Unleashing AI Agents

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Setting a bunch of A.I. agents loose on the internet could provoke a backlash. If you’re a business buying ads on Amazon, you want those ads to be seen by humans, not bots pretending to be humans.In the future, I can imagine more websites taking steps to block A.I. agents or steer them toward certain pages or products.

Right now, A.I. agents are too incompetent to be much of a threat. But it doesn’t take much imagination to envision a near future when most of the web will consist of robots talking to robots, buying things from robots and writing emails that only other robots will read.

Kevin Roose  writing in the New York Times

19 Articles about the Business of Running an AI Company

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Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance - Washington Post 

Chegg bets big on the AI that nearly broke it – Semafor

OpenAI Set to Make Super Bowl Ad Debut – Wall Street Journal  

OpenAI looks across US for sites to build its Trump-backed Stargate AI data centers - Washington Post

DeepSeek AI Is the Competition America Needs – Wall Street Journal

OpenAI may reveal reasoning steps behind outputs from its AI models, will consider open source approach – Business Insider  

European AI firms encouraged by DeepSeek in scramble to catch up to US - Semafor 

The AI Spending Race Is Still On as Google Antes Up – Wall Street Journal 

Why ‘Distillation’ Has Become the Scariest Word for AI Companies – Wall Street Journal

The DeepSeek app is impressively strange. It’s clever, quirky and self-censoring — but it’s the stuff behind the scenes that really matters. – Washington Post 

SoftBank in Talks to Invest as Much as $25 Billion in OpenAI – Wall Street Journal

What to Know About DeepSeek and How It Is Upending A.I. – New York Times

DeepSeek's great news for the corporate world - Axios

Reid Hoffman Raises $24.6 Million for AI Cancer-Research Startup - Wall Street Journal

Stunning breakthroughs from China's DeepSeek AI alarm U.S. rivals – Axios  

OpenAI introduced a new tool, called Operator, that can autonomously perform tasks on the internet – New  York Times 

South Carolina to Reboot Giant Nuclear Project to Meet AI Demand – Wall Street Journal 

Google rushed to sell AI tools to Israel’s military after Hamas attack – Washington Post   

OpenAI product chief says world is "on the verge" of AI agents - Axios

21 Recent Articles about Politics & AI

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Washington lawmakers weigh new artificial intelligence regulations - PBS

Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance - Washington Post 

AI systems with ‘unacceptable risk’ are now banned in the EU – Tech Crunch 

Will AI Regulation “Avoid Past Mistakes” or Just Make Different Ones? - Information Technology & Innovation Foundation 

Legal challenges await OpenAI chief as he visits India on global tour – Washington Post

The Manhattan Project Was Secret. Should America’s AI Work Be Too? - Wall Street Journal

Is China winning the AI race? – Washington Post  

Stunning breakthroughs from China's DeepSeek AI alarm U.S. rivals – Axios

The global struggle over how to regulate AI – Rest of World

South Carolina to Reboot Giant Nuclear Project to Meet AI Demand - Wall Street Journal

Trump Announces Private-Sector $500 Billion AI Infrastructure Investment – Unite 

Google rushed to sell AI tools to Israel’s military after Hamas attack – Washington Post  

China's AI keeps getting better — and cheaper – Axios

Joe Biden signs executive order to speed AI data center construction – The Verge

Sam Altman on ChatGPT’s First Two Years, Elon Musk and AI Under Trump – Bloomberg

A Book App Used AI to ‘Roast’ Its Users. It Went Anti-Woke Instead – Wired

Israel built an ‘AI factory’ for war. It unleashed it in Gaza. – Washington Post

Don’t Look Now, but China’s AI Is Catching Up Fast - Wall Street Journal  

Behind the Curtain: A chilling, "catastrophic" warning – Axios

House AI Report Lays the Foundation for a Clear, Credible U.S. Vision on AI Governance – Data Innovation

Generative AI bias poses risk to democratic values, research suggests – Phys.org

18 Recent Articles about AI & Journalism

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Copyright & AI Use in the Creative Process

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The US Copyright Office says “the use of artificial intelligence tools to assist in the creative process does not undermine the copyright of a work. The announcement clears the way for continued adoption of AI in post-production, such as in the enhancement of Hungarian-language dialogue in “The Brutalist.” https://variety.com/2025/biz/news/copyright-ai-tools-filmmaking-studios-office-1236288969/

8 Webinars This Week about AI, Journalism & Media

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Mon, Feb 3 - AI ChatBot Ethics

What: We examine how children and teens engage with AI tools, from companionship to questionable information sources. Drawing on the BBC TechLife podcast “Dating a Chatbot” and recent high-profile stories, we’ll discuss media literacy strategies to identify risks, navigate misinformation, and foster responsible AI use. Don’t miss this timely conversation on the opportunities and challenges chatbots bring to families today.

Who: Wesley Fryer, an educational technology early adopter / innovator who teaches middle school STEM and media literacy.

