Good evening!
Welcome to the 29th edition of the Quantumics Weekly Roundup. Today, we’re taking a look at Bard, Google’s answer to ChatGPT and Chinese cloned super-cows! We’ll also explore the latest news and information in data and AI, business and tech.
Let’s go! 👇
👋 Hello Bard, Google’s answer to ChatGPT
Earlier this week, Google’s CEO announced Bard, an “experimental conversational AI service” that will answer users’ queries and take part in conversations.
Although details of Bard aren’t quite widely available yet, we can guess that the bot will be similar to ChatGPT. However, Pichai also notes that Bard “draws on information from the web to provide fresh, high-quality responses,” suggesting it may be able to answer questions about recent events — something ChatGPT struggles with.
Also during the week, Google held a much-anticipated press conference in Paris, but it failed to live up to the expectations of many experts who believed it would provide a strong response to ChatGPT and the Microsoft-OpenAI alliance. Instead, the presentation was low-key and featured a recap of previously announced technologies, including a failed demonstration of a phone.
In an effort to compete with ChatGPT, Google brought in co-founders Brin and Page to join the AI battle. The demo, which mentioned several products that have not yet been released, took place shortly after an error was discovered in Google's ad for its new Bard large language model. This error, reported by Reuters, resulted in a 7% decline in Google's stock price, causing a loss of roughly $100 billion in value.
🐄 Introducing: Super-Cow!
Chinese scientists have successfully cloned three calves that are capable of producing 50% more milk than the average American cow, according to the Global Times. The cloning experiment was carried out at the Northwest University of Agricultural and Forestry Science and Technology in Shaanxi, China, and involved the use of the somatic cell nuclear transfer method to create embryos. The calves were born healthy last month and are expected to produce 18 tons of milk per year. The super cows were created using Holstein Friesian cows, a Dutch breed of cattle known for producing a high volume of milk.
China imports roughly 70% of its dairy cows, which is a result of the rising demand for milk and cheese. However, only 5 out of every 10,000 Holstein Friesian cows within the country are capable of producing high volumes of milk. The cloning experiment was led by Yaping Jin, a bovine veterinarian at Northwest A&F, and produced more than 100 cloned embryos. The goal is to build up a herd of over 1,000 super cows in the next two to three years to tackle China's reliance on overseas dairy cows.
The meat and milk from a cloned cow is considered "as safe to eat as food from conventionally bred animals" by the US Food and Drug Administration. The super cow experiment is seen as a major breakthrough by the Chinese scientists and will help revitalise the country's agricultural sector. The newly born calves will be used as the basis for a larger herd of super cows.
News Bites 📰
Microsoft announced a new Bing browser with ChatGPT powered features.
Netflix has extended their password sharing ban to 4 new countries.
Scaling to millions of users, with a Google Sheets backend?
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