabled by AI technology. Leveraging Machine learning & AI tools (technology developed for the recent Beatles documentary Get Back) have been used to extract Lennon’s vocals from a ‘ropey little bit of cassette’ to a fully produced song. "Now & Then" featuring some recording from 1995, new bass from McCartney +Ringo added drums and George Martin's Son Giles conducted A string arrangment.

//Scarlett Johansson has taken legal action against an AI app that used her name and likeness in an online advertisement without permission. Johansson appeared in a 22-second ad posted on X/Twitter by an artificial intelligence image-generating app called Lisa AI: 90s Yearbook & Avatar. Representatives for the actor confirmed to Variety that Johansson is not a spokesperson for the app, and her attorney, Kevin Yorn, handled the situation in a legal capacity.

//ChatGPT wrote code that can make databases leak sensitive information. Six AI tools, including OpenAI’s ChatGPT, were exploited to write code capable of damaging commercial databases – although OpenAI appears to have now fixed the vulnerabilityResearchers manipulated ChatGPT and five other commercial AI tools to create malicious code that could leak sensitive information from online databases, delete critical data or disrupt database cloud services in a first-of-its-kind demonstration.The work has already led the companies responsible for some of the AI tools – including Baidu and OpenAI – to implement changes to prevent malicious users from taking advantage of the vulnerabilities.“It’s the very first study to demonstrate that vulnerabilities of large language models in general can be exploited as an attack path to online commercial applications,” says Xutan Peng, who co-led the study while at the University of Sheffield in the UK.

//AI Is Stealing Your Content. Steal It Back.“It’s like having a genius in your pocket.”It was the early morning of 3rd December 2022 and my friend Richard had just messaged.“I was working on a project that was going to take me all day to do manually. I asked OpenAI’s new chatbot to write a program that does it for me. I finished it in five minutes. Insane.” It was insane. Within an hour, not only had Richard written hundreds of lines of code, but he’d also summarized contracts, come up with ideas for a new podcast series, planned a nonfiction book and got a motivational pep talk in the style of Tony Robbins.

//A new fashion brand is rethinking production using AI / Vogue Business

//New Tool Helps Artists Protect Their Work From AI Scraping. Nightshade works by subtly shifting the pixels in an artwork in order to “confuse” the technology, allegedly protecting artists’ works.A new tool lets artists protect their work from being used by AI. Named “Nightshade,” the program allows creators to “poison” image generators, which have come under scrutiny for scraping the work of artists without their permission. Nightshade works by subtly shifting the pixels in an artwork, leading the AI technology to “confuse” the picture’s subject: A dog could turn into a cat, or a sun into a cloud. If enough people use this technology, its creators claim, Nightshade could disrupt generators’ ability to produce accurate outputs. The researchers hope the tool will force AI companies to source images with artists’ consent.

//Context Collapse: GenAI's Downstream Effects on Media, PR, Advertising & Marketing. In this issue: LLMs = search engine chaos / GenAI will make a new set of industry winners & losers / Acquiring GenAI expertise = $$$. From where I sit, ChatGPT and Midjourney and all the rest are awesome: Powerful tools that are the best thing since autocorrect and smartphones for getting stuff done.But I’m also an industry veteran in my forties with a very extensive skillset, lots of experience and entrepreneurial tendencies. So my perspective is a little different than, say, someone who’s just getting started in the creative, journalism or advertising world. I’m fully cognizant of that + it is what it is. But boy oh boy LLMs like ChatGPT are going to fuck up the media ecosystem well and good.

1.     LLMs will upend the traditional search engine experience. This will change how traffic goes to media outlets.

2. The rise of generative AI will shake up the tech industry and create a new set of winners and losers. Media and PR and advertising are downstream from tech and will get shook up by this.

3. Personal assistants like Alexa and Google Home were a false alarm in how we interact with technology. ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, etc. are the real things.

