This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.
LLMs are stuck in a groupthink groove. This startup is trying to get them out.
Open up your chatbot of choice—Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini—and type “Give me a random number between 1 and 10.” You’re going to get 7. Almost always.
That won’t work every time—but if it did for you, you may wonder if I have superpowers. I don’t.
The truth is that most large language models are stuck in a rut. They are far more predictable and far less creative in their responses than you might expect. That’s fine for tasks like coding or research, but groupthink is a problem when you’re brainstorming or planning your next vacation.
The Australian startup Springboards has a solution. It built an LLM called Flint, which has been trained to come up with a wider variety of responses than mainstream LLMs to open-ended questions such as “Where should I go in Europe?”
Meet the company pushing chatbots away from the obvious.
—Will Douglas Heaven
The must-reads
I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.
1 Scientists say they have built a cell from scratch for the first time
Built with lab-made DNA, it can feed, grow, and multiply. (CNN)
+ It brings us closer to creating synthetic life. (Quanta)
+ And is arguably the greatest feat of bioengineering yet. (New Scientist $)
+ But also raises concerns over the dangers of synthetic biology. (NYT $)
+ Mirror organisms could threaten life on Earth. (MIT Technology Review)
2 OpenAI has proposed giving the Trump administration a 5% stake
Talks over a public ownership deal come amid rising political pressure.(FT $)
+ OpenAI also proposed other US AI giants providing a 5% stake. (CNBC)
+ That could include Anthropic, Google, and Meta. (Bloomberg $)
+ President Trump says he wants the public to have a stake in AI. (BBC)
3 Singapore has seized a $42 million mansion tied to Nvidia chip smuggling
It was seized as part of an investigation into alleged illegal trading. (BBC)
+ Days earlier, Supermicro’s Taiwan offices were raided in the probe. (FT $)
4 Anthropic’s Fable 5 is back online
But queries posing security risks may be routed to less powerful models. (Axios)
+ Anthropic restored access yesterday after the US lifted an export ban. (BBC)
+ But the battle over how to tame AI has just begun. (WSJ $)
+ Anthropic has launched a new AI science product. (MIT Technology Review)
5 Meta is building its own cloud infrastructure business
It’s exploring two ways of monetizing AI compute and models. (Bloomberg $)
+ One is selling access to models hosted on Meta’s infrastructure. (CNBC)
+ The other is selling “raw” computing power. (TechCrunch)
6 PlayStation will stop releasing games on discs in 2028
Future PS5 games will be digital-only releases. (Verge)
+ The news comes days after reports that GTA VI will have no disc. (BBC)
+ It’s put a nail in physical media’s coffin. (Wired $)
7 A low-cost Chinese AI model is catching up with US giants on their home turf
Western customers are drawn to GLM-5.2’s cheap but powerful model. (Reuters $)
+ Chinese open-source models are spreading fast. (MIT Technology Review)
8 Google has lost its fight against a record €4.1 billion EU antitrust fine
It was charged in 2018 for using Android to block rivals. (CNBC)
9 The UN has launched an “AI for Good” commission
Salesforce CEO Benioff and Rwandan President Kagame will co-chair it. (Axios)
10 People prefer AI impersonators over politicians
The study’s findings raise alarm bells around potential public deception. (404 Media)
Quote of the day
“If AI overdelivers, it will impact financial stability. If AI underdelivers, it will impact financial stability.”
—Torsten Slok from Apollo Global Management shares common concerns about AI at the European Central Bank’s annual conference, Reuters reports.
One More Thing
America was winning the race to find Martian life. Then China jumped in.
In July 2024, after more than three years on Mars, the Perseverance rover came across a peculiar rocky outcrop. Instead of the usual crystals or sedimentary layers, this one had spots. Those specks were the best hint yet of alien life.
NASA began a new mission to bring the rocks back to Earth to study. But now, just over a year and a half later, the project is on life support. As a result, those oh-so-promising rocks may be stuck out there forever.
This also means that, in the race to find evidence of alien life, America has effectively ceded its pole position to its greatest geopolitical rival: China. Beijing is now moving full steam ahead with its own version of NASA’s mission.
Here’s how the search for Martian life has become a contest between two superpowers.
—Robin George Andrews
We can still have nice things
A place for comfort, fun, and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line.)
+ The classic arcade game Crazy Taxi is returning.
+ Thom Yorke’s live set from the Sydney Opera House is a reminder of what an extraordinary performer he is.
+ Peer into 1,000 gloriously illuminated New York apartment windows at night in this generative photography project.
+ The Orion constellation dazzlingly displays every stage of star formation in this image from the James Webb Space Telescope.
Top image credit: Sarah Rogers/MITTR | Photos Getty
Please send gloriously illuminated New York apartments to hi@technologyreview.com.
You can follow me on LinkedIn. Thanks for reading!
—Thomas
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