Tech Brew Ride Home - Wed. 01/04 – ChatGPT Coming To Bing?

Episode Date: January 4, 2023

Is Microsoft gonna steal one on Google by bring ChatGPT to Bing search? What is Bonk, the new crypto coin posting monster gains this week? Is Apple bringing MagSafe charging to everyone, even Android users? Roku is launching its own TV sets. And how you could get a check in the mail from Tim Apple for those wonky keyboards. Sponsors: Upside App and promocode RIDEHOME Links: Microsoft and OpenAI Working on ChatGPT-Powered Bing in Challenge to Google (The Information) Salesforce to cut 10% of workforce in latest tech layoffs (Reuters) Sam Bankman-Fried Pleads ‘Not Guilty’ to Fraud, Conspiracy Charges (CoinDesk) Shiba Inu-Themed BONK Tokens Are Yielding Nearly 1,000% for Solana Liquidity Providers (CoinDesk) Nvidia upgrades GeForce Now with RTX 4080 performance for premium users (TechCrunch) Wireless Power Consortium works with Apple on next generation ‘Qi2’ standard based on MagSafe (9to5Mac) Qi2: How Apple might finally harness MagSafe by giving it away (The Verge) Roku does the obvious thing and announces its own TV line (The Verge) MacBook owners have two months to claim up to $395 over butterfly keyboard woes (The Verge) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the TechMame right home for Wednesday, January 4th, 22. I'm Brian McCullough. Today, is Microsoft going to steal one on Google by bringing chat GPT to Bing search? What is Bonk? The new crypto coin posting monster gains this week? Is Apple bringing MagSafe charging to everyone, even Android users?

Roku is launching its own TV sets and how you could get a check in the mail from Tim Apple for those wonky keyboards. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. sources are telling the information that Microsoft plans to release a version of Bing that will use OpenAI's chat GPT tech to answer some search queries, possibly launching this as soon as the first quarter of this year. Microsoft, of course, is an investor in OpenAI to the tune of $1 billion. Quote, Microsoft is preparing to launch a version of its Bing search engine that uses the artificial intelligence behind chat GPT to answer some search queries rather than just show a list of links, according to two people with direct knowledge of the plans. Microsoft hopes the

new feature, which could launch before the end of March, will help it outflank Google its much bigger search rival. Details of Bing's integration of OpenAI software couldn't be learned, but the technology could power more full-sentence answers to questions from Bing users, and ChatGPT itself has some ideas about what the collaboration could yield. The Microsoft OpenAI relationship has attracted outsized interest in the tech world, especially after the information reported in October that Microsoft was in advanced talks to make a second investment in the AI startup at evaluation of tens of billions of dollars. As the information also reported, Microsoft essentially has been footing the startup's cloud bill as it trains machine learning

models on data across the internet to develop tools that help people generate text, computer code, and imagery in response to a few simple text prompts. It isn't clear how Microsoft will minimize potential errors and avoid offensive content troubles like it had with a chat bot it launched in 2016 named Tay. OpenAI has said it plans to charge for chat GPT in the future, similar to the way it charges developers to build text-creating bots using GPT, meaning Bing might become one of the only ways to access parts of GPT for free. OpenAI built GPT to quickly respond to written questions with text that mimics a human, but the software isn't meant to continuously scrape the web or provide real-time information like a search engine does. That's

why Bing will still rely on its own technology to produce most search results, but GPT could improve the way Bing presents the results to users, such as by generating text that summarizes the results in a more intuitive way. For example, rather than providing a link with a quoted excerpt, GPT could spin up a full sentence answer to a typed question while showing the source of the information according to someone familiar with Bing's systems. Google offers a similar instant answer feature. Or if a user asked a question about the French resistance during World War 2, chat GPT could suggest a related query about the Vichy Front's regime while explaining the relevance to the original query, even if the user didn't mention those keywords. GPT could also help Bing do a better

job of suggesting other keywords users could type to see answers related to searches, this person said, end quote. Reuters this morning is reporting that Salesforce plans to lay off around 10% of its staff and close some offices expecting to incur $1.4 to $2.1 billion in charges for this restructuring. Quote, the environment remains challenging and our customers are taking a more measured approach to their purchasing decisions, co-chief executive officer Mark Benioff said in a letter to employees, as our revenue accelerated through the pandemic, we hired too many people leading to this economic downturn we're now facing, and I take responsibility for that, Beniof said. Salesforce growth has slowed during the past four.