RIP Search Engine Results. Earlier this year I did something really, really weird. I switched my primary search engine from Google to Bing. It turned out that Bing offered a superior experience, and Bing’s ChatGPT-powered Gen AI functionality is a big part of that. Look at that right column! That’s the future of search engines right there! And, I mean, it was a decent answer. If I was teaching a college class and a student handed that it in wouldn’t be the brightest answer in the class by any means but it definitely wouldn’t be the worst. As I write this in fall 2023, Google’s built-in generative AI functionality lags way behind Bing’s. I fully expect Google to catch up in the future. But as time goes on—and especially as newer cohorts of technology users get their first smartphones and start using their first laptops/desktops—querying search engines to get LLMs to answer questions will be the future. Waaaay less visits to websites basically. How this will impact video search engines/platforms like YouTube and TikTok is a really interesting question I’m pretty unclear on. What this does mean is that basically everyone is expecting web traffic from search to plummet. This will change SEO greatly (though it won’t kill it by any means). It will mean media outlets will be emphasizing email as a channel to reachout to audiences because social is a disorganized mess right now (Twitter’s a mess + the Meta omniplex wants their services to be walled gardens w/o users leaving their sites + LinkedIn is totally having a growth moment right now that we’re rolling with). It will mean that a lot of the dark art SEO that public relations for movies/pop music/television shows have been doing—the fake reviews, the ghost websites, the social media bot armies—will matter way way less. Advertisers and marketers will be adjusting to a SEO-deemphasized future. Though I’m a skeptic on the idea of every company having their own customer facing LLM (though this has all sorts of cool applications for the B2B space), there’s going to be much more emphasis on both online and offline events, on social community building and on brands themselves as social hubs. We’re in an environment where it makes absolute sense for a candy bar to start their own Discord server and where whichever consumer brand cracks the code on getting baby boomer customers to join a heavily-moderated social media group at scale will make lots and lots of money. Meanwhile, the web itself will pivot from useful webpages outnumbered by SEO churn built around keywords to useful webpages outnumbered by SEO churn built around chatbot spider accessibility. So the enshittification goes!

//Let's use AI to rethink education, instead of panicking about cheating. If we build and use AI effectively, we can create an education system where students are assessed on the quality and depth of their knowledge, rather than the content of an exam, says Okezue BellON A Monday afternoon in May, a final-year student, fresh off the Texas A&M University-Commerce graduation stage, received a shocking email. “The final grade for the course is due today at 5 p.m.,” it read. “I will be giving everyone in this course an… incomplete.

// YouTube Music will let you change up your playlist cover art by prompting a text-to-image AI. YouTube Music is finally letting you change the cover art of your playlists. While you still won’t get to upload your own image, you can now make a custom image using generative AI.As shown in the below GIF, you can create AI-generated art by tapping the pen icon in the bottom right corner of your playlist’s cover art. You can then select the category that you want your image to fall into, like animals, food and drink, colors, nature, or travel.From there, you can either hit “randomize” or choose from several prompts, such as creating a pug “in the style of a Medieval Gothic painting.” The AI will output five different images for you to choose from. Once you hit “save,” that art will become the image representing your playlist.

//With a simple prompt of “ask any parenting question,” users can submit queries on a wide range of topics, including breastfeeding, discipline, and divorce, and expect detailed responses within seconds. ParentGPT draws its information from three dozen credible sources carefully selected by the healthcare company.

//EY report sheds new light on global AI regulatory landscape. A report by Ernst & Young (EY), one of the Big Four accounting firms, on the global AI regulatory landscape is receiving renewed interest after President Biden signed a sweeping executive order on Monday that aims to monitor and regulate the risks of artificial intelligence (AI) while also harnessing its potential.The EY report, titled “The Artificial Intelligence (AI) global regulatory landscape: Policy trends and considerations to build confidence in AI,” was published last month. Its goal is to clarify the global AI regulatory environment, providing policymakers and businesses with a roadmap to understand and navigate this complex landscape.

