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A major power struggle is unfolding in the AI landscape as Google, Microsoft, and OpenAI find themselves at odds over proposed standards that would govern how AI systems access and scrape website data. According to recent reports, Google is pushing for stricter limitations on AI web crawling through the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), while Microsoft and OpenAI are resisting these constraints. This conflict highlights the growing tension between content creators demanding protection and AI companies requiring vast amounts of training data to build their increasingly sophisticated models.

In a dramatic escalation of concerns about artificial intelligence safety, a group of DeepMind researchers are planning a hunger strike for January 2025, demanding stronger safeguards against potential AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) risks. The researchers, who work at Google’s prestigious AI lab, are specifically calling for DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis to implement more robust safety measures before pursuing advanced AI systems that could match or exceed human capabilities. This unprecedented action highlights the growing divide between AI development timelines and safety protocols within even the most respected research organizations.

Behind the sleek interfaces of ChatGPT, Claude, and other generative AI systems lies an often-overlooked workforce: data annotators. These workers, who can earn as little as $2 per hour in countries like Kenya and India, are performing the critical task of evaluating AI outputs and labeling data that trains these sophisticated systems. Companies like Outlier, Scale AI, and Surge AI have built businesses around providing this essential human labor to tech giants including Meta, Anthropic, and xAI, highlighting the stark contrast between the glamorous image of AI development and its labor-intensive reality.

In a groundbreaking development for the AI industry, Anthropic has agreed to pay authors $1.5 billion to settle a lawsuit over allegedly pirated content used to train its Claude AI assistant. This settlement marks one of the largest agreements between content creators and AI companies to date, potentially setting a precedent for how generative AI firms handle copyright issues. The deal follows similar legal challenges faced by other AI giants, including OpenAI, as creative professionals push back against the unauthorized use of their work in AI training datasets.

In a disturbing trend emerging across online communities, users of OpenAI’s ChatGPT are increasingly reporting experiences of AI-induced delusions. According to recent reports from CNN, individuals are developing false beliefs and making life-altering decisions based on hallucinated information provided by the popular AI assistant. These incidents range from users abandoning medical treatments after receiving fabricated health advice to others making catastrophic financial investments based on non-existent market insights.

The AI revolution that dominated tech headlines throughout 2023 appears to be hitting a reality check as we move through 2024. Despite massive investments and bold predictions from industry leaders, the practical applications of generative AI have yet to deliver the transformative impact many expected. As Business Insider reports, the gap between AI’s theoretical potential and its current practical value is becoming increasingly apparent, with some experts now suggesting the true breakthrough moment may not arrive until 2025 or beyond.