ChatGPT has 300 million weekly active users and will allow you to send reminders and regular updates.
NurPhoto (from Getty Images)
Welcome to Prompt.
ChatGPT will be able to handle tasks like sending reminders about important deadlines and sharing daily weather forecasts. OpenAI announced today that people can now ask a conversational AI chatbot to send alerts to future dates and times. The new feature, which is being rolled out to the company’s paid users, signals the AI giant’s efforts to add assistant-like functionality to ChatGPT, its star product, which has more than 300 million users. However, it still has a long way to go before it catches up with other assistants like Google Assistant and Alexa that can play music and make phone calls.
ALSO: Submissions are now being accepted for the 7th annual AI 50 list. This is Forbes’ definitive list of the most prominent private AI startups around the world.
So let’s get into the headlines.
big play
AI-based software built to mitigate disasters didn’t help much when devastating wildfires broke out in parts of Los Angeles, California last week. In 2022, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced plans to build an AI system that would analyze video footage to detect new fires and issue warnings and dispatch human teams before the fires intensify. But while this has helped prevent some fires, the latest disaster, which has caused an estimated $150 billion worth of damage so far, moved too quickly for the system.
please show me the money
AI giant Anthropic plans to raise $2 billion in venture capital at a $60 billion valuation. Once the deal is completed, each of the company’s seven founders, including CEO Dario Amodei, will become billionaires, Forbes reported. This is based on estimates that each co-founder will continue to hold a 2% stake in the company and each will have a net worth of at least $1.2 billion.
politics
With just days left until President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, OpenAI outlined its vision for building AI in the United States. The creators of ChatGPT launch a new “economic blueprint” detailing how the U.S. can maintain its lead in AI over China by attracting more than $100 billion in global capital that was supposed to be funneled to Chinese tech companies. ” was announced. The company also proposes easing regulations based on “democratic values.”
This week’s AI sale
Collate, a startup that uses AI to help life science companies with back-office operations, has raised $30 million in a round led by Redpoint Ventures. CEO Surbhi Sarna said generative AI tools will allow researchers to focus more on drug development rather than managing the documentation needed to comply with regulations.
deep dive
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt has been working in recent months on an artificial intelligence project aimed at burgeoning AI video generation. The startup, which has not been previously reported, was founded last year under the name Hooglee, according to a source familiar with the company’s development and business documents viewed by Forbes. Schmidt’s family office, Hillspire, is currently providing the financing and housing.
The billionaire “AI whisperer” has become a sometimes polarizing voice in Silicon Valley and Washington on the promise and dangers of artificial intelligence, saying it will “double everyone’s productivity.” and characterize these systems as “a different kind of nuclear weapon.” Or, as he did last December, he predicted it might become so sophisticated that “we need to seriously think about unbundling it.”
But months earlier, Schmidt and a small group had quietly incorporated Hooglee LLC, a company whose mission is loosely described as “democratizing video creation with AI.” The company’s website consists of a single landing page and does not name Schmidt or his staff, but says the company “develops innovative solutions that bring people closer together, simplify communication, and increase engagement.” “I do,” he claims. Schmidt declined to comment.
Hooglee appears to be Schmidt’s first artificial intelligence project on his own after investing in a number of AI companies, including Anthropic and quantum computing startup SandboxAQ. The billionaire, whose fortune is estimated by Forbes at more than $26 billion, also funds the OpenAI Grants Program and the AI science nonprofit FutureHouse.
Read the full story on Forbes.
weekly demo
AI financial apps like Cleo AI and Bright claim to help people with money worries by offering advice and analyzing spending. They also often end up using people’s personal data to upsell other products, Wired found. These apps offer cash advances and loans through third parties and entice users to take out short-term debt.
Model behavior
Users noted that OpenAI’s o1 model showed chain of thought reasoning before giving an output, and appeared to perform some steps in Chinese. TechCrunch reports that viewers believe the trend is due to Chinese training data from open source datasets and third-party data labelers. OpenAI has not commented on the obvious issue.
