🚀 Musk's xAI offers free access to Grok-2

Also: Pika Labs releases AI video generator 2.0 with new features

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Evolving AI
December 16, 2024

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Welcome, AI enthusiasts

Elon Musk’s AI startup, xAI, announced on Saturday that the new version of its Grok-2 chatbot will be available for free to all users of the social media platform X. Pika Labs has officially launched Pika 2.0, an advanced AI video generation model featuring several innovations designed to enhance creative video production. After a few months out of the spotlight, Ilya Sutskever has returned with another fascinating talk on the future of AI. Let’s dive in! 

In today’s insights:

  • Musk's xAI offers free access to Grok-2 AI chatbot

  • Pika Labs releases AI video generator 2.0 with new features

  • ‘AI with reasoning power will be less predictable’ says Ilya Sutskever

Read time: 3 minutes

🗞️ LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

Source: REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo

Evolving AI: Elon Musk’s platform now offers free access to Grok-2.

Key Points:

  • Grok-2, xAI’s improved chatbot, is now free for all X users, with premium perks available.

  • Features include web search, citations, an image generator, and a new Grok button for context.

  • xAI recently hit a $50 billion valuation amid ongoing legal battles with OpenAI.

Details:

Elon Musk’s xAI has announced that all X users can now access Grok-2, the latest version of its AI chatbot, for free. This update triples the speed of its predecessor and improves accuracy, multilingual support, and instruction-following. Premium users will retain higher usage limits and early access to future updates. Other xAI features, like the Aurora image generator and the new Grok button for contextual insights, enhance the platform’s capabilities. Meanwhile, xAI’s valuation has surged to $50 billion, fueled by a $5 billion funding round, while the company remains locked in a legal battle with OpenAI.

Why It Matters:

People can now use a powerful AI tool for free, with features like web search, citations, and image generation. This gives users more options to find the right tool for their needs. It also pushes competition in AI, which could lead to better tools for everyone.

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Source: Pika Labs

Evolving AI: Pika Labs has a new feature that lets you use your own pictures to create AI videos.

Key Points:

  • Pika Labs 2.0 adds "Scene Ingredients," so you can upload your own pictures and turn them into videos.

  • The tool is easy to use and lets you mix pictures with text instructions to build creative scenes.

  • Unlike OpenAI’s Sora, Pika Labs works worldwide, even in the EU, and has more features for everyone.

Details:

Pika Labs’ "Scene Ingredients" lets you upload pictures of people, objects, clothes, or places to create animated videos. The AI figures out what each picture is and puts them together to make a scene based on your text. You can do fun things like placing historical figures in modern settings or making dance videos from different pieces. The new version also has better picture quality and follows instructions more accurately. Unlike OpenAI’s Sora, which is only fully available to paid Pro users and isn’t allowed in the EU, Pika Labs 2.0 is available everywhere. Pika Labs was started by Stanford students and has raised $80 million to keep improving their tools.

Why It Matters:

Pika Labs 2.0 makes it easier for anyone to create fun and complex videos. According to Pika Labs, the new model is also particularly good at following a prompt. It follows both the intent and detail of the text and uses that to generate the video. The company promises that it "can turn even the most complex prompts into clips without omitting important elements or breaking down."

Source: Jim Wilson/The New York Times

Evolving AI: AI reasoning will unlock superintelligence but make outcomes increasingly unpredictable, predicts Ilya Sutskever at NeurIPS 2024.

Key Points:

  • Ilya Sutskever predicts reasoning capabilities will make AI outcomes less predictable.

  • Current pre-training approaches are reaching limits due to finite internet data.

  • Future AI will involve deeper reasoning, generating its own data and evaluating answers.

Details:

At NeurIPS 2024, Ilya Sutskever explained that AI’s ability to think and reason will be the next big step. This could help AI become much smarter, but it might also make its actions harder to predict. Sutskever received a “Test of Time” award for a 2014 research paper that shaped how AI is built today. He said that the way we currently train AI, by feeding it tons of data from the internet, is running out of steam because there’s only so much data available. To move forward, he suggested letting AI create its own data or checking multiple answers before picking the best one. He pointed out how reasoning can make AI unpredictable by recalling AlphaGo’s surprising moves in a 2016 game that shocked experts. He also imagined a future where AI could think and understand more like humans do.

Why It Matters:

After leaving OpenAI, Sutskever founded Safe Superintelligence (SSI), a lab focused on general AI safety. SSI raised $1 billion in September. Since his departure, Sutskever has largely stayed out of the media, but now he’s back with another talk. AI that can reason better could solve problems in creative ways, but its unpredictability might make it harder to trust. Can people and industries rely on AI if they don’t fully understand its decisions?

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