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Anthropic wants its AI assistant Claude to be your favorite coworker
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Anthropic has upgraded its Claude generative AI assistant to be more useful in the office. Claude Pro and Claude Team subscribers can now better organize and track their work with the AI assistant thanks to the new Projects and Artifacts features.

Projects are both a place for storing and interacting with data for tasks. Users can upload all their documents, code, and other relevant data into one place. Each project within Claude.ai includes a 200K context window, equivalent to a 500-page book. They can then ask Claude about it, and even set up custom instructions for how to respond in terms of tone or the context of who is asking and what they might need. The idea is to avoid what Anthropic calls “cold starts,” where users must start from scratch each time they engage with the AI assistant. By having a knowledge base to draw from, Claude can respond to queries more quickly and accurately.

Office Artifacts

The Artifacts feature is a kind of flip of the Projects in that it can produce a wide range of content the way Projects can store them. Users can ask Claude to make text, code, and other 'artifacts.' Claude will share the output in a dedicated window alongside the chat, like a preview window of what it's composing. This setup enables users to see and interact with the generated content in real time, providing immediate feedback and adjustments where needed. An additional upgrade lets users share the best bits of conversations with Claude with their team in a shared project activity feed.

Both Projects and Artifacts are powered by Claude 3.5 Sonnet, Anthropic’s latest AI model. According to the company, Claude 3.5 Sonnet outperforms recently announced models like GPT-4o and Google's Gemini 1.5 on a variety of benchmarks.

“Our vision for Claude has always been to create AI systems that work alongside people and meaningfully enhance their workflows,” Anthropic explained in a blog post. “With this new functionality, Claude can enable idea generation, more strategic decision-making, and exceptional results.”

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Microsoft has gone too far: including a Game Pass ad in the Settings app ushers in a whole new age of ridiculous over-advertising
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Windows 11 is getting out of hand with its push for advertisments, frankly – remember the recent full-screen pop-up to persuade users to install Edge or other Microsoft services? Then another advertisment was placed in the Start menu, and now Microsoft has finally worn my temper thin – with a new Game Pass ad coming to the Settings app.

This will likely arrive in the July update for Windows 11, or at least it’s almost certain to do so. It was present in the latest preview update Microsoft just released for the OS (and quickly paused due to a bug, but that’s another story). It’s also worth noting that the ad has been present in earlier test versions of Windows 11.

You can call it a ‘recommendation’ if you’re feeling kind, but the veiled advertisement for Game Pass appears for Windows 11 Home and Pro users who actively play games on their rig, as Windows Central reports.

Microsoft’s bid to further monetize the operating system seems to be going down the route of smaller, less conspicuous ‘recommendations’ or suggestions like this, which are happening more often, and my worry is that they will become even more frequent and annoying. 

Taking it too far… 

In my opinion, things have already gone too far. The attempt to blur the line between a recommendation and an ad makes the whole thing feel rather disingenuous. Yes, one could argue that Microsoft is (at the moment) only recommending its own products that could make the lives of Windows 11 users easier or more interesting, but who’s to say it will always stay this way? Once some kind of broad acceptance has been established with the Windows user base, the fear is that Microsoft might push boundaries in the future.

I’m thinking about third-party app ads, which have already crept into some corners of Windows 11 – will these inevitably become more prevalent? And could Microsoft’s use of them even trigger similar moves from rivals? Might I turn on my Chromebook in a few months – well, okay, years – and be bombarded with ads for things I don’t want or care for? 

Another thing that bothers me is that it’s not like these ads will appear in some obscure corner of Windows 11. Think about how often you open your Settings app and consider how aggressive this level of advertising really is in the grand scheme of things. Are you going to have to deal with a full-screen ad when you’re trying to open File Explorer eventually?

