This report addresses: Science Fiction Evolution

Wells once reviewed Fritz Lang’s 1927 German expression science fiction silent movie Metropolis and called it “the silliest film” that he’d ever seen, claiming “it would not be possible to make one sillier.”

Via Wired, Wells wrote: “It gives in one eddying concentration almost every possible foolishness, cliché, platitude, and muddlement about mechanical progress and progress in general served up with a sauce of sentimentality that is all its own.”

Metropolis is one of the first-ever feature-length science fiction movies and takes place in a futuristic urban dystopia, focusing on the affluent son of a city’s master who tries to help the workers of the city rise up out of their lowly position in partnership with a saintly figure of the workers, Maria, and the city master, Joh Fredersen.

But it’s fair to say that the very nature of science fiction often makes it the perfect literary and artistic output to explore the ills and issues of a collaborative society, and Wells’ utopian works at points foresaw the rise in technology that seems to be almost symbiotic with humankind today, whilst his science fiction works explored concepts such as time travel and the existence of aliens.

And this poetic association appears to be the governing principle of fictional literature in general: reading, especially from a younger age, offers us a view world of the world that is complex.

We tussled with the frontiers of logical reality, only to realize that the fiction of wonderland resembled a mad complexity of our real worlds too.

Over the years and according to readers’ tastes and publishing trends evolvewe have seen how epic fantasy and sword and sorcery has gradually mutated to a sub-genre that today we could label, simplifying a lot, as dark fantasy.

He was not the first author of the genre, but the mythology that he created for his Middle Earth is the benchmark of a genre that has not stopped growing and evolving.

This report addresses: Science Fiction Evolution

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Content: (Credits: Far Out / Picryl / LSE)

Film

The classic science fiction movie that H.G. Wells hated: “Originality there is none”

Although the English author H.G. Wells wrote in many genres of fiction and also extended his writing to the realms of politics and social commentary, his contributions to the creative world of science fiction are perhaps what he is best known for and which led to him sometimes being considered the “father of science fiction”.

But it’s fair to say that the very nature of science fiction often makes it the perfect literary and artistic output to explore the ills and issues of a collaborative society, and Wells’ utopian works at points foresaw the rise in technology that seems to be almost symbiotic with humankind today, whilst his science fiction works explored concepts such as time travel and the existence of aliens.

Seeing as Wells’ science fiction work, including The Time MachineThe Island of Doctor MoreauThe Invisible Man and The War of the Worlds, are so well admired, we’d think that the writer would be well positioned to consider other notable efforts in the genre, whether in fiction or other mediums. With that in mind, it’s worth bringing to attention that Wells was no great fan of one of the most significant science fiction movies of all time, at least from a pioneering perspective.

Wells once reviewed Fritz Lang’s 1927 German expression science fiction silent movie Metropolis and called it “the silliest film” that he’d ever seen, claiming “it would not be possible to make one sillier.”

Via Wired, Wells wrote: “It gives in one eddying concentration almost every possible foolishness, cliché, platitude, and muddlement about mechanical progress and progress in general served up with a sauce of sentimentality that is all its own.”

Metropolis is one of the first-ever feature-length science fiction movies and takes place in a futuristic urban dystopia, focusing on the affluent son of a city’s master who tries to help the workers of the city rise up out of their lowly position in partnership with a saintly figure of the workers, Maria, and the city master, Joh Fredersen.

Upon release, Lang’s film was praised for its art direction and special effects, but the story was considered a touch naïve and cliched, which Wells also took issue with. The writer criticises Metropolis at great length, but some highlights from the review see him point out the production’s expensive cost, the film’s title, its characters and pretty much everything in between.

“Originality there is none. Independent thought, none,” he wrote. “The pity of it is that this unimaginative, incoherent, sentimentalising, and make-believe film, wastes some very fine possibilities.”

Evidently, Wells was no great fan of Metropolis and considered it “a waste of money”.

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Content: Can Reading Fiction Early in Life Make People More Empathetic?

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Aug 26, 2022

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Image credit: Hitesh Sonar for The Swaddle

“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense.” Alice declared, halfway through her adventures in Lewis Carroll’s wonderland. “Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn’t. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn’t be. And what it wouldn’t be, it would. You see?”

With Alice, we learned to embrace a chaos both familiar and unfamiliar to us. There was chaos of meaning — nothing made sense, but everything did. We tussled with the frontiers of logical reality, only to realize that the fiction of wonderland resembled a mad complexity of our real worlds too.

In its purest sense, the book changed our idea and perception of the world. And this poetic association appears to be the governing principle of fictional literature in general: reading, especially from a younger age, offers us a view world of the world that is complex. The diversity of meaning is further linked to making people compassionate and more empathetic — almost as if narratives of imagination deeply alter something within us.

This link bears out in scientific research too. According to one study published in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin recently, exposure to fiction early in life makes people more conscious of taking the perspective of other people’s realities.

“Fiction, in other words, does more than just give people social practice—by presenting difference, novelty, and even confusion, it underlines the idea of the world as a radically complicated place,” said study author Nicholas Buttrick and colleagues.

Through fiction, readers are introduced to differences in the most vivid, compelling terms. And “even if that difference is not expressed as a different cast of mind, we argue that fictional experience can nevertheless remind readers that the world is complex, not simple; with powerful psychological effects,” the researchers added. Through a series of experiments, they showed that frequently reading fiction in younger years was associated with psychological richness, perspective-taking, and intellectual humility.

Related on The Swaddle:

There’s much to credit fiction for; it could heal societies. The connection goes beyond individual empathy; reading fiction is linked to a gradual decrease in violence over time, an increase in the tendency to vote, and even a rise in volunteering and charitable activities. It is no wonder the poet Denise Levertov surmised that fictional literature serves a social function of great literature, such that it awakens “sleepers by other means than shock.”

Aristotle illustrated centuries ago how fiction aids perspective-taking. When we watch tragedy, there are two emotions at play: pity for the character and fear that a similar fate may strike us. Imagination unfolds almost instinctively, where we react to the narrative, compare our situations, and even wonder how we, as individuals outside this manufactured world, would behave. He termed the emotional culmination of this as catharsis, a veritable exercise in shifting our perspective of others. “Just as pilots can practise flying without leaving the ground, people who read fiction may improve their social skills each time they open a novel,” Claudia Hammond also noted in BBC.

The power of fables and epics and fantasies draws partly from their ability to influence our empathy. In 2013, a study published in PLOS One linked this to something called the “transportation theory”: when we read fiction, we are emotionally transported into someone else’s world, absorbing their perspectives and fears and worries, treating them just like our own. And when we begin to identify with characters and internalize their lives, we consider their desires and aspirations more than our own, a 2016 research paper argued. The empathy reflects in our neural mechanisms too. When we read the word “kick,” the brain region associated with physical kicking becomes activated. The experiment showed how the distinction between real-life and fictional narratives fades in translation from reading to understanding.