When: 12 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Media Education Lab

More Info

 

Wed, Feb 5 - The Playbook for GenAI in the News Media Business

What: How best to harness this GenAI technology, common mistakes made, and insights from working on GenAI solutions worldwide. Our guests will present guidelines for those just getting started with GenAI, those with some experience, and those who are now advanced users, ensuring that this session is valuable for news brands at different stages of technological maturity.

Who: Justin Kosslyn, an AI consultant who was previously Director of News Ecosystem products at Google and has also been head of digital products at TED conferences; Lukas Görög, an AI consultant who works extensively on GenAI implementation across industries and draws on his experience as AI and data strategy lead at NZZ, data strategist at Die Presse, and AI consultant for The Thomson Foundation.

When: 10 am, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free to members

Sponsor: International News Media Association

More Info

 

Wed, Feb 5 - Mini-Lab: AI Tools for Video Creation

What: We’ll experiment with prompts in Sora to build lengthy videos that will have some journalistic value. We’ll start building a prompt library for Sora videos and tweak/test them as we build videos. We’ll cover how to post them properly online (YouTube) and disclose the AI use to readers when posting. Participants will be given a handout with links to all the tools and exercises on how to use them. Prior to the session, have an account set up at Sora and have access to a YouTube account if we want to post the videos there afterward.

Who: Mike Reilley  Senior Lecturer, University of Illinois-Chicago.

When: 11 am, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Online News Association

More Info

 

Wed, Feb 5 - Demystifying AI Agents

What: Real-world examples of how generative and agentic AI can help you work smarter, streamlining workflows, enhancing proactive threat detection, and automating key tasks.

Who: David Irwin, Director of Product Management - AI, Swimlane; Katie Bykowski, Sr. Director of Product Marketing, Swimlane.

When: 1 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Swimlane

More Info

 

Thu, Feb 6 - Journalism and Technology Trends and Predictions 2025

What: We unpack the findings for 2025 of the Study of Journalism, the Journalism and Technology Trends and Predictions report—including the transformative role of generative AI in newsrooms, the rise of 'creator-fication' of news and more.

Who: Tom Platt, Global Head of Newsgathering & Video at Reuters; Nic Newman, Senior Research Associate Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism

When: 10 am, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Reuters

More Info

 

Thu, Feb 6 - Creating Action-FIrst Learning Through AI-Generated Avatars

What: Explore how AI-driven avatars can transform traditional training by simulating real-world conversations, decision-making challenges, and interactive scenarios, Plus learn how to create your own AI avatar using several different AI software tools in a matter of mere minutes. If you have ever wanted to create your own digital twin, this webinar will teach you how to quickly create a digital copy of yourself for use in training, delivering messages, or even just to have a little fun.

Who: Karl Kapp, Director, Institute for Interactive Technologies, Bloomsburg University.

When: 12 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: OpenSesame

More Info

 

Thu, Feb 6 -  SEO Basics 2.0: Strategies and Tools to Write Winning Headlines

What: Agentic AI vs. generative AI - what’s the difference? The do’s and don’ts for using AI in your SOC. Tips for getting (and quantifying) the business value of AI. Meet Hero, Swimlane’s private AI companion for SecOps.

Who: Jessie Willms & Shelby Blackley cofounders of SEO for journalists.

When: 2 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Indiegraf

More Info

 

Fri, Feb 7 - Trust and The Government: What journalists need to know to guide political coverage

What: This briefing that will prepare journalists to cover politics with their audience in mind, while noting their unique role in how the public perceives — and trusts — their federal government.

Who: Max Stier, founding president and CEO, Partnership for Public Service; Elliot C. Williams, training coordinator for the National Press Club Journalism Institute.

When: 12 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: National Press Club

More Info

Love and Death

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In the 1993 movie “Groundhog Day,” Bill Murray plays Phil Connors, a reporter who, confronted with living the same day over and over again, matures from an arrogant, self-serving professional climber to someone capable of loving and appreciating others and his world. Murray convincingly portrays the transformation from someone whose self-importance is difficult to abide into a person imbued with kindness.  

But there is another story line at work in the film, one we can see if we examine Murray’s character not in the early arrogant stage, nor in the post-epiphany stage, where the calendar is once again set in motion, but in the film’s middle, where he is knowingly stuck in the repetition of days. In this part of the narrative, Murray’s character has come to terms with his situation. He alone knows what is going to happen, over and over again.  He has no expectations for anything different.  In this period, his period of reconciliation, he becomes a model citizen of Punxsutawney. He radiates warmth and kindness, but also a certain distance.

The early and final moments of “Groundhog Day” offer something that is missing during this period of peace:  passion. Granted, Phil Connors’s early ambitious passion for advancement is a far less attractive thing than the later passion of his love for Rita (played by Andie MacDowell).  But there is passion in both cases. It seems that the eternal return of the same may bring peace and reconciliation, but at least in this case not intensity.

And here is where a lesson about love may lie. One would not want to deny that Connors comes to love Rita during the period of the eternal Groundhog Day. But his love lacks the passion, the abandon, of the love he feels when he is released into a real future with her. There is something different in those final moments of the film. A future has opened for their relationship, and with it new avenues for the intensity of his feelings for her. Without a future for growth and development, romantic love can extend only so far.  Its distinction from, say, a friendship with benefits begins to become effaced.

