Spotify won’t ban AI music, Tesla robot can now do yoga

The boss of Spotify says he has no plans to completely ban content created by artificial intelligence from the music streaming platform. Earlier this year the platform pulled a track featuring AI-cloned voices of the performers Drake and The Weeknd. Daniel Ek told the BBC there were valid uses of the tech in making music – but AI should not be used to impersonate human artists without their consent. He said using AI in music was likely to be debated for “many, many years”. BBC 

Spotify Technology is testing an artificial intelligence (AI) powered feature that will translate podcasts into other languages. Powered by Microsoft-backed OpenAI’s newly released voice generation technology, translated versions of podcasts will mimic the original speaker’s style and will be more natural than traditional dubbing, Spotify said. Podcasts such as Armchair Expert from actor Dax Shepard, Diary Of A CEO from Dragons’ Den mogul Steven Bartlett and The Bill Simmons Podcast, from sportswriter Bill Simmons, will be available to translate into languages including Spanish, French and German. Sky News 

ChatGPT has a new upgrade that lets the viral artificial intelligence tool “see, hear, and speak”, according to OpenAI. The update for OpenAI’s artificial intelligence chatbot will allow users to have voice conversations with the AI chatbot and interact with it using images as well, the firm said in a blog post on Monday. “ChatGPT can now see, hear, and speak,” the firm also said in a post on X/Twitter. The features will be rolled out “over the next two weeks” and enable users to “use voice to engage in a back-and-forth conversation” with the AI assistant. Independent 

Tesla’s venture into the realm of humanoid robots, represented by Optimus, has taken colossal strides since its inception. Remember the first “robot” that was a person dressed up? Or the second one that was barely able to move? Initially met with skepticism due to a less-than-stellar unveiling, the latest updates showcase Optimus’ ability to autonomously sort objects and move around — specifically doing yoga and revealing Elon Musk’s vision inching closer to reality. NotATeslaApp

Optimus can now sort objects autonomously 🤖

Its neural network is trained fully end-to-end: video in, controls out.

Come join to help develop Optimus (& improve its yoga routine 🧘)

→ https://t.co/dBhQqg1qya pic.twitter.com/1Lrh0dru2r

— Tesla Optimus (@Tesla_Optimus) September 23, 2023

Concerns that criminals or terrorists could use artificial intelligence to cause mass destruction will dominate discussion at a summit of world leaders, as concern grows in Downing Street about the power of the next generation of technological advances. British officials are touring the world ahead of an AI safety summit in Bletchley Park in November as they look to build consensus over a joint statement that would warn about the dangers of rogue actors using the technology to cause death on a large scale. The Guardian 

Ford will pause the construction of a $3.5bn (£2.9bn) electric vehicle battery plant in the US amid a high profile dispute with unions over pay and job security. The motor giant said it had halted works on the factory in Michigan and limited spending on it until it is confident it can be run competitively. The site had been expected to start making batteries in 2026, which would have supplied cells for 400,000 vehicles per year. Unions called the move “a shameful, barely-veiled threat by Ford to cut jobs” at a plant that is not open yet. Telegraph