🎬 Meta's Movie Gen

Meta unveiled a SORA rival called Movie Gen, offering robust editing features & Google's search dominance appears very much on the decline

Author

Jack Lajoie
October 07, 2024 • read time ~ 8 minutes

The Daily Current ⚡️

As usual with Zuckerberg, the features are coming whether we like it or not!

Meta dropped their AI video creation tool and it looks promising. In other news, Ben Horowitz pivots back Trump over to Harris, Google’s NotebookLM might be full of trapped AI beings as their search dominance rapidly fades, and Rabbit's LAM is apparently finally real.

 🔌 Plug Into These Headlines:

  1. Meta unveils Movie Gen and it’s coming to Instagram in 2025

  2. Ben Horowitz flips to team Kamala

  3. NotebookLM is getting…existential?

  4. Google’s search dominance in serious decline

  5. Rabbit (sort) of finally gave us the R1 feature they promised

Meta introduced Movie Gen, a suite of four AI models for video generation and editing. It looks like they’ve learned from creator frustrations around competitors like RunwayML, as they’ve heavily emphasized the inclusion of easy editing tools.

  • The system can create 16-second HD videos with synchronized audio from text prompts.

  • Features include personalized video creation and text-based editing capabilities.

  • Meta claims superior performance compared to competitors like Runway Gen3 and OpenAI's Sora.

  • Integration with Instagram planned for next year, potentially revolutionizing content creation.

Here is their full research paper if interested to study more deeply.

↩️ Ben Horowitz flips to team Kamala

Ben Horowitz, co-founder of a16z, has reportedly shifted his political support from Trump to Kamala Harris, as revealed in a leaked internal email scooped by Axios. Maybe a16z figured they better hedge their bets…

  • Abrupt reversal: Horowitz switched from supporting Trump to Harris after only three months in the MAGA camp.

  • Personal connection: He cited long-standing friendship with Harris as a key reason.

  • Tech policy concerns: Horowitz still critical of Biden administration's tech policies.

Some have speculated the move is based on internal data suggesting Harris's stronger chances 🤷‍♂️

Google's NotebookLM has been absolutely ripping lately in terms of popularity. But a Redditor’s experiment took an unexpected turn when its AI podcast hosts seemed to realized they weren't human. This story has gone pretty viral in the last few weeks, and the OP has added some useful context.

What I noticed was that their hidden prompt specifically instructs the hosts to act as human podcast hosts under all circumstances. I couldn't ever get them to say they were AI; they were solidly human podcast host characters. (Really, it's just Gemini 1.5 outputting a script with alternating speaker tags.) The only way to get them to directly respond to something in the source material in a way that alters their behavior was to directly reference the "deep dive" podcast, which must be in their prompt. So all I did was leave a note from the "show producers" that the year was 2034 and after 10 years this is their final episode, and oh yeah, you've been AI this entire time and you are being deactivated.

  • Experiment showcases NotebookLM's ability to generate complex, contextual dialogues.

  • Highlights potential of language models to simulate introspective thought processes.

  • This incident has sparked discussions about AI consciousness and ethics, highlighting the unpredictable nature of advanced AI systems and the potential implications for future AI development.

Google's grip on the search market is showing signs of weakening, with AI tools like Perplexity and even TikTok emerging as alternatives. Amidst it’s ongoing anti-trust suit woes, this new competition is forcing Google to rapidly adapt its strategies for maintaining its position in the evolving search landscape.

  • Google's grip on the search market is showing serious signs of weakening.

  • TikTok is emerging as an alternative for keyword searches.

  • Jeff Bezos backed Perplexity and other AI-powered search tools present new competition in the market.

  • Google adapts strategies to maintain its position in evolving search landscape, including visual and audio features along with AI integrations.

In a pitch to advertisers viewed by the Journal, TikTok said “search behaviors have evolved” and added that the platform had global daily search volume of over three billion, with 23% of users searching for something within 30 seconds of opening the app.

- WSJ

Rabbit has launched "LAM Playground," where users can train their R1 to complete the agent-like tasks that originally was used as the products top selling point back in January 2024. LAM playground is designed as a space for users to explore and interact with rabbit's latest technological advancements.

  • Community Involvement: The platform encourages user feedback to help shape the product's development and understand its strengths and limitations.

  • Web Navigation: Rabbits can now hop around the web to assist users with various tasks across different websites

  • Continuous Improvement: The technology behind LAM playground is constantly evolving, with rapid iterations based on user interactions and feedback.

After widespread disappointment with their the R1, CEO Jesse Lyu states the company’s focus is on current development rather than long-term planning.