Companies scramble to incorporate generative AI in products

https://www.axios.com/2023/02/28/chatgpt-generative-ai-products-microsoft

The rush is on among tech companies large and small to add the latest hot AI technology into their products.

Why it matters: Generative AI has dominated the tech conversation in recent months with both its impressive capabilities and its noteworthy shortcomings.

Driving the news:

• Microsoft, which earlier this month integrated the technology behind ChatGPT into its Bing search and Edge browser, announced today it is adding similar capabilities into its Windows 11 operating system.

• Meta on Monday reorganized its generative AI work, creating a new product team tasked with getting the technology into apps like Facebook and Instagram as well as into its VR and metaverse projects.

• Google rushed out an announcement ahead of Microsoft's Bing and Edge news unveiling Bard, a ChatGPT rival, as well as plans to incorporate generative AI responses into its flagship search engine.

• Snapchat, meanwhile, announced Monday it is adding My AI, an experimental chatbot for those who subscribe to its paid Snapchat+ service.

Smaller companies are also keen to show they are fully on board with the white-hot trend.

• For example, corporate travel specialist TripActions rebranded as Navan, promising to use AI to overhaul the way workers book travel and report expenses.

• ChatGPT and the like are being added into all manner of other services, with new startups pitching AI chatbots as the solution for everything from retail to marketing to customer service.

The big picture: Technologies like ChatGPT and image generators such as Dall-E 2 and Stable Diffusion have captured the imagination of the tech industry and beyond. (Yes, but: Excitement is one thing; practical uses and profitable businesses are another.)

• Whether these new AI technologies are ready for prime time remains a wide-open question. as highlighted by the many humorous and sometimes frightening chats that have been served up by Bing and others.

• Even assuming these early bugs are worked out, a host of thorny business and legal challenges remain, as we've been writing about.

"The problem with AI right now isn't that it's smart — it's that it is stupid in ways that we can't always predict," as John Oliver put it in a must-watch segment on AI in the latest episode of Last Week Tonight. Oliver points out AI's propensity to automate bias and makes the case for explainable AI, in which such systems at least have to show the work behind how they created a specific piece of content or reached a particular conclusion.

What they're saying: Microsoft corporate VP and consumer marketing chief Yusuf Mehdi says it's the right time to add generative AI capabilities to shipping products, even if the technology itself has limitations.

• "You can’t build the perfect product in a lab," Mehdi told Axios on Monday. "You have to get it out and test it with people."

• And, yes, he acknowledged, that also means some very public flops, such as Bing professing its love for New York Times columnist Kevin Roose.

• "If you don’t do that then this technology is getting developed in secret," Mehdi said.

The other side: Others say that the competitive pressure is leading companies to remove needed safeguards.

• "The more money that flows in, the faster people are moving the goal posts and removing the guardrails," says Matthew Butterick, an attorney who is involved in lawsuits against several companies over how their generative AI systems operate, including Microsoft's GitHub.

• While early adopters of tech products often serve as guinea pigs, some argue that generative AI is too powerful and unpredictable for a global public experiment to be safe.

>>18468976

What's really funny is what the Tucker story pushed out of the news - proof that the entire covid lockdown was a power grab by world governments. Much more to come from 100,000 plus whatsapp texts.

Isabel Oakeshott: the lesson of the Lockdown Files

The journalist explains how politicians got drunk on power during the pandemic

https://unherd.com/thepost/isabel-oakeshott-the-lesson-of-the-lockdown-files/

https://youtu.be/UqMI9pIyi30

>>18469064

https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_harvesting_(ballot_collection)_laws_by_state

If there will be ballot harvesting, MAGA is going to be BY FAR the largest ballot harvesting movement in the history of ballot harvesting.

#Trump2024

What is Ballot Harvesting?

How do you Ballot Harvest?

Are there laws governing Ballot Harvesting?

What is Ballot Collection? Is it the same as Ballot Harvesting?

How are Ballot Harvesting non profits created?

Anons have a real opportunity to lead from the front here.

https://www.mapresearch.org/democracy-maps/ballot_collection_policies

Third party ballot collection, which is also referred to negatively as “ballot harvesting,” refers to a voter allowing another individual to return their completed ballot. MAP has analyzed each state law to determine whether a given state’s restrictions on ballot collection are overly burdensome to voters. Restrictions on ballot collection can disproportionately affect Native voters, disabled voters, and other voters such as those in remote locations. Factors considered in our scoring include: 1) Who can collect a ballot; 2) How many ballots can be collected; 3) In what circumstances ballot collection is allowed; 4) Whether compensation is prohibited for ballot collection; 5) Time limits in which ballots must be returned; 6) Criminal penalties associated with ballot collection; and 7) Other restrictions such as requiring notarization for a ballot collected by a third party.