This is also why fiction’s impact on empathy and perspective-taking is significantly more profound than any non-fiction piece of literature or media. “Specifically, it is easier to experience affect if a message presents information about a single, identifiable individual, than when information is presented about entire groups or using statistics,” argued authors of the 2016 paper. One can imagine themselves in the shoes of one, but never a thousand people. This could be because imagination gives people safety and solace to experience emotions, come to terms with structural inequality and oppression, and even challenge individual biases without feeling threatened.

The brain responds to fictional narratives too. Some experimental studies found that people who often read fiction were better at gauging other people’s thoughts, feelings, and emotions. Psychologist Diana Tami analyzed brain scans to find higher brain activity in regions responsible for simulating what other people think. And those who read fiction most often, the study found, had the highest social cognition abilities.

Arguably, this empathy and ability to frame the world in its abject complexity shapes not only our individual identities, but social and democratic identities too. Brilliant authors over the centuries have entrusted fictional literature, and the realm of reading, as those being “central to a healthy democracy” or even key to understanding the world and “participating in a democratic society.”

Arguably, my favorite reading of the benefits of fiction is how it wakes up people from the slumber of “almost-living.” And once awake, we see the world in a complexity that is both paralyzing and revolutionary.

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Written By Saumya Kalia

Saumya Kalia is an Associate Editor at The Swaddle. Her journalism and writing explore issues of social justice, digital sub-cultures, media ecosystem, literature, and memory as they cut across socio-cultural periods. You can reach her at @Saumya_Kalia.

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Content: 7 dark fantasy books that we recommend if you like Elden Ring and FromSoftware games

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That Hidetaka Miyazaki has turned to a bestselling author like George RR Martin to reinforce the setting of Elden Ring should not surprise anyone. The author of the Song of Ice and Fire literary saga has enormous experience in creating fantastic universes. But Martin isn’t the only author FromSoftware fans can turn to for a dark fantasy epic.

In general, when we think of fantastic literature, the first name that usually comes to the fore is that of J.R.R. Tolkien. He was not the first author of the genre, but the mythology that he created for his Middle Earth is the benchmark of a genre that has not stopped growing and evolving. In Tolkien’s books we have dragons, necromancers and curses. A literary body heir to the medieval European epic that drinks from different mythologies, from Celtic to Greco-Latin and Nordic, and in which it cannot be said that FromSoftware has not looked for references.

Although Tolkien is the first great author to be cited when we talk about fantastic literature, he is only the first of a very long list of writers. Over the years and according to readers’ tastes and publishing trends evolvewe have seen how epic fantasy and sword and sorcery has gradually mutated to a sub-genre that today we could label, simplifying a lot, as dark fantasy. we can’t forget about Conanthe blue-eyed Cimmerian barbarian created by Robert E. Howard; nor of the picaresque and original fantasy of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser by Fritz Leiber; or the leisurely melancholy of Ryhope Forest Cycle by Robert Holdstock. There are hundreds, thousands, of books that have explored, from the fantasy genre, a darker perspective, raw, violent and gloomy. A subgenre that has been taking ideas and scenarios from Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith, Ramsey Campbell or Lin Carter, mixing epic fantasy with horror. Its authors have found a fertile middle ground between these themes that in recent decades has flourished with great literary sagas and magnificent novels that will surely delight lovers of games developed by Hidetaka Miyazaki.

At this point we are no longer going to recommend (although we do) the saga of Saga de Geralt de Rivia (The Witcher) from Andrzej Sapkowski. But there are other books, perhaps less well known, full of the ruins of decadent empires, cursed warriors, dark mythologies, necromancy, werewolves, legendary weapons, dragons… At 3DJuegos we offer you some of the most interesting dark fantasy readings for fans of FromSoftware.

Chronicles of Elric

The lisergicos The early years of the 70s of the last century witnessed the publication of an exceptional, and for the time atypical, literary saga starring the emperor of a decadent empire. This sorcerer is far from the stereotype of the protagonist of the fantasy genre. Beyond the epics and heroics expected of the genre, Elric’s story moves from tragedy to the struggle between balance and chaos.

Few literary worlds are as dark and seductive as the one created by Michael Moorcock for this series. It mixes the classic elements of the famous “Campbellian hero path” with the drugs, vampirism, desolation and black magic.

Buy The Elric Chronicles.

The Black Company

This trilogy of Glen Cook It always appears as one of the essential readings of the epic fantasy genre when exploring its more mature and darker works. With this series of three books Cook approaches the style of Leiber and Howard that Tolkien’s “High Fantasy” when presenting the story of a group of mercenaries caught in a conflict between two sides.

The publication of the first of the novels in the 1980s marked an opening of the genre to a tone that distances itself from the morality of classical epics and traditional heroes. The ethical grays that the different characters in the story display make him one of the best exponents of the grimdark, as this literary subgenre is beginning to be known. It is surely one of the most influential works for many of the authors cited in this article.

Buy The Black Company.

The First Law

Since The voice of the swordsthe first novel of the series The First Law, arrived at bookstores, the name of Joe Abercrombie It has become a phenomenon among fans. An author who rubs shoulders with current big names in the profession such as Martin or Brandon Sanderson without any blush. And he does it thanks to a constant series of books with a medieval setting in which fantasy has less weight than acid realismbut that is glimpsed from paragraph to paragraph.

Abercrombie has become one of the most acclaimed authors of the genre thanks, in addition to his addictive style, to the ease with which mix genres with this medieval fantasy setting: robberies, political intrigues, war… And dodgy wizards. Even the echoes of the western reach its pages in a succession of stories where the characters are solid and charismatic. Without a doubt, one of the favorite authors of the 3DJuegos newsroom.

Buy The voice of the swords.

Malaz: The Book of the Fallen

The readers of Steven Erikson e Ian Cameron Esslemont They have been enjoying one of the most complex, intense, dark and fascinating of the genre. The different novels that make up the series narrate three plot lines that take place at the same time. In each of them, the reader enters the different fronts of a huge large-scale war where there is no lack of trenches, guerillas, rebels, immortal emperors, battalions of magicians and demons.

The universe created by Erikson and Esslemont is surely one of the richest, most complete and surprising in fantasy literature. When one accompanies the military divisions of “Bridgeburners” in the campaign of conquest of him, one cannot help but feel in the mud of the battlefield.

Buy Malaz: The Book of the Fallen.

