Exciting AI Milestones: Meta’s AR Glasses, ChatGPT’s Advanced Voice, and Mira Murati’s Exit from OpenAI
This week marked key developments in the world of AI, with Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg unveiling Ray-Ban smart glasses integrated with AI, and OpenAI launching its advanced voice model for ChatGPT, which feels more human and intuitive. However, Europeans remain excluded due to AI Act compliance concerns. Meanwhile, Mira Murati, OpenAI’s CTO, resigned amid the company’s shift from a non-profit structure, leaving OpenAI at a critical juncture. These rapid changes reflect the fast-evolving landscape of AI, with Meta and OpenAI at the forefront.
Algoritmo Transparente: Horas trepidantes en la IA: las gafas Meta Orion, la voz de ChatGPT y el portazo de Mira Murati en OpenAI. 26 de septiembre de 2024
We’ve moved the publication of Algoritmo Transparente 14 hours earlier to bring you the most important news of the week, but especially the most exciting events of Wednesday afternoon and evening. Three undeniable protagonists in the world of Artificial Intelligence: Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Altman, and Mira Murati—three names familiar to our readers. And two very significant AI launches that could shape the immediate future of our tech habits: Meta Orion AR glasses and ChatGPT’s advanced voice model. Mark Zuckerberg (Meta) presented, at a developer event on Wednesday, the AI-powered Ray-Ban glasses that bring us closer to the concept of augmented reality. They are incredibly lightweight and will deal a significant blow to Apple Vision Pro, though they could end up being different concepts or have distinct uses.
This presentation came just hours after the social media buzz surrounding the launch of ChatGPT’s advanced voice model—the most human-like voice yet, with less latency, which brings us closer to the concept of a personal assistant that almost perceives our emotions or mood. And precisely because of this, due to the highly humanized nature of ChatGPT's voice, OpenAI has decided to exclude Europeans from this option to avoid legal disputes or conflicts regarding European AI regulations, notably the famous AI Act, which the "guardians of ethics" proudly enforce. The advanced voice model that ChatGPT users have long awaited is a crucial step in positioning AI as a personal, close, almost human assistant, which will undoubtedly lead to its widespread adoption. Unfortunately, OpenAI’s blackmail of the European Union—or the European institutions’ excessive regulation, depending on how you see it—will force us to use VPNs or patiently wait while U.S. users can speak Catalan or with an Andalusian accent to their ChatGPT as if it were a real person, while we continue interacting with the current robotic voice mode. Long live continental regulation of global tools!
The arrival of this advanced voice mode was soon followed—on Wednesday evening—by the announcement that OpenAI’s CTO, Mira Murati, is leaving the company, which is led by Sam Altman, as he finalizes a more agile business structure to attract investment, fully detaching it from the non-profit mission that had governed the company until now. The loss of Murati’s talent is no small matter for OpenAI, as we are talking about the creator of ChatGPT and one of the brightest minds in the organization, which is also losing executives Barret Zoph and Bob McGrew.
These fast-paced hours encapsulate the current state of the AI sector. On the one hand, there are truly important advances: AI-powered augmented reality glasses—Ray-Ban glasses—along with other Meta Quest 3 mixed-reality glasses priced under 330 euros, and Llama 3.2, Meta's open-source AI capable of understanding images. Meta and Zuckerberg have made a strong move this week. ChatGPT's voice assistant has also reached all paying subscribers with several updates, and OpenAI is taking a big step just days after letting us sample the fruits of its latest model, o1. The “strawberry” (fresa) refers to OpenAI’s project closest to superintelligence (AGI), as the o1 model takes a few seconds to reason and think before responding to the problems or questions we present to it.
Clearly, Meta and OpenAI deserve to headline this edition of Algoritmo Transparente. But, as I said, the departure of OpenAI’s executive team also reflects the moment AI is going through, with Sam Altman increasingly alone but more powerful, now without the limitations of non-profit investors, and without personal ties to the most talented colleagues who had accompanied him thus far. In the original picture, there are no longer figures like Ilya Sutskever, Greg Brockman—who took a sabbatical year—or now, the admired Mira Murati. We already pointed out in an urgent article in August that OpenAI was experiencing its second crisis in 9 months. Sam Altman has lost 11 founders, leaving only Wojciech Zaremba.
Friends of Algoritmo Transparente, below you will find the most significant AI and technology links of the week, as well as content from the series IA for Everyone, published by the leading Catalan newspaper El Punt Avui. Share if you can and subscribe if you wish. Thank you!