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- AI's New Frontiers: Voice Mimicry, Beatles Reunion, Musical Masterpieces, and More!
AI's New Frontiers: Voice Mimicry, Beatles Reunion, Musical Masterpieces, and More!
Plus Breakthroughs in Solar Tech and the Return of Alibaba's Jack Ma to the Public Eye
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Meta, creates a new AI that can mimic the voices of your close ones, but says it's too dangerous to make public
Meta has made a new artificial intelligence (AI) tool called Voicebox that can copy voices. This tool can speak six different languages and is considered a big step forward in AI speech technology. However, Meta won't release it to the public because it might be used in the wrong way.
Even though Meta wants to share its research with the AI community, it also wants to ensure they're doing it responsibly.
Meta is excited to see how other researchers can use this technology to improve their work. The company has been very interested in AI, especially in using it to improve its products. This is a big deal since Meta hasn't been as visible in the consumer AI product field.
AI music battle: Meta competes with Google by launching its own AI song creator - but which one is superior?
AI music is advancing quickly. After Google introduced its text-to-music AI tool called MusicLM, Meta has now launched a similar open-source tool named MusicGen.
Both MusicGen and MusicLM are AI models that create short music clips from text instructions. With MusicGen, you can type in a description like '90s rock song with electric guitar' or 'fast gabber track with a unique synth lead' and the AI will try to match the music it creates to your description.
If you sign up for HuggingSpace, the platform where MusicGen is hosted, the tool can make clips up to 2 minutes long and even recreate melodies that you upload. For example, if you want a dance remix of an old song or a heavy metal version of a famous soundtrack, MusicGen will try to make it.
Unlike MusicLM, MusicGen doesn't stop you from using artist and song names in your instructions, but the resulting music might not sound much like the artist or song you mentioned. This could be because MusicGen learned from 20,000 hours of music, including 390,000 tracks from stock media libraries, not from popular artists' music.
Meta says their open-source approach makes it fair by letting all musicians and producers use their tools. They believe that these models can be useful for both amateur and professional musicians.
In their paper, Meta claims that MusicGen is better than other similar tools, including Google's MusicLM. Click this link to listen and compare the music created by various AI tools.
While neither MusicGen nor MusicLM can make complete songs that sound like 'real' music yet, they could be helpful (and free) tools for musicians and producers to come up with new ideas or to create royalty-free music samples.
AI Recreates The Beatles' Music
John Lennon, who was part of the famous band, the Beatles, was tragically killed in New York City in 1980.
Before his death, Lennon recorded a song on a cassette tape as a gift for Paul McCartney, his bandmate.
Now, McCartney has said that he will use artificial intelligence (A.I) to separate Lennon's voice from the tape and make one final song by the Beatles.
This not only gives the Beatles a grand finale, but it also shows how A.I can be used for good things.
Amazing New Solar Panels Set to Start Being Made in China
New perovskite solar panels cost half as much and work twice as well as traditional silicon ones.
A China-based startup is gearing up to manufacture ultra-efficient solar panels made from a "miracle material" called perovskite. Researchers from Nanjing University, who made the design breakthrough to allow mass production, claim these next-generation solar cells can be produced at half the cost of traditional silicon cells and are 50% more efficient.
Perovskite solar cells are made from abundant and inexpensive raw materials, reducing production costs to just 5% of traditional solar cells. They are easier to produce and can be manufactured in a single factory, making the total production cost half of that of conventional silicon cells.
The startup, Renshine Solar, is moving forward with the commercialization of this technology and has already signed a government contract to start a production line in Jiangsu province this summer. The factory is expected to produce 150 megawatts by September, with the solar panels designed to be used on roofs, walls, or electric vehicles to extend their range.
The perovskite solar cells can maintain over 90% of their original performance after 600 hours of continuous use, making them suitable for commercial purposes. The researchers believe these solar cells could also be used in a variety of applications, from integrated building panels to electricity generation in space.
Perovskite solar cells are viewed as the likely choice for next-generation solar cells, replacing silicon due to their easier manufacturing process, lower cost, and greater flexibility.
Billionaire Jack Ma, who co-founded Alibaba and vanished from public view in 2020, has just taught his first class in Japan
Jack Ma, the billionaire who founded Alibaba, a big online marketplace in China, recently taught his first class at Tokyo College, part of the University of Tokyo. The class was about how to be successful in the future and how to run a business, based on Ma's own experience. Tokyo College had earlier announced that Ma, who used to be an English teacher, would teach about sustainable farming and food production. This position will last until October.
In 2019, Ma had said he wanted to go back to teaching after leaving Alibaba. But in 2020, he criticized China's rules about money and banking, which led to problems with the Chinese government. He's been keeping a low profile since then. The Chinese government stopped a huge financial deal with Ant Group, another company Ma founded, which led to a big drop in Alibaba's stock price and Ma's own wealth.
Since November last year, Ma has been seen in Japan, Thailand, and Hong Kong. He was also given an honorary professor title at the University of Hong Kong in April. The teaching job at Tokyo College is one of the first times he's been in the public eye since his problems with the Chinese authorities in 2020.
Recently, Ma was seen at an Alibaba event. This happened a few days after the company's president, Michael Evans, said that Ma was "alive," "happy," and "creative."
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