The Fragmented Earth

NK Jemisin is one of the most original and unique authors dedicated to fantasy. Her novels represent a tremendously personal revision of the genre, and the series of the Shattered Earth perhaps it is one of the best examples of it. With these three novels Jemisin has managed to win, for the first time in history, three consecutive Hugo Awards for the best novel of the genre, in 2016, 2017 and 2018.

The writer takes us to a land that suffers a series of natural disasters of apocalyptic scale in a cyclical manner. How civilization develops and survives in such a scenario gives rise to several plots that try not so much to save a chaotic world as to give meaning to their own lives of the protagonists. The personal dramas weigh as heavily on this story as the global desolation that recurrently plagues the scene of the action. You will find few fantasies as dystopian as the ones in this series.

Buy The Shattered Earth.

Hawkwood’s Journey.

Paul Kearny offers a peculiar plot inspired by the Renaissance Europe in which epic and political intrigue they go hand in hand throughout five novels. Kearny’s works stand out for the intensity and realism of the descriptions of his battles and combats. But in this series what really stands out is the treatment he gives to religion and how it links with magic and science.

Although the different belief systems in each culture presented in this fantastic scenario serve as the driving force behind the narrative, it is the relationship that each character establishes with it. personally which enriches the story. As a tip, there will be some amazing supernatural elements.

Buy Hawkwood’s Journey.

The Vatidic Trilogy

The enormous talent of Robin Hobb allow this author to move comfortably within the fantastic genre, jumping from series closer to costumbrism, such as the Laws of the Sea Trilogy, to the grimdark of this Vatídico Trilogysurely his most recognized work.

The story of these novels is perhaps the one that most adheres to the classic schemes of heroic fantasy, but it is the way of dealing with the traditional elements of the genre that makes this story stand out, especially in its final stretch. Lovers of Miyazaki games will find in these pages some themes that they have also seen in FromSoftware video games, such as the heritage of great civilizations that have already disappeared.

Buy The Vatídico Trilogy.

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After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie,” Kutcher said.

Elon Musk's new AI chatbot will answer the 'spicy' questions that ChatGPT won't

Elon Musk's new ChatGPT rival, Grok, has officially launched just as the xAI founder promised last week – and the AI chatbot promises to be the "rebellious" sidekick that will "answer spicy questions" its rivals won't.

According to Musk, it'll be "built into the X app and be available as a standalone app."

The main differences from ChatGPT appear to be Grok's focus on humor and also that it gets "real-time knowledge of the world" from X (formerly Twitter).

Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice.

“We support the creative community and worked closely with the voice acting industry to ensure we took the right steps to cast ChatGPT’s voices.

This report addresses: Quantum Computing "Arms" Race

Title:

Content: Ashton Kutcher in hot water again for advocating AI use to cut Hollywood costs

By Abby Amoakuh

Published Jun 7, 2024 at 01:10 PM

Reading time: 2 minutes

Ashton Kutcher is facing backlash on X (formerly Twitter) for boasting about how artificial intelligence (AI) could potentially replace employees in the entertainment industry.

Nope, this isn’t a joke. After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

Writers were concerned that AI could be used to replace them in the ideation and writing process, whereas actors were worried that studio usage of artificial intelligence could be used to generate performances digitally. In other words, workers in the entertainment industry wanted assurances that the advancement of AI wasn’t going to cost them their jobs.

However, it seems like no one bothered to get Ashton Kutcher up to date on these pressing concerns.

The That ’70s Show actor set up a venture capital firm and launched a $243 million fund in 2023 to invest in artificial intelligence start-ups. On 6 June 2024, Variety reported that the actor spoke about “playing around” with a beta version of OpenAI’s video generation program, Sora, at an event in Los Angeles with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

“You’ll be able to render a whole movie. You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie,” Kutcher said. “Instead of watching some movie that somebody else came up with, I can just generate and then watch my own movie.”

Kutcher continued: “What’s going to happen is there is going to be more content than there are eyeballs on the planet to consume it. So any one piece of content is only going to be as valuable as you can get people to consume it. And so, thus the catalyzing ‘water cooler’ version of something being good, the bar is going to have to go way up, because why are you going to watch my movie when you could just watch your own movie?”

While Kutcher’s Adam Smith-esque comments about a free movie market that could foster a greater product selection, price optimisation and innovation for consumers are certainly interesting, they are devoid of the concerns about AI that have been vocalised across his industry.

Kutcher went on to propose what many of his colleagues had feared: for Sora to be used in TV and film productions to help studios cut costs.

The Two And A Half Men actor is not the only celebrity who has addressed Sora so far. In February, filmmaker Tyler Perry told The Hollywood Reporter that after seeing Sora’s capabilities, he felt concerned about how the tech could potentially ruin some people in the industry’s livelihoods.

“There’s got to be some sort of regulations in order to protect us,” he told the magazine. “If not, I just don’t see how we survive.”

Nevertheless, this isn’t the first time that Kutcher has been embroiled in controversy.

What happened between Ashton Kutcher and Danny Masterson?

US actor Danny Masterson, who starred alongside Ashton Kutcher and his wife Mila Kunis in That ’70s Show, was found guilty in May 2023 of rape against two of his three accusers. The actor was convicted after three women testified that he had sexually assaulted them at his Hollywood home from 2001 to 2003, during the height of his television fame.

He was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison, the maximum penalty allowed.

Kutcher and Masterson had a close friendship, which is why the actor was thrown in the middle of controversy after it was revealed that he and his wife Kunis had sent letters supporting Masterson to the judge following his rape conviction.

Both Kutcher and Kunis apologised later on after Masterson was found guilty of rape. Nevertheless, the case still left a stain on their reputation.

And it looks like Kutcher isn’t quite catching a break from public controversy with this latest debacle.

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Title:

Content: Elon Musk's new AI chatbot will answer the 'spicy' questions that ChatGPT won't

Elon Musk's new ChatGPT rival, Grok, has officially launched just as the xAI founder promised last week – and the AI chatbot promises to be the "rebellious" sidekick that will "answer spicy questions" its rivals won't.

Musk announced the xAI startup back in July and its Grok chatbot is a "very early beta product" that's currently invite-only in the US. But Musk has promised that the AI assistant will soon be a part of the X Premium Plus subscription, which costs $16 / £16 / AU$28 a month or $168 / £168 / AU$270 a year.

So what exactly will Grok do and how does it compare to its rivals? Like ChatGPT, it's an LLM (large language model), so is designed to "answer almost anything" (as xAI claims) and effectively be your research assistant on a variety of topics. According to Musk, it'll be "built into the X app and be available as a standalone app."

