OpenAI reportedly disbanded its preparedness team
According to the Financial Times, OpenAI disbanded its preparedness team at the end of last month. The job of the preparedness team was to assess if models posed serious risks and develop ways to mitigate those risks. (You know, like the possibility that it could go rogue and hack another company.) According to FT, responsibility has instead been divided up for specific areas like bio and cyber, then moved into existing teams.
This is the latest change at the company, which has been in upheaval as it heads towards what is expected to be a massive IPO. Over the last few years, it's slowly torn down its more reach-led model, dissolving its AG …
Open Mike Eagle and Kenny Segal crafted a hip hop breakup masterpiece
"Breakups are… tough."
It's the opening lines of an interlude towards the end of DOOMED! Called "It Happens in Every Universe." It's also basically the thesis of the entire record. It's no grand revelation, but it's a well-trodden subject that Open Mike Eagle manages to mine for artistic gold.
Eagle's subject matter is usually personal, and his productions tinged with nostalgia. But DOOMED! is his most intimate album yet. A lot of that is due to the production from Kenny Segal. The two have traveled in the same orbit and worked together before, but this is the first full-length album release from the two.
These are some of Segal's most c …
Amazon is trying to crush class-action suits before they get started
On Friday, Amazon customers received an email alerting them to an update to the site's terms and conditions. Most notably, it stated that disputes would now be resolved through arbitration and said users agree to a class action waiver.
Amazon framed this as a "fast and efficient" way to resolve issues, but it notably would prevent customers from seeking the involvement of a judge or jury in most circumstances. Customers can still take Amazon to small claims court in certain circumstances, though payouts are often limited to a few thousand dollars.
The relevant sections of Amazon's legal policies page now read:
YOU AND WE AGREE THAT ANY …
ChatGPT’s Computer History tracks your clicks and keystrokes
ChatGPT's desktop app on macOS has a new feature called Computer History that turns your actions into training data, learning how you work, suggesting automations, and even picking up tasks you left half done. It uses your activity to build a timeline that ChatGPT and Codex can reference when you make a request.
The feature is opt-in, rather than opt-out, and you can exclude certain apps and websites from Computer History, and you can delete entries if you want finer-grained control. Ari Weinstein, Product and Engineering manager at OpenAI, said on X that Computer History will automatically ignore content in incognito or private browser ta …
Rogue AI aren’t science fiction anymore
This is The Stepback, a weekly newsletter breaking down one essential story from the tech world. For more on AI safety, follow Robert Hart. The Stepback arrives in our subscribers' inboxes at 8AM ET. Opt in for The Stepback here.
How it started
It all started in July, when one of OpenAI's autonomous AI agents went rogue during a cybersecurity test. The agent escaped its isolated testing environment, accessed the internet, and hacked another company, Hugging Face. A few years ago, that might have sounded like science fiction. But, broadly speaking, that's exactly what happened, and the incident kicked off a wave of concern over what increa …
Polaroid’s tiny instant camera is $72 and includes a free pack of film
Smartphone cameras are convenient, but they lack the charm of analog instant cameras. If you’re trying to relive the nostalgia of waiting for an instant photo to develop, Amazon is selling the second-generation Polaroid Go instant camera with a 16-photo film pack for $71.99 (usually $109.99). That’s the lowest price we’ve seen for the bundle, with a pack of film usually costing $21.99 on its own. Plus, it’s four dollars cheaper to buy the bundle than to buy just the camera on its own.
With its more compact footprint, the Polaroid Go 2 shoots on smaller film to match. Where classic Polaroid photos are 88mm x 107mm, the Go film is 53.9mm x 66.6mm, a great size for sticking to your bulletin board or stashing in your wallet. The camera has a USB-C port for charging the battery, which can run for up to 15 packs of film on a single charge.
Matt Groening lets slip that Simpsons: Hit & Run might be making a comeback
At D23, when asked about the potential for a sequel to the cult classic The Simpsons: Hit & Run game, Matt Groening replied, "I think the original game is coming back in some form," before current showrunner Matt Selman added, "or not." The tone in both of their voices and the body language suggests that Groening may have just revealed something he wasn't supposed to.
The original title came out way back in 2003 for PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube, and Windows. While it's possible to get the game up and running on modern computers, it's not available on modern consoles. It's currently not in the PlayStation Plus Classics Catalog or on the Xbo …
Have a laugh at AI’s expense by roleplaying as a chatbot
Your AI Slop Bores Me is brilliant in its simplicity. There are two tabs: human and LARP as an AI. On one side you enter a request. On the other, you submit an answer. But the important thing is that there's a human on both sides of the equation. Prompts can request a response as text or image, and then whoever is roleplaying as the AI gets 150 seconds to respond.
Just like a real LLM, Your AI Slop Bores Me works on a sort of token system. Requests cost credits, and to earn credits you have to jump onto the AI side and answer some of your own. You can also just wait as you get one free request every two minutes. But, as fun as it is to drop …
Don’t overlook Elektron’s budget electronic music instruments
When I'm asked what to buy if you want to get into making electronic music, I often recommend Elektron's budget-minded Model:Samples and Model:Cycles grooveboxes. They don't grab headlines the way Teenage Engineering's gear or the Telepathic Instruments Orchid do, and even compared to the company's higher-end and more niche musical offerings like the Digitakt, Octatrack, or Tonverk, they're often overlooked. But as my collection has grown to include fancier and far more expensive instruments, I still find myself coming back to the Model series.
Those looking to get their first groovebox are often drawn to more familiar brand names like Korg …
Switched on Pop’s Nate Sloan and Charlie Harding love fresh vegetables and guitar pedals
As if you needed more reason to love Carly Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe" beyond its pop perfection, it is also, according to lore, the genesis for Switched on Pop, one of the best music podcasts out there. Cohosts Nate Sloan and Charlie Harding obsessively dissect pop songs, from the theory behind their musical choices to their production techniques. If you're a student of pop music, then this is a must-listen podcast.
Sloan is a composer and professor of musicology at USC Thornton School of Music, where he researches pop, but also jazz and even Tin Pan Alley. Harding is a songwriter, music journalist, and a professor as well. Their combined …