quarters with the company posting its weakest revenue increase for the three months ended October 31st, as a strong dollar also eats into its sales. The company said affected employees in the United States will receive a minimum of about five months pay, health insurance, and other benefits, while those outside the country will receive a similar level of support. Salesforce had 73,541 employees at the end of January last year, end quote. Sam Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty to all eight criminal charges, including wire fraud and money laundering. If convicted, SBF faces up to 115 years in prison. The judge in the trial set SBF's trial for October 2023, allowing the redacting of his bond signers names for now and amended SBF's bail terms to prohibit him from accessing FTX

funds, quoting Coin desk. Assistant U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon told the court that the prosecution expected the bulk of its discovery to be completed within the coming weeks. The government will produce materials it already has accessed within the next several weeks, she said. This includes documents shared by FDX's bankruptcy attorneys. Judge Kaplan also granted Bankman-Freed's application to seal the names of the two additional co-signers who, in addition to his parents, guaranteed his $250 million bail bond. Media can object to the redaction of the identities of the bond signers through January 12th. Bankman-Freed's lawyers had argued that there were,

were safety and privacy concerns with revealing the names of the co-signers. On the government's behalf, Sassoon asked the court to modify the conditions of Bankman Freed's bail conditions, requesting that he be prohibited from accessing or transferring any assets tied to FTX or its affiliated entities. She referenced last week's discovery that several Alameda wallets had begun moving thousands of dollars worth of crypto into other wallets. This money is now inaccessible for the purposes of government seizure, Sassoon said, and quote. Bonk is a new Shiba-inu-themed coin, just like Dogecoin is. It was issued on December 25th and has subsequently risen 2,220% in just the past week, 150% in just the past 24 hours. So maybe I shouldn't have

ignored those spam tweets sent my way about this, but also this is an interesting new play in the Seoul ecosystem, which you might know has been struggling of late. Quoting, Dengdesk again. The token was airdropped to Solana NFT communities and creators, which led to quick hype and trading volumes for the Young token, as CoinDesk reported Tuesday. Early investors aren't the only ones gaining, however, liquidity pools on Solana-based decentralized exchanges such as Orca have attracted over $20 million in volume for trading pairs involving Bonk, cumulatively netting thousands of dollars and fees for liquidity providers. Despite being fashioned as a meme coin, Bonk tokens are seeing steady adoption in the Solana ecosystem. Several Solana projects have already

integrated Bonk tokens for use as payments for listed NFTs, while some introduced burn mechanisms for NFT-based events. Over one billion Bonk was burned in the past 24 hours as per tweets. Meanwhile, the interest around Bonk has likely contributed to the demand for sole tokens. Prices are up 16% in the past 24 hours, erasing losses from a steep decline last week, end quote. Some CES headlines for you. Invidia is bringing its G-Force R-TX-40 GPUs to laptops, offering the R-TX-4080 and R-TX-4090 for around $2,000 on February 8th, followed by the R-TX-4050 for around $1,000 on February 22nd,

and Nvidia has upgraded its 1999-per-month, G-Forse Now Plan, renamed Ultimate, to support 240 frames per second streaming, ultra-wide monitors, and more by using RTX-4080 GPUs. Quoting TechCrunch. The company is now using G-Force RTF4080 class graphics processing units on its high-end servers. Before today, users paying for the most expensive subscription plan could access servers with server-grade GPUs that are equivalent to G4RTX3080 GPUs.

As a reminder, GFORS now lets you play your own games from the cloud. The game is running in a data center near you, and the video feed is then relayed to your device. GeoForce Now supports Windows, MacOS, Android, as well as Android TV, and some web browsers, including Safari on the iPhone and iPad. G4Snow customers still have to buy games on Steam, the Epic Games store and other digital stores. They own the games even if they stop subscribing to the service. But the biggest issue with the service is that some game publishers refuse to let Nvidia support their games on GForce Now.

There are currently 1,500 supportive games including Fortnite, League of Legends, cyberpunk 2077 and many Ubisoft games, but you can't play Overwatch 2 or Eldon Ring, for instance. Customers can try out G-Force Now for free. There is a Q system and you are limited to 60-minute gaming sessions. If you want to use the service on a daily basis, a priority membership lets you launch a game right away and play for up to six hours at a time for $9.99 per month. You are limited to a 10 ADP resolution and 60 frames per second, though, end quote. The bigger news out of Vegas is that the Wireless Power Consortium,

and Apple are working on a next-generation Chi-2 wireless charging standard based on Apple's own MagSafe set to arrive by the end of this year. Quoting 9 to 5 Mac. Apple's MagSafe is a more convenient way to charge the iPhone using accessories based on the Chi standard, but with strong magnets that keep the accessory aligned to the back of the device. Now the company seems willing to let its competitors have the same technology as the Wireless Power Consortium or WPC has been working with Apple on the next generation of Chi-2 standard based on MagSafe. The WPC announced during CES 2023 that the next generation of the Chi-Standard named Chi-2 was built with Apple's help. The new standard aims to improve the efficiency and interoperability of the technology, which is why it will

have a magnetic power profile at its core. As explained by WPC, this magnetic power profile essentially works like Apple's MagSafe. As a result, Chi-2 accessories will be perfectly aligned with the devices, thus improving energy efficiency and fast charging. And of course, since it was developed in partnership with Apple, the Chi-2 standard will also work with MagSafe by default. Currently, MagSafe is a proprietary standard from Apple, and even accessory manufacturers have to pay to use such a standard. While Apple can still technically limit some features to MagSafe certified accessories, the announcement of the Chi-2 standard is good news to ensure that this type of accessory is compatible with different phones, end quote.