The problem is that you aren’t renting your PC – you own it, or maybe it’s a work device, but whatever the case, you, your company, or your boss have already paid for Windows. Given that, implementing inescapable ads diminishes your ownership experience – kind of like how you have to sit through ads on YouTube to watch free content. Except Windows 11 isn’t free – and if I have to navigate a maze of ads to change my wallpaper or check on an update, I’m not going to be pleased about it.

Microsoft better watch how it treads here, and keep these kinds of ads to a minimum if it doesn’t want to turn the Windows 11 user base against it – though I have my doubts that the company will. 

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YouTube may be planning to give us new AI song generators this year – and this time the music labels could let it happen
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The battle between the music industry and the rampant, often copyright-infringing, use of AI to train and compile data sets has been heating up for quite some time. But now YouTube is reportedly negotiating with record labels to pay for that privilege instead.

It seems that Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group, and Warner Records are in talks with the Google-owned platform about paying to license their songs for AI training, according to an article from the Financial Times (and reported on by Engadget). However, if this deal goes through, the individual artists, not the record companies, will most likely have the last word on their participation.

It’s no coincidence that these giants have been the focus of YouTube, either. Artificial intelligence music makers Suno and Udio have recently been hit with major lawsuits filed by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and major music labels for copyright infringement. The RIAA has also been backed by the likes of Sony Music Entertainment, UMG Recordings, Inc., and Warner Records, Inc.

Furthermore, this isn’t even the first time YouTube has been reportedly involved in ways to properly compensate music artists for generative AI use. In August 2023, the video platform announced its partnership with Universal Music Group to create YouTube’s Music AI Incubator program. This program would partner with music industry talent like artists, songwriters, and producers to decide on how to proceed with the advent of AI music.

Artists have been quite outspoken about generative AI use and music 

Judging from artists' past responses on the subject of AI, many of them have been very outspoken about its dangers and how it devalues their music. In April 2023, over 200 artists signed an open letter calling for protections for AI.

In a statement by the Artist Rights Alliance, those artists wrote: “This assault on human creativity must be stopped states. We must protect against the predatory use of AI to steal professional artists' voices and likenesses, violate creators' rights, and destroy the music ecosystem.”

Even artists who are more open to and have even benefited from generative AI’s usage regarding music ask to be properly included in any decision-making regarding such use, as asserted by an open letter from Creative Commons released in September 2023. 

According to said letter: “Sen. Schumer and Members of Congress, we appreciate…that your goal is to be inclusive, pulling from a range of ‘scientists, advocates, and community leaders’ who are actively engaged with the field. Ultimately, that must mean including artists like us.”

The general consensus from creatives in the music industry is that, whether for or against generative AI use, artists must be included in conversations and policy-making and that their works must be properly protected. And considering that artists are the ones with the most to lose, this is by far the best and most ethical way to approach this issue.

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Microsoft pauses Windows 11 update as it’s sending some PCs into an infinite reboot hell
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Windows 11 just got its latest update, but Microsoft has put it on hold following the discovery of a bug that’s seriously bad news.

This is the KB5039302 update, which is an optional download for Windows 11 22H2 and 23H2, so it’s still in preview, ahead of its release as the cumulative update for July 2024 next month.

The showstopper of a bug puts affected PCs into what’s known as ‘reboot hell’ whereby the PC keeps failing to start, rebooting, failing again, then rebooting, and so on ad infinitum – well, until the user intervenes and tries to initiative a recovery. (Or in some cases, unplugs their PC out of frustration, no doubt – never do this if you can at all avoid it, we should add, as cutting power at the wrong time can be bad news for your system drive, as it could corrupt files potentially).

What’s the root cause here? Well, it appears to have something to do with PCs using virtual machines (running another OS inside the current operating system, essentially).

Neowin noticed that in its release health dashboard, where this gremlin has been flagged up, Microsoft tells us: “This issue is more likely to affect devices utilizing virtual machines tools and nested virtualization features, such as CloudPC, DevBox, Azure Virtual Desktop. We are investigating to determine the precise conditions under which this issue can trigger.”