_It’s quite soul-destroying’: how we fell out of love with dating apps. For a decade, apps have dominated dating. But now singles are growing tired of swiping and are looking for new ways to meet people – or reverting to old ones. Kacey deleted dating apps from her phone a couple of years ago and has never looked back – and not because she met the man of her dreams. The 55-year-old social worker now spends her weekends on the dancefloors of illegal nightclubs in north London’s Turnpike Lane, unlicensed venues where people go to let loose. “I meet so many men,” she says enthusiastically. She will often go out alone to these clubs where, she says, men outnumber women. “Recently, I met a younger man with an amazing body. It was probably the best sex of my life.” As for her relationship status? “I’m always in a state of flux.” Lacey’s approach might not suit everyone looking for love, but she is one of a growing number of people rejecting swiping on a screen and taking their dating lives offline.

_A new photo app. The history of social media platforms is littered with apps that had their moment before fading. BeReal, the 2022 darling that required users to post just once a day at a random time, has lost momentum, according to Gen Z.Dispo, a photo-sharing platform inspired by disposable cameras, briefly made headlines in 2021. And in 2015 there was Beme, which was marketed as an online space for sharing everyday life as it really is. Now there’s a new contender: Lapse, a photo app with the tagline “friends not followers.” It had its launch in 2021but, after a rerelease, it has shot to No. 2 in the United States on the Apple App Store’s free chart.Much like Dispo, Lapse encourages people to take pictures the way they did in the analog days, when disposable cameras were all the rage. Users snap photos and “develop” them in the app. When the photos are ready, several hours later, their takers can decide if they want to post them for their Lapse friends or archive them for private viewing.All photos posted on Lapse must be taken in the app and cannot be altered in any way. There are no visible “like” counts. Instead, friends can react with emojis.

_Worldcoin, the cryptocurrency project set up by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, aims to establish a global ID network akin to India's Aadhaar biometric ID system, a senior employee told Reuters.

_This Florida School District Banned Cellphones. Here’s What Happened. Schools in Orlando took a tougher approach than a new state law required. Student engagement increased. So did the hunt for contraband phones.

BRANDS

_Motorola’s Adaptive Smartphone can be worn like a slap bracelet. AI automatically adjusts the size of the phone’s display based on the screen’s positionality/ Motorola says that when wrapped around one’s wrist entirely, the phone will have a display similar to that of its square smartphone, the motorola razr+.Apparently it's still in the experimental phase. (in my opinion UGLY..lol)

_Disney has announced that it will buy the remaining stake in streaming service Hulu, in a widely expected move.The company said on Wednesday it would acquire the 33% stake it does not own from TV giant Comcast. This would give Disney full ownership of the streaming service and the ability to incorporate it into its own Disney+ platform.

_Mercedes crowns itself Music’s Hottest car brand in striking ‘Iconic Playlist’.

_The next hot Gen Z ad channel. Free mobile networks. TextNow offers a unique blend of free mobile service and strategic advertising that connect brands with young consumers in the platform they love the most … their cell phones. The mobile revolution has been so ubiquitous that any reminders of a time without cell phones seem like ancient history. Just as commonplace are those pesky—and pricey—monthly fees that make mobile access possible.The entire digital mobile advertising ecosystem is built on that access. But as Gen Z has come of age, it has reshaped the rules of engagement, both in terms of how brands advertise to Gen Zers and the services they are willing to pay for, from TV to cell service. Mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) have been around since the ’90s (it’s probably not widely known that some of the best-known mobile services are in fact MVNOs). TextNow, with over 10 million users, is the only ad-supported MVNO in the U.S to offer free phone service. The company is leading the charge of a new mobile revolution by combining free phone service with strategic advertising opportunities for brands to connect with this valuable but often elusive demographic.

