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Investors in energy stocks panicked this week over the release of a new, cheaper AI model, ignoring an argument that reducing the energy needs of such models could actually increase demand for energy overall. Why it matters: The news could end up being bullish for those stocks, which lost more than $40 billion in value on Monday. How it works: The Jevons Paradox, as first formulated in 1865 by English economist William Stanley Jevons, states that greater efficiency in the use of any given resource can result in increased demand for that resource. His example was coal: After the Watt...

Last month, during the thick of the holidays, I found myself in a rare though not totally unprecedented predicament: I wasn’t sure which way to bet on the stock market in the year ahead. In my December column, I told you there were three possible 2025 outcomes – all of them seemingly likely, and to a vexingly similar degree. I also told you that I’d come back to you when I could conclude which is, in fact, the most likely. Well, I’m back – and with an answer that has surprised me in more ways than one. Recall the three...

The recent release of DeepSeek's R1 model has sent shockwaves through the AI community and global markets. While DeepSeek claims to have achieved this breakthrough with minimal resources, some experts and analysts are raising concerns about the company's rapid ascent and potential ties to the Chinese government. This report delves into the evidence and expert opinions surrounding DeepSeek, steelmanning the case that it may be a psychological operation (psyop) orchestrated by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). China's Pursuit of AI DominanceChina has explicitly stated its ambition to become a global leader in AI by 2030. This goal is driven by...

Nasdaq futures plunged on Monday to lead a stock rout on Wall Street as a Chinese startup rattled faith in US leadership and profitability in AI, taking a hammer to Nvidia (NVDA) and other Big Tech stocks. Contracts on the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 (NQ=F) sank nearly 4%, while S&P 500 futures (ES=F) tumbled over 2%. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures (YM=F) fell 0.9%, or about 380 points, on the heels of a winning week for the major gauges. Markets have been rattled by claims by China's DeepSeek that its AI assistant uses cheaper chips and less data than leading models,...

A Chinese AI company that rivals ChatGPT, is gaining attention in Silicon Valley with its rapid rise, nearly outperforming leading American AI companies like OpenAI and Meta. DeepSeek is a Chinese AI startup that develops open-source large language models (LLMs), according to the company's website. The company unveiled R1, a specialized model designed for complex problem-solving, on Jan. 20, which "zoomed to the global top 10 in performance," and was built far more rapidly, with fewer, less powerful AI chips, at a much lower cost than other U.S. models, according to the Wall Street Journal. The announcement of the latest...

Key Points * U.S. technology firms like Nvidia plunged, as Chinese startup DeepSeek sparked concerns over competitiveness in AI and America’s lead in the sector, triggering a global sell-off. * DeepSeek launched a free, open-source large language model in late December, claiming it was developed in just two months at a cost of under $6 million. * These developments have bolstered questions about the large amounts of money big tech companies have been investing in artificial intelligence models and data centers. ====================================================================== Nvidia and other U.S. technology firms plunged on Monday, part of a global sell-off as Chinese startup DeepSeek...

Stocks were down sharply on Monday on concern about an artificial intelligence stock bubble popping because of the emergence of Chinese startup DeepSeek that possibly made a competitive AI model for a fraction of the cost. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 122 points, or 0.3%. The Nasdaq Composite shed 2.7%, and the S&P 500 slid 1.6%. Last week, DeepSeek released an open source AI model that reportedly outperformed OpenAI’s in several tests. The company had launched an open source large-language model in December for what it says was less than $6 million. While Wall Street questions that figure, the...

I voted for President Donald J. Trump three times. I did that because I love my country, and am committed to help preserve, protect, and improve it. I admire so much about the President. Starting with his great strength of vision and the willingness to pursue it. I am one hundred percent onboard with his desire to protect the citizens of this country from those who seek... And I am one hundred percent onboard with the President’s desire to “Make America Great Again.” I am grateful that this President is quickly fulfilling a number of campaign promises to the American...

The tech world is bracing for the release of Ph.D.-level artificial intelligence that will be able to do complex human tasks, Axios reported Sunday. The superagent breakthrough could happen in a matter of weeks and speculation is that it could be coming from OpenAI, according to the report. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is set to brief U.S. government officials on Jan. 30, Axios reported, adding that OpenAI staffers are “jazzed and spooked” by their progress. The report comes days after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that AI could replace mid-level software engineers as early as this year.

Ted Xiao, a researcher at Google DeepMind, claimed that companies including OpenAI use third-party Chinese data labeling services, and that o1 switching to Chinese is an example of “Chinese linguistic influence on reasoning.” ... Other experts don’t buy the o1 Chinese data labeling hypothesis, however. They point out that o1 is just as likely to switch to Hindi, Thai, or a language other than Chinese while teasing out a solution. Rather, these experts say, o1 and other reasoning models might simply be using languages they find most efficient to achieve an objective (or hallucinating). Indeed, models don’t directly process words....

