Meta rethinks smart glasses with Orion

Meta Connect 2024 was this weekshowcases new hardware and software that supports the company’s two big goals: Artificial Intelligence and metadatabase. CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced new Quest headphonesupdates Meta’s Llama AI model, and real-time video capabilities Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses. But the biggest reveal was Orion. real AR glasses prototype It was touted as “the most advanced eyewear the world has ever seen.”

OpenAI CTO Mira Murati announced this week he is leaving the company More than six years later. Hours after the announcement, OpenAI’s chief research officer Bob McGrew and vice president of research Barret Zoph said He also left the company. The high-level departures come less than a week before OpenAI’s annual developer conference is set to begin.

One of the first employees of CloudKitchens is suing the company. In the lawsuit, Isabella Vincenza alleges that: unfair termination, gender discrimination, and a hostile work environment, including an intense “bro culture” at the company. Vincenza also claims she was “retaliated for defending herself” following her pregnancy and subsequent maternity leave.

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News

Talk to me, ChatGPT: After some delays and controversy, OpenAI has introduced Enhanced Audio Mode. The feature features an updated blue spherical view, five new voices, and improved accent features for customers in ChatGPT’s Plus and Teams tiers. Read more

YC Demo Day: Y Combinator has kicked off its two-day “Demo Day” event, showcasing what the latest YC collectives are building. Here are the companies to watch out for outside the event. (Spoiler alert: Almost all of them use artificial intelligence.) Read more

Amazon employees and RTO: Amazon CEO Andy Jassy announced that employees will be expected to work from the office five days a week starting in 2025. But an anonymous survey created by workers reveals that many people adjusting to the hybrid work structure are “strongly dissatisfied.” Read more

How much can a phone wallpaper cost? Marques Brownlee, known as MKBHD on YouTube, launched the panels wallpaper app, where artists select high-quality digital wallpapers. However, to access high-resolution wallpapers without ads, users have to pay around $50 per year. Read more

WordPress and WP Engine: A heated legal battle is brewing between WordPress founder and Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg and WP Engine, which hosts websites built on WordPress, after Mullenweg wrote a blog post calling WP Engine the “cancer of WordPress.” Read more

X turns on blocking: X will soon change the way the blocking feature works, so accounts you’ve blocked will still be able to see your public posts. Elon Musk explained that blocked accounts still cannot interact with users who blocked them. Read more

RevenueCat turns up the excitement: Subscription management platform RevenueCat has acquired Dipsea, an app that offers subscriptions to “spicy” audiobooks. The idea is to bring a subscription-based application in-house that will serve as a testing ground for RevenueCat’s new features. Read more

RIP, TikTok Music: ByteDance is shutting down its music streaming service TikTok Music in November. TikTok Music was based on a ByteDance product called Resso, and the service later became available in Indonesia, Brazil, Australia, Singapore, and Mexico. Read more

Meta faces another privacy penalty: Meta was reprimanded and fined $101.5 million (based on current exchange rates) by the Irish Data Protection Commission in 2019 for a breach that exposed hundreds of millions of Facebook passwords. Read more

Hands-on work with Plaud’s NotePin: TechCrunch’s Brian Heater tests Plaud’s $169 ChatGPT-powered NotePin for transcribing meetings and taking notes. He argues that unlike other AI pins, Plaud’s product looks like a solution to real problems. Read more

Analysis

Sam Altman goes into “god mode”: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has historically touted AI as the solution to the world’s problems, despite its significant impact on the environment. In his new rose-colored blog post, Altman offers an incredibly positive update on the state of AI, highlighting its potential to change the world. But as TechCrunch’s Sarah Perez points out, much of what he writes is seemingly aimed at making skeptics see how important AI is, and may have the opposite effect. Read more