Weekly Link Roundup
Late but still....it's late....
>I searched long and hard for a reason to share this video. I don’t think it’s a stretch too far to say that this blending of electronic music and the organ at the Royal Albert Hall -is innovative. It’s also (to me) breath-taking and gives me goose bumps every time I hear it. We should always have some wonder in our lives.
Charting the Course for 2024: Embracing L&D Evolution in the Post-Pandemic Era: The key take aways (IMHO): “There is no version of the future that exists without AI. If you are not already playing with it, testing it, trying to break it — then you are behind the curve.” > 100%. No joke. “As trusted learning advisors, we align learning initiatives with organizational goals and measure their impact on business outcomes.” > That’s the goal but we need to recognize that its more than needing a different strategy or additional headcount that will make the difference. We need to advocate for new ways and new accounting models to demonstrate the value of investing in employees. Everyone says employees are our greatest asset - they sure don’t look that way on the balance sheet.
Social intrapreneurship needs a systems-thinking upgrade: Reading this but man do I agree with the headline. I like this definition: “A Systemic Intrapreneur is a professional transforming the core purpose, strategy, operations and culture of their company or organization to be fit for purpose in a just and regenerative economy.”
Shipping container buildings may be cool — but they're not always green: Really interesting - I love the upcycling of old containers but evidently I need to look more closely at it.
The ongoing content moderation issues behind Substack's meltdown: As someone who left X/Twitter after being a year one account there specifically because of the lack of content moderation, this troubles me. I’m still getting started here and finding my pace so I’ll stick it out for now buts its on my radar.
South Korea splashes out on CES's prime startup zone as China lies low: A lot of companies (mainly American ones) talk about being “global” companies but how many are actually paying attention to the rest of the world?
New study from Anthropic exposes deceptive ‘sleeper agents’ lurking in AI’s core: “The deceiving AI models resisted removal even after standard training protocols were designed to instill safe, trustworthy behavior.” > Look, you MUST be exploring AI and how it can fit into and even change your org but you MUST also do it smartly and with guardrails. This tech is changing and growing so rapidly, that normal, pedestrian modes of approach will not suffice and you’ll either be left behind by the good stuff or buried by the bad - especially when both dynamics can operate at a scale and speed that is unprecedented.
No turning back: The largest dam removal in U.S. history begins: This is so important to the future of rivers and the fish that live and spawn there and the ecosystems, both human and animal, that depend on them.
India’s generative AI efforts begin to take shape: I’d hope that companies are paying attention to the world’s most populous, democracy. One of the big challenges? > “The same challenge also impedes India’s generative AI ambitions. However, the problem is multifold bigger in this case. The country is home to 1.4 billion people, or nearly 18% of the world’s population, and has 22 officially recognized languages, 1,600+ dialects and 19,200 unofficial dialects.” That’s not just translation but localization - understanding cultures and meaning in specific contexts.
GPT Is Disrupting The Consulting Industry: This article is a great read not just on the disruption in this one sector but also a lesson in how ALL sectors have to evaluating how they can move up the value chain for the clients and customers when AI starts automating all their current activities.
From Google Gemini to OpenAI Q* (Q-Star): A Survey of Reshaping the Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) Research Landscape: “This comprehensive survey explored the evolving landscape of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI), with a specific focus on the transformative impacts of Mixture of Experts (MoE), multimodal learning, and the speculated advancements towards Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). It critically examined the current state and future trajectory of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI), exploring how innovations like Google's Gemini and the anticipated OpenAI Q* project are reshaping research priorities and applications across various domains, including an impact analysis on the generative AI research taxonomy. It assessed the computational challenges, scalability, and real-world implications of these technologies while highlighting their potential in driving significant progress in fields like healthcare, finance, and education. It also addressed the emerging academic challenges posed by the proliferation of both AI-themed and AI-generated preprints, examining their impact on the peer-review process and scholarly communication. The study highlighted the importance of incorporating ethical and human-centric methods in AI development, ensuring alignment with societal norms and welfare, and outlined a strategy for future AI research that focuses on a balanced and conscientious use of MoE, multimodality, and AGI in generative AI”
Valve Announces Changes to How It's Handling AI Content on Steam: I know some of you might not know what Valve or Steam is. Valve is a game company (kindof) and Steam is the largest online store for games in the world. What really matters here is that this could be a signal - that in the future we’ll need to be able to rely on trusted labels to tell us what is touched by AI and what is purely human.
Is GenAI’s Impact on Productivity Overblown?: “we suggest that organizations need to take a nuanced, data-driven approach to adopting LLMs” >There ya go. Now you don’t have to read the article.
Generative AI Has a Visual Plagiarism Problem Experiments with Midjourney and DALL-E 3 show a copyright minefield: Yeah. Wow. Some of these images are both way too easy to generate and way too accurate to not have been trained on copyright material.
The myth that remote work stifles innovation and creativity is gaining ground–but the same evidence shows that it was only true in the pre-2010s workplace: Shockingly looks like the data is still out on this one although it’s pretty easy to see which orgs want to put in the hard work (but ultimately profitable) of adapting to a new reality that offers a wealth of new opportunities and possibilities and those that just want to snap back to the status quo.