Creativity Squared: On What Makes Us Human

Dear Creativity Squared Member,

Wow - what a wild week since our last newsletter with all the OpenAI news that broke and the ensuing drama that followed.

We are skipping a new podcast episode this week to save room for turkey. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone who is celebrating!

As I reflect on the holiday, I’m grateful for this community and for you joining me on this adventure exploring the intersection of A.I. and creativity, envisioning a world where artists not only coexist with A.I., but thrive.

One major takeaway I took from this past week is:

Let us not forget our humanity.

It’s a lesson we’ve discussed on the show. A.I. will never be human, but it can serve as a mirror, reflecting back who we are.

And at the core of our human experience is story.

The Greeks had their gods, while we have our tech titans.

The OpenAI chaos may not hold a candle to Homer’s The Iliad, but it certainly kept us glued to our screens, guessing what happened and what will happen next…and we still don’t know the answers!

Are we in a simulation? Kevin Roose and Casey Newton think so, especially with all that has transpired since Friday. Instead, our most human stimulation is at play: Story! Game of Thrones-level drama, filled with unparalleled twists and chaotic, topsy-turvy turns with the ousting of OpenAI Co-founder Sam Altman by the OpenAI board only to be re-instated Tuesday night.

What stories are you telling about A.I., including about OpenAI, with your family and friends over the dinner table? Are they bewildered? Tales of caution? Optimistic about what the future holds?

The stories we tell are part of what makes us most human and shape our experiences and perspectives of the world, including our collective consciousness.

A.I. is democratizing and enabling new forms of expression and storytelling, but despite the medium, the elements of a powerful story remain.

And behind the story of OpenAI, this past week is also a reminder — a dizzying one! — that behind these tools are not gods, but humans.

Deeply flawed, imperfect humans, just like you and me. And no matter what A.I. does or does not do, we must be forever compelled to remember our humanity.

And despite our shortcomings, we need to understand the power of story. What will our next chapter be? What will we write and co-create together?

What story do you want to tell?

Join again next week for our full newsletter and a new episode — Creativity Squared’s THIRTIETH!! It commemorates and will be released on the one-year anniversary of OpenAI’s announcement of ChatGPT.

Thank you for being part of the story of Creativity Squared and our mission to co-create the future we want to live in.

Scroll on to discover:

• 📆 Calendar of Events: Cincy

• 🎧 Creativity Squared Episodes to Catch Up on Over the Holiday Weekend

• 🤯 A.I. + Creativity News Roundup

• 👯‍♀️ Apply to Join the Clone Club

• 💎 Creativity Squared Premium Member Benefits

• 💝 Milestone Rewards

Time is one of our most precious resources, and I appreciate you taking some time to read this newsletter and listen to the podcast.

Here's to exponential possibilities!

Helen

Helen Todd (she/her)
Human behind Creativity Squared
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How creatives are collaborating with A.I.

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📆 CALENDAR OF A.I. EVENTS: CINCY

For those local in Cincinnati, join these upcoming A.I. events. 🥳 

👩‍🏫 DEC 7 - Hosted by Tensure, “Plotting Your Course with Generative AI” will take place on December 7 from 2-4pm at Morton’s Steakhouse in OTR. Join to discover how GenAI can be more than just a buzzword—it can be a transformative force for your business. Sign up here.

🤝 DEC 12 - Join me and others interested in all things A.I. at the CincyAI Meetup for Humans, cohosted by Creativity Squared, on Tuesday, December 12, at the UC Digital Futures building from 3-5pm ET. Sign up now!

✏️ FEB 2 - Save the date for February 2 because the women’s network Ellevate is teaming up with IBM for an afternoon of A.I. programming here in Cincinnati. More details to come!

Looking forward to meeting those who can make it in person and geeking out about all things A.I. and creativity!

Creativity Squared Episodes to Catch Up on Over the Holiday Weekend

Apple | Spotify | YouTube | Pandora | Amazon | Google | SoundCloud | iHeart Radio

Here’s a selection of episodes to catch up on over the holiday weekend — enjoy!

