Elon Musk’s AI company, xAI, has launched a standalone iOS app for its chatbot, Grok, marking a major expansion beyond its initial availability to X users. The app is now live in several countries, including the US, Australia, and India, allowing users to access the chatbot directly on their iPhones.
The Grok app offers features such as real-time data retrieval from the web and X, text rewriting, summarising long content, and even generating images from text prompts. xAI highlights Grok’s ability to create photorealistic images with minimal restrictions, including the use of public figures and copyrighted material.
In addition to the app, xAI is working on a dedicated website, Grok.com, which will soon make the chatbot available on browsers. Initially limited to X’s paying subscribers, Grok rolled out a free version in November and made it accessible to all users earlier this month. The launch marks a notable push by xAI to establish Grok as a versatile, widely available AI assistant.
US safety regulators are investigating Tesla’s ‘Actually Smart Summon’ feature, which allows drivers to move their cars remotely without being inside the vehicle. The probe follows reports of crashes involving the technology, including at least four confirmed incidents.
The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is examining nearly 2.6 million Tesla cars equipped with the feature since 2016. The agency noted issues with the cars failing to detect obstacles, such as posts and parked vehicles, while using the technology.
Tesla has not commented on the investigation. Company founder Elon Musk has been a vocal supporter of self-driving innovations, insisting they are safer than human drivers. However, this probe, along with other ongoing investigations into Tesla’s autopilot features, could result in recalls and increased scrutiny of the firm’s driverless systems.
The NHTSA will assess how fast cars can move in Smart Summon mode and the safeguards in place to prevent use on public roads. Tesla’s manual advises drivers to operate the feature only in private areas with a clear line of sight, but concerns remain over its real-world safety applications.
A prominent technology trade group has urged the Biden administration to reconsider a proposed rule that would restrict global access to US-made AI chips, warning that the measure could undermine America’s leadership in the AI sector. The Information Technology Industry Council (ITI), representing major companies like Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta, expressed concerns that the restrictions could unfairly limit US companies’ ability to compete globally while allowing foreign rivals to dominate the market.
The proposed rule, expected to be released as soon as Friday, is part of the Commerce Department’s broader strategy to regulate AI chip exports and prevent misuse, particularly by adversaries like China. The restrictions aim to curb the potential for AI to enhance China’s military capabilities. However, in a letter to Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, ITI CEO Jason Oxman criticised the administration’s urgency in finalising the rule, warning of ‘significant adverse consequences’ if implemented hastily. Oxman called for a more measured approach, such as issuing a proposed rule for public feedback rather than enacting an immediate policy.
Industry leaders have been vocal in their opposition, describing the draft rule as overly broad and damaging. The Semiconductor Industry Association raised similar concerns earlier this week, and Oracle’s Executive Vice President Ken Glueck slammed the measure as one of the most disruptive ever proposed for the US tech sector. Glueck argued the rule would impose sweeping regulations on the global commercial cloud industry, stifling innovation and growth.
While the administration has yet to comment on the matter, the growing pushback highlights the tension between safeguarding national security and maintaining US dominance in the rapidly evolving field of AI.
Elon Musk’s AI venture, xAI, has unveiled a standalone iOS app for its chatbot, Grok, marking its first major expansion beyond the X platform. The app, currently in beta testing across Australia and a few other regions, offers users an array of generative AI features, including real-time web access, text rewriting, summarisation, and even image generation from text prompts.
Grok, described as a ‘maximally truthful and curious’ assistant, is designed to provide accurate answers, create photorealistic images, and analyse uploaded pictures. While previously restricted to paying X subscribers, a free version of the chatbot was launched in November and has recently been made accessible to all users.
The app also serves as a precursor to a dedicated web platform, Grok.com, which is in the works. xAI has touted the chatbot’s ability to produce detailed and unrestricted image content, even allowing creations involving public figures and copyrighted material. This open approach sets Grok apart from other AI tools with stricter content policies.
As the beta rollout progresses, Grok is poised to become a versatile tool for users seeking generative AI capabilities in a dynamic and user-friendly interface.
The NeurIPS conference, AI’s premier annual gathering, drew over 16,000 computer scientists to British Columbia last week, highlighting the field’s rapid growth and transformation. Once an intimate meeting of academic outliers, the event has evolved into a showcase for technological breakthroughs and corporate ambitions, featuring major players like Alphabet, Meta, and Microsoft.
Industry luminaries like Ilya Sutskever and Fei-Fei Li discussed AI’s evolving challenges. Sutskever emphasised AI’s unpredictability as it learns to reason, while Li called for expanding beyond 2D internet data to develop “spatial intelligence.” The conference, delayed a day to avoid clashing with a Taylor Swift concert, underscored AI’s growing mainstream prominence.
Venture capitalists, sponsors, and tech giants flooded the event, reflecting AI’s lucrative appeal. The number of research papers accepted has surged tenfold in a decade, and discussions focused on tackling the costs and limitations of scaling AI models. Notable attendees included Meta’s Yann LeCun and Google DeepMind’s Jeff Dean, who advocated for ‘modular’ and ‘tangly’ AI architectures.
In a symbolic moment of AI’s widening reach, 10-year-old Harini Shravan became the youngest ever to have a paper accepted, illustrating how the field now embraces new generations and diverse ideas.
Alcon Entertainment, the producer behind Blade Runner 2049, has filed a lawsuit against Tesla and Warner Bros, accusing them of misusing AI-generated images that resemble scenes from the movie to promote Tesla’s new autonomous cybercab. Filed in California, the lawsuit alleges violations of US copyright law and claims Tesla falsely implied a partnership with Alcon through the use of the imagery.