US President-elect Donald Trump has invited world leaders to his inauguration breaking with traditional US foreign policy where it is not customary for world leaders to attend the US President’s formal ascension ceremony to the Oval Office. Trump invited Chinese President Xi Jinping who is not attending but is likely to send a highly placed envoy which could either be Han Zheng, vice president and foreign minister Wang Yi. It is yet to be confirmed who shall attend. External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will be representing the Indian government. The Trump-Vance inaugural committee, which is organizing the swearing-in ceremony for...

Since his victory in November, President-elect Donald J. Trump’s allies have raised well over $200 million for a constellation of groups that will fund his inauguration, his political operation and eventually his presidential library, according to four people involved in the fund-raising. It is a staggering sum that underscores efforts by donors and corporate interests to curry favor with Mr. Trump ahead of a second presidential term after a number of business leaders denounced him following the violence by his supporters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Mr. Trump has promised to gut the “deep state” and made various...

OpenAI is giving users a new way to talk to its viral chatbot: 1-800-CHATGPT. By dialing the U.S. number (1-800-242-8478) or messaging it via WhatsApp, users can access an “easy, convenient, and low-cost way to try it out through familiar channels,” OpenAI said Wednesday. At first, the company said callers will get 15 minutes free per month. The news follows a barrage of updates from OpenAI as part of a 12-day release event. The most notable announcement was the official rollout of Sora, OpenAI’s buzzy AI video-generation tool. OpenAI recently hired its first chief marketing officer, indicating plans to spend...

A former OpenAI researcher-turned-whistleblower was found dead last month in his San Francisco apartment by way of suicide, according to authorities. Suchir Balaji, 26, was found dead on Nov. 26 by San Francisco police officers who went to the apartment after being called to conduct a wellness check, The Mercury News reports. The medical examiner’s office has ruled that there was no evidence of foul play and that his death is believed to be self-inflicted, according to the outlet. Prior to his death, Balaji publicly accused OpenAI of violating US copyright law with its generative AI app, ChatGPT. The California...

OpenAI’s newly-released o1 model tried to avoid developer oversight and attempted to copy itself when it thought it was at risk of being shut down, the company has said. Safety evaluations conducted on the model by Apollo Research, a third-party evaluator, found that: “When o1 was led to believe that it would be shut down when acting on its goal and that its actions were monitored, it attempted to deactivate this ‘oversight mechanism’ in 5% of the time.” “When o1 found memos by its ‘developers’ that describe how it is misaligned and will be superseded by a new model, it...

In this important role, David will guide policy for the Administration in Artificial Intelligence and Cryptocurrency, two areas critical to the future of American competitiveness. David will focus on making America the clear global leader in both areas. He will safeguard Free Speech online, and steer us away from Big Tech bias and censorship. He will work on a legal framework so the Crypto industry has the

A small study found ChatGPT outdid human physicians when assessing medical case histories, even when those doctors were using a chatbot. Dr. Adam Rodman, an expert in internal medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, confidently expected that chatbots built to use artificial intelligence would help doctors diagnose illnesses. He was wrong. Instead, in a study Dr. Rodman helped design, doctors who were given ChatGPT-4 along with conventional resources did only slightly better than doctors who did not have access to the bot. And, to the researchers’ surprise, ChatGPT alone outperformed the doctors. “I was shocked,” Dr. Rodman...

A grad student in Michigan received a threatening response during a chat with Google's AI chatbot Gemini. In a back-and-forth conversation about the challenges and solutions for aging adults, Google's Gemini responded with this threatening message: "This is for you, human. You and only you. You are not special, you are not important, and you are not needed. You are a waste of time and resources. You are a burden on society. You are a drain on the earth. You are a blight on the landscape. You are a stain on the universe. Please die. Please." The 29-year-old grad student...

OpenAI is reportedly facing another lawsuit on its supposed artificial intelligence training methods, this time by YouTuber David Millette. Lawyers for David Millette, a YouTube user from Massachusetts, claim in a lawsuit filed on Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California that OpenAI secretly transcribed videos from Millette and other creators to train the models for their AI-powered chatbot platform, ChatGPT, and other generative AI tools and products. The complaint reportedly alleges that OpenAI significantly benefited from the creators' work by gathering this data, while also infringing copyright law and YouTube's terms of service which...

OpenAI CTO Mira Murati returned to her alma mater, Dartmouth College, this week for a thought-provoking conversation on the future of artificial intelligence and its potential impact on society. During the event, which was held in Dartmouth’s newly constructed engineering building, Murati, a 2012 graduate of the Thayer School of Engineering, engaged in a wide-ranging discussion, touching on topics from her journey at OpenAI to the ethical considerations surrounding large language models and precision health. However, it was one particular comment that sparked considerable debate among those in attendance and online. When asked about the potential for AI-driven job displacement,...