While that investigation is taking place, Microsoft has paused this update, so it won’t be offered to Windows 11 home users or businesses.

Unhappy millennial male employee work online on laptop at home office frustrated by gadget error or mistake. Angry young Caucasian man stressed with computer operational problem or breakdown.

(Image credit: Shutterstock / fizkes)

Analysis: Room for doubt

Clearly, given that having a PC trapped in a reboot loop is a dire scenario, it’s a good idea that Microsoft has pulled this update until the firm can work out what’s really going on here. This is an optional update anyway, so it’s not like KB5039302 is crucial, or even finished – which is why this flaw is present, no doubt.

Although you’d really have hoped Microsoft would have picked up on such a calamitous bug before the final preview release of the update – but at least it’s being fixed now. This also goes to illustrate why it’s always a risk to download an optional update for Windows 11 – we’d recommend steering clear of these in case there is a last-minute showstopper, just like this glitch.

Granted, as Microsoft observes: “Users of Windows Home edition are less likely to experience this issue, as virtualization is less common in home environments.”

Even so, some Windows 11 Home users will use virtualization features, no doubt, and Microsoft isn’t 100% clear about the bug not affecting other PCs either. The language used is that the problem is “more likely” to hit PCs using virtual machines in some way, leaving room for doubt that it could affect other systems too. This is likely why the update has been retracted, for now, we’d wager.

The crucial thing is that Microsoft fixes this one up, or at least pushes the feature or code that’s caused the problem aside, before the full release of the July 2024 cumulative update, clearly enough.

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Mac users rejoice! The ChatGPT app is finally available for everyone, not just subscribers
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Anyone can now download the ChatGPT app on the Mac and use it, including non-paying users – previously the app was restricted to ChatGPT Plus subscribers. 

OpenAI announced in a post on X that you can now “get faster access to ChatGPT to chat about email, screenshots and anything on your screen with the Option + Space shortcut.” You can download the app via the official website, enabling more convenient access to the AI, and putting various features at your fingertips on the desktop.

From a central prompt box you can query ChatGPT, and access options to take a screenshot or upload a file to send to the chatbot, and engage with the AI in other ways, including easily searching through your old conversations to find something specific.

Another example shows someone using the shortcut to upload some PDF class schedule files, asking ChatGPT to find and summarize the deadlines within the three files. That effectively illustrates how this can be a helpful tool to sort through your overwhelming college or school workload. 

The most impressive aspect of the app is the way it streamlines the process of using ChatGPT. Instead of having to copy an entire document to paste into ChatGPT, you can simply select a section (or as noted above, upload the whole file), bring up ChatGPT, and just ask for feedback in the search bar. 

Alongside all of this, Mac users can speak to the desktop ChatGPT app for a more hands-free experience, a feature I believe truly shifts ChatGPT from being just any old chatbot and turns it into a virtual assistant in macOS.

An example query on the OpenAI website shows someone prompting ChatGPT to take a screenshot of some broken code, requesting help with that code, which then opens the app and provides suggestions as to what to do to fix the problem.

All that said, I’m someone who's very skeptical about the increasing integration and use of artificial intelligence in this way, especially considering the environmental impact that AI can have (in terms of processing workloads, and the power needed for that).

So while I do appreciate that this is all incredibly cool, and will make the lives of many people easier and more productive, at the same time, the more widely available this kind of tech becomes, the more impact it will have on the environment – and that's something the big AI brands need to be thinking about.

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Amazon is reportedly working on its own AI chatbot that might be smarter than ChatGPT
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Amazon is reportedly working on its own AI chatbot, codenamed “Metis”, that’ll operate in a similar vein to ChatGPT. 

