This episode we cover news from the NVIDIA Conference: AI models like Groot for humanoid robots, AI infrastructure platforms, advances in weather simulation and graphics chips enabling exponential growth in capabilities. We take a peek at early Apple Vision AR apps – revealing the challenges of designing truly immersive experiences. And finally, we cover the rush to build general AI versus finding valuable near-term use cases for current tools.
From William & AB:
A first dive into the tsunami of NVIDIA news.
Nvidia made several significant announcements at their recent ‘event ‘Woodstock for AI’ event – this includes the Groot foundation model for training dexterous humanoid robots using simulation, new hardware platforms like Jetson-Thor to power edge devices, and Blackwell chips drastically improving computational power for applications like weather forecasting.
https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/foundation-model-isaac-robotics-platform
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vEaImsSCrw
We’ll return to the NVIDIA week of announcements in coming episodes – including looking at their potential move to being cloud-only/timeshare-only for their new Blackwell super-high-end GPUs.
From Mirek:
TechCrunch’s list of ‘most exciting indie apps and games’ for Apple Vision Pro… are not exciting?
TechCrunch is trying to be upbeat, but in this list, it’s plain to see that early Apple Vision augmented reality apps are mostly disappointing ports of iPad games and tools not taking full advantage of spatial computing. We call out a few notable exceptions, but we’re also seriously waiting for more compelling use cases – likely involve complementing existing human ways of working.
https://techcrunch.com/2024/03/22/apple-vision-pro-apps
From Violet:
Insert your own ‘ums’: Low-code voice interface tool on the rise.
As voice interfaces become more common, conversation design will be critical for natural interactions. Tools like PlayHT and Voiceflow show promise for integrating both structure and AI to balance flexibility with deterministic flows for business needs.
https://play.ht/studio/files/b75eb4c3-6662-45b3-99ab-a062b561a78c
HOSTS
AB – Andrew Ballard
Spatial AI Specialist at Leidos.
Robotics & AI defence research.
Creator of SPAITIAL
Helena Merschdorf
Geospatial Marketing/Branding at Tales Consulting.
Undertaking her PhD in Geoinformatics & GIScience.
Mirek Burkon
CEO at Phantom Cybernetics.
Creator of Augmented Robotality AR-OS.
Violet Whitney
Adj. Prof. at U.Mich
Spatial AI insights on Medium.
Co-founder of Spatial Pixel.
William Martin
Director of AI at Consensys
Adj. Prof. at Columbia.
Co-founder of Spatial Pixel.
To absent friends.