Your A.I. + Creativity News Roundup

With all of the A.I. news flooding our feeds and screens, we’ve got you covered. News to check out includes:

What Happened in the World of Artificial Intelligence? The New York Times — Sam Altman is back at the helm of OpenAI after a tumultuous weekend where he was briefly fired, then hired at Microsoft before pressure forced OpenAI’s board to bring him back. The reason behind his initial ouster is still not clear. The dominant narrative says OpenAI Chief Scientist (and board member), Ilya Sutskever, believed Altman was not focused enough on risk. Sutskever ended up reversing his position and stepping down from the board.

OpenAI drops a big new ChatGPT feature with a joke about its CEO drama The Verge — Amid the feverish negotiations about Sam Altman, OpenAI released a new feature enabling free users to converse with ChatGPT through the mobile app. Many have pointed out that ChatGPT’s “voice” has an uncanny resemblance to Scarlet Johansson’s. The film, “Her,” becomes less like fiction by the day. 

Anthropic's ChatGPT rival Claude can now analyze 150,000 words in one prompt Engadget — While it wasn’t able to seduce any OpenAI employees despite this weekend’s chaos (mass exodus from OpenAI was a real possibility for a few days), Anthropic did make progress on their flagship LLM, Claude. Version 2.1 can now digest around 150,000 words uploaded from a document or file. Claude’s update also cuts the hallucination rate in half, making it a more reliable assistant when accuracy matters. 

Screenshots show xAI’s chatbot Grok on X’s web app TechCrunch — Elon Musk says that X Premium+ subscribers will get access to the platform’s new LLM, Grok, as early as next week. X Premium+ is now the third and highest tier of X membership, costing $16/month. X has said that Grok will have more of a personality than its competitors and is more willing to answer controversial questions that its competitors may refuse to. 

Introducing Stable Video Diffusion Stability AI —  Stability.ai just released a research-only version of a new foundation model for video generation based on their text-to-image generator. Stability says that its new model competes with the leading alternative, Runway, and outperforms Pika Labs’ model. Stability is collecting feedback on the model before releasing a text-to-video web interface. 

Sarah Silverman Hits Stumbling Block in AI Copyright Infringement Lawsuit Against Meta The Hollywood Reporter  —  An LLM is not inherently a “copyright infringement machine,” and LLM outputs are not automatically a derivative work just because copyrighted works were used to train the model, a judge ruled on Monday in one of the country’s most significant A.I./copyright cases. Dismissing those arguments leaves Silverman’s case largely toothless. However, Silverman can still move forward on the argument that training LLM models on copyrighted materials without compensation could constitute infringement. 

Apply to Join the Clone Club Today
Digitally Clone Yourself: The Avatar Experience Cincinnati

👯‍♀️ Ready to be digitally cloned? Get your own custom synthetic avatar! Creativity Squared is collaborating with our partner and sponsor, Render, to bring The Avatar Experience to Cincinnati, OH, by appointment that fits into your schedule. Digitally clone yourself to unlock streamlined and dynamic video content — Apply to be cloned today!

There are less than a thousand known hyper-realistic custom synthetic avatars in existence, so participants will be at the forefront of this groundbreaking A.I. technology. Custom synthetic avatars are part of a massive and growing digital avatar market and is projected to be $270B by 2030.

Custom synthetic avatars can be used for creating:

• Dynamic online course instruction

• Streamlined SEO video production of blog or audio-only content

• Turnkey social media and email marketing video content

• Engaging customer service messaging

• And more!

👯‍♀️ In case you missed the announcement, I’ve digitally cloned myself! Learn all about mine in episode E14. Not Deepfaked! I Cloned Myself. You’ll meet Helen 2.ODD, my digital double, and discover why and how I made my A.I.-created custom synthetic avatar.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Thank You to Render

Creativity Squared is supported by Render which provides Digital Likeness solutions for personal brand businesses, thought leaders, influencers, and business leaders who want to leverage their synthetic, A.I.-powered Likeness to communicate more effectively online and create audio and video content from anywhere without going on camera. Learn more by visiting: https://rendermedia.ai.

Interested in partnering with Creativity Squared? Reach out!

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