Time strikes licensing deal with OpenAI

TOP 3 STORIES

Happy Thursday! Here are today’s top 3 headlines:

👀 Google teams up with MOODY

✏️ Time strikes licensing deal with OpenAI

🌿 Bill Gates urges moderation on AI energy use concerns

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Google teams up with Moody's to ground AI models in facts...

Google is enhancing its AI capabilities by partnering with Moody's to integrate financial data into its AI models, aiming to reduce inaccuracies and enhance reliability.

Why it matters: Generative AI has a tendency to fabricate information, but grounding these systems in verified data can significantly mitigate these "hallucinations."

What's new: Google is now allowing its cloud customers to ground their enterprise AI chatbots in factual third-party data. Initial partners include Moody's, Thomson Reuters, and ZoomInfo.

What they’re saying: "You can actually trust the model to do a task on your behalf because you have a basis for trusting it," Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian told Axios.

The bigger picture: This move comes as generative AI providers like Google aim to demonstrate the safety and reliability of their systems for business applications.

New features:

1. Confidence score: AI models will now provide a numeric indicator of their certainty in responses.

2. Focused answers: Models can be directed to prioritize information from specific documents or prompts over their general training data.

Enhancing reliability: "We've taught the model how to guarantee that when it responds, it takes what's in the input prompt as the primary information it needs to pay attention to," Kurian said. "It avoids being distracted by all other training data."

New releases: Google also announced the general availability of its low-latency Gemini 1.5 Flash model and Gemini 1.5 Pro, capable of handling up to 2 million tokens of context, sufficient for two hours of video content.

By integrating trusted data sources, Google aims to improve the accuracy and reliability of its AI models, making them more suitable for enterprise use.

Time strikes licensing deal with OpenAI

Time has entered a multiyear content licensing and strategic partnership with OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT.

Why it matters: This partnership aims to broaden Time's reach to younger and more diverse audiences globally, aligning with its strategy to expand access to its content. Last year, Time removed its digital paywall for this very reason.

Deal highlights:

• Content access: OpenAI will gain access to Time’s 101-year archive to train its large language models and respond to user queries through its consumer-facing products, like ChatGPT.

• Real-time updates: The AI giant will also have access to Time's real-time content to provide up-to-date answers.

• Attribution: OpenAI will cite Time and link back to the original content on Time.com in its responses.

Strategic benefits:

• For Time: The partnership allows Time to leverage OpenAI’s technology and tools to develop new products for its audience.

• For OpenAI: The collaboration helps enhance the use of reputable journalism within its AI products, ensuring proper attribution to original sources.

Statements: Mark Howard, Time’s COO, emphasized that the partnership advances Time’s mission to expand access to trusted information globally. OpenAI’s COO, Brad Lightcap, noted that the partnership supports reputable journalism by providing proper attribution to original sources.

Context:

• Recent deals: This follows similar agreements OpenAI has made with The Atlantic, Vox Media, and News Corp.

• Litigation: Unlike The New York Times and several regional newspapers owned by Alden Global Capital, which have sued OpenAI for copyright infringement, Time has opted for partnership over litigation.

By teaming up with OpenAI, Time aims to enhance the distribution and accessibility of its trusted journalism, while also leveraging cutting-edge AI tools to innovate and engage with a broader audience.

Bill Gates urges moderation on AI energy use concerns

Bill Gates defended the increasing energy consumption of artificial intelligence systems, asserting that the technology will eventually offset its electricity demands. Speaking in London, Gates urged environmentalists and governments to temper their concerns about AI's power usage, as tech giants like Microsoft invest heavily in new data centers.

• Rising energy use: Gates acknowledged that data centers could drive a 2-6% increase in global electricity usage but argued that AI would ultimately spur a reduction exceeding that amount.

• Green premium: Gates emphasized that tech companies are willing to pay higher prices for clean energy, thus boosting the development and deployment of sustainable power sources.

• Investment in clean energy: At the Breakthrough Energy Summit, Gates highlighted the role of tech companies in supporting green energy initiatives. The Breakthrough Energy group, founded by Gates and backed by investors like Jeff Bezos and Jack Ma, has invested in over 100 companies focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

• Electricity challenges: Despite the push for green energy, Gates expressed concerns about meeting the increasing demand for electricity, essential for both AI growth and the transition to clean energy in industries like cement and steel.

• Net zero goals: Gates suggested that the global goal of reaching net zero emissions by 2050 might be unrealistic, proposing that achieving this target by 2060 or 2065 might be more feasible.

Industry response:

• Tech giants' plans: Companies such as Microsoft, Amazon, and Google plan to invest tens of billions in AI infrastructure globally. However, they face challenges due to electricity constraints.

• US Department of Energy report: A recent report indicated that AI would be the primary driver of data center-related electricity demand growth in the US, highlighting the need for more aligned power purchase agreements to ensure emissions are effectively offset.

While Gates advocates for a balanced approach to AI's energy use, he underscores the significant role of tech companies in driving green energy solutions. His remarks highlight both the opportunities and challenges in aligning AI advancements with sustainable energy goals.