Your AI Girlfriend Is Harvesting Your Data

Welcome to the first issue of Technonomicon! I am still fleshing out what this newsletter will be, but it will likely be news and stories I find interesting, with some commentary and any other cool things I come across while exploring the internet. Thanks for reading!

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Sora, OpenAI's new text-to-video model

OpenAI, flexing its rolodex of AI models, released Sora, their new text-to-video model. If you take a look at the example videos, they are stunningly good. Some AI funkiness is going on in the background of some of them, but it is a great start. MKBHD did an excellent overview of it and brings up a good point, where he says the model in its current state is the worst it will be. I also can't imagine how much computing power they will need for every minute of video, between generating it and the work the AI model needs to do. NVidia can hardly keep up as it is.

Your AI Girlfriend Is a Data-Harvesting Horror Show

Ah, yes, the dawn of a new way to collect personal data. Advertisers would love to have data about someone's sex life or other personal matters. This information generally isn't accessible online for obvious reasons, but an AI girlfriend or boyfriend could get it out. These are like how VPN companies are now, where they are generally talked about as helping you stay private and safe online but are essentially owned by a marketing agency. Here is the original write-up Mozilla did on one of the popular ones, EVA AI, where they warn that "Privacy is not included with this product."

Interesting Reads

• Air Force OKs Autonomous Cargo Flights Across California After Successful Test

• The Strange World of Yakuza Fan Magazines

• Big Pharma spends billions more on executives and stockholders than on R&D

• TSMC to build second Japan chip factory, raising investment to $20 billion

Cool Finds

• Aldi Price Map - Check the prices of popular items at every Aldi in the United States

• Trader Joe's Prices - What if you wanted to check the prices of every item at Trader Joe's? This is the tool

• Aaron's List of Recruiters - With significant layoffs happening what seems like every week now, here is a cool list I came across that includes recruiters' LinkedIn profiles, email templates, and some other cool tips and tricks about talking to recruiters

Thanks for reading, and I will see you next Monday.

Been playing Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor. I highly recommend it, and it’s only $10.

Have a good week!

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