Neuralink patient playing Mario Kart with his mind

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1. Neuralink patient playing Mario Kart with his mind

The first patient with a Neuralink brain-computer implant, Noland Arbaugh, has demonstrated "lifechanging" abilities by playing Nintendo's Mario Kart video game with his mind. Arbaugh, who is quadriplegic and requires a wheelchair, demonstrated impressive control and analog control dexterity.

Neuralink, founded by Elon Musk, has faced negative press for its controversial trials and needs to come clean about its trials and publish quantifiable results to ensure its safety and efficacy.

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2. Stability AI CEO resigns to ‘pursue decentralized AI’

Emad Mostaque has resigned as CEO of Stability AI, the startup that created Stable Diffusion. Mostaque will also step down from his board of directors position. The board has appointed COO Shan Shan Wong and CTO Christian Laforte as interim co-CEOs while searching for a permanent CEO.

Mostaque's departure comes after key developers resigned, and the company faces lawsuits related to the data used in Stable Diffusion. The move aims to ensure AI remains open and decentralized.

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3. SAG-AFTRA ratifies TV animation contracts that establish AI protections for voice actors

SAG-AFTRA has ratified new contracts for voice actors in TV animation, establishing AI protections. The three-year agreements, which will be effective until June 30, 2026, require producers to obtain an actor's consent before using their name as a prompt to create an AI-generated voice.

The contracts also outline voice actors' rights around studios' use of their digital replicas and require producers to notify and bargain with the union when using AI-generated voices instead of voice actors. The agreements also establish wage increases, starting with a 7% increase from July 1, 2023, followed by a 4% increase and a 3.5% increase the following year.

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4. Here’s proof you can train an AI model without slurping copyrighted content

OpenAI claimed it was impossible to build AI models without using copyrighted data. However, two announcements show that large language models can be trained without permissionless use of copyrighted materials. Researchers backed by the French government have released the largest AI training dataset composed entirely of public domain text.

Nonprofit Fairly Trained has awarded its first certification for a large language model built without copyright infringement, KL3M. The model was developed by Chicago-based legal tech consultancy startup 273 Ventures using a curated training dataset of legal, financial, and regulatory documents.

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5. Open-source AI models released by Tokyo lab Sakana founded by former Google researchers

Sakana AI, a Tokyo-based startup founded by former Google researchers David Ha and Llion Jones, has released open-source AI models. The models were built using a method called "model merging," which combines existing AI models to yield a new one. This approach, inspired by evolution, led to the creation of hundreds of model generations.

The most successful models from each generation were identified as the "parents" of the next generation. The company is releasing three Japanese language models and two are being open-sourced. Sakana AI aims to put the Japanese capital on the map as an AI hub, similar to OpenAI and DeepMind.

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