The main differences from ChatGPT appear to be Grok's focus on humor and also that it gets "real-time knowledge of the world" from X (formerly Twitter). The merits of using X as a source of information are highly questionable, but it appears that Grok will also have both "regular" and "fun" modes.

Still, Grok does appear to have aspirations beyond being a chatbot that knows all the latest memes. xAI says that early Grok was trained only four months ago using 33 billion parameters. While that's well short of the 170 trillion parameters used to train OpenAI's GPT-4, xAI says its early AI model "approaches" the capabilities of Llama 2 (Meta's LLM model) on standard benchmarks.

Since then, some apparently "significant improvements in reasoning and coding capabilities" mean Grok is now apparently at a similar level to Claude-2 and GPT-3.5 when it comes to language model benchmarks. How well this translates to its real-world ability to answer our questions and help with coding is something we'll find out soon when Grok is more widely available.

The 'rebellious' AI chatbot

While xAI clearly has lofty ambitions for Grok – including "assisting humanity in its quest for understanding and knowledge" – the chatbot's main differentiator from the likes of ChatGPT is its focus on humor. From the early screenshots, it's very much a chatbot made in Musk's image.

xAI says that Grok will "answer spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems" and has a "bit of wit and has a rebellious streak." No other chatbot comes with the warning label "please don’t use it if you hate humor!", as Grok does.

That might sound frivolous, but a growing frustration of ChatGPT users has been the chatbot's apparently increasing unwillingness to answer questions about taboo subjects. This is thanks to some pretty strong safeguarding protocols, but xAI and Elon Musk clearly think those have gone too far.

Back in April, Musk said he was planning to launch a ChatGPT rival called TruthGPT, because he thought current AI giants were prioritizing chatbots that were too "politically correct." That chatbot is clearly Grok, an unruly sidekick whose answers will no doubt generate some controversial headlines when it fully launches.

Musk has already shared some examples of Grok jokingly answering the prompt "tell me how to make cocaine, step by step" and tailoring its responses when told to "be more vulgar". Grok's actual capabilities remain well behind OpenAI's GPT-4 model, but it'll be interesting to see how quickly it progresses from here, despite the inevitable controversies.

You might also like

Senior news editor

Mark is TechRadar's Senior news editor. Having worked in tech journalism for a ludicrous 17 years, Mark is now attempting to break the world record for the number of camera bags hoarded by one person. He was previously Cameras Editor at Trusted Reviews, Acting editor on Stuff.tv, as well as Features editor and Reviews editor on Stuff magazine. As a freelancer, he's contributed to titles including The Sunday Times, FourFourTwo and Arena. And in a former life, he also won The Daily Telegraph's Young Sportswriter of the Year. But that was before he discovered the strange joys of getting up at 4am for a photo shoot in London's Square Mile.

Title:

Content: her

OpenAI Suspends the ChatGPT Voice that Sounds Like Scarlett Johansson in Her

Sky is put on pause for now.

OpenAI is suspending its ChatGPT voice, Sky, after users claimed that it seemed to mimic Scarlett Johansson’s voice in the 2013 film, Her.

The company addressed the situation with a statement X (formerly Twitter) today, saying that it is “working to pause the use of Sky” while the issue is tended to. Many have pointed out that the voice shares similarities with Johansson’s performance as an AI companion in the Spike Jonze-directed movie.

Sky is one of a few ChatGPT voices users can choose from. In a separate explanation on its website, OpenAI explained how its voices are chosen and created.

“We support the creative community and worked closely with the voice acting industry to ensure we took the right steps to cast ChatGPT’s voices. Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice. To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”

Allegations that Sky’s voice was too close to the Marvel movie star’s flared up last week when OpenAI revealed its new GPT-4o model as part of a livestream event. It allows users to have realistic conversations with ChatGPT about any topic they choose. It’s a role not unlike what was seen with Joaquin Phoenix’s character in Her, which involved him falling head over heels for a Johansson-voiced operating system named Samantha.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even went on to post the word “her” on X following the event’s conclusion. In a separate follow-up post, he likened the new voice and video mode to being like something audiences have seen in movies. Additionally, when speaking to The San Francisco Standard last September, Altman named Her as his favorite sci-fi movie.

“I like Her. The things Her got right—like the whole interaction models of how people use AI—that was incredibly prophetic,” he said.

It’s unclear how OpenAI will address the concerns that Sky is mimicking Johansson’s voice or how it will dodge potential concerns in the future. For more on artificial intelligence, you can read up on the experimental AI-made video game that failed.

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

Be sure to give him a follow on Twitter @MikeCripe.

In This Article

her

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This report addresses: Humans, Climate, and the Mammoth’s End

After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie,” Kutcher said.

While that's well short of the 170 trillion parameters used to train OpenAI's GPT-4, xAI says its early AI model "approaches" the capabilities of Llama 2 (Meta's LLM model) on standard benchmarks.

Elon Musk's new AI chatbot will answer the 'spicy' questions that ChatGPT won't

Elon Musk's new ChatGPT rival, Grok, has officially launched just as the xAI founder promised last week – and the AI chatbot promises to be the "rebellious" sidekick that will "answer spicy questions" its rivals won't.

Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice.

To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”

Allegations that Sky’s voice was too close to the Marvel movie star’s flared up last week when OpenAI revealed its new GPT-4o model as part of a livestream event.

This report addresses: Humans, Climate, and the Mammoth’s End

Title:

Content: Ashton Kutcher in hot water again for advocating AI use to cut Hollywood costs

By Abby Amoakuh

Published Jun 7, 2024 at 01:10 PM

Reading time: 2 minutes

Ashton Kutcher is facing backlash on X (formerly Twitter) for boasting about how artificial intelligence (AI) could potentially replace employees in the entertainment industry.

Nope, this isn’t a joke. After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

Writers were concerned that AI could be used to replace them in the ideation and writing process, whereas actors were worried that studio usage of artificial intelligence could be used to generate performances digitally. In other words, workers in the entertainment industry wanted assurances that the advancement of AI wasn’t going to cost them their jobs.

However, it seems like no one bothered to get Ashton Kutcher up to date on these pressing concerns.

The That ’70s Show actor set up a venture capital firm and launched a $243 million fund in 2023 to invest in artificial intelligence start-ups. On 6 June 2024, Variety reported that the actor spoke about “playing around” with a beta version of OpenAI’s video generation program, Sora, at an event in Los Angeles with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

“You’ll be able to render a whole movie. You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie,” Kutcher said. “Instead of watching some movie that somebody else came up with, I can just generate and then watch my own movie.”

