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Flip something right into a podcast
After Thrive Protocol’s Ben West learn Evan Hatch’s in style explainer on who Len Sassaman is — the person Polymarket briefly named most certainly to be Satoshi Nakamoto — he uploaded the article to Google’s NotebookLM Audio Overviews.
It rapidly produced a 12-minute podcast, with two jokey hosts bantering as they revealed the story of Len Sassaman.
I performed the consequence to my girlfriend to check her response earlier than revealing it was fully AI-generated. She says she was completely fooled.
“That fully appears like individuals crapping on in a podcast,” she says.
Different individuals have been simply as impressed with Audio Overviews, which allows customers to add web site or YouTube hyperlinks, PDFs, plain textual content, Google Docs and slides.
Audio Overview then gives a deep dive into the content material within the type of a conversational-style podcast, with two natural-sounding voices interrupting one another and laughing at one another’s lame jokes.

A16z companion Olivia Moore uploaded 200 pages of courtroom paperwork to the service.
“It created a real crime podcast that’s higher than 90% of what’s on the market now… And ends with the hosts debating the ethics of the style.”
Enterprise Insider’s Ana Altchek additionally examined the software program and stated the voices are greater high quality than anything in the marketplace, together with ChatGPT’s Superior Voice Mode.
“Not solely do the voices sound actual, however the way in which the AI hosts bounce off one another and banter mimics the type and construction of an actual podcast.”
She didn’t catch any apparent inaccuracies within the outcomes, however that’s clearly a priority with AI-generated something. So, whereas it’s in all probability an effective way to get the gist of a bunch of sophisticated info in a compressed burst, you’ll nonetheless must double-check information earlier than counting on them.
“It’s uncommon that I’m left awestruck by a instrument that’s truly accessible to mess around with, immediately.”
“Audio Overviews might be my favourite AI instrument I’ve tried out thus far — and it showcases the progressive methods AI can be utilized in our every day lives.”
AI + crypto cash surge 2X greater than memecoins in previous 30 days
Based on Artemis, the AI sector noticed a weighted common improve of 38% over the previous month, outpacing its nearest rivals. Bridge tokens had a 38.3% rise, and memecoins rose 20.8%.
Of the bigger AI tasks with tokens, Bittensor (TAO) appears to be doing many of the heavy lifting, up 120% in 30 days. Different big-name tasks didn’t fare as properly, together with Arkham (ARKM), up 31%, Synthetic Superintelligence Alliance (FET), up 19% and Close to Protocol (NEAR), up 22.2%.

However over the previous 12 months, the script flips, with the AI + Crypto sector down 14.4%, whereas memecoins gained 57.2%.
Then once more, the AI + Crypto tokens in style immediately are in all probability much like these from a 12 months in the past, whereas holding most memecoins for a 12 months is harmful to your wealth.
Centralized change (77.8%) and Actual World Asset (351.4%) sectors each outperformed memecoins regardless of talks of a “memecoin supercycle,” whereas Bitcoin made 40.6% and Ethereum made …. *cough* 3.8%.
Additionally learn: Superior AI system is already ‘self-aware’ — ASI Alliance founder
Truthful fakes
Till now, it appeared that the large downside was going to be telling AI fakes and misinformation from the reality, however two current incidents recommend the larger concern is getting anybody to care.
Some individuals don’t appear that fussed if one thing is confirmed to be an AI-generated deepfake so long as it “feels” truthful to them.

Senator Mike Lee of Utah posted an image of a crying lady in a lifejacket on a ship in floodwaters throughout Hurricane Helene, holding a bedraggled sad-looking canine. He wrote “caption this picture” opening the floodgate for his followers to vent their frustrations on the Biden Administration’s failure to forestall floating crying women and puppies.
Though Lee deleted the pic after customers identified it was faux, Trump stan/groupie Laura Loomer has left her repost of the pic up, whereas Amy Kremer, the co-founder of Ladies For Trump, stated it didn’t matter “the place this picture got here from” as “There are individuals going by a lot worse than what’s proven on this pic. So I’m leaving it.”
On the opposite aspect of the political fence, BBC disinformation reporter Marianna Spring visited Pikesville, Maryland, to observe up on a “racist AI deepfake” scandal in January through which the native faculty principal had been apparently caught on tape making racist remarks.
The tape was rapidly uncovered as an AI deepfake by the Baltimore Banner, however many readers refused to consider the reason, seeing it as a method to dodge accountability.
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Even six months after the varsity’s disgruntled fitness center instructor was charged over making the faux, many locals nonetheless appear to assume the incident was actual. Spring described her five-minute dialog with an area named Sharon who stored speaking in regards to the clip as if it was actual, solely to be gently reminded by her husband it was faux.
“She admitted she did discover out later it was AI-generated,’” Spring stated. “However she stated she was nonetheless offended about it.”
Spring says she’s discovered time and time once more that if AI fakes communicate to some fact the viewer already believes, then they’ve bother getting the primary impression out of their heads.
“Properly, even when it’s not actual, it’s what I believe they assume,” Spring says of the thought course of.
Google searches return greater percentages of AI photos
If you happen to seek for an image of a child peacock utilizing Google Photos, there’s solely a couple of 25% probability you’ll discover a actual picture. X person Dinesh posted a screenshot of the highest 15 outcomes for “child peacock” and stated that 11 of the photographs have been AI-generated.
“Many of the photos are AI-generated. Human web is coming to an finish. Lifeless web principle will turn into so actual in just a few years.”
The Lifeless Web principle is a conspiracy principle that the web is generally faux and never produced by people.

