📰Trace Lab Newsletter #9

🌍 Welcome back Tracers!🌟

I hope those who had the chance to take a few days off this summer are feeling well-rested and recharged! While many were unwinding, innovation didn’t take a break. The Paris Olympics and the Euro football championship are now behind us, and we’re kicking off a new year full of challenges and opportunities, with fresh ideas and the rapid adoption of AI driving us forward.

In this edition, we take a look back at how AI played a major role in the Paris Olympics, the latest innovations from Google with their AI-generated audio tool, Adobe’s new video AI features, and an exciting study showing that AI can generate more novel ideas than humans. It’s the perfect way to start this new chapter!

LATEST NEWS

PARIS 2024
🏅 AI Revolution at the Paris 2024 Olympics

The Paris 2024 Summer Olympics left a lasting legacy by extensively integrating AI across various aspects of the games. From enhancing athletes' performance to improving the fan experience, AI proved to be a game-changer, marking a pivotal shift in how global sporting events are managed and enjoyed.

Key highlights:

• AthleteGPT, an AI chatbot, provided 24/7 assistance to athletes through the Athlete365 mobile app.

• AI-powered 3D athlete tracking (3DAT) offered detailed biomechanical insights, helping athletes refine their techniques.

• AI played a role in talent scouting, with a notable IOC pilot program in Senegal.

• NBC leveraged AI to deliver personalized highlights and real-time statistics to viewers.

Read more here

Why It Matters for Trace: The extensive use of AI at a high-profile event like the Olympics underscores the increasing normalization of AI in industries beyond tech. For Trace, this signals potential opportunities to leverage AI in content production, live events, and viewer engagement strategies.

GOOGLE
🤖 Google turns your notes into podcasts

Google recently introduced Audio Overviews, a groundbreaking feature in NotebookLM that transforms notes, PDFs, Google Docs, Slides, and other materials into AI-generated audio discussions between two virtual AI agents. This innovation is set to redefine how users interact with written content, making it more accessible and engaging.

Key highlights:

• Audio Overviews create "deep dive" conversations from uploaded sources, with AI hosts summarizing content and connecting topics across materials.

• The tool supports various source types, such as documents, slides, charts, and web URLs, using Gemini 1.5's multimodal capabilities.

• To use Audio Overviews, open an existing notebook, navigate to the Notebook guide, and click on the “generate” button.

• NotebookLM can process up to 50 sources, each up to 500,000 words, allowing for a total of 25 million words to be analyzed when generating the audio.

Read the full story

Why it matters for Trace: Audio Overviews can revolutionize content consumption for auditory learners, which can be particularly useful for reviewing academic papers, presentations, or even internal Trace reports. This tool could enhance our ability to create more accessible and diverse forms of media content.

ADOBE FIREFLY
🔥 Adobe previews new AI video model

Adobe recently previewed its Firefly AI Video Model, showcasing groundbreaking tools that extend existing videos and generate new clips from text or image prompts. These features are expected to launch before the end of the year and promise to transform video editing workflows.

Key highlights:

• Three main features are coming: Text to Video, Image to Video, and Generative Extend.

• Text to Video allows users to create clips from prompts, with controls for camera angles and reference images.

• Image to Video turns still images or illustrations into live-action clips.

• Generative Extend, arriving in the Premiere Pro beta, will allow editors to add footage to fill gaps or extend scenes seamlessly.

Read the full story

Why it matters for Trace: Adobe’s Firefly AI could dramatically simplify video production workflows for Trace, making it easier to adjust camera angles, generate b-roll, or extend shots on the fly. This could be a game-changer for content creation, giving editors more creative control and flexibility without increasing production time.

SURVEY
🧠 AI Generates Ideas Better than Humans

Researchers recently discovered that AI-generated ideas are judged to be more novel, though slightly less feasible, compared to those from human experts in a study evaluating research ideas in natural language processing (NLP). This finding could have far-reaching implications for how we view AI’s role in innovation and creativity.

Key highlights:

• Over 100 NLP researchers participated in the study, writing novel ideas and reviewing both AI- and human-generated proposals.

• The evaluation was conducted blindly, meaning the reviewers didn’t know whether ideas were AI- or human-generated.

• AI-generated ideas were rated significantly more novel than human expert ideas, but less feasible.

• The study highlighted challenges in AI-generated ideas, such as self-evaluation issues and a lack of diversity in the outputs.

Read the full study

Why it matters for Trace: This study underscores AI’s potential to drive innovation, especially in content creation and research. For Trace, embracing AI-driven ideas could lead to new, creative approaches to content production and media strategies, sparking greater innovation within the company.

NEW PRODUCTIVITY TOOLS

GPTs and AI Tools Spotlight

• 🤖 Kling AI: The Future of Image-to-Video AI
  Kling AI specializes in transforming static images or illustrations into dynamic, live-action videos. With this cutting-edge AI tool, media companies can seamlessly convert visuals into engaging video content, making it an ideal solution for enhancing storytelling and boosting creativity in content production.

• 🌐 GetIndigo.AI: AI-Powered Digital Assistants
  GetIndigo.AI offers customizable AI-driven digital assistants that help automate customer interactions across multiple platforms. Whether for support, marketing, or engagement, this tool enables businesses to optimize communication and increase efficiency.

• ⚙️ Aicado.AI: AI for Streamlining Workflows
  Aicado.AI is designed to revolutionize business processes by automating repetitive tasks and enabling smarter decision-making through predictive analytics. It's especially useful for content production teams who want to simplify workflows and focus on creativity.

• 🎙️ NotebookLM: Podcast Possibilities
  Google's NotebookLM now offers Audio Overviews, an exciting feature that turns written content into podcast-like discussions between AI agents. Whether you're digesting complex reports or transforming presentations into audio, this tool can bring a new layer of interactivity to content consumption.

UNTIL NEXT TIME…

AI Paving the Future: Embracing Change Together

As we close this edition, we hope you’re feeling inspired by the latest AI innovations. These advancements are reshaping media, and together at Trace, we’ll continue to lead the way. Stay curious, keep learning, and let’s push the boundaries of what’s possible!

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Thank you for staying with us, and keep an eye out for the next edition where we’ll share more cutting-edge AI developments. Let’s keep driving the future of media!