Alcon stated that it had rejected Warner Bros’ request to use official Blade Runner images for Tesla’s cybercab event on October 10. Despite this, Tesla allegedly proceeded with AI-created visuals that mirrored the film’s style. Alcon is concerned this could confuse its brand partners, especially ahead of its upcoming Blade Runner 2099 series for Amazon Prime.
Though no specific damages were mentioned, Alcon emphasized that it has invested hundreds of millions in the Blade Runner brand and argued that Tesla’s actions had caused substantial financial harm.
A London-based company, Synthesia, known for its lifelike AI video technology, is under scrutiny after its avatars were used in deepfake videos promoting authoritarian regimes. These AI-generated videos, featuring people like Mark Torres and Connor Yeates, falsely showed their likenesses endorsing the military leader of Burkina Faso, causing distress to the models involved. Despite the company’s claims of strengthened content moderation, many affected models were unaware of their image’s misuse until journalists informed them.
In 2022, actors like Torres and Yeates were hired to participate in Synthesia’s AI model shoots for corporate projects. They later discovered their avatars had been used in political propaganda, which they had not consented to. This caused emotional distress, as they feared personal and professional damage from the fake videos. Despite Synthesia’s efforts to ban accounts using its technology for such purposes, the harmful content spread online, including on platforms like Facebook.
UK-based Synthesia has expressed regret, stating it will continue to improve its processes. However, the long-term impact on the actors remains, with some questioning the lack of safeguards in the AI industry and warning of the dangers involved when likenesses are handed over to companies without adequate protections.
Nothing is built on stone; All is built on sand, but we must build as if the sand were stone.
Borges
Borges chose Geneva as his home and, ultimately, the place where he is laid to rest. Borges, one of the leading writers of the 20th century, was the master of discovering paradoxes and of addressing irreconcilable contradictions in human existence.
He rarely provides answers in his writings. Instead, he takes us on a journey showing that every certainty triggers a new uncertainty. Borges’s work gives a sobering look at the human condition and the limits of reason when it comes to solving personal and social problems.
His fiction is inspirational reading for addressing the core questions of humanity’s future, centred on the interplay between science, technology, and philosophy. His short story The Library of Babel, written in 1941, is prophetic; it outlines the search for meaning in endless volumes of information, as we do today on the internet. Borges writes: ‘Nonsense is normal in the Library and that the reasonable (and even humble and pure coherence) is an almost miraculous exception.’
The truth exists somewhere in Borges’ library but is almost impossible to find as it is overwhelmed by irrelevant information, fake news, and competing narratives.
In addressing informational chaos, Borges shies away from giving a naive hope of certainty, but he does provide some hope: He advocates for order in chaos and argues that by taking an occasional rest, we can stop, or at least slow down, the constantly shifting kaleidoscope of meaning.
Borges wrote about Geneva:
Of all the cities in the world, of all the homelands that a man seeks to earn, Geneva seems to me to be the one most likely to bring happiness. Thanks to her I discovered, since 1914, French, Latin, German, Expressionism, Schopenhauer, the doctrines of Buddha, Taoism, Conrad, Lafcadio Hearn and nostalgia for Buenos Aires. Also love, frienship, humiliation and the siren call of suicide. Things remembered are always pleasant, even trials. These are personal reasons, but I can give a more general one. Unlike other cities, Geneva has no emphasis. Paris is not unaware that she is Paris. Benevolent London knows that she is London. Geneva, however, barely realizes that she is Geneva. Here are the towering shadows of Calvin, Rousseau, Amiel and Ferdinand Hodler, but no one speaks of them to the traveller passing through. Geneva, somewhat like Japan, has renewed herself without losing her past.
Borges
Borges died in Geneva 10
Here you can find an excerpt from Jovan Kurbalija’s study published in the Geneva Digital Atlas: EspriTech de Genève | Why does technology meet humanity in Geneva?
Ferdinand de Saussure was a Geneva-born linguist, whose book ‘Course in General Linguistics’ (1916) (1) became the cornerstone of modern linguistics. Saussure’s work on language and systems laid the basis for natural language processing (NLP) and modern AI.
Time changes all things; there is no reason why language should escape this universal law.
Ferdinand de Saussure
Saussure’s pioneering linguistic research on identifying language patterns and relationships between signifiers and signifieds (or words and their meanings) is key to understanding how NLP systems can map words and other linguistic units to the concepts they represent, allowing them to perform tasks such as text classification and machine translation.
The conceptual bridge between Saussure and the latest AI developments is represented in Alan Turin’s paper Computing machinery and intelligence.
Birth of Ferdinand de Saussure 13
Here you can find an excerpt from Jovan Kurbalija’s study published in the Geneva Digital Atlas: EspriTech de Genève | Why does technology meet humanity in Geneva?
Mary Shelley, the British writer, started writing ‘Frankenstein’ in 1816 in Villa Diodati in Geneva. Shelley was a great fan of science and experimentation. However, she also recognised the potential for the abuse and misuse of science and technology.
The beginning is always today
Shelley, M. (2014). Short stories, Vol. II. Miniature Masterpieces.
Together with Lord Byron and a group of friends, Shelley came to Geneva in search of better weather, as Geneva typically has more sunny days than London. This was not the case in 1816. That year, both cities missed summer weather because of the eruption of Mount Tambora in Indonesia.
Shelley was a big fan of science and experimentation. She believed that science and technology could improve the human condition. However, she also recognised the potential for abuse and misuse of these new technologies. In this way, Shelley brought into the focus important questions about the ethics of progress and how to use scientific knowledge in a responsible way.
Even though technology and society have come a long way since 1816, the dilemma that people faced then are still relevant today. How far can technology go in affecting core human features? Are there ethical limits to technological development?
Here you can find an excerpt from Jovan Kurbalija’s study published in the Geneva Digital Atlas: EspriTech de Genève | Why does technology meet humanity in Geneva