According to Business Insider, who spoke “to people familiar with the project,” the new platform will be accessible through a web browser. They also viewed an internal document revealing the chatbot's potential capabilities. It’ll provide text answers to inquiries in a “conversational manner,” give links to sources, suggest follow-up questions, and even generate images. 

So far, it appears that Metis performs just like any other generative AI, but things soon begin to deviate. The company apparently wants to utilize a technique called “retrieval-augmented generation,” or RAG for short. It gives Metis the ability to grab information outside of its original training data, thereby giving the AI a big advantage over its rivals.

ChatGPT, by comparison, works by accessing a data reservoir whenever a user inputs a prompt, but that reservoir has a cut-off date that differs between the service’s models. For example, GPT-4 Turbo has a cut-off date of December 2023. It’s not privy to anything that has happened so far in 2024.

Powering the AI chatbot

It’s unknown if Amazon has implemented RAG at the time of Business Insider’s report. Metis is also slated to function as an “AI agent.” Judging from the description given, it would allow the service to function as a smart home assistant of sorts, “automating and performing complex tasks.” This includes but is not limited to turning on lights, making vacation itineraries, and booking flights.

The report goes on to reveal some of the tech powering Metis. The AI runs on a new internal AI model called Olympus, which is supposed to be a better version of Amazon’s “publicly available Titan.” The company even brought people from the Alexa team to help with development. In fact, Metis “uses some of the [same] resources” as the long-rumored Alexa upgrade.

Differing attitudes

Attitudes towards the AI chatbot vary among different parts of the company. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy seems very interested in the project, as he is directly involved with development and often reviews the team’s progress. Others, however, are less enthusiastic. One of the sources told Business Insider that they felt the company was way too late to party. Rival companies are so ahead of the curve that playing chase may not be worthwhile.

The report mentions that Amazon’s ventures into AI have been mostly duds. The Titan model is considered weaker than rival models; their Amazon Q corporate chatbot isn’t great, and there is low demand for their Trainnium and Inferentia AI chips. Amazon needs a big win to stay in the AI space.

Sources claim Metis is scheduled to launch in September around the same time Amazon is planning to hold its next big event. However, the date could change at any time. Nothing is set in stone at the moment.

While we have you, be sure to check out TechRadar's list of the best AI chatbots for 2024.

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Watch the AI-produced film Toys”R”Us made using OpenAI’s Sora – and get misty about the AI return of Geoffrey the Giraffe
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Toys”R”Us premiered a film made with OpenAI's artificial intelligence text-to-video tool Sora at this year's Cannes Lions Festival. “The Origin of Toys”R”Us” was produced by the company's entertainment production division Toys”R”Us Studios, and creative agency Native Foreign, who scored alpha access to Sora since OpenAI hasn't released it to the public yet. That makes Toys”R”Us one of the first brands to leverage the video AI tool in a major way

 “The Origin of Toys”R”Us” explores the early years of founder Charles Lazarus in a rather more whimsical way than retail giants are usually portrayed. Company mascot Geoffrey the Giraffe appears to Lazarus in a dream to inspire his business ambitions in a way that suggests huge profits were an unrelated side effect (at least until relatively recently) for Toys”R”Us.

“Charles Lazarus was a visionary ahead of his time and we wanted to honor his legacy with a spot using the most cutting-edge technology available,” four-time Emmy Award-winning producer and President of Toys”R”Us Studios Kim Miller Olko said in a statement. “Partnering with Native Foreign to push the boundaries of OpenAI's Sora is truly exciting. Dreams are full of magic and endless possibilities, and so is Toys”R”Us.”

Sora Stories and the uncanny valley

Sora can generate up to one-minute-long videos based on text prompts with realistic people and settings. OpenAI pitches Sora as a way for production teams to bring their visions to life in a fraction of the usual time. The results can be breathtaking and bizarre.

For “The Origin of Toys”R”Us,” the filmmakers condensed hundreds of iterative shots into a few dozen, completing the film in weeks rather than months. That said, the producers did use some corrective visual effects and added original music composed indie rock band Copeland's Aaron Marsh.

