TPR Newsletter No. 3
Big tech facial recognition, AI deepfakes and text generation, content moderation, and storytelling.
Tech
Big tech companies seem to be taking a step back when it comes to face recognition software. Amazon, Microsoft, and IBM drew headlines this week by promising either to temporarily halt sales of their face-scanning software to law enforcement agencies. However, this announcement doesn't come without skepticism >> link
The debate on whether or not social media companies, namely Facebook & Twitter, should moderate president Trump's comments continues. It is a complex topic, and I have seen valid arguments on both sides. This week media outlets reported on a few experiments that showed what we already knew; if Trump was treated like a regular citizen, his posts would be immediately flagged.
Here are two thoughtful articles, on this matter, with different points of view.
Security
Security improvements for Gmail >> link
Hackers broke WhatsApp >> link
Artificial Intelligence
OpenAI is commercializing a sophisticated text-generation tool it previously said was too dangerous to release widely over fears of misuse.
"The company made the decision because it has not yet finalized a deal to use Google Cloud to host the AI that can read and "process" human language. About two years ago, Robert Murphy, founder and CEO of DeepMind, wrote on his blog , "We do not believe it is safe for any central authority to be able to consider itself the final authority on anything." In an interview with Bloomberg , he said he's prepared to work with anyone willing to help bring the technology to market. In May 2017, DeepMind disclosed that Google had contributed $400,000 in its private seed round."
The tool wrote the paragraph above -in quotes-. It works pretty well.
Facebook released a library of 100,000 deepfakes to help train AI models that spot doctored images and videos >> link
Open Source
Wondering what's the fuzz about quantum computing, here is a primer >> link
Economics
The Covid-19 recession looks an awful lot like the great recession
The 1619 Project is an ongoing series The New York Times Magazine that began in August 2019, to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery. It aims to reframe the country's history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of the narrative.
Storytelling
If you are interested in storytelling, listen to this episode of Planet Money. It is a masterclass in podcasting and narrative structure.
Quote of the week
"There are two types of people who come out of Louisiana, preachers and storytellers. For God's sake be a storyteller, the world has too many preachers.” - Walker Percy