AI replaces Gen Z at work

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🦾 AI is replacing Gen Z in the workplace

💵 AI worth $1 trillion but ‘the biggest bubble of all time’: CEO

🇨🇳 Beijing doubles down on blockchain and AI, trains 10K engineers

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AI is replacing Gen Z in the workplace

Is Gen Z headed for a career crisis, no thanks to AI?

With the blossoming promise of generative AI, businesses are beginning to automate many "junior" tasks, potentially scrapping major efforts to "teach" young employees. Several surveys highlight Gen Zers worries over AI's effect on their careers, with a recent one from job-posting site ZipRecruiter finding that 76% of Gen Zers expressed their worry about losing their jobs to ChatGPT.

Studies also indicate companies’ lack of interest in helping the young ones move up the career ladder:

• While 70% of firms offered "some type of training to employees," it was mainly for "management and mid-level workers." ( US Department of Labor, 2014)

• Slightly less than 50% of employees said they'd received no formal job training from their employer over the last year. (MIT professor Paul Osterman, 2020)

Meanwhile, a new study says ChatGPT can match the top 1% of creative human thinkers. The University of Montana research found AI responses were as creative as those from the most creative real people who took the test, in fact outperforming a majority of students nationally.

AI worth $1 trillion but ‘the biggest bubble of all time’: CEO [Link]

Look out for a bursting hype-laden AI bubble, warns Stability AI CEO Emad Mostaque as he spoke with analysts on a call, dubbing AI as “the biggest bubble of all time.”

Thoughts from the chief exec of the company behind popular generative AI took Stable Diffusion:

• AI is still at the very early stages and not yet ready for mass-scale adoption in industries such as banking.

• The total amount of investment needed in AI is likely to be $1 trillion as
  “it’s more important than 5G as infrastructure for knowledge.”

• Companies that don’t use AI appropriately in their businesses will be “punished” by the stock market, with Mostaque citing Google as it lost $100B in a single day after its AI chatbot Bard gave inaccurate information in a promotional video.

Stable Diffusion lets users, so far over 1M on the platform, generate photorealistic images by inputting text.

Beijing doubles down on blockchain and AI, trains 10K engineers [Link]

Beijing has announced plans to provide training to 10,000 engineers annually in emerging tech, including blockchain, AI, and Big Data. Despite the crypto ban, China aims to cultivate its web3 capabilities and leverage its deep blockchain talent pool with this initiative.

The government has initiated the construction of the Metaverse Innovation Center, which will support the research, development, and adoption of metaverse tech in the city.

This move aligns with Beijing's broader focus on web3, while other Chinese cities such as Shanghai have also been investing in similar high-powered web3 projects, anticipating significant returns in the culture and tourism sectors.

CEO wipes out 90% of support staff with AI [Link]

Suumit Shah, the founder and CEO of Bangalore-based e-commerce company Dukaan, has laid off 90% of his support staff after developing an AI chatbot, which he claims could respond to customer queries instantly and slash the average time for issue resolution by 98%.

His tweets on the matter sent users into a frenzy and spawned more heated discussions on generative AI’s potential disruption of the workplace and jobs.

The job cuts were made in September due to a shift away from smaller businesses and a newfound focus on profitability, essentially cutting the cost of customer support by 85%.

Despite the layoffs, Dukaan is still hiring for multiple roles. AI has caused fears of mass job losses, particularly for low- and middle-skilled jobs and among professionals in sectors such as finance, medicine, and law.

The Flash web3 movie experience comes with NFT [Link]

Warner Bros. Home Entertainment and Eluvio are releasing DC Studios' The Flash movie as a multimedia living movie experience, featuring dynamic menu options, key art, AR collectibles, exclusive content, and more.

The experience will be available in two editions, Mystery and Premium, beginning on July 18th. It is the first time WB has released a multimedia NFT at the same time the film is in theaters.