The film is brief and its AI origins are only really obvious when it is paused. Otherwise, you might think it was simply the victim of an overly enthusiastic editor with access to some powerful visual effects software and actors who don't know how to perform in front of a green screen.

Overall, it manages to mostly avoid the uncanny valley except for when the young founder smiles, then it's a little too much like watching “The Polar Express.” Still, when considering it was produced with the alpha version of Sora and with relatively limited time and resources, you can see why some are very excited about Sora.

“Through Sora, we were able to tell this incredible story with remarkable speed and efficiency,” Native Foreign Chief Creative Officer and the film's director Nik Kleverov said in a statement. “Toys”R”Us is the perfect brand to embrace this AI-forward strategy, and we are thrilled to collaborate with their creative team to help lead the next wave of innovative storytelling.”

The debut of “The Origin of Toys”R”Us” at the Cannes Lions Festival underscores the growing importance of AI tools in advertising and branding. The film acts as a new proof of concept for Sora. And it may portend a lot more generative AI-assisted movies in the future. That said, there's a lot skepticism and resistance in the entertainment world. Writers and actors went on strike for a long time in part because of generative AI, and the new contracts included rules for how companies can use AI models. The world premiere of a movie written by ChatGPT had to be outright canceled over complaints about that aspect, and if Toys”R”Us tried to make its film available in theaters, it would probably face the same backlash.

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This app can add AI narration to any site or text – here’s how to make it work
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Artificial intelligence-powered audio creator ElevenLabs has brought its synthetic voices to the iPhone with a new iOS app. The ElevenLabs Reader App will read out any uploaded text or website using ElevenLabs' library of synthetic and cloned voices, even your own if you want. 

The new app essentially turns books, website content, and any other text into a kind of podcast hosted by whichever voice you want to hear. Users can listen to content by pasting a link, copying text, uploading a file, or selecting one of the preloaded stories, which are then read in the chosen voice from the library. The stories are public domain and come from Project Gutenberg, including “Cinderella,” “The Tale of Peter Rabbit,” and “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.” 

As for the voices, users can pick based on accent, style, and tone to match the text. That might mean switching from a warm, friendly voice reading a bedtime story to a child to a brisk, authoritative voice reading a scientific study. The app can run in the background like an audiobook or podcast and is clearly aimed at those who are multitasking, at least based on the promotional video. 

Narrate Your Life

The ElevenLabs Reader App only narrates in English for now and only in the U.S., Canada, and the UK. The company said it is “working on widening access, adding content download and audio sharing features, and adding all of the 29 languages available inElevenLabs'' wider library thanks to its multilingual AI model. The app is included with a subscription to ElevenLabs' platform, though you can get three months of free access without an account. An Android version is also coming soon, with an early access waitlist available to sign up for.

“It's our mission to make content accessible in any language and voice, and everything we do is oriented around achieving that mission,” ElevenLabs head of growth Sam Sklar explained in a blog post about the new app.”Creating best-in-class AI audio models is not enough. Creators need tools through which they can create. And consumers need interfaces through which they can consume audio.”

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macOS Sequoia has yet another cool feature to look forward to, this time adding a way to customize your AirPods Audio experience
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It seems like every day, there is a new macOS Sequoia feature to look forward to, or some kind of improvement in Apple’s incoming OS, with a freshly spotted one opening up the doors to improved accessibility on the audio front.

MacRumors has been busy playing with the macOS 15 developer beta and discovered this new functionality in System Settings. Under Headphone Accommodations (in Accessibility > Audio), you can tweak the sound for your AirPods and some Beats headphones. 

The settings therein let you amplify softer sounds – to make them more easily heard – and change the audio output frequencies to make your music, phone calls, and more clearer sounding (or at least that’s the idea). From what we can tell, the new settings you run with will carry over when using your AirPods on devices other than your Mac. 

