UK arts must not be sacrificed for speculative AI gains, peers say

The UK’s creative industries must not be sacrificed in the pursuit of speculative gains in AI technology, a House of Lords committee has warned, as the government prepares to reveal the economic cost of proposals to change copyright rules.A report by peers has urged ministers to develop a licensing regime for the use of creative works in AI products and abandon proposals to let tech firms use the work of novelists, artists, writers and journalists without permission.The call from the House of Lords communications and digital committee comes as the government prepares to release an economic impact assessment of proposed changes to copyright law, as well as a progress update on a consultation about the legal overhaul, by a deadline of 18 March.Barbara Keeley, a Labour peer and committee chair, said the UK’s creative industries faced a “clear and present danger” from AI firms using their work without credit or payment.“AI may contribute to our future economic growth, but the UK creative industries create jobs and economic value now,” she said

Mark Zuckerberg says criminal behavior on Facebook inevitable

Harms to children, such as sexual exploitation and detriments to mental health, are inevitable on Meta’s platforms, the company’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram leader Adam Mosseri said in taped depositions played at a trial in New Mexico on Tuesday and Wednesday.“I just think if you’re serving billions of people, the unfortunate reality is that some very small percent of them are going to be criminals, and we should work as hard as we can to stop that activity from happening,” said Zuckerberg. “I don’t think that the standard for our platforms would be that you should assume that it will ever be perfect.”Meta’s apps, which include Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, are among the most popular in the world, each with 3 billion monthly active users.The trial has set the social media giant against New Mexico’s attorney general, who alleges that Meta’s platforms put profits and user engagement over child safety

Trump says he fired Anthropic ‘like dogs’ as Pentagon formally blacklists AI startup

Donald Trump boasted about severing ties between the US military and Anthropic on Thursday, the same day multiple reports said that negotiations between the Department of Defense and the AI startup had resumed.They’re among the latest developments in the twisting rift between the US government and the AI company.“Well, I fired Anthropic. Anthropic is in trouble because I fired [them] like dogs, because they shouldn’t have done that,” Trump told Politico on Thursday.Hours later, the Pentagon officially designated Anthropic a “supply chain risk”, a move that prevents all government contractors from using the company’s technology

Retailers want ‘delightfully human’ AI to do your shopping, but will the chatbots go rogue?

Major retailers say it won’t be long before sophisticated AI “assistants” plan your meals, organise your parties and do your shopping.But companies, many that are already struggling with their more primitive AI chatbots, will have to balance making the newer, “agentic” bots relatable without them going rogue.AI chatbots were in the news recently when Woolworths reined in its virtual shopping assistant, Olive, after the company’s attempt to have the robot relate to customers on a human level backfired.Customers reported feeling annoyed rather than soothed when Olive told them about its “relatives” over the phone.Sign up: AU Breaking News emailAs one complained on Reddit: “I’m already pissed that I have to call and now I’ve got some robot babbling to me on the phone? Wtf Woolies?”While Woolworths has said it will dial down Olive’s quirky personality, the incident – and further testing by Guardian Australia of a range of retailers’ chatbots – shows the technology still has teething problems

Google Pixel 10a review: cheaper Android is great, but no real advance

The latest smartphone in the lower-cost A-series Pixel line shows what makes Google phones so good, while undercutting the competition on price. The problem is that it differs little from its predecessor, which is still on sale.The Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more

Sam Altman admits OpenAI can’t control Pentagon’s use of AI

OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, told employees on Tuesday that his company does not control how the Pentagon uses their artificial intelligence products in military operations. Altman’s claims on OpenAI’s lack of input come amid increased scrutiny of how the military uses AI in war and ethics concerns from AI workers over how their technology will be deployed. “You do not get to make operational decisions,” Altman told employees, according to reports by Bloomberg and CNBC.“So maybe you think the Iran strike was good and the Venezuela invasion was bad. You don’t get to weigh in on that,” Altman reportedly said