MMMMMM OF THE WEEK

_TikTok’s Finest Lobsterman. A new crop of popular social media personalities includes a trucker, a shepherd and a commercial fisherman. What they earn from sponsorships is just a nice bonus. It was another busy day for the crew of the Rest-Ashoar, a lobster fishing boat that works the waters off the rocky coast of Winter Harbor, Maine. The captain, Jacob Knowles, had gotten up at 3 a.m. on a brisk October morning and took his vessel 10 miles into the ocean.Using a hydraulic hauler, buoys and ropes, Mr. Knowles, Keith Potter (the stern man) and Coty White (the third man) hauled up 400 wire traps over the next 10 hours. They pulled legal-size lobsters — at least 3.25 inches but not over 5 inches, from its eye to the back of its shell — from each baited cage and tossed back the smaller ones. As the boat listed in the rolling waves, they heaved the empty traps back overboard.Even while doing the grueling work of commercial fishermen, the crew was engaged in another job: filming a video.Over the past two years, Mr. Knowles, 30, has amassed a large audience on social media by sharing snippets of his workday with his 2.5 million followers on TikTok and nearly 400,000 followers on Instagram. Wearing an orange Grundens rubber fishing bib and a matching coat, he stands on the deck and, in a Down East accent, gives tutorials about, say, lobster reproductivity, or how to remove barnacles from the shells of crabs.Mr. Knowles is one of several people in what are considered blue-collar jobs who use social media to offer a window into their lives. Their videos are about as far as you can get from the “get ready with me” makeup videos that are a TikTok staple, resembling instead a social media version of “Dirty Jobs,” the long-running show on the Discovery Channel. In some cases, as with Mr. Knowles, these hard-working influencers have signed sponsorship deals with brands, giving them an additional source of income.Another popular online figure who works outdoors is Adam Perry, a tree trimmer in England, who has racked up 245,000 followers on Instagram by posting videos of himself scaling trees with a chain saw and tying knots with names like double Portuguese bowline and clove hitch. There is also Hannah Jackson, who herds sheep in the rolling hills of Cumbria, England, and goes by theredshepherdess on TikTok, where she has 100,000 followers. A recent post introduced her new herding dog, Mick.Ms. Jackson, 31, said her feed appeals to “people who are in a little more of a townie setting.” “Probably because I explain farming in a really easy way,” she said. “People feel quite comfortable that they can ask questions and not feel stupid.”With her red hair and cheeky humor, Ms. Jackson is a striking presence, and she has parlayed her online success into a memoir that was a best seller in England. She has also appeared on the BBC show “Countryfile” and signed sponsorship deals with Can-Am, which makes off-road vehicles, and other companies.“It really helps support the farm,” she said of the money she earns through posting.

OFF TOPIC

_RAYE and Hans Zimmer Present "Mother Nature" for 'Planet Earth III'. An ethereal homage to nature for the latest Sir David Attenborough projectRAYE is a self-described “Planet Earth stan,” so getting to partner with the esteemed Hans Zimmer for Planet Earth III’s official theme song was a dream come true for the London songstress. After globally debuting “Mother Nature” on Greg James’s BBC Radio 1 breakfast show, the duo gave the whimsical ode to nature a full-fledged release earlier today – which serves as the backing track for Planet Earth III‘s captivating trailer.Sir David Attenborough narrates the two-minute clip, with RAYE’s poignant lyricism – rooted in “Earth’s awe, beauty, fragility and resilience” – bolstering his message. “She’ll be beautiful / So beautiful / For as much as she can stand / Forgive us Mother Nature / For we know not what we do,” she croons. Zimmer also enlisted Bastille to contribute background vocals; he explained in a statement – “Creating scores for any of the BBC‘s Natural History series is always an honor for me as there are no more epic stories than those occurring naturally every day in our own planet’s ecosystem. For Planet Earth III, it’s a further privilege to bring the incredible world-class talents of Bastille and RAYE to create both a wonderful soundscape for the series.”RAYE has been in her orchestral era for a minute now, fresh off her My 21st Century Symphony album release, which she recorded live at The Royal Albert Hall. “I’ve watched religiously for years, so having this opportunity open for me doesn’t even feel real,” RAYE shared in a statement. “David Attenborough and Hans Zimmer are two of my heroes, to be able to compose a song with Hans is BEYOND a wildest dream, and then to hear Sir David narrate over and in between my voice actually brings tears to my eyes.”“Once again we journey across our magnificent planet,” Attenborough announces toward the trailer’s close. “To meet the astonishing animals that live here and reveal their extraordinary stories.”Stream the trailer for Planet Earth III above, and find “Mother Nature” on streaming everywhere now via Human Re Sources/The Orchard.

_Amazon, You could buy an ‘Energy Drink’ made of delivery drivers’ urine.