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😺 US vs. China. vs. ... UAE?!

😺 US vs. China. vs. ... UAE?!

PLUS: all you need is 2 AI tools, really.

Noah Edelman
September 01, 2023

Welcome, humans.

🎵 It’s Friday, Friday. Gotta debug on Friday.

🎵 Everyone’s lookin’ forward to A-G-I.

🎵 Fine-tuning, fine-tuning (Yeah). Fine-tuning, fine-tuning (Yeah).

🎵 Code, code, code, code.

🎵 Lookin' forward to the deploy!

Here’s what you need to know about AI today:

The US is halting AI chip exports to parts of the Middle East.
The UAE announced it’s “highest-quality” AI model.
Midjourney & Jasper are seeing users slumps.
Coding is the most common task people turn to ChatGPT for.

Countries Want Powerful AI … For Themselves.

As AI becomes more powerful, nations want more control.

This mean you might end up using whatever version of AI your country serves up, like you do with currencies.

This week, the US told Nvidia and AMD: hey, no more exporting AI chips to parts of the Middle East.

The hostility isn’t anything new. China itself doesn’t allow the usage of American chatbots like ChatGPT. And Europe doesn’t seem to want ChatGPT either, thanks to their AI Act.

It’s basically a “we’re all mining for gold, but nobody wants to trade maps” type of situation.

So what do you do when you live abroad and can’t use ChatGPT? You use your country’s homegrown version of ChatGPT:

In China, that would be Baidu’s chatbot Ernie, which the CCP finally gave the thumbs-up (aka it was fine-tuned to their liking).
In the UAE, Jais might become your go-to. It’s G42 + the monarchy’s latest and greatest AI model.

Why it matters: If you’re in the AI product game, pay attention to which market might be off-limits.

And a quick nod to our *1* reader chilling in China. Yup, just one. How did we figure out his location beyond him just telling us? He wanted us to "send tips via WhatsApp instead of email".…

FROM … US!

This AI Success Story Is Wild.

Last month, an AI startup fresh off their Series A came to us with a problem: our product is great, but how do we attract users?

Say less.

They sponsored The Neuron, and in hours, they secured hundreds of new customers. Sales go brrrrrr.

How’d we pull it off? Unlike other newsletters, we work with you to tell your company’s story in our voice. Folks read The Neuron because we give our take, our way, and we’ll do the same for your product.

We’re currently accepting advertisers for Q4, but slots are going fast.

Go reserve your spot before a competitor beats you to it!

Users Need A Small Set Of Reliable AI Tools.

AI isn’t overrated. AI tools are. Here’s the lowdown:

This year, an avalanche of startups touted themselves as “ChatGPT for ______.” They got $ and eyeballs.

But now, the initial buzz is waning for some high-profile AI startups.

Midjourney’s traffic declined over the past three months.
Jasper’s user growth dipped over the past four months.

Here’s our take: Most people really only need a handful of AI tools for their jobs. Our poll from Tuesday confirms this: ¾ of y’all use less then four AI tools on a weekly basis.

For many readers, it’s a you-pick-two deal of ChatGPT + a specialized AI for their job function (i.e., Copilot for coding, Firefly for design, etc).

And the willingness to pay for tools that do make the cut isn’t slowing down: ChatGPT Plus subscriptions have increased every month since February.

Around the Horn.

A roundup of significant developments in humanoid robots.
AI21 Labs, which develops AI models, raised $155 million at a $1.4 billion valuation. Damn.
Programming is by far the most common task people use ChatGPT for.
OpenAI is being accused of violating GDPR data protection rules.
Walmart is giving its ~50,000 employees each an AI assistant.