And quoting The Verge. Yes, this effectively means that MagSafe is coming to Android for better or for worse. Samsung and Apple are both expected to put Chi-2 certified products on the market. Wireless Power Consortium spokesperson Paul Golden tells the Verge, and he says there's no reason to think future Chi-2 certified chargers wouldn't work with both. And while I say for better or for worse, it mostly sounds better. Golden says the idea is to eliminate the confusion of whether chargers and phones are actually interoperable and to ensure the coils are tightly coupled and properly aligned so they can charge at full speed,

unlike how Apple currently limits today's Chi chargers to half speed when they're charging an iPhone. There's no reason to think a future Chi-2 charger wouldn't work seamlessly and identically with both Android and iPhones, Golden says when I ask. That's because Apple, a WPC steering member and chair of the board of directors, is contributing essentially the same magnetic power profile as MagSafe to the new Chi-2 standard. That's not all the WPC is working on either, while the Chi 2.0 release is largely just about adding magnets. It's still primarily for phones, still tops out at 15 watts, still has the same foreign object detection, etc. The WPC intends to take advantage of guaranteed magnetic coupling to give us faster charging speeds too. When we finish with the spec for Chi 2, we'll immediately start working on a significantly higher power profile level for the next version of Chi 2, says Golden, end quote.

More CES. Roku plans to launch its own TVs in the spring of 2020, across two brands, Roku Select and Roku Plus. But they're hitting basically every TV size you can imagine, ranging from 24-inch TVs for $119 to $75 inches for $999. Quoting The Verge. Roku's move into TV hardware has been rumored for some time now, and the company is lagging behind rival Amazon, which began selling Fire TV-branded 4K sets in 2021.

Lower-end Roku select models will ship with the standard Roku voice remote, and the Plus series will include the Voice Remote Pro that's capable of hands-free voice commands and has a rechargeable battery. Roku's TVs will begin shipping this spring. The announcement comes only a few months after Roku entered the smart home category by selling relabeled Wise products under its own brand. Roku isn't yet answering many technical questions about what features its own TVs will offer. That leads me to believe they won't rival or surpass products like the TCL 6 series Roku TV

in terms of picture quality or high refresh rate capabilities for gaming. I expect Roku will focus on delivering good picture quality while leaning on its other strengths, simple software, an ecosystem of wireless speakers and soundbars, etc., to make these TVs an attractive option. Working out a manufacturing deal with TCL or high sense for these sets could ease any possible tension, resulting from Roku now competing against them more directly in retail stores. Roku has to pull off a delicate dance in order not to upset its existing Roku TV OEMs. Many companies already sell TVs that run the company's software.

Roku claims one out of every three TVs sold in the U.S. is a Roku TV. If those partners are rattled, they could start favoring Google TV over Roku TV as a platform. Google is unlikely to make its own television anytime soon. Roku tries to address this head-on in today's press release, vowing that its first-party TVs will only help the Roku TV program evolve, and improve for everyone since they are all running the same OS. To better serve consumers, Roku branded TVs will enable further innovation around the TV experience, and all innovations will be made available to the full Roku TV program,

including current and future OEM partners, the company said, end quote. And finally today, you poor Sods, who suffered through the years of that disastrous, farcical, MacBook butterfly keyboard period, your ship has come in. affected MacBook owners now have two months to claim up to $395 from Apple in compensation for the most insane design decision that I can remember. Quoting the Verge, If you bought an Apple MacBook with an ill-fated butterfly keyboard and ended up having to replace either individual keycaps or the whole keyboard, you may be eligible to claim part of a $50 million settlement reached after a class action lawsuit. The law firm handling the settlement has been emailing class members since mid-December, judging by this Mac Rumors report. but we wanted to highlight that the deadline for making a claim is fast approaching on March 6,

2023. Claims can be submitted via the keyboardsettlement.com website, which says that the settlement class includes, quote, all persons and entities in the United States who purchased a butterfly-equipped MacBook, MacBook Air, or MacBook Pro, between 2015 and 2019. There are three main class members. The first includes anyone that had to replace their keyboard, aka got a top-case replacement, more than once. This group should get their payment automatically, but should confirm their mailing address for their $395 max payment.

The other two groups, which include anyone who replaced their whole keyboard or individual keycaps, and found this didn't resolve their issues, will need to submit a claim form. You can get up to $125 for replacing a keyboard and up to $50 for keycaps. Settlement payments are only available if your repair was carried out by Apple or one of its authorized service providers within four years of purchase, end quote. Quick review and or the TV show, watch it, the best Star Wars content maybe ever. Not only is it an adult show with adult themes and real stakes and grit, but it mostly stays away from anyone involved in the Skywalker family for once. Plus, it does a real service to Star Wars Canon. We always knew there was a rebellion, right?

Now we can see in close up detail why there was a rebellion. Consider me now a Mon Mothma Stan. Talk to you tomorrow.