Soon after Capt. Cook discovered Australia for the English people, Woollarawarre Bennelong discovered England for the Aboriginal people.

Atari 10400 when? The Atari 7800+ is a no-frills glimpse into a forgotten gaming era Awkward controls and a lack of features make a device for Atari completists only. Kyle Orland Nov 26, 2024 2:34 pm | 61 Shiny and chrome? In this economy? Credit: Kyle Orland Shiny and chrome? In this economy? Credit: Kyle Orland Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn moreLike a lot of children of the '80s, my early gaming nostalgia has a huge hole where the Atari 7800 might have lived. While practically everyone I knew had an NES during my childhoodand a few uncles and friends' older siblings even had an Atari 2600 gathering dust in their densI was only vaguely aware of the 7800, Atari's backward compatible, late '80s attempt to maintain relevance in the quickly changing console market.Absent that kind of nostalgia, the Atari 7800+ comes across as a real oddity. Fiddling with the system's extremely cumbersome controllers and pixelated, arcade-port-heavy software library from a modern perspective is like peering into a fallen alternate universe, one where Nintendo wasn't able to swoop in and revive a flailing Western home video game industry with the NES.Even for those with fond memories of Atari 7800-filled childhoods, I'm not sure that this bare-bones package justifies its $130 price. There are many more full-featured ways to get your retro gaming fix, even for those still invested in the tail end of Atari's dead-end branch of the gaming console's evolutionary tree.7800HDMuch like last year's Atari 2600+, the 7800+ shell is a slightly slimmed-down version of Atari's nostalgic hardware design. This time, Atari took design inspiration from the rainbow-adorned European version of the 7800 console (which released a year later), rather than the bulkier, less colorful US release. A reverse angle showing how 7800 cartridges stick out with the art facing away from the front. Kyle Orland A reverse angle showing how 7800 cartridges stick out with the art facing away from the front. Kyle Orland Two Atari controller ports support a variety of original controllers. Two Atari controller ports support a variety of original controllers. USB power and HDMI output are pretty much all you get here. Kyle Orland USB power and HDMI output are pretty much all you get here. Kyle Orland Two Atari controller ports support a variety of original controllers.USB power and HDMI output are pretty much all you get here. Kyle Orland The 7800+ plays any of the 58 officially licensed Atari 7800 cartridges released decades ago, as well as the dozens of homebrew cartridges released by coders in more recent years (some of which are now being sold for $30 each by the modern Atari corporation itself; more on those later). The data on those cartridges is run via the open source ProSystem emulator, which seems more than up to the job of re-creating the relatively ancient 7800 tech without any apparent slowdown, input lag, or graphical inconsistencies. The 15 to 30 seconds of loading time when you first plug in a new cartridge is more than a bit annoying, though.The HDMI output from the 7800+ is the updated console's main selling point, if anything is. The sharp, upscaled images work best on games with lots of horizontal and/or vertical lines and bright, single-colored sprites. But blowing up decades-old low-resolution graphics can also hurt the visual appeal of games designed to take advantage of the smoother edges and blended color gradients inherent to older cathode ray tube TVs.Atari's new console doesn't offer the kind of scanline emulation or graphical filters that can help recreate that CRT glow in countless other emulation solutions (though a hardware switch does let you extend the standard 4:3 graphics to a sickeningly stretched-out 16:9). That means many of the sprites in games like Food Fight and Fatal Run end up looking like blocky riots of color when blown up to HD resolutions on the 7800+.Beyond graphics, the 7800+ also doesn't offer any modern emulation conveniences like save states, fast-forward and rewind, slow-mo, controller customization, or high-score tracking across sessions. Authenticity seems to have taken precedence over modern conveniences here.Much like the original Atari 7800, the 7800+ is also backward-compatible with older Atari 2600 cartridges and controllers (re-created through the able Stella emulator). That's a nice touch but also a little galling for anyone who already invested money in last year's Atari 2600+, which the company is still selling for roughly the same price asthe 7800+. Aside from the nostalgic styling of the box itself, we can't see any reason why the less-capable 2600+ still needs to exist at all at this point.A mess of a controllerIn the US, the original Atari 7800 came with an oddly designed "ProLine" joystick featuring two buttons on either side of the base, designed to be hit with the thumb and index finger of