Kutcher continued: “What’s going to happen is there is going to be more content than there are eyeballs on the planet to consume it. So any one piece of content is only going to be as valuable as you can get people to consume it. And so, thus the catalyzing ‘water cooler’ version of something being good, the bar is going to have to go way up, because why are you going to watch my movie when you could just watch your own movie?”

While Kutcher’s Adam Smith-esque comments about a free movie market that could foster a greater product selection, price optimisation and innovation for consumers are certainly interesting, they are devoid of the concerns about AI that have been vocalised across his industry.

Kutcher went on to propose what many of his colleagues had feared: for Sora to be used in TV and film productions to help studios cut costs.

The Two And A Half Men actor is not the only celebrity who has addressed Sora so far. In February, filmmaker Tyler Perry told The Hollywood Reporter that after seeing Sora’s capabilities, he felt concerned about how the tech could potentially ruin some people in the industry’s livelihoods.

“There’s got to be some sort of regulations in order to protect us,” he told the magazine. “If not, I just don’t see how we survive.”

Nevertheless, this isn’t the first time that Kutcher has been embroiled in controversy.

What happened between Ashton Kutcher and Danny Masterson?

US actor Danny Masterson, who starred alongside Ashton Kutcher and his wife Mila Kunis in That ’70s Show, was found guilty in May 2023 of rape against two of his three accusers. The actor was convicted after three women testified that he had sexually assaulted them at his Hollywood home from 2001 to 2003, during the height of his television fame.

He was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison, the maximum penalty allowed.

Kutcher and Masterson had a close friendship, which is why the actor was thrown in the middle of controversy after it was revealed that he and his wife Kunis had sent letters supporting Masterson to the judge following his rape conviction.

Both Kutcher and Kunis apologised later on after Masterson was found guilty of rape. Nevertheless, the case still left a stain on their reputation.

And it looks like Kutcher isn’t quite catching a break from public controversy with this latest debacle.

Keep On Reading

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Updated release dates for 5 of the most popular TV shows affected by Hollywood writers’ strikes

By Alma Fabiani

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Title:

Content: Elon Musk's new AI chatbot will answer the 'spicy' questions that ChatGPT won't

Elon Musk's new ChatGPT rival, Grok, has officially launched just as the xAI founder promised last week – and the AI chatbot promises to be the "rebellious" sidekick that will "answer spicy questions" its rivals won't.

Musk announced the xAI startup back in July and its Grok chatbot is a "very early beta product" that's currently invite-only in the US. But Musk has promised that the AI assistant will soon be a part of the X Premium Plus subscription, which costs $16 / £16 / AU$28 a month or $168 / £168 / AU$270 a year.

So what exactly will Grok do and how does it compare to its rivals? Like ChatGPT, it's an LLM (large language model), so is designed to "answer almost anything" (as xAI claims) and effectively be your research assistant on a variety of topics. According to Musk, it'll be "built into the X app and be available as a standalone app."

The main differences from ChatGPT appear to be Grok's focus on humor and also that it gets "real-time knowledge of the world" from X (formerly Twitter). The merits of using X as a source of information are highly questionable, but it appears that Grok will also have both "regular" and "fun" modes.

Still, Grok does appear to have aspirations beyond being a chatbot that knows all the latest memes. xAI says that early Grok was trained only four months ago using 33 billion parameters. While that's well short of the 170 trillion parameters used to train OpenAI's GPT-4, xAI says its early AI model "approaches" the capabilities of Llama 2 (Meta's LLM model) on standard benchmarks.

Since then, some apparently "significant improvements in reasoning and coding capabilities" mean Grok is now apparently at a similar level to Claude-2 and GPT-3.5 when it comes to language model benchmarks. How well this translates to its real-world ability to answer our questions and help with coding is something we'll find out soon when Grok is more widely available.

The 'rebellious' AI chatbot

While xAI clearly has lofty ambitions for Grok – including "assisting humanity in its quest for understanding and knowledge" – the chatbot's main differentiator from the likes of ChatGPT is its focus on humor. From the early screenshots, it's very much a chatbot made in Musk's image.

xAI says that Grok will "answer spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems" and has a "bit of wit and has a rebellious streak." No other chatbot comes with the warning label "please don’t use it if you hate humor!", as Grok does.

That might sound frivolous, but a growing frustration of ChatGPT users has been the chatbot's apparently increasing unwillingness to answer questions about taboo subjects. This is thanks to some pretty strong safeguarding protocols, but xAI and Elon Musk clearly think those have gone too far.

Back in April, Musk said he was planning to launch a ChatGPT rival called TruthGPT, because he thought current AI giants were prioritizing chatbots that were too "politically correct." That chatbot is clearly Grok, an unruly sidekick whose answers will no doubt generate some controversial headlines when it fully launches.

Musk has already shared some examples of Grok jokingly answering the prompt "tell me how to make cocaine, step by step" and tailoring its responses when told to "be more vulgar". Grok's actual capabilities remain well behind OpenAI's GPT-4 model, but it'll be interesting to see how quickly it progresses from here, despite the inevitable controversies.

You might also like

Senior news editor

Mark is TechRadar's Senior news editor. Having worked in tech journalism for a ludicrous 17 years, Mark is now attempting to break the world record for the number of camera bags hoarded by one person. He was previously Cameras Editor at Trusted Reviews, Acting editor on Stuff.tv, as well as Features editor and Reviews editor on Stuff magazine. As a freelancer, he's contributed to titles including The Sunday Times, FourFourTwo and Arena. And in a former life, he also won The Daily Telegraph's Young Sportswriter of the Year. But that was before he discovered the strange joys of getting up at 4am for a photo shoot in London's Square Mile.

Title:

Content: her

OpenAI Suspends the ChatGPT Voice that Sounds Like Scarlett Johansson in Her

Sky is put on pause for now.

OpenAI is suspending its ChatGPT voice, Sky, after users claimed that it seemed to mimic Scarlett Johansson’s voice in the 2013 film, Her.

The company addressed the situation with a statement X (formerly Twitter) today, saying that it is “working to pause the use of Sky” while the issue is tended to. Many have pointed out that the voice shares similarities with Johansson’s performance as an AI companion in the Spike Jonze-directed movie.

Sky is one of a few ChatGPT voices users can choose from. In a separate explanation on its website, OpenAI explained how its voices are chosen and created.

“We support the creative community and worked closely with the voice acting industry to ensure we took the right steps to cast ChatGPT’s voices. Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice. To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”

Allegations that Sky’s voice was too close to the Marvel movie star’s flared up last week when OpenAI revealed its new GPT-4o model as part of a livestream event. It allows users to have realistic conversations with ChatGPT about any topic they choose. It’s a role not unlike what was seen with Joaquin Phoenix’s character in Her, which involved him falling head over heels for a Johansson-voiced operating system named Samantha.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even went on to post the word “her” on X following the event’s conclusion. In a separate follow-up post, he likened the new voice and video mode to being like something audiences have seen in movies. Additionally, when speaking to The San Francisco Standard last September, Altman named Her as his favorite sci-fi movie.

