What's Appening: The Search Engine Killer 🗣️🤖

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CHATGPT COULD UPEND MANY INDUSTRIES, BUT SEARCH ENGINES MIGHT BE FIRST

👀 TLDR:

In this week’s What’s Appening, we lift the lid on ChatGPT. In the past, OpenAI wowed us with its DALLE-2 text-to-image creator, but its new chatbot tool has everyone talking. Capable of answering complex questions, giving practical advice, writing prose and poetry, and computer code, it promises to disrupt several industries at once. But could Google Search be the most likely loser as the world gets to grips with this awesome new technology? Elsewhere, we have news of Elon Musk implanting chips in our brains. We hail the App of the Year, cover Netflix woes, AWS app builder, and more. Our Stat of the Week looks at ChatGPT’s rapid and remarkable user rise. And What’s dAppening covers the row between Coinbase and Apple.

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Takes 🎬

🗣️🔎 OpenAI – ChatGPT Captures the Imagination (and Fears) of Many

We have covered AI – Cicero, Canva’s Art Generator, DALLE-2 – in recent editions of this newsletter, but none of those have caused a stir quite like ChatGPT, the updated version of OpenAI’s machine learning chatbot. Unlike DALLE-2 (text to image), ChatGPT is (text to text). It understands ‘natural’ human language, and it is capable of generating detailed human-like responses. All it needs is a “prompt” (the conversational text command), and the ChatGPT can create a (surprisingly good) poem about Einstein’s Theory of Relativity or write the code for building an app (we are still better at this😉) or explain how to change a tire or perform well in an SAT exam. It’s only been released for a few days, but it has become the most talked-about story in tech. It is the virtual assistant that can provide an answer to everything. It’s not yet perfect. And one of the problems it has is that it tends to bluff when an irrefutably correct answer is not possible: That in itself is impressive and scary, as ChatGPT can create arguments and evidence to back up points we know are wrong – as someone pointed out on Twitter, it’s an impressive “bullshitter”. We will leave the whole “we are going to be replaced by machines” angle for another day and instead look at the entity that experts believe ChatGPT is most likely to challenge for now – Google Search. Are the days of “just google it” and “google is your friend” being part of the common lexicon soon to be over? Well, some believe that this technology will either displace the world’s most used search engine or encourage it to up its game. However, there are trust issues to overcome. Remember, for all that we rely on it, Google does not “tell you the answer” – it provides the links that MAY lead you to what you are looking for. ChatGPT gives you a direct answer without providing sources. This will require a leap of faith among users going forward. Regardless, within a few days of its release, ChatGPT has shaken the pillars of the tech industry. And it seems like it’s just getting started. #AiCaramaba! Try it yourself!

🧠🤯 Neuralink – Musk’s “Smartwatch in Brain” Could Be Tested on Humans in 6 Months

And speaking of crazy technology, Elon Musk has announced that Neuralink chips could be tested in humans within six months. What’s Neuralink, you ask? Well, it’s a BMI (brain-machine interface) chip that allows you to control a computer with your thoughts. Before anyone cries that Musk wants to implant Twitter newsfeeds in our heads for 24 hours a day, it is worth saying that there are some worthy goals behind this. For example, BMI chips could be used to help those with vision impairments see via cameras, and even help those with spinal injuries walk again. We should also temper expectations somewhat, as Musk tends to state final goals for his projects, then worry about the particulars later – see humans landing on Mars for evidence. Moreover, Musk will also need to convince regulators he can do this stuff safely, and the scare stories have already begun to appear in the media. Still, it’s incredible to see what Musk’s team at Neuralink is doing; and, more importantly, what they believe they can do in the future. #SixMonthCountDown Read more here.

🌍📱 Apps – A Breakdown of What’s Appening in the World This Week

Away from AI and brain chips, the world of apps keeps turning: Uber has become one of the first big names to support Apple’s iOS 16.1 “Live Activities”, which provides a rolling real-time feed of events on your lock screen. Elsewhere, BeReal has won the coveted App of the Year award from the App Store, unsurprising given its surge in popularity and positive headlines. While BeReal had a stellar 2022, Netflix had an annus horriblis, and to cap it all off, Amazon Prime has now replaced it as the top paid-for streaming provider in the United States. Speaking of Amazon, we were interested to see the launch of AWS Application Composer, a low-code app builder designed to eliminate some of the barriers to entry for serverless apps. #WeekInApps Read more here.

🧐 Stat of the Week: 1 Million Users

🤖↗️ OpenAI – ChatGPT Gains Passes 1 Million Users within 5 Days of Launch

While still in nascent form, ChatGPT is not just a gimmick for a few tech heads to showcase on social media. In fact, it has passed one million users within five days of going live. For perspective, it took Twitter the best part of two years to reach one million users. The good news is that you can try it out for yourself; the bad news is that there is a bit of wait as everyone wants to play with this incredible tool. #1Week1Million Try it yourself!

🕸️ What’s dAppening?

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

🪙🍏 Coinbase – NFT Fight with Apple Leads to Blocking of Coinbase Wallet Update

It’s not controversial to say that there is a growing wave of discontent over Apple’s App Store Fees, and we think this will have to come to a head at some point in the near future. Nonetheless, the latest brand to cry foul play over Apple’s 30% fees on in-app purchases is Coinbase. This is a little different from the usual row over fees, as, in this case, Apple wants a slice of the gas (transfer) fees and network fees for sending NFTs. Coinbase has said that it can’t provide the cut, even if it wanted to, as those gas fees are in cryptocurrency, usually Ether, and in-app purchases do not support crypto directly. Apple has reacted by blocking the updated Coinbase Wallet app in the App Store, which has effectively stalled some NFT trading through the Coinbase Wallet. Neither party looks like budging on this, so it could get real ugly, real fast. #AppleBlocksCoinbase Read more here.

Meanwhile at 3Advance...

The World Cup is in full swing and here at 3Advance we are enjoying every bit of it. With our office sweepstakes ongoing, it's been sad to see some teams go. The World-Cup-2022 Channel on Slack is constantly buzzing. Enjoying the games together remotely has been great but in person meetups are definitely more fun. A few of our team members had the right idea and met up for drinks whilst catching the game together. This World Cup has been quite the shocker and we can tell there are more surprises on the horizon.

P.S. We hope you’ve been having fun using our Notion template for your very own office sweepstakes. Send us an update over at [email protected]. We’d love to hear from you.

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