your off hand. For the 7800+, Atari instead went with a controller modeled after the CX78 joypad released with the European version of the console.This pad represents an odd inflection point in video game history, with a hard plastic thumbstick sticking out above a standard eight-way D-pad. Years before analog thumbsticks would become a console standard, this thumbstick feels incredibly fiddly for the console's completely digital directional inputs. In a game like Asteroid Deluxe, for instance, I found turning to the right or left frequently led to thrusting forward with an accidental "up" push as well. Everything from the joystick to the button placement is a bit of a mess on the CX78+ controller. Kyle Orland Everything from the joystick to the button placement is a bit of a mess on the CX78+ controller. Kyle Orland NES controller and Atari 2600 joystick shown for scale. Kyle Orland NES controller and Atari 2600 joystick shown for scale. Kyle Orland Everything from the joystick to the button placement is a bit of a mess on the CX78+ controller. Kyle Orland NES controller and Atari 2600 joystick shown for scale. Kyle Orland The CX78 pad was also the first packaged Atari controller with two face buttons, a la the familiar NES controller. Unfortunately, those buttons are spaced just far enough apart to make it extremely awkward to hit both at once using a single thumb, which is practically required in newer titles like Bentley Bears Crystal Quest. The whole thing seems designed for placing the controller in front of you and hitting the buttons with two separate fingers, which I found less than convenient.The Atari 7800+ does feature two standard Atari console plugs in the front, making it compatible with pretty much all classic and revamped Atari controllers (and, oddly enough, Sega Genesis pads). Be wary, though; if a 7800 game requires two buttons, a lot of single-button Atari control options will prove insufficient.The CX78+'s included wireless receivers (which plug into those controller ports) mean you don't have to run any long cables from the system to your couch while playing the Atari 7800+. But a few important controls like pause and reset are stuck on the console itselfjust as they were on the original Atari 7800meaning you'll probably want to have the system nearby anyway. It would have been nice to have additional buttons for these options on the controller itself, even if that would have diminished the authenticity of the controllers.There are better versions of these games The VIP package Atari sent me, along with a selection of cartridges. Credit: Kyle Orland Since I've never owned an Atari 7800 cartridge, Atari sent me eight titles from its current line of retro cartridges to test alongside the updated hardware. This included a mix of original titles released in the '80s and "homebrew elevation" cartridges that the company says are now "getting a well-deserved official Atari release."The titles I had to test were definitely a step up from the few dozen Atari 2600 games that I've accumulated and grown to tolerate over the years. A game like Asteroids Deluxe on the 7800 doesn't quite match the vector graphics of the arcade original, but it comes a lot closer than the odd, colorful blobs of Asteroids on the 2600. The same goes for Frenzy on the 7800, which is a big step up from Berzerk on the 2600.Still, I couldn't help but feel that these arcade ports are better experienced these days on one of the many MAME-based or FPGA-based emulation boxes that can do justice to the original quarter munchers. And the more original titles I've sampled mostly ended up feeling like pale shadows of the NES games I knew and loved.The new Bentley Bears Crystal Quest (which is included with the 7800+ package) comes across as an oversimplified knock-off of Adventure Island, for instance. And the rough vehicular combat of Fatal Run is much less engaging than the NES port of Atari's own similar but superior Roadblasters arcade cabinet. The one exception to this rule that I found was Ninja Golf, a wacky, original mix of decent golfing and engaging run-and-punch combat.Of course, I'm not really the target audience here. The ideal Atari 7800+ buyer is someone who still has nostalgic memories of the Atari 7800 games they played as a child and has held onto at least a few of them (and/or bought more modern homebrew cartridges) in the intervening decades.If those retro gamers want an authentic but no-frills box that will upscale those cartridges for an HDTV, the Atari 7800+ will do the job and look cute on your mantel while it does. But any number of emulation solutions will probably do the job just as well and with more features to boot.Kyle OrlandSenior Gaming EditorKyle OrlandSenior Gaming Editor Kyle Orland has been the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica since 2012, writing primarily about the business, tech, and culture behind video games. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He once wrote a whole book about Minesweeper. 