There is, of course, in all romantic love the initial infatuation, which rarely lasts. But if the love is to remain romantic, that infatuation must evolve into a longer-term intensity, even if a quiet one, that nourishes and is nourished by the common engagements and projects undertaken over time. 

The future is open. Unlike the future in “Groundhog Day,” it is not already decided.  We do not have our next days framed for us by the day just passed.  We can make something different of our relationships.  There is always more to do and more to create of ourselves with the ones with whom we are in love.

This is not true, however, and romantic love itself shows us why.  Love is between two particular people in their particularity. We cannot love just anyone, even others with much the same qualities.  If we did, then when we met someone like the beloved but who possessed a little more of a quality to which we were drawn, we would, in the phrase philosophers of love use, “trade up.” But we don’t trade up, or at least most of us don’t.  This is because we love that particular person in his or her specificity.  And what we create together, our common projects and shared emotions, are grounded in those specificities.  Romantic love is not capable of everything. It is capable only of what the unfolding of a future between two specific people can meaningfully allow.

Todd May writing in the New York Times

Lucky in Life

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According to psychologist Richard Wiseman, luck – bad or good – is just what you call the results of a human beings consciously interacting with chance, and some people are better at interacting with chance than others.

Over the course of 10 years, Wiseman followed the lives of 400 subjects of all ages and professions. He found them after he placed ads in newspapers asking for people who thought of themselves as very lucky or very unlucky. He had them keep diaries and perform tests in addition to checking in on their lives with interviews and observations. In one study, he asked subjects to look through a newspaper and count the number of photographs inside. The people who labeled themselves as generally unlucky took about two minutes to complete the task. The people who considered themselves as generally lucky took an average of a few seconds. Wiseman had placed a block of text printed in giant, bold letters on the second page of the newspaper that read, “Stop counting. There are 43 photographs in this newspaper.” Deeper inside, he placed a second block of text just as big that read, “Stop counting, tell the experimenter you have seen this and win $250.” The people who believed they were unlucky usually missed both.  

Wiseman speculated that what we call luck is actually a pattern of behaviors that coincide with a style of understanding and interacting with the events and people you encounter throughout life.  

Unlucky people are narrowly focused, he observed. They crave security and tend to be more anxious, and instead of wading into the sea of random chance open to what may come, they remain fixated on controlling the situation, on seeking a specific goal. As a result, they miss out on the thousands of opportunities that may float by.  

Lucky people tend to constantly change routines and seek out new experiences. Wiseman saw that the people who considered themselves lucky, and who then did actually demonstrate luck was on their side over the course of a decade, tended to place themselves into situations where anything could happen more often and thus exposed themselves to more random chance than did unlucky people. The lucky try more things, and fail more often, but when they fail they shrug it off and try something else. Occasionally, things work out.

David McRaney

23 Articles about Social Media & AI

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10 Best AI Tools for Social Media – Unite AI

Instagram Begins Randomly Showing Users AI-Generated Images of Themselves – 404 Media

Here’s what to know before using AI to craft your brand’s social media posts - Technical.ly

Meta plans to flood social media with AI-generated users and content - SiliconANGLE

Instagram is planning to introduce a generative AI editing feature next year that will allow users to 'change nearly any aspect of your videos' – The Verge

AI Social Media Users Are Not Always a Totally Dumb Idea – Wired  

Instagram Ads Send This Nudify Site 90 Percent of Its Traffic - 404 Media 

TikTok owner ByteDance plans to spend $12 billion on AI chips in 2025 - Reuters

Instagram’s head says social media needs more context because of AI – The Verge

Meta Permits Its A.I. Models to Be Used for U.S. Military Purposes - The New York Times

Does Anyone Need an AI Social Network? – NY Mag

The rise of fake influencers – Axios

Will AI Suck the Humanity Out of Social Media? – Social Media Today

Elon Musk’s X is a haven for free speech — and noxious AI images – Washington Post

Meta Launches Custom AI Bot Creation Platform in the US - Social Media Today

Facebook Is Already Mistakenly Tagging Real Photos as "Made With AI" – Futurism

Hot AI Jesus Is Huge on Facebook – The Atlantic

Meta Is Offering Hollywood Stars Millions for AI Voice Projects – Bloomberg

How Reddit Fits Into the AI World – Wall Street Journal

AI-generated influencers based on stolen images of real-life adult content creators are flooding social media – Wired   

Meta Moves to End Fact-Checking Program – New York Times

Is it still 'social media' if it's overrun by AI? – CBC

AI and Social Media Fakes: Are You Protecting Your Brand? – Law.com

23 Articles from January about Data Science & AI

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Getting Clarity

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We are too often motivated by a craving to put an end to the inevitable surprises in our lives. This is especially true of the biggest "negative" of all. Might we benefit from contemplating mortality more regularly than we do? As Steve Jobs famously declared, "Remembering that you are going to die is the best way that I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose."

Oliver Burkeman

11 Articles about AI & Coding

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