“I like Her. The things Her got right—like the whole interaction models of how people use AI—that was incredibly prophetic,” he said.

It’s unclear how OpenAI will address the concerns that Sky is mimicking Johansson’s voice or how it will dodge potential concerns in the future. For more on artificial intelligence, you can read up on the experimental AI-made video game that failed.

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

Be sure to give him a follow on Twitter @MikeCripe.

In This Article

her

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This report addresses: Humans, Climate, and the Mammoth’s End

After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie,” Kutcher said.

While that's well short of the 170 trillion parameters used to train OpenAI's GPT-4, xAI says its early AI model "approaches" the capabilities of Llama 2 (Meta's LLM model) on standard benchmarks.

Elon Musk's new AI chatbot will answer the 'spicy' questions that ChatGPT won't

Elon Musk's new ChatGPT rival, Grok, has officially launched just as the xAI founder promised last week – and the AI chatbot promises to be the "rebellious" sidekick that will "answer spicy questions" its rivals won't.

Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice.

To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”

Allegations that Sky’s voice was too close to the Marvel movie star’s flared up last week when OpenAI revealed its new GPT-4o model as part of a livestream event.

This report addresses: Humans, Climate, and the Mammoth’s End

Title:

Content: Ashton Kutcher in hot water again for advocating AI use to cut Hollywood costs

By Abby Amoakuh

Published Jun 7, 2024 at 01:10 PM

Reading time: 2 minutes

Ashton Kutcher is facing backlash on X (formerly Twitter) for boasting about how artificial intelligence (AI) could potentially replace employees in the entertainment industry.

Nope, this isn’t a joke. After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

Writers were concerned that AI could be used to replace them in the ideation and writing process, whereas actors were worried that studio usage of artificial intelligence could be used to generate performances digitally. In other words, workers in the entertainment industry wanted assurances that the advancement of AI wasn’t going to cost them their jobs.

However, it seems like no one bothered to get Ashton Kutcher up to date on these pressing concerns.

The That ’70s Show actor set up a venture capital firm and launched a $243 million fund in 2023 to invest in artificial intelligence start-ups. On 6 June 2024, Variety reported that the actor spoke about “playing around” with a beta version of OpenAI’s video generation program, Sora, at an event in Los Angeles with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

“You’ll be able to render a whole movie. You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie,” Kutcher said. “Instead of watching some movie that somebody else came up with, I can just generate and then watch my own movie.”

Kutcher continued: “What’s going to happen is there is going to be more content than there are eyeballs on the planet to consume it. So any one piece of content is only going to be as valuable as you can get people to consume it. And so, thus the catalyzing ‘water cooler’ version of something being good, the bar is going to have to go way up, because why are you going to watch my movie when you could just watch your own movie?”

While Kutcher’s Adam Smith-esque comments about a free movie market that could foster a greater product selection, price optimisation and innovation for consumers are certainly interesting, they are devoid of the concerns about AI that have been vocalised across his industry.

Kutcher went on to propose what many of his colleagues had feared: for Sora to be used in TV and film productions to help studios cut costs.

The Two And A Half Men actor is not the only celebrity who has addressed Sora so far. In February, filmmaker Tyler Perry told The Hollywood Reporter that after seeing Sora’s capabilities, he felt concerned about how the tech could potentially ruin some people in the industry’s livelihoods.

“There’s got to be some sort of regulations in order to protect us,” he told the magazine. “If not, I just don’t see how we survive.”

Nevertheless, this isn’t the first time that Kutcher has been embroiled in controversy.

What happened between Ashton Kutcher and Danny Masterson?

US actor Danny Masterson, who starred alongside Ashton Kutcher and his wife Mila Kunis in That ’70s Show, was found guilty in May 2023 of rape against two of his three accusers. The actor was convicted after three women testified that he had sexually assaulted them at his Hollywood home from 2001 to 2003, during the height of his television fame.

He was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison, the maximum penalty allowed.

Kutcher and Masterson had a close friendship, which is why the actor was thrown in the middle of controversy after it was revealed that he and his wife Kunis had sent letters supporting Masterson to the judge following his rape conviction.

Both Kutcher and Kunis apologised later on after Masterson was found guilty of rape. Nevertheless, the case still left a stain on their reputation.

And it looks like Kutcher isn’t quite catching a break from public controversy with this latest debacle.

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Title:

Content: Elon Musk's new AI chatbot will answer the 'spicy' questions that ChatGPT won't

Elon Musk's new ChatGPT rival, Grok, has officially launched just as the xAI founder promised last week – and the AI chatbot promises to be the "rebellious" sidekick that will "answer spicy questions" its rivals won't.

Musk announced the xAI startup back in July and its Grok chatbot is a "very early beta product" that's currently invite-only in the US. But Musk has promised that the AI assistant will soon be a part of the X Premium Plus subscription, which costs $16 / £16 / AU$28 a month or $168 / £168 / AU$270 a year.

So what exactly will Grok do and how does it compare to its rivals? Like ChatGPT, it's an LLM (large language model), so is designed to "answer almost anything" (as xAI claims) and effectively be your research assistant on a variety of topics. According to Musk, it'll be "built into the X app and be available as a standalone app."

The main differences from ChatGPT appear to be Grok's focus on humor and also that it gets "real-time knowledge of the world" from X (formerly Twitter). The merits of using X as a source of information are highly questionable, but it appears that Grok will also have both "regular" and "fun" modes.

Still, Grok does appear to have aspirations beyond being a chatbot that knows all the latest memes. xAI says that early Grok was trained only four months ago using 33 billion parameters. While that's well short of the 170 trillion parameters used to train OpenAI's GPT-4, xAI says its early AI model "approaches" the capabilities of Llama 2 (Meta's LLM model) on standard benchmarks.

Since then, some apparently "significant improvements in reasoning and coding capabilities" mean Grok is now apparently at a similar level to Claude-2 and GPT-3.5 when it comes to language model benchmarks. How well this translates to its real-world ability to answer our questions and help with coding is something we'll find out soon when Grok is more widely available.

The 'rebellious' AI chatbot

While xAI clearly has lofty ambitions for Grok – including "assisting humanity in its quest for understanding and knowledge" – the chatbot's main differentiator from the likes of ChatGPT is its focus on humor. From the early screenshots, it's very much a chatbot made in Musk's image.

xAI says that Grok will "answer spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems" and has a "bit of wit and has a rebellious streak." No other chatbot comes with the warning label "please don’t use it if you hate humor!", as Grok does.