This could be a really useful feature for those who are hard of hearing to some degree, and it’s an ability that has been on iOS devices for some time. So, while it’s undoubtedly a very commendable step forward for accessibility with macOS, some folks out there are wondering why it took so long to bring this functionality across to the Mac.

Still, we’re glad to see it’s arriving, and in the run-up to the release of macOS Sequoia, we’re seeing a lot of new and interesting features and tweaks pop up that seem to be popular. 

A recent example is the fix for the annoying storage issue Mac users have to deal with when it comes to downloading apps, as well as the more anticipated changes like iPhone mirroring and a plethora of AI features powered by Apple Intelligence.

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Meta Quest 3’s next update steals the Vision Pro’s best productivity feature… kinda
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The Meta Quest 3 looks set to be taking yet another step towards being an Apple Vision Pro that doesn’t cost $ 3,499 / £3,499 / AU$ 5,999, by taking yet another feature from the Apple headset for itself.

This time it's a new window layout style, though it’s not really fair to say Meta is stealing this idea from Apple, merely improving its current approach. Rather than simply having three 2D apps docked side by side in fixed positions (which is what is currently possible on the Meta Quest 3 and other Meta headsets), you can now have three windows that are freely placeable anywhere in your virtual home office, and another three docked – making a total of six.

The experimental setting has been unlocked as part of the HoizonOS v67 update which is currently in beta for members of the Meta Quest Public Test Channel. Clips of people testing it out also show users switching the windows between curved and flat, as well as a feature that can lower the brightness of 2D environments – though this doesn’t work if you’re using the windows in mixed reality with passthrough.

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While this does bring the Quest 3 closer to matching the Vision Pro’s approach to 2D apps in a 3D space, it’s not quite one-to-one yet. The biggest difference is if you stray too far from a window it returns to its default docked position on the Quest 3 – whereas on Vision Pro you can leave windows in their custom floating positions indefinitely like they’re real objects.

That said, it’s also worth noting the Meta Quest 3 only costs $ 499.99 / £479.99 / AU$ 799.99, so it’s forgiven for not being a direct copy.

A closing gap

The Apple Vision Pro will always be better than the Meta Quest 3 on a technical level with its vastly better displays and chipset. But Apple hasn’t done enough to leverage its advantages in ways that matter, but that was probably always going to be the case.

The Vision Pro with its eye-tracking, laptop-level power, focus on less active XR experiences, and approach to hand-tracking offers app developers a vast array of tools to create interesting software for the device. 

However, what makes the headset unique is also its downfall – it’s too dissimilar to its rivals. If you make a VR app that takes full advantage of the Vision Pro it probably won’t be well suited to other platforms (and vice versa). So if you’re weighing up your options, making a non-Vision Pro app just makes more financial sense as it can run on more popular platforms; that is, unless Apple is offering some kind of financial incentive.

A Meta Quest 3 user throwing a giant die onto a virtual medieval tabletop game board full of castles, wizards and knights

Demeo is great, but the Apple Vision Pro needed more than this (Image credit: Meta)

Some classic VR games and apps have started to get Vision Pro ports, but they are in small numbers and have trickled in months after the headset launched and the hype has died down.

Instead, most of the apps that it can run are XR versions of iPad and Mac apps which begs the question of what you really gain from buying a Vision Pro – especially as you likely already have those other gadgets, or could buy them for less than the cost of Apple’s headset.

Meta on the other hand has continued to fund exciting exclusive apps – we’re getting a bonafide Batman: Arkham game to name a recent example. At the same time, it's rolling out monthly major software updates that have only narrowed the gap between the Vision Pro and Quest 3.

We’ll have to wait and see how things continue the rest of the year and beyond, but my advice remains the same as it always has: if you want to try VR then get a Quest 3 or Quest 2 – there’s no good reason to get a Vision Pro instead.

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