>>18469439

If MAGA becomes proficient at 3rd Party ballot collection, blue 'safe' states like Colorado and Oregon and quite possibly Washington State can be put into play. The key is to start planning the largest 3rd Party Ballot Collection army that has ever been assembled.

Republicans reconsider ballot harvesting and early voting amid midterm losses

Nov 22, 2022

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/republicans-reconsider-ballot-harvesting-early-voting-midterm-losses

After Democrats defied historical trends and political expectations in the midterm elections, some Republicans are reconsidering their party’s resistance to ballot harvesting, voting by mail, and extensive early voting periods. The GOP has fought in several states to roll back changes to election law that became widespread during the pandemic, such as unlimited voting by mail and the proliferation of ballot drop boxes. Republicans have rejected ballot harvesting in particular as a threat to election integrity. Ballot harvesting refers to a practice in which a third party collects ballots from voters in bulk and delivers them to a drop box or polling location. Proponents of the practice say it increases election access for people who may struggle to submit their ballots themselves, such as elderly patients in nursing homes. Opponents have argued it opens the door to abuses large and small, from the submission of potentially fraudulent ballots to the subtle forms of social pressure that might arise from having a friend or community leader oversee the completion of multiple ballots. Thirty-one states specifically allow a person other than the voter who filled out the ballot to return it, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. While a number of those states place limits on who can do the returning — restricting it to family members of a voter, for example — and how many ballots a person can return on behalf of others, 16 states allow virtually anyone to return a ballot for someone else, and only nine states cap the number of ballots a third party can return. Alabama is the only state in the nation that requires a voter to drop off his or her own ballot.

“You’ve still got, first, potential pressure to make it into a social process,” Olson said. “So, all of this takes us away from a conception of voting that we struggled long and hard to get, which is that it is a profoundly individual decision where you don’t have to feel accountable to your nearest and dearest, let alone a political boss.” “We want to insulate people from feeling that kind of pressure,” he added. But a number of prominent Republicans, even ones closely allied with former President Donald Trump, have called for a greater focus on the tactical aspect of elections. “The No. 1 reason for that is Democrat mastery of mail-in balloting, vote harvesting, and the machinery of the early vote in these states where they’re voting for weeks if not months before the election,” Stephen Miller, a former top aide to Trump, said this week of the GOP's underwhelming midterm performance.

“I think he ought to tell people to start their mail-in ballots immediately,” Kudlow said. “Don't stop! Republicans have to learn how to play this game too.” Some states are far more permissive about ballot harvesting than others, which would force Republicans to adopt a patchwork approach if the party does indeed shift toward taking the practice more seriously. For example, California lawmakers removed virtually all barriers to ballot harvesting in 2016, and both parties have adjusted over the election cycles since in ways that could provide lessons to the rest of the country. House Republicans wrote in a report about ballot harvesting in California that the removal of any limits on who could submit ballots in the state paved the way for Republican losses in 2018. “This also gave rise to paid political operatives, known as ‘ballot brokers,’ recruiting and pressuring voters to vote by mail,” the House Administration Committee Republicans wrote in the report. “These ballot brokers identify specific locations, such as large apartment complexes or nursing homes, where voters have traditionally voted for their party and build relationships with the residents,” the report said. “Operatives encourage, and even assist, these unsuspecting voters in requesting a mail-in ballot; weeks later when the ballot arrives in the mail the same ballot brokers are there to assist the voter in filling out and delivering their ballot.”

“For more than two decades, Republicans in Arizona used early voting with precision — always outperforming Democrats in the early vote totals,” Sean Noble, a Republican strategist, told the Washington Examiner. “Donald Trump’s ridiculous claims of not trusting mail-in ballots put Republicans at a disadvantage in 2020 and 2022.” “There is no question that Republicans must go back to dominating early voting if they are to stand a chance in 2024 and beyond,” Noble added. “Smart candidates will work to get votes from whatever means are available.”

Smart Candidates Will Work To Get Votes Wherever They May Be Available

>>18469507

Manchin to Vote NO on Gigi Sohn for FCC Commissioner

March 7, 2023

https://www.manchin.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/manchin-to-vote-no-on-gigi-sohn-for-fcc-commissioner

Washington, DC – Today, U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) released the following statement on his decision to vote against Gigi Sohn for Democratic Commissioner on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Ms. Sohn has faced unprecedented, bipartisan opposition to her nomination as a result of her years of partisan activism, inflammatory statements online, and work with far-left groups. She has also spent many years as a public interest advocate, using similarly inflammatory language on social media.

“For nearly 100 years, the FCC has been an independent, nonpartisan regulator of all forms of communication in American life, from radio to television to satellite. Unfortunately, over the last several years, it has become increasingly politicized. The FCC must focus on issues of critical importance to West Virginian and Americans, such as updating broadband coverage maps, addressing compromised Chinese equipment and products that threaten the security of our communications infrastructure, and ensuring every American has access to affordable Internet services. Especially now, the FCC must remain above the toxic partisanship that Americans are sick and tired of, and Ms. Sohn has clearly shown she is not the person to do that. For those reasons, I cannot support her nomination to the FCC, and I urge the Biden Administration to put forth a nominee who can bring us together, not drive us apart.”