61 Comments Staff Picksbbreadly The 2600+ also works with 7800 games, so there's really not much point in those of us, myself included, who purchased the 2600+ to buy the new console. I own a bunch of 7800 games, they work perfectly on the 2600+. The 2600+ console looks better imo and has the same functionality. The 7800 has a relatively miniscule library and was vastly overshadowed by the NES on its release, do people really have a ton of nostalgia for the 7800? I actually owned one back in the day, and I'm more nostalgic for the 2600, by far. The only benefit I can see to the 7800+ is not having to purchase an additional 2 button controller (2600 uses one button). I'm not sure the 2600+ is actually any less capable. It seems like the same console in a different box. (Pause was added in a firmware update to the 2600+). quote: Much like the original Atari 7800, the 7800+ is also backward-compatible with older Atari 2600 cartridges and controllers (recreated through the able Stella emulator). That's a nice touch, but also a little galling for anyone who already invested money in last year's Atari 2600+, which the company is still selling for roughly the same price as the 7800+. Aside from the nostalgic styling of the box itself, we can't see any reason why the less-capable 2600+ still needs to exist at all at this point.November 26, 2024 at 7:53 pm

Hailing a ride NASA awards SpaceX a contract for one of the few things it hasnt done yet This was the first time ULA's Vulcan rocket was eligible to compete for a major NASA contract. Stephen Clark Nov 26, 2024 1:23 pm | 36 Graphite impact shells containing plutonium-238 glowing red hot. Credit: NASA Graphite impact shells containing plutonium-238 glowing red hot. Credit: NASA Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn moreWhen you compare SpaceX to the world's other space enterprises, it's probably easier to list the things SpaceX hasn't done instead of reciting all of the company's achievements.One of these is the launch of nuclear materials. SpaceX has launched a handful of planetary science missions for NASA, but these spacecraft have all used solar arrays to generate electricity. In this century, NASA's probes relying on nuclear power have all flown on rockets built by United Launch Alliance (ULA), a 50-50 joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin.This is about to change with a $256.6 million contract NASA awarded to SpaceX on Monday. The contract covers launch services and related costs for SpaceX to launch Dragonfly, a rotorcraft designed to explore the alien environment of Saturn's largest moon, Titan.Dragonfly's power source is a radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG), which generates electricity from the heat put out by the radioactive decay of plutonium-238. These plutonium-fueled generators have flown on many previous space missions, including NASA's Perseverance and Curiosity rovers on Mars, the New Horizons spacecraft that beamed back the first up-close views of Pluto, and the long-lived Voyager probes exploring interstellar space.All of these missions were launched on rockets that have either retired or are nearing retirement: the Atlas V, the Titan, and the space shuttle, to name a few.So, it is time for NASA to certify a new generation of rockets to launch nuclear-powered payloads. The Space Force is already working on this for ULA's Vulcan rocket, the replacement for the Atlas V, which is due to launch an innovative nuclear propulsion demonstration as soon as 2027. A SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket lifts off with NOAA's GOES-U weather satellite on June 25, 2024. Credit: SpaceX SpaceX's Falcon Heavy has launched 11 times, all successfully, and is based on the Falcon 9 rocket rated to ferry people into orbit. NASA already certified Falcon Heavy to launch its most expensive robotic missions, such as the Europa Clipper mission, which launched last month.But there is an additional certification required to launch nuclear materials, including a review of the rocket's explosive self-destruct range safety system to ensure it would not damage the payload and cause a release of radioactive plutonium. The RTG itself is designed to survive an impact with the ocean intact.Notably, the Dragonfly launch was one of the first times United Launch Alliance has been eligible to bid its new Vulcan rocket for a NASA launch contract. NASA officials gave the green light for the Vulcan rocket to compete head-to-head with SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy after ULA's new launcher had a successful debut launch earlier this year. With this competition, SpaceX came out on top.A half-life of 88 yearsNASA's policy for new space missions is to use solar power whenever possible. For example, Europa Clipper was originally supposed to use a nuclear power generator, but engineers devised a way for the spacecraft to use expansive solar panels to capture enough sunlight to produce electricity, even at Jupiter's vast distance from the Sun.But there are some missions where this isn't feasible. One of these is Dragonfly, which will soar through the soupy nitrogen-methane atmosphere of Titan. Saturn's largest moon is shrouded in cloud cover, and Titan is nearly 10 times farther from the Sun than Earth, so its surface is comparatively dim. The Dragonfly mission, seen here in an artist's concept, is slated to launch no earlier than 2027 on a mission to explore Saturn's moon Titan. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/Steve Gribben Dragonfly will launch with about 10.6 pounds (4.8 kilograms) of plutonium-238 to fuel its power generator. Plutonium-238 has a half-life of 88 years. With no moving parts, RTGs have proven quite reliable, powering spacecraft for many decades. NASA's twin Voyager probes are approaching 50 years since launch.The Dragonfly rotorcraft will launch cocooned inside a transit module and entry capsule, then descend under parachute through Titan's atmosphere, which is four times denser than Earth's. Finally, Dragonfly will detach from its descent module and activate its eight rotors to reach a safe landing.Once on Titan, Dragonfly is designed to hop from place to place on numerous flights, exploring environments rich in organic molecules, the building blocks of life. This is one of NASA's most exciting, and daring, robotic missions of all time.After launching from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida in July 2028, it will take Dragonfly about six years to reach Titan. When NASA selected the Dragonfly mission to begin development in 2019, the agency hoped to launch the mission in 2026. NASA later directed Dragonfly managers to target a launch in 2027, and then 2028, requiring the mission to change from a medium-lift to a heavy-lift rocket.Dragonfly has also faced rising costs NASA blames on the COVID-19 pandemic and supply chain issues and an in-depth redesign since the mission's selection in 2019. Collectively, these issues caused Dragonfly's total budget to grow to $3.35 billion, more than double its initial projected cost.Stephen ClarkSpace ReporterStephen ClarkSpace Reporter Stephen Clark is a space reporter at Ars Technica, covering private space companies and the worlds space agencies. Stephen writes about the nexus of technology, science, policy, and business on and off the planet. 36 Comments

Artificial Intelligence is rapidly transforming the business landscape, already shifting the way we work, create and gather data insights. This year, 72% of organizations have adopted generative AI in some way, and 50% have adopted AI in two or more business functions --up from less than a third of respondents in 2023. On the other hand, as AI adoption heats up, so do concerns around security -- with 45% of organizations experiencing data exposures while implementing AI. CISOs and security leaders now face the critical challenge of balancing AI implementation with growing data security risks.At the same time, government agencies are also turning their attention to AI security concerns -- and the regulatory landscape surrounding the technology is quickly evolving. Uncertainty persists on a federal level, as no all-encompassing legislature is currently in place in the US to set guardrails for the use of AI tools. However, frameworks including the AI Bill of Rights and Executive Order on AI, as well as state-wide regulations like the Colorado AI Act (with 45 other states in 2024 introducing AI bills), are gaining momentum -- as governments and organizations look to mitigate security risks associated with the use of AI.To prepare for rapidly evolving regulations in todays unpredictable threat landscape, while still advancing AI initiatives across the organization, here are the strategies security leaders must prioritize in the year ahead:Related:Building a robust data management infrastructure: Whether or not an organization is ready for widespread AI adoption, implementing an advanced data management, governance, and lifecycle infrastructure is critical to keep information safe from threat. However, 44% of organizations still lack basic information management measures, and only just over half have basic measures like archiving and retention policies (56%) and lifecycle management solutions (56%) in place.To keep sensitive data safe from potential threats, proper governance and access policies must be established before AI is widely implemented. That way, employees are not inadvertently sharing sensitive information with AI tools. Beyond keeping data secure, employing proper governance policies and investing in the automated tools needed to do so can also help streamline compliance with new regulations -- supporting security leaders by building a more flexible, agile data infrastructure to keep up with these fast-moving developments.Leveraging existing standards for AI use: To prepare data and security practices for new regulations in the years to come, CISOs can look towards existing, widely recognized standards for AI use within the industry. International standards