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Author Archives: Sabrina I. Pacifici

A new tool for copyright holders can show if their work is in AI training data

MIT Technology Review [unpaywalled]: “Since the beginning of the generative AI boom, content creators have argued that their work has been scraped into AI models without their consent. But until now, it has been difficult to know whether specific text has actually been used in a training data set. Now they have a new way… Continue Reading

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, July 27, 2024

Via LLRX – Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, July 27, 2024 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the… Continue Reading

UN Secretary-General’s Call to Action on Extreme Heat

“The UN Secretary-General’s Call to Action on Extreme Heat brings together the diverse expertise and perspectives of ten specialized UN entities (FAO, ILO, OCHA, UNDRR, UNEP, UNESCO, UN-Habitat, UNICEF, WHO, WMO) in a first-of-its-kind joint product, underscoring the multi-sectoral impacts of extreme heat. Earth is becoming hotter and more dangerous for everyone, everywhere. Billions of… Continue Reading

Microsoft’s generative search engine weds something new, something old

ZDNET: “Microsoft has been a major player in the AI race and one of the first companies to unveil a chatbot that’s a worthy ChatGPT competitor — Copilot. Now, the company is returning its attention to the project that started it all: the Bing search engine. On Wednesday, Microsoft unveiled a new generative search experience… Continue Reading

Here’s how extreme climate is driving inflation

“TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) — In today’s Climate Classroom, we will be speaking to William S. Becker, a writer for The Hill, a Nexstar-owned property on climate inflation, better known by its new name “climateflation.” No doubt it’s a new term to most, but it’s very real and it’s already hitting us in the wallet— think… Continue Reading

When scientific citations go rogue: Uncovering ‘sneaked references’

Via LLRX – When scientific citations go rogue: Uncovering ‘sneaked references’ – Reading and writing articles published in academic journals and presented at conferences is a central part of being a researcher. When researchers write a scholarly article, they must cite the work of peers to provide context, detail sources of inspiration and explain differences in… Continue Reading

Long COVID puzzle pieces are falling into place – the picture is unsettling

Via LLRX – Long COVID puzzle pieces are falling into place – the picture is unsettling – Long COVID is a term that describes the constellation of long-term health effects caused by infection with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. These range from persistent respiratory symptoms, such as shortness of breath, to debilitating fatigue or brain fog that… Continue Reading

Breaking Up the Giants of Harm

Breaking Up the Giants of Harm. To protect democracy and have a resilient economy, we must tackle corporate power. Again. “Governments and economic regulators have, since the 1980s, turned a blind eye to a handful of giant companies steadily gaining chokeholds in global markets. Banking, agriculture, digital technology, publishing, music, pharmaceuticals and more are dominated… Continue Reading

Microsoft researchers are teaching AI to read spreadsheets

Spreadsheet LLM – Encoding Spreadsheets for Large Language Models: “Spreadsheets are characterized by their extensive two-dimensional grids, flexible layouts, and varied formatting options, which pose significant challenges for large language models (LLMs). In response, we introduce SpreadsheetLLM, pioneering an efficient encoding method designed to unleash and optimize LLMs’ powerful understanding and reasoning capability on spreadsheets.… Continue Reading