Ms. Sohn has been re-nominated this Congress to be the third Democratic Commissioner on the FCC, and she has now had three controversial Senate Commerce Committee hearings. Last Congress, she was reported out of Committee on a 14-14 party-line split – the first time an FCC nominee has not been reported favorably by the Committee. Given ethical concerns raised during her confirmation process, Ms. Sohn has agreed to recuse herself from regulating certain broadcast issues if confirmed, leading to additional questions about whether she can adequately serve as FCC Commissioner if she cannot weigh in on some of the key matters before the Commission.

Tell the truth Gigi - this is why you pulled the plug, to be spared the humiliation of being spurned by a losing confirmation vote.

The Lockdown Files

• The Telegraph has obtained more than 100,000 WhatsApp messages sent between Matt Hancock and other ministers and officials at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic.

• The conversations raise vital new questions about the handling of the pandemic ahead of a public inquiry into the response to Covid-19.

• Over the coming days we will reveal devastating details about the pandemic response that had until now remained secret.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/lockdown-files/

Matt Hancock Covid memoirs censored over Wuhan lab leak comments

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/08/matt-hancock-covid-memoirs-censored-wuhan-lab-leak-comments/

Matt Hancock was censored by the Cabinet Office over his concerns that the Covid-19 pandemic began with a lab leak in Wuhan, the Lockdown Files reveals. The former health secretary was told to tone down claims in his book because the Government feared it would "cause problems" with China. Mr Hancock wanted to say that the Chinese explanation - that the virus being discovered close to a government science lab in Wuhan was coincidental - "just doesn't fly". But, in correspondence from late last year and leaked to the Telegraph, the Cabinet Office told him that the Government's position was that the original outbreak's location was "entirely coincidental" . It is the first time that the British position has been categorically stated. Mr Hancock was warned that to differ from this narrative, which resembles China's version of events, risked "damaging national security". In his book, Pandemic Diaries, Mr Hancock also wanted to write that "Global fear of the Chinese must not get in the way of a full investigation into what happened” but this too was watered down. The disclosure comes just days before Rishi Sunak prepares to set out a new defence and security strategy that is expected to take a less aggressive tone to China than that proposed by his predecessor, Liz Truss. The changes to the book were made by the Cabinet Office when Mr Hancock submitted his manuscript for review - a process all former ministers are expected to follow - last year. Once alterations were made, the book was signed off for publication by Simon Case, the Cabinet Secretary, on November 4 2022. The assertion that the nature of the outbreak was "entirely coincidental" marks the first time that the British government has directly commented on the lab leak claims. It is in contrast to the USA where the FBI and the Department for Energy have recently said that they believe that a lab leak theory is plausible. In the draft of his Pandemic Diaries memoir, written with Isabel Oakeshott, Mr Hancock wrote “given how cagey the Chinese have been, I think we have to treat their official version of events – still the Wuhan thing – with considerable scepticism. “Imagine there was an outbreak of a deadly new virus in Wiltshire and we shrugged off the fact that the outbreak ‘just so happened’ to be near a little place called Porton Down. We’d be laughed out of town."

However, officials at the Cabinet Office responded saying “this is highly sensitive and would cause problems if released”. In a separate section he planned to write: "To me it seems pretty credible. It’s just too much of a coincidence that the pandemic started in the same city as the lab, which – by the way, is a full 40 minutes drive from the wet market originally linked to the outbreak. The only plausible alternative is that the virus was brought to Wuhan to be studied, and then escaped. The Chinese denials are a bit like us claiming that a random virus just happened to break out near a little place called Porton Down, perhaps because of some badgers. It just doesn’t fly." The section was almost entirely removed at the behest of the Cabinet Office. To explain proposed alterations, civil servants wrote that the reference to “Porton Down is damaging to national security”, referring to the laboratory linked to the Ministry of Defence. They explained: “What is set up as a joke, is one of the attack lines Russia has used against us for the Novichok poisoning, as it is only a few miles from Porton Down to Salisbury (which is entirely coincidental – as, we believe, it is that the Wuhan lab is so close to where the first covid outbreak was recorded)”.

The comments appear in the final version of the book significantly watered down with references to Porton Down – the Government's scientific and military research centre – and "global fear of the Chinese" removed.

(excerpt from article to fit text for post, more at url)

MP lobbied NHS chief on behalf of firm that paid him £1,600 a month

Steve Brine contacted Simon Stevens and Department of Health for Remedium, leaked WhatsApp messages show

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/08/mp-lobbied-nhs-chief-behalf-firm-paid-1600-month/