like the ISO/IEC 42001 outline recommended practices for organizations looking to utilize AI tools, to support responsible development and use and provide a structure for risk management and data governance. Aligning internal practices with frameworks like ISO/IEC early on in the implementation process assures that AI data practices are meeting widely accepted benchmarks for security and ethics -- streamlining regulatory compliance down the road.Related:Fostering security-focused culture and principles: Security leaders must strive to emphasize that security is everyones job in the organization, and that all individuals play a part in keeping data safe from threats. Ongoing education around AI and new regulations (through constantly evolving and highly customized trainings) ensures that all members of the organization know how to use the technology safely -- and are prepared to meet new standards and mandates for security in the years to come.Adopting do no harm principles will also help to future-proof the organization to meet new regulations. This involves carefully assessing all of the potential consequences and effects of AI before implementation, evaluating how these tools can impact all individuals and stakeholders. Its important to establish these principles early on -- informing what limitations should be set to prevent potential misuse and preparing security teams for future regulations around ethical and fair use.Related:As we continue to see new AI regulations take shape in the coming years, security and business leaders need to focus their attention on how to prepare their entire organization to meet new compliance standards. As CISOs continue to face uncertainty in how regulations will progress, this is a strong signal to safeguard data and ensure individual preparedness now to meet new standards, as they evolve rapidly. AI is now everywhere, and ethical, secure and compliant use is an organization-wide effort in 2025 -- which begins with building the proper data management and fair use principles and emphasizing security awareness for all individuals.

An orca carrying a salmon in its mouth in south-east AlaskaMinden Pictures/AlamySome of the orcas off North Americas west coast have taken to wearing dead salmon on their heads, resurrecting a curious trend that was first reported in the 1980s.Local photographers noticed the salmon-wearing orcas last month and so did researchers. Deborah Giles, science and research director for the non-profit organisation Wild Orca, was observing the marine mammals in South Puget Sound in south-west Washington a few weeks ago. We saw one with a fish on its head, she says. So that was fun

Nature, Published online: 27 November 2024; doi:10.1038/d41586-024-03807-2The UK, Canadian and Australian governments have introduced immigration restrictions for students.

Nature, Published online: 26 November 2024; doi:10.1038/d41586-024-03773-9Climate change and urbanization are exacerbating the effects of flooding. A close look at a Nepalese river reveals that efforts to reduce the impact of floods must consider the geomorphic changes that occur during these extreme events.

Left to their own devices, an army of AI characters didnt just survive they thrived. They developed in-game jobs, shared memes, voted on tax reforms and even spread a religion. The experiment played out on the open-world gaming platform Minecraft, where up to 1000 software agents at a time used large language models (LLMs) to interact with one another. Given just a nudge through text prompting, they developed a remarkable range of personality traits, preferences and specialist roles, with no further inputs from their human creators. The work, from AI startup Altera, is part of a broader field that wants to use simulated agents to model how human groups would react to new economic policies or other interventions. But for Alteras founder, Robert Yang, who quit his position as an assistant professor in computational neuroscience at MIT to start the company, this demo is just the beginning. He sees it as an early step towards large-scale AI civilizations that can coexist and work alongside us in digital spaces. The true power of AI will be unlocked when we have actually truly autonomous agents that can collaborate at scale, says Yang. Yang was inspired by Stanford University researcher Joon Sung Park who, in 2023, found that surprisingly humanlike behaviors arose when a group of 25 autonomous AI agents was let loose to interact in a basic digital world. Once his paper was out, we started to work on it the next week, says Yang. I quit MIT six months after that. Yang wanted to take the idea to its extreme. We wanted to push the limit of what agents can do in groups autonomously. ALTERA Altera quickly raised more than $11m in funding from investors including A16Z and the former Google CEO Eric Schmidts emerging tech VC firm. Earlier this year Altera released its first demo: an AI-controlled character in Minecraft that plays alongside you. Alteras new