The pace of Artificial Intelligence development has reached a natural crescendo. Tools such as GPT-4, Gemini, Claude, etc., and their makers all claim to soon be able to change every facet of society, from healthcare and education to finance and entertainment. This rapid evolution raises evermore critical questions about AI’s trajectory: the technology’s benefits, yes, but also (mostly!) the potential risks it poses to us all. Under these circumstances, listening, understanding and heeding experts’ perspectives becomes crucial. A recent survey titled “Thousands of AI Authors on ..read more

Artificial Intelligence’s integration into the office has sparked significant academic and public debate. Most discussions have focused AI’s impact on employment. Meanwhile, it’s consequences on workers’ psychology and behaviour has been largely ignored. A new study, titled “Deployment of algorithms in management tasks reduces prosocial motivation” by Armin Granulo, Sara Caprioli, Christoph Fuchs, and Stefano Puntoni, addresses this less-explored dimension. The research investigates how the use of algorithms in “management tasks” (e.g., evaluating workers’ performance) affects employees’ proso ..read more

In the realm of science fiction, the idea of melding the human brain with advanced technology has long been tantalizing. Today, this notion is becoming closer to reality through the concept of “Brain-Computer Interfaces” (often referred to as BCIs). The idea is simple : translate brain signals into physical outputs. Among the most notable ventures in this field is Neuralink, co-founded by our Lord & Saviour Elon Musk. His (overhyped) company is developing implantable (invasive) brain–machine interfaces, with a chip implemented directly into the user’s brain. But there are also plenty of no ..read more

Every year, in early January, tens of thousands of tech aficionados descend on Las Vegas for the Customer Electronic Show (CES). It’s an event best known for capturing the tech world’s current zeitgeist; 2023 was heavy on EVs and sustainability, while 2022 revolved around improved hardware and gaming setups. Unsurprisingly, CES 2024 was all about AI. AI for headsets, AI for babies, AI for pets… this year had it all. Obviously, the press unofficially crowns winners and losers at the end of the event. There is a variety of opinions on the losers (Google seems to be getting a lot of votes), but t ..read more

Over the past year, we have witnessed a seemingly infinite amount of AI projects emerge. There is, of course, OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Then its copies: Claude, Anthropic and Google’s Bard. Finally, we have the weird stuff, like Replika and whatever Meta is up to these days. For now, all are digital products, running on “old” laptops and mobile… which is a little boring. Humanity will only see real innovation when it starts building specialised hardware with the sole purpose of interacting with AIs in the physical world. We have created all-knowing gods, and we must now give them a physical form. We k ..read more

A lot has been said about the jobs of the future. In fact, I wrote much of what has been said. From Robot Butler to Climate Refugees, I’ve covered it all. Mostly, I’ve talked about the jobs AI will create; those are the ones people are most curious about. One such AI job of the present and future has had many of us stumped for the past year or so: “prompt engineer.” For a long time, my thinking on prompt engineering was as follows:  Productized LLMs are a brand-new technology that people have not yet fully tamed Twitter reply guys have just been burnt by crypto and need a ..read more

2023 is over, and what a year it was. War. Ukraine. COVID. Coups in Africa. Invasions. Earthquakes. Nuclear escalation. Prigozhin. SBF. Drama at OpenAI. Barbenheimer. Inflation. The Eras Tour. Bankruptcy. Fire. Fire. Fire. The Last of Us. Chinese spy balloon. Titan. Twitter? X. McCarthy. Yaccarino. Argentinian elections. Netherlands elections. Matthew Perry. Hollywood on strike. Messi in Miami. The Roman Empire. Girl Dinner. Girl Math. Nepo Babies. Skibidi Toilet.  I don’t like it here and I think I’d like to go home, please. But we’ve made it. And though many (but not all) of my pre ..read more

As we step into 2024, the tech world is buzzing with transformative trends. Through 24 Technology Predictions for 2024, I propose a concise yet comprehensive glimpse into what the future may hold (without getting into the 2024 presidential elections or the Superbowl...). From Meta’s potential domination in the social media landscape with Threads to TikTok challenging traditional media powerhouses, I cover the key shifts that could shape our digital experience. I also explore crucial developments like the potential Meta-Snap acquisition, the rise of voice-first applications, and the evolving ro ..read more

Allow me to state the obvious: as recent technological advancements go, few innovations have the potential to reshape our work and productivity as profoundly as AI does. We have already witnessed its evolution from buzzword to a fully-productized tool used by 100 million people (mostly for low-value tasks). Next step : conquering the office to complement and enhance everyday white collar workers. A research paper titled “Early LLM-based Tools for Enterprise Information Workers Likely Provide Meaningful Boosts to Productivity” comes at a crucial juncture. Authored by a team from ..read more

What. A. Year. The Ukraine war stalled. COVID too. There were coups in Africa, and in Silicon Valley boardrooms. The Middle East: Took, shook, grim outlook. Barbenheimer went nuclear, and so did the rest of the world. Inflation went up, and Prigozhin went down. The Eras Tour was fire, while regional banks were a dumpster fire. In other news, ,everything was on fire. The Last of Us, indeed. A Chinese spy balloon exploded in the sky, and the Titan imploded undersea. “Under the Sea”… are grown men still mad at the Little Mermaid? We broke up with Twitter, now an X. McCarthy is the ..read more