Future Bites #1

Google announces Bard, Microsoft reveals ChatGPT-powered Bing, AI 101 series, and a sci-fi book you should read

Welcome back to Year 2049, the weekly newsletter keeping you informed on the most fascinating technologies, innovations, and ideas shaping the future.

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This Week’s Edition

• Cartoon: The death of expertise

• Stories:

  • Google announces their AI chatbot, Bard

  • Microsoft reveals their ChatGPT-powered Bing

  • AI 101 series

  • How Apple wants to make AR (finally) succeed

  • Why living on Mars is a terrible idea

• Book Recommendation: From the Earth to the Moon - Jules Verne

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Cartoon

Inspiration: ChatGPT and the Enshittening of Knowledge

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Stories

Microsoft reveals the new AI-powered Bing and Edge

After much anticipation, Microsoft revealed its AI-powered search engine and browser. They describe it as an “AI copilot” for the web.

I’m on the waitlist and can only use the preview at the moment, but here’s how they plan to integrate the chatbot into the existing search experience:

I love that the chatbot cites specific sources and websites for further reading, which was one of ChatGPT’s biggest weaknesses.

But the most exciting features I found were the “Chat” and “Compose” within the Edge browser, which can be enabled on any site you’re on. Some example use cases:

• Summarizing a long PDF document into its key takeaways

• Generating a draft for a Linkedin post (as if everyone on Linkedin didn’t sound the same already)

I plan to write a more detailed analysis about the new Bing once I get access. Stay tuned.

Google announces their AI chatbot, Bard

Google finally announced its ChatGPT competitor, Bard, which will start to roll out in “the coming weeks”.

The company’s been much more cautious in releasing AI products, and understandably so. Their shares fell 7% after their AI event, which might be the result of Bard showing incorrect information about the James Webb Space Telescope’s discoveries.

Regardless, Google will still win the search battle, and Microsoft will cement its dominance in enterprise apps.

I’m eager to see whether Google will follow OpenAI’s approach of having a standalone chatbot with free and paid tiers or integrate the chatbot within the existing search experience like Microsoft.

AI 101 Series

In light of the hype around AI, it’s important to understand some of the fundamental ideas behind it. So, I’ve started an “AI 101” series on my Instagram. I’m making short videos to bring you up to speed on:

• The branches of AI

• The different types of machine learning

• Concepts like the Turing test and the Singularity

• Ethics and bias

• And more!

If you have specific questions you want me to cover, reply to this email or leave a comment.

Here’s Episode 1 of AI 101, where I share how the technology almost died without realizing its potential:

futurewithfawzi

A post shared by Fawzi | Future of Tech (@futurewithfawzi)

Apple wants everyone to make AR apps

Apple is set to release its first-generation mixed-reality headset sometime this year, and they want to make AR finally go mainstream after a decade of hype.

According to The Information, Apple is creating software to allow anyone to create AR apps without coding. The technical barrier to creating AR and VR apps is why they haven’t taken off the way companies like Meta and Google expected.

The convergence of generative AI and mixed-reality headsets will make it even easier for everyone to design and build apps that provide value.

Why living on Mars is a terrible idea

If you ever get the opportunity to go to Mars, think again.

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Book Recommendation

From the Earth to the Moon by Jules Verne

I’ve been trying to read more science fiction, so I recently bought a box set of Jules Vernes’ books.

I just finished reading From the Earth to the Moon, and I was fascinated by Vernes’ foresight, imagination, and technical calculations of how to send a projectile to the Moon. He wrote the book 100 years before the first Moon landing.

It makes you think: does science fiction inspire reality?

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