experiment, Project Sid, uses simulated AI agents equipped with brains made up of multiple modules. Some modules are powered by LLMs and designed to specialize in certain tasks, such as reacting to other agents, speaking, or planning the agents next move. The team started small, testing groups of around 50 agents in Minecraft to observe their interactions. Over 12 in-game days (4 real-world hours) the agents began to exhibit some interesting emergent behavior. For example, some became very sociable and made many connections with other characters, while others appeared more introverted. The likability rating of each agent (measured by the agents themselves) changed over time as the interactions continued. The agents were able to track these social cues and react to them: in one case an AI chef tasked with distributing food to the hungry gave more to those who he felt valued him most. More humanlike behaviors emerged in a series of 30-agent simulations. Despite all the agents starting with the same personality and same overall goalto create an efficient village and protect the community against attacks from other in-game creaturesthey spontaneously developed specialized roles within the community, without any prompting. They diversified into roles such as builder, defender, trader, and explorer. Once an agent had started to specialize, its in-game actions began to reflect its new role. For example, an artist spent more time picking flowers, farmers gathered seeds and guards built more fences. We were surprised to see that if you put [in] the right kind of brain, they can have really emergent behavior, says Yang. That's what we expect humans to have, but don't expect machines to have. Yangs team also tested whether agents could follow community-wide rules. They introduced a world with basic tax laws and allowed agents to vote for changes to the in-game taxation system. Agents prompted to be pro or anti tax were able to influence the behavior of other agents around them, enough that they would then vote to reduce or raise tax depending on who they had interacted with. The team scaled up, pushing the number of agents in each simulation to the maximum the Minecraft server could handle without glitching, up to 1000 at once in some cases. In one of Alteras 500-agent simulations, they watched how the agents spontaneously came up with and then spread cultural memes (such as a fondness for pranking, or an interest in eco-related issues) among their fellow agents. The team also seeded a small group of agents to try to spread the (parody) religion, Pastafarianism, around different towns and rural areas that made up the in-game world, and watched as these Pastafarian priests converted many of the agents they interacted with. The converts went on to spread Pastafarianism (the word of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster) to nearby towns in the game world. The way the agents acted might seem eerily lifelike, but really all they are doing is regurgitating patterns the LLMshave learned from being trained on human-created data on the internet. The takeaway is that LLMs have a sophisticated enough model of human social dynamics [to] mirror these human behaviors, says Altera co-founder Andrew Ahn. ALTERA In other words, the data makes them excellent mimics of human behavior, but they are in no way alive. But Yang has grander plans. Altera plans to expand into Roblox next, but Yang hopes to eventually move beyond game worlds altogether. Ultimately, his goal is a world in which humans dont just play alongside AI characters, but also interact with them in their day-to-day lives. His dream is to create a vast number of digital humans who actually care for us and will work with us to help us solve problems, as well as keep us entertained. We want to build agents that can really love humans (like dogs love humans, for example), he says. This viewpointthat AI could love usis pretty controversial in the field, with many experts arguing it's not possible to recreate emotions in machines using current techniques. AI veteran Julian Togelius, for example, who runs games testing company Modl.ai, says he likes Alteras work, particularly because it lets us study human behavior in simulation. But could these simulated agents ever learn to care for us, love us, or become self-aware? Togelius doesnt think so. There is no reason to believe a neural network running on a GPU somewhere experiences anything at all, he says. But maybe AI doesnt have to love us for real to be useful. If the question is whether one of these simulated beings could appear to care, and do it so expertly that it would have the same value to someone as being cared for by a human, that is perhaps not impossible, Togelius adds. You could create a good-enough simulation of care to be useful. The question is whether the person being cared for would care that the carer has no experiences. In other words, so long as our AI characters appear to care for us in a convincing way, that might be all we really care about.

