What's Appening: Buzzfeed Bets On AI 🗞️🤖

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👀 TLDR:

In this week’s What’s Appening, we report on Buzzfeed’s announcement that it will use AI to create content for its platform. While Buzzfeed will initially partner with OpenAI to create content like quizzes, critics believe it could be the beginning of the end for “real” reporters. Buzzfeed isn’t alone in adopting AI this week, as we also have news of Amazon employees using ChatGPT for coding and customer service. Elsewhere, we follow up on a report that Amazon is planning to launch a gaming-focused NFT marketplace in spring. We are also highlighting the latest updates from Google’s open-source developing toolkit, Flutter. Our Stat of the Week shows America can’t stop streaming. And What’s dAppening has the remarkable story of the DMV making vehicle registrations a lot easier by using blockchain technology.

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Takes 🎬️

📰🤖 Buzzfeed – Stocks Soars After Company Says It Will Use AI Content

One of the things that have amazed us about AI recently is the explosive rate of commercial adoption fostered by the technology. In past newsletters, we have touched on how AI could disrupt several sectors, notably content creation, but we’ve been taken aback at just how quickly this is all happening. Consider the case of Buzzfeed: the entertainment and news platform announced this week that it will now be using AI to generate content. Now, context is important here, as Buzzfeed isn’t replacing its reporters with an army of AI tools – at least, not yet. Instead, it will use OpenAI’s API to begin creating personalized content – quizzes, games, etc. – for its readership. The report caused a stir, with Buzzfeed’s stock rocketing by 160% in a day. Not everyone is happy with the news, though, with one Buzzfeed columnist telling the CEO to…….. well, we aren’t going to repeat what they said in this family-friendly newsletter; you can see what Buzzfeed columnist Max Collins said here. But the entertainment platform is not alone in officially adopting AI. On Friday last week, news broke that Amazon employees were also using ChatGPT for software coding, as well as for answering customer questions and writing training manuals. We’ve been clear that we are already using AI tools here at 3Advance to supplement and enhance our business, and our Slack channels have been pinging all week with stories about new AI tools from Shutterstock, Playground AI, and a text-to-music generator from Google. Although, don’t get too excited about the latter as Google won’t release it to the public over copyright concerns. Nevertheless, we are witnessing this remarkable rate of change in real-time. And like all the great digital disruptions of the past – the world wide web, smartphones, cloud computing – you need to embrace it, not fight it. #AIBuzz Read more here.

🎮️🐋 Amazon – Reports that NFT-Focused Gaming Project to Launch in Spring

There have been several moments in recent years where we have seen big brands move into NFTs, including huge initiatives by Starbucks and Nike. But there are few big fish that could make a splash quite like Amazon, considering its massive customer base and reach of its retail arm. A report – backed up by several strong sources – by Blockworks claims that this will be the reality by April, with Amazon launching (or at least announcing) a web3 marketplace initiative with a strong focus on NFTs and gaming. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has hinted that the company was open to exploring NFTs before, although he has remained cool on the idea of adding crypto as a payment method on its retail platforms. Nonetheless, the Blockworks report focuses on a key aspect – the NFT project will be based on the main Amazon platform, not an auxiliary based on AWS. If the reports are to be believed, then this will be a dream scenario for those who want to see more mainstream adoption of NFT technology. However, skeptics have claimed that an NFT marketplace could be a compliance nightmare for the retail giant. We will wait for more concrete reports before speculating too much about Amazon’s NFT plans, but this feels like further evidence that NFTs have truly become mainstream. #AmazonNFTs Read more here.

📱🕊️ Google -Flutter 3.7 Update Showcased at Annual Forward Event

Despite all the talk of AI disrupting coding, or at least making some basic coding obsolete, the fundamental toolkits we use as developers remain relevant and must constantly improve and evolve. Last week at Flutter Forward, Google gave us a hint of what is to come with its cross-platform app development kit when announcing Flutter version 3.7. It has notable updates in several areas, including marked improvements in graphics capabilities and creating menus, the introduction of Material 3 widgets, and the addition of a built-in text magnifier for Android and iOS that works on Flutter’s fields. In addition, it’s a lot easier to embed code in existing mobile and web apps. There were also a whole host of updates announced for the future, including a preview of the Impeller rendering engine. Now at 3Advance, we’ve fluttered (flirted?) with this cross-platform choice, and we’ve even released a couple of Flutter apps (check out Impromptu, for example) but Google has always been playing catch-up with React, our particular weapon of choice. Hopefully these new updates elevate the competition, but we still believe in using React & React Native. With one fully cross-stack language (Javascript), it still holds the most benefit for our developers and our startup clients. #FlutterFlies Read more here.

🧐 Stat of the Week: 19.4M Years

📺️🍿 Streaming – US Viewers Streamed Almost 20 Million Years of Content in 2022

If you, like many experts, thought 2022 would see a post-pandemic decline in streaming hours, you’d be wrong. Our appetite for streaming content shows no signs of slowing down, reaching a record equivalent to 19.4 million years last year; that’s up 27% from 2021, according to the WSJ and Nielsen. And what did we spend the most time watching? Those kids in Stranger Things, with the Duffer Brothers’ smash-hit totaling 58 billion streaming minutes last year. #StreamingThings Read more here.

🕸️ What’s dAppening?

A dApp is a decentralized app. Here’s the latest in web3, NFTs and blockchain apps.

🚗✉️ DMV – California Vehicles Agency to Use Blockchain for Record Keeping

Let’s face it: nobody likes dealing with the Department of Motor Vehicles. It might be hyperbole for Reddit users to call the DMV “the worst place on earth”, but you can understand the sentiment. The DMV is synonymous with bureaucracy, long waits, mistakes, and, yes, just making-you-want-to-bang-your-head-against-a-wall with frustration. But in California, at least, the agency is taking a big step into the future with blockchain technology. In partnership with Tezos, the California DMV is going to use blockchain for record-keeping, registration, transfers, and issuance. In short, they’ll make it a whole lot easier to, for example, sell your car and for the new owner to register. It’s the kind of thing that web3 supporters have been talking about for years; faster, immutable transactions on a public ledger. Similar to what we have seen with real estate and blockchain, the technology is perfect for making the system more expedient and secure. The California DMV is going a step further, too, by laying out plans for customer-facing apps, including digital wallets that can hold car-ownership NFTs. So there you have it: one of the most change-resistant organizations in America is going to give drivers a win by going into web3. Love it. #DMVWeb3 Read more here.

Meanwhile at 3Advance...

🚨Reminder🚨 Our clients and friends at JUKE are going live with the very first public drop of Ace Ventura NFTs. At 11am (PST) tomorrow, February 1st, you can get your hands on one of JUKE’S first Dynamic Poster Frames, with artist Akiko Stehrenberger celebrating surrealism by reimagining Ace Ventura through the lens of René Magritte. The standard NFTs cost $20, but there’s also a chance of getting your hands on a Rare version, as they are randomly mixed into the Reels. You can keep up to date with the drop on JUKE’s Discord here, or visit the drop website here. We are so proud to be part of this NFT project, and loving how JUKE is putting Hollywood on the blockchain!

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