Google plans so as to add a disclaimer to AI-generated photos within the coming months, however just for photos containing C2PA metadata.
Telltale indicators of AI technology embody additional fingers, reflections in individuals’s eyes, the truth that the whole lot is just too good or that the background is much less properly rendered. However these indicators will disappear because the tech improves, so platforms might want to handle the issue now.
Earlier this 12 months, Fox Company teamed up with the blockchain platform Confirm to trace and authenticate the supply of articles and multimedia, and Time journal turned its first buyer.
Promoting turns into insidious as AI is put in cost
TikTok has formally launched its “Good+” AI-powered advert shopping for and marketing campaign administration instruments to compete with comparable choices from Google’s Efficiency Max and Meta’s Benefit+.
TikTok hasn’t been probably the most profitable advert platform thus far, raking in $22.32 billion a 12 months in comparison with Meta’s $154 billion, and hopes the brand new platform will assist change that. The brand new suite permits entrepreneurs to resolve whether or not they need to create and optimize advertisements and placement or hand it over to the black field algorithm.
Inevitably, they’re going handy it over to the algo as a result of it’s even higher at manipulating human conduct than promoting and advertising and marketing guys.
“Advertisers optimizing for worth with Good+ internet campaigns obtain a 53% enchancment in return on advert spend on common [compared to without it],” stated Adolfo Fernandez, TikTok’s world head of product technique.
Ray-Ban used the platform in beta, and its value per acquisition fell by 50% and conversion charges jumped 47%. General, the sun shades producer noticed a 42% improve in return on funding.
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Google’s AI overview sells you stuff
Google’s AI Overview characteristic exhibits customers little snippets of AI-generated solutions to questions. On debut, it was roundly criticized for telling individuals to eat rocks or learn how to get cheese to stay to pizza with glue but it surely seems to have improved.
However the decades-long drive to make Google search ever worse with sponsored advertisements and web optimization spam outcomes means the corporate is now putting advertisements alongside AI overviews.
Seek for “ get grass stains out of denims,” and the AI provides you with some ideas, together with utilizing a stain remover. Then, there can be a useful Tide Pen stain remover advert.
Though Google is getting cash from these advertisements, it received’t be sharing any income with the publications and web sites the AI scraped the solutions from, the search big informed Bloomberg.
Google’s share of the $300 billion annual search promoting market is forecast to drop under 50% subsequent 12 months, with rivals like Amazon rising twice as quick and anticipated to take 22.3% of the market this 12 months.
AI search startup Perplexity has been praised for the superior high quality of its outcomes, but it surely plans to introduce advertisements later this month slightly than relying solely on subscriptions.
“This area has been ripe for a shake-up for a protracted time frame,” Brendan Alberts, head of search and commerce on the ad-buying agency Dentsu, informed The Wall Avenue Journal.
Virtually half of queries to Perplexity result in follow-up questions, and the platform will permit manufacturers to sponsor the solutions, which can be “accepted forward of time and might be locked, supplying you with consolation in how your model can be portrayed in a solution.”
Sounds terrible.
Virtually 60% of US customers used a chatbot to assist resolve on a purchase order within the final month, which is why platforms are so determined to monetize the outcomes.
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Andrew Fenton
Based mostly in Melbourne, Andrew Fenton is a journalist and editor overlaying cryptocurrency and blockchain. He has labored as a nationwide leisure author for Information Corp Australia, on SA Weekend as a movie journalist, and at The Melbourne Weekly.