Quick Hits

🎮 Gaming

• Neopets is an independent company again, cancels NFT game - the details inside. (Link)

• A zombie-shooting Fortnite activation for new A24 horror film Talk To Me suggests that the metaverse isn’t dead at all. (Link)

• Meanwhile, TikTok users viewed over 3 trillion gaming-related videos in 2022. (Link)

• LA-based, Zynga founder-backed startup Artie is pinning its hopes on Threads, launching its maiden game on it this fall. (Link)

• Playboy, in collaboration with The Sandbox, announces the virtual game contest Bunnies Treasure Island. (Link)

• KAP Games launches as web3’s 1st browser and mobile-native gaming distribution and publishing platform, packed with a gaming portal, solutions for developers, and a new indie game studio. (Link)

• Galaxy Fight Club (GFC) shakes things up in the NFT universe with its new cross-IP game. (Link)

🕶 Fashion

• Ralph Lauren dips its toes into gaming once again as it dresses G2 Esports athletes and creators. (Link)

• NFC tags and gaming partnerships, straight from the sneaker brand marketing playbook today. (Link)

• Stylitics buys Barcelona-based Wide Eyes, a visual AI solution for fashion and retail for digital merchandising enhanced with image recognition and AI. (Link)

• Arzu Kaprol, a self-described “human innovation designer,” focuses on wearable tech since designing for the Turkish Armed Forces in 2005. (Link)

• How robotics is transforming apparel manufacturing. (Link)

• Sweden-based Nigerian fashion consultant Felix Adu popularizes African textiles while integrating AI, NFTs, and crypto into his brand. (Link)

🏀 Sports

• Super Bowl MVP and Kansas City Chiefs star Patrick Mahomes drops 15K digital collectibles this September. (Link)

• The LSU football field is about to gain some AI action. (Link)

• Major League Soccer’s Chris Schlosser on what it’s like pioneering the digital-1st sports league with AI. (Link)

• In college football, AI could make a mark in recruiting and game planning. (Link)

• Builder.ai is Ultimate Tennis Showdown’s official tech partner for its 2023 tour. (Link)

🎥 Media & Entertainment

• Meta is temporarily banned from behavioral advertising on Facebook and Instagram in Norway. (Link)

• YouTube is testing a new Stable Volume feature across its mobile apps. (Link)

• Birthday girl Priyanka Chopra "looks perfect" as Barbie in an AI-generated pic with Nick Jonas's Ken. (Link)

• Free AI tools to create music videos in seconds. (Link)

• The AmazeVR Concerts app for Meta Quest and SteamVR features Swedish pop artist Zara Larsson. (Link)

• Tom Cruise lobbies studios on SAG-AFTRA stunt and AI positions. (Link)

• Metaverse-savvy India’s entertainment and media industry is expected to reach $73.6B by 2027. (Link)

🖼 Art

• Oases collaborates with Belvedere Museum to transform Gustav Klimt’s masterpiece The Kiss into an array of NFTs. (Link)

• Van Gogh goes digital: Thyssen National Museum and Olyverse bring the iconic artworks to the NFT space. (Link)

• Hong Kong Down Syndrome Association gets support via a purpose-driven NFT collection. (Link)

• AI-generated street art brings realistic scenes of Brighton and Hove to life in a surprising experiment. (Link)

• The Stable Doodle AI tool can turn scribbles into “real” art. (Link)

🤖 AI

• France and Britain are battling for position as Europe’s capital for AI. (Link)

• An Israeli startup’s traffic management system predicts traffic events with advanced algorithms. (Link)

• There’s a surge in lonely men seeking AI girlfriends. (Link)

• DIY website builder Wix announces AI text-to-website generator to create complete websites. (Link)

• How do K-pop Idols really feel about voice AI covers? (Link)

• AI Suitcase is a Japanese travel bag for the visually impaired. (Link)

💸 Funding & Partnerships

• Siemens invests $1.1B (€1B) in Erlangen Industrial Metaverse Hub. (Link)

• Futureverse, whose suite of proprietary AI content generation tools designed to enhance the music, objects, characters, and animations in the metaverse, raises $54M. (Link)

• Open-source low-code platform ToolJet raises funds from Microsoft’s M12 and GitHub Invest. (Link)

• ENV Media joins forces with Ken Research to examine Indian gambling behavior. (Link)

• Ivy.Cash partners with Katla to enable universal access to their “wonderful beings” NFTs. (Link)

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All content on this newsletter is for informational purposes only and does not aim to serve as or replace expert investment advice.

📈 If you are a startup building in the metaverse / web3 ecosystem and are raising capital, please reach out to Sfermion. Sfermion is an investment firm focused on accelerating the emergence of the metaverse 📈

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