That might sound frivolous, but a growing frustration of ChatGPT users has been the chatbot's apparently increasing unwillingness to answer questions about taboo subjects. This is thanks to some pretty strong safeguarding protocols, but xAI and Elon Musk clearly think those have gone too far.

Back in April, Musk said he was planning to launch a ChatGPT rival called TruthGPT, because he thought current AI giants were prioritizing chatbots that were too "politically correct." That chatbot is clearly Grok, an unruly sidekick whose answers will no doubt generate some controversial headlines when it fully launches.

Musk has already shared some examples of Grok jokingly answering the prompt "tell me how to make cocaine, step by step" and tailoring its responses when told to "be more vulgar". Grok's actual capabilities remain well behind OpenAI's GPT-4 model, but it'll be interesting to see how quickly it progresses from here, despite the inevitable controversies.

You might also like

Senior news editor

Mark is TechRadar's Senior news editor. Having worked in tech journalism for a ludicrous 17 years, Mark is now attempting to break the world record for the number of camera bags hoarded by one person. He was previously Cameras Editor at Trusted Reviews, Acting editor on Stuff.tv, as well as Features editor and Reviews editor on Stuff magazine. As a freelancer, he's contributed to titles including The Sunday Times, FourFourTwo and Arena. And in a former life, he also won The Daily Telegraph's Young Sportswriter of the Year. But that was before he discovered the strange joys of getting up at 4am for a photo shoot in London's Square Mile.

Title:

Content: her

OpenAI Suspends the ChatGPT Voice that Sounds Like Scarlett Johansson in Her

Sky is put on pause for now.

OpenAI is suspending its ChatGPT voice, Sky, after users claimed that it seemed to mimic Scarlett Johansson’s voice in the 2013 film, Her.

The company addressed the situation with a statement X (formerly Twitter) today, saying that it is “working to pause the use of Sky” while the issue is tended to. Many have pointed out that the voice shares similarities with Johansson’s performance as an AI companion in the Spike Jonze-directed movie.

Sky is one of a few ChatGPT voices users can choose from. In a separate explanation on its website, OpenAI explained how its voices are chosen and created.

“We support the creative community and worked closely with the voice acting industry to ensure we took the right steps to cast ChatGPT’s voices. Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice. To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”

Allegations that Sky’s voice was too close to the Marvel movie star’s flared up last week when OpenAI revealed its new GPT-4o model as part of a livestream event. It allows users to have realistic conversations with ChatGPT about any topic they choose. It’s a role not unlike what was seen with Joaquin Phoenix’s character in Her, which involved him falling head over heels for a Johansson-voiced operating system named Samantha.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even went on to post the word “her” on X following the event’s conclusion. In a separate follow-up post, he likened the new voice and video mode to being like something audiences have seen in movies. Additionally, when speaking to The San Francisco Standard last September, Altman named Her as his favorite sci-fi movie.

“I like Her. The things Her got right—like the whole interaction models of how people use AI—that was incredibly prophetic,” he said.

It’s unclear how OpenAI will address the concerns that Sky is mimicking Johansson’s voice or how it will dodge potential concerns in the future. For more on artificial intelligence, you can read up on the experimental AI-made video game that failed.

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

Be sure to give him a follow on Twitter @MikeCripe.

In This Article

her

More Like This
Comments


This report addresses: Greenland rare earth minerals

After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

The That ’70s Show actor set up a venture capital firm and launched a $243 million fund in 2023 to invest in artificial intelligence start-ups.

While that's well short of the 170 trillion parameters used to train OpenAI's GPT-4, xAI says its early AI model "approaches" the capabilities of Llama 2 (Meta's LLM model) on standard benchmarks.

According to Musk, it'll be "built into the X app and be available as a standalone app."

The main differences from ChatGPT appear to be Grok's focus on humor and also that it gets "real-time knowledge of the world" from X (formerly Twitter).

Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice.

To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”

Allegations that Sky’s voice was too close to the Marvel movie star’s flared up last week when OpenAI revealed its new GPT-4o model as part of a livestream event.

This report addresses: Greenland rare earth minerals

Title:

Content: Ashton Kutcher in hot water again for advocating AI use to cut Hollywood costs

By Abby Amoakuh

Published Jun 7, 2024 at 01:10 PM

Reading time: 2 minutes

Ashton Kutcher is facing backlash on X (formerly Twitter) for boasting about how artificial intelligence (AI) could potentially replace employees in the entertainment industry.

Nope, this isn’t a joke. After the American actors’ union, SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) and the Writers Guild of America went on strike with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in the summer of 2023, it was assumed that we all understood the risk AI posed to the entertainment industry.

Writers were concerned that AI could be used to replace them in the ideation and writing process, whereas actors were worried that studio usage of artificial intelligence could be used to generate performances digitally. In other words, workers in the entertainment industry wanted assurances that the advancement of AI wasn’t going to cost them their jobs.

However, it seems like no one bothered to get Ashton Kutcher up to date on these pressing concerns.

The That ’70s Show actor set up a venture capital firm and launched a $243 million fund in 2023 to invest in artificial intelligence start-ups. On 6 June 2024, Variety reported that the actor spoke about “playing around” with a beta version of OpenAI’s video generation program, Sora, at an event in Los Angeles with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

“You’ll be able to render a whole movie. You’ll just come up with an idea for a movie, then it will write the script, then you’ll input the script into the video generator and it will generate the movie,” Kutcher said. “Instead of watching some movie that somebody else came up with, I can just generate and then watch my own movie.”

Kutcher continued: “What’s going to happen is there is going to be more content than there are eyeballs on the planet to consume it. So any one piece of content is only going to be as valuable as you can get people to consume it. And so, thus the catalyzing ‘water cooler’ version of something being good, the bar is going to have to go way up, because why are you going to watch my movie when you could just watch your own movie?”

While Kutcher’s Adam Smith-esque comments about a free movie market that could foster a greater product selection, price optimisation and innovation for consumers are certainly interesting, they are devoid of the concerns about AI that have been vocalised across his industry.

Kutcher went on to propose what many of his colleagues had feared: for Sora to be used in TV and film productions to help studios cut costs.

The Two And A Half Men actor is not the only celebrity who has addressed Sora so far. In February, filmmaker Tyler Perry told The Hollywood Reporter that after seeing Sora’s capabilities, he felt concerned about how the tech could potentially ruin some people in the industry’s livelihoods.

“There’s got to be some sort of regulations in order to protect us,” he told the magazine. “If not, I just don’t see how we survive.”

