🧞 It turns out Genie's do exist!

Sup, Nerds 🧙 

If you’re into podcasts, you can now be serenaded by a lovely British man talking about AI news, tech, and culture every day of the week. 

The kicker? It’s completely AI-generated. Every bit of it. We can thank Perplexity and ElevenLabs for this tandem gem. Is the quality of news the greatest? Eh, it could be better. But do your ears a favor and bless them with these free ear biscuits. 

Here’s the daily quests in AI to complete today:

• 🍭 Willy’s Chocolate Experience lied with AI

• 🧞 Google built a genie that grants games

• 🚗 Apple pulls the plug on electric cars

• 📞 1 AI assistant  = 700 full-time agents

Google’s Genie is officially out of the bottle  

And the first wish granted? The power to generate video games. 

The crazy part? It can do this with just one image. ONE STINKIN’ IMAGE. From there, Genie flicks its magic wand seven different ways, and POOF. You’ve got yourself a bonafide 2-D side-scrolling platformer. You can even prompt “Super Mario Bros”, “Contra”, or any other word under the sun and it’ll generate a playable world for you. 

How the hell is this possible?! 🤯 

Well, some form of magic is involved for sure. That’s just a given. But sprinkled in there, Genie studied 200,000+ hours of 2-D platformer videos on YouTube analyzing movement, turning those movements into code, and then using that code to decide what happens next in the picture. 

Will we see an influx of AI-generated 2-D platformers on Steam? It’s possible, but I don’t think we’re quite there… yet.

Willy forgot to bring the chocolate…and the entertainment

What do you think of when you hear Willy’s Chocolate Experience?

According to Willy, they offer an experience like no other: 

“Dive into the whimsical of Willy's Chocolate Experience!, a place where chocolate dreams become reality. Book your adventure now and embark on a journey filled with wondrous creations and enchanting surprises at every turn!”

Now that sounds great, but take a stroll over to their site and you’ll be bombarded with nothing but AI-generated images. Literally, every single one. At face value, it sure seems “wondrous” and “enchanting” to the untrained eye. But, oh doctor, that was the farthest from the truth. 

You lie like a rug, Willy

For the poor bastards who went in thinking this was going to be the most magical, chocolatey-fueled, mind-melting event, this is what they were greeted with:

Yes, you’re seeing that correctly. One stinkin’ bounce house. On the bright side, at least two kids are enjoying themselves. But was it worth the $20 entry fee per person? My gut says no. 

What’s even worse? There was not one ounce of chocolate to be found.

☠️ Apple's Electric Car is Replaced by AI

Well, not exactly. 

Apple has been working on a top-secret electric car project codenamed Project Titan for over a decade. After 10 years and spending billions of dollars they've decided to kill the project. 

What we know about Project Titan:

• 🤓 Over a decade of R&D (10+ years)

• 💸 Estimated $1 billion spent annually

• 💼 Almost 2,000 employees

• 💰 Approximately $100,000 purchase price

• 😓 Leadership challenges

• 🤝 Negotiations with Hyundai-Kia to handle manufacturing

• 📅 Release date delayed to 2028 and the plan for a sexy self-driving electric car was neutered

As revolutionary as the iPod was to music and the iPhone was to mobile communication, I was excited to see what their vision of cars could be.... 💀 RIP

That's cool, so Apple just wasted billions of dollars?

Eh, strategically speaking, it would've been great to cut the cord sooner but it's worth noting that they recognize Project Titan as a sunk cost (past expenses that can't be recovered and shouldn’t influence future decisions).

Instead, they're redistributing resources to prioritize generative AI and the Apple Vision Pro.

Walkthrough Wednesday

Let the wizards be your guide to create something fun with AI.

Pika - text-to-video AI generator to create 3-7 second videos

We don’t have access to Sora (Open AI’s text-to-video generator) yet but this is the next best thing!

Quick Start

1. Visit pika.art 

2. Click Try Pika

3. Sign in with Google or Discord (unfortunately, those are the only options)

4. Explore some of the great videos created by the community (default page)

5. When you’re ready to create - in the top left corner, choose My Library

6. At the bottom of the page, create a fun prompt in the prompt box

7. Select the Generate Button

Master Pika

8. Upload an image or video as a reference

9. Adjust the Prompt Options [from left to right]

• Video options - aspect ratio ie. 4:3 or 16:9 and FPS (frames per second)

• Motion control - pan, tilt, rotate, or zoom and strength of motion (

• Parameters for each video (aspect ratio - ie. 4:3 or 16:9, camera control - panning, tilt, or zoom, and negative prompts - what you definitely don’t want included in your video)

Bonus: The Consistency with the Text parameter is the degree of creative freedom you’re allowing the AI to have. The higher the number, the more strictly it will follow your prompt exactly.

Yer a wizard, Harry

10.  Video Options:

• Retry will regenerate a video based on current prompt

• Reprompt will allow you to adjust an existing prompt

• Edit will allow you to reframe or add elements to an already generated video

Daily Delight

Just something fun and interesting around the web.

Apparently, Earth is the biggest, baddest tank around.

Earth’s magnetic field deflects an astonishing 1.5 million tons of solar material shot off the sun at 100 miles per second EACH SECOND. This video puts it into perspective quite nicely. I call taking Earth as the main tank on the next raid.

What’s happening inside the Realm

A list of side quests to explore and more.

• 💪 Mistral Large has landed, and it’s already taking swings at the big boys.

• 🧑‍🎓 Singapore is looking towards the future and preparing its citizens for the inevitability of AI.

• 🔍️ OpenAI looks to be creating a search engine to be in direct competition with Google, the Supreme Lord of search itself. 

• ❤️ Japan is using AI as a nationwide matchmaker to help solve its plummeting population problem.

That’s all the quests we have for today. Check back tomorrow for more!

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