This story is from The Algorithm, our weekly newsletter on AI. To get it in your inbox first,sign up here. Generative AI models have become remarkably good at conversing with us, and creating images, videos, and music for us, but theyre not all that good at doing things for us. AI agents promise to change that. Think of them as AI models with a script and a purpose. They tend to come in one of two flavors. The first, called tool-based agents, can be coached using natural human language (rather than coding) to complete digital tasks for us. Anthropic released one such agent in Octoberthe first from a major AI model-makerthat can translate instructions (Fill in this form for me) into actions on someones computer, moving the cursor to open a web browser, navigating to find data on relevant pages, and filling in a form using that data. Salesforce has released its own agent too, and OpenAI reportedly plans to release one in January. The other type of agent is called a simulation agent, and you can think of these as AI models designed to behave like human beings. The first people to work on creating these agents were social science researchers. They wanted to conduct studies that would be expensive, impractical, or unethical to do with real human subjects, so they used AI to simulate subjects instead. This trend particularly picked up with the publication of an oft-cited 2023 paper by Joon Sung Park, a PhD candidate at Stanford, and colleagues called Generative Agents: Interactive Simulacra of Human Behavior. Last week Park and his team published a new paper on arXiv called Generative Agent Simulations of 1,000 People. In this work, researchers had 1,000 people participate in two-hour interviews with an AI. Shortly after, the team was able to create simulation agents that replicated each participants values and preferences with stunning accuracy. There are two really important developments here. First, its clear that leading AI companies think its no longer good enough to build dazzling generative AI tools; they now have to build agents that can accomplish things for people. Second, its getting easier than ever to get such AI agents to mimic the behaviors, attitudes, and personalities of real people. What were once two distinct types of agentssimulation agents and tool-based agentscould soon become one thing: AI models that can not only mimic your personality but go out and act on your behalf. Research on this is underway. Companies like Tavus are hard at work helping users create digital twins of themselves. But the companys CEO, Hassaan Raza, envisions going further, creating AI agents that can take the form of therapists, doctors, and teachers. If such tools become cheap and easy to build, it will raise lots of new ethical concerns, but two in particular stand out. The first is that these agents could create even more personal, and even more harmful, deepfakes. Image generation tools have already made it simple to create nonconsensual pornography using a single image of a person, but this crisis will only deepen if its easy to replicate someones voice, preferences, and personality as well. (Park told me he and his team spent more than a year wrestling with ethical issues like this in their latest research project, engaging in many conversations with Stanfords ethics board and drafting policies on how the participants could withdraw their data and contributions.) The second is the fundamental question of whether we deserve This future feels far off, but it isnt. Theres a chance that when we get there, there will be even more pressing and pertinent ethical questions to ask. In the meantime, read more from my piece on AI agents here, and ponder how well you think an AI interviewer could get to know you in two hours. Now read the rest of The Algorithm Deeper Learning Inside Clears ambitions to manage your identity beyond the airport Clear is the most visible biometrics company around, and one youve likely interacted with already, whether passing security checkpoints at airports and stadiums or verifying your identity on LinkedIn. Along the way, its built one of the largest private repositories of identity data on the planet, including scans of fingerprints, irises, and faces. A confluence of factors is now accelerating the adoption of identity verification technologiesincluding AI, of course, as well as the lingering effects of the pandemics push toward contactless experiencesand Clear aims to be the ubiquitous provider of these services. In the near future, countless situations where you might need an ID or credit card might require no more than showing your face. Why this matters: Now that biometrics have gone mainstream, whatand whobears the cost? Because this convenience, even if chosen by only some of us, leaves all of us wrestling with the effects. If Clear gains ground in its vision, it will move us toward a world where were increasingly obligated to give up our biometric data to a system thats vulnerable to data leaks. Read more from Eileen Guo. Bits and Bytes Inside the booming AI pimping industry Instagram is being flooded with hundreds of AI-generated influencers who are stealing videos from real models and adult content creators, giving them