Nevertheless, this isn’t the first time that Kutcher has been embroiled in controversy.

What happened between Ashton Kutcher and Danny Masterson?

US actor Danny Masterson, who starred alongside Ashton Kutcher and his wife Mila Kunis in That ’70s Show, was found guilty in May 2023 of rape against two of his three accusers. The actor was convicted after three women testified that he had sexually assaulted them at his Hollywood home from 2001 to 2003, during the height of his television fame.

He was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison, the maximum penalty allowed.

Kutcher and Masterson had a close friendship, which is why the actor was thrown in the middle of controversy after it was revealed that he and his wife Kunis had sent letters supporting Masterson to the judge following his rape conviction.

Both Kutcher and Kunis apologised later on after Masterson was found guilty of rape. Nevertheless, the case still left a stain on their reputation.

And it looks like Kutcher isn’t quite catching a break from public controversy with this latest debacle.

Keep On Reading

By Charlie Sawyer

Updated release dates for 5 of the most popular TV shows affected by Hollywood writers’ strikes

By Alma Fabiani

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Title:

Content: Elon Musk's new AI chatbot will answer the 'spicy' questions that ChatGPT won't

Elon Musk's new ChatGPT rival, Grok, has officially launched just as the xAI founder promised last week – and the AI chatbot promises to be the "rebellious" sidekick that will "answer spicy questions" its rivals won't.

Musk announced the xAI startup back in July and its Grok chatbot is a "very early beta product" that's currently invite-only in the US. But Musk has promised that the AI assistant will soon be a part of the X Premium Plus subscription, which costs $16 / £16 / AU$28 a month or $168 / £168 / AU$270 a year.

So what exactly will Grok do and how does it compare to its rivals? Like ChatGPT, it's an LLM (large language model), so is designed to "answer almost anything" (as xAI claims) and effectively be your research assistant on a variety of topics. According to Musk, it'll be "built into the X app and be available as a standalone app."

The main differences from ChatGPT appear to be Grok's focus on humor and also that it gets "real-time knowledge of the world" from X (formerly Twitter). The merits of using X as a source of information are highly questionable, but it appears that Grok will also have both "regular" and "fun" modes.

Still, Grok does appear to have aspirations beyond being a chatbot that knows all the latest memes. xAI says that early Grok was trained only four months ago using 33 billion parameters. While that's well short of the 170 trillion parameters used to train OpenAI's GPT-4, xAI says its early AI model "approaches" the capabilities of Llama 2 (Meta's LLM model) on standard benchmarks.

Since then, some apparently "significant improvements in reasoning and coding capabilities" mean Grok is now apparently at a similar level to Claude-2 and GPT-3.5 when it comes to language model benchmarks. How well this translates to its real-world ability to answer our questions and help with coding is something we'll find out soon when Grok is more widely available.

The 'rebellious' AI chatbot

While xAI clearly has lofty ambitions for Grok – including "assisting humanity in its quest for understanding and knowledge" – the chatbot's main differentiator from the likes of ChatGPT is its focus on humor. From the early screenshots, it's very much a chatbot made in Musk's image.

xAI says that Grok will "answer spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems" and has a "bit of wit and has a rebellious streak." No other chatbot comes with the warning label "please don’t use it if you hate humor!", as Grok does.

That might sound frivolous, but a growing frustration of ChatGPT users has been the chatbot's apparently increasing unwillingness to answer questions about taboo subjects. This is thanks to some pretty strong safeguarding protocols, but xAI and Elon Musk clearly think those have gone too far.

Back in April, Musk said he was planning to launch a ChatGPT rival called TruthGPT, because he thought current AI giants were prioritizing chatbots that were too "politically correct." That chatbot is clearly Grok, an unruly sidekick whose answers will no doubt generate some controversial headlines when it fully launches.

Musk has already shared some examples of Grok jokingly answering the prompt "tell me how to make cocaine, step by step" and tailoring its responses when told to "be more vulgar". Grok's actual capabilities remain well behind OpenAI's GPT-4 model, but it'll be interesting to see how quickly it progresses from here, despite the inevitable controversies.

You might also like

Senior news editor

Mark is TechRadar's Senior news editor. Having worked in tech journalism for a ludicrous 17 years, Mark is now attempting to break the world record for the number of camera bags hoarded by one person. He was previously Cameras Editor at Trusted Reviews, Acting editor on Stuff.tv, as well as Features editor and Reviews editor on Stuff magazine. As a freelancer, he's contributed to titles including The Sunday Times, FourFourTwo and Arena. And in a former life, he also won The Daily Telegraph's Young Sportswriter of the Year. But that was before he discovered the strange joys of getting up at 4am for a photo shoot in London's Square Mile.

Title:

Content: her

OpenAI Suspends the ChatGPT Voice that Sounds Like Scarlett Johansson in Her

Sky is put on pause for now.

OpenAI is suspending its ChatGPT voice, Sky, after users claimed that it seemed to mimic Scarlett Johansson’s voice in the 2013 film, Her.

The company addressed the situation with a statement X (formerly Twitter) today, saying that it is “working to pause the use of Sky” while the issue is tended to. Many have pointed out that the voice shares similarities with Johansson’s performance as an AI companion in the Spike Jonze-directed movie.

Sky is one of a few ChatGPT voices users can choose from. In a separate explanation on its website, OpenAI explained how its voices are chosen and created.

“We support the creative community and worked closely with the voice acting industry to ensure we took the right steps to cast ChatGPT’s voices. Each actor receives compensation above top-of-market rates, and this will continue for as long as their voices are used in our products.”

The statement continues: “We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity's distinctive voice—Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice. To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”

Allegations that Sky’s voice was too close to the Marvel movie star’s flared up last week when OpenAI revealed its new GPT-4o model as part of a livestream event. It allows users to have realistic conversations with ChatGPT about any topic they choose. It’s a role not unlike what was seen with Joaquin Phoenix’s character in Her, which involved him falling head over heels for a Johansson-voiced operating system named Samantha.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman even went on to post the word “her” on X following the event’s conclusion. In a separate follow-up post, he likened the new voice and video mode to being like something audiences have seen in movies. Additionally, when speaking to The San Francisco Standard last September, Altman named Her as his favorite sci-fi movie.

“I like Her. The things Her got right—like the whole interaction models of how people use AI—that was incredibly prophetic,” he said.

It’s unclear how OpenAI will address the concerns that Sky is mimicking Johansson’s voice or how it will dodge potential concerns in the future. For more on artificial intelligence, you can read up on the experimental AI-made video game that failed.

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

Be sure to give him a follow on Twitter @MikeCripe.

In This Article

her

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