AI-generated faces, and monetizing their bodies with links to dating sites, Patreon, OnlyFans competitors, and various AI apps.404 Media) How to protect your art from AI There is little you can do if your work has already been scraped into a data set, but you can take steps to prevent future work from being used that way. Here are four ways to do that. (MIT Technology Review) Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have offered details on their plans to cut regulations In an op-ed, the pair emphasize that their goal will be to immediately use executive orders to eliminate regulations issued by federal agencies, using a lean team of small-government crusaders. This means AI guidelines issued by federal agencies under the Biden administration, like ethics rules from the National Institute of Standards and Technology or principles in the National Security Memorandum on AI, could be rolled back or eliminated completely. (Wall Street Journal) How OpenAI tests its models OpenAI gave us a glimpse into how it selects people to do its testing and how its working to automate the testing process by, essentially, having large language models attack each other. (MIT Technology Review)

A 28-year-old used an AI tool called AIHawk to apply for hundreds of jobs on LinkedIn.He said AIHawk helped him land a software engineering job.Using AI tools during the application process comes with risks.Applying for jobs can be a time-consuming and frustrating process, and some job seekers are using AI to try to make it more tolerable.Guilherme, a 28-year-old based in Brazil, began looking for a software engineering role after he was laid off in April. In October, after little luck, he learned about AIHawk a"This the type of job I was looking for," said Guilherme, whose identity was verified by Business Insider but asked to use a pseudonym. "It was certainly a byproduct of AIHawk."Guilherme is among the people who have struggled to find work over the past year and turned to AI tools to help them write rsums and cover letters, prepare for interviews, and apply for jobs.To be sure, relying on AI during the application comes with risks including a rsum littered with mistakes and it could be a dealbreaker for some HR departments. Additionally, in the quickly evolving AI landscape, there's a lack of clarity over how employers and job platforms view candidates' use of these tools.Automating the job search process can save timeFederico Eliacreated AIHawkearlierthis year, and in August, he published the code hosting platform GitHub so anyone could use the tool. AIHawk automates the application process for LinkedIn's easy-apply jobs which pulls info from a user's profile to fill in an application. To date, AIHawk has been "starred" or bookmarked on GitHub by more than 22,000 people globally. There are more than 6,300 members of the AIHawk community on the messaging service Telegram, where users critique the tool, share tips on how to use it, and provide updates on their job searches.AIHawk is one of many AI job application tools on the market. While it can be installed and used without any cost, users previously told BI that doing so requires some familiarity with the programming language Python.Guilherme's tech background made it easier to use the tool. He said AIHawk typically applied to about 50 jobs a day and that some of these applications turned into interviews.Guilherme ultimately was hired for a job he didn't apply for using AIHawk. He said he learned about the role after someone from the company reached out to him via LinkedIn. However, Guilherme believes AIHawk played a major role in the outcome of his job search. When he started using the tool, he said he began hearing from several recruiters about jobs he'd never applied for."I got several LinkedIn InMails a day, every single day, since mid-October, from recruiters, hiring managers, and C-suites of companies," he said, adding, "This was something that never happened to me before."Guilherme said that he believes applying for so many jobs "boosted" his LinkedIn profile in the platform's algorithm making it easier for recruiters to find him."With my account's activity being through the roof, my profile was boosted up in searches, which led to my new boss finding me," he said.A LinkedIn spokesperson told BI that applying to more roles would not make a person's profile more visible to a recruiter. The spokesperson said that job seekers who keep their profiles up to dateare more likely to hear from recruiters.The spokesperson said that the company doesn't permit the use of third-party software such as bots that scrapes or automates activity on LinkedIn.Guilherme recommended that AIHawk users spend time filtering out job titles that aren't a good fit and use interviews as an opportunity to practice their communication skills which could help them land a job down the road.Overall, Guilherme said the biggest perk of AIHawk was the time it saved him."Imagine if I had to do this manually?" he said, referring to the resumes he submitted with AIHawk. "I'd probably go insane."Are you looking for a job and comfortable sharing your story with a reporter? Did an AI job tool help you land a job recently? Please fill out this form.