OpenAI launches new AI assistant, US Govt launches AI-powered search site, Google launches prototype data centre into space

The 'AI Assistant' battle is heating up  

We talked about Muse last week, now OpenAI has announced their 'always on' assistant called Dots. Each company seems to be trying to make AI friendly, helpful, fuzzy and warm with these cute mascots. But do you find all this confusing? I do. I don't understand why there is ChatGPT, ChatGPT Work, Codex, now Dots... can it not all just be inside ChatGPT? That simplicity is partly what made the whole thing feel so magic at the beginning.  

The US Government held a tech launch event to rival Apple  

The flashy launch of America.gov was... impressive! Despite what people might think about Donald Trump and his administration's policies and actions, there was almost a collective "wow" in the tech world that the US government launched something so great. America.gov wants to be the front door to every government service. Need a passport? Need to change your name? Need to get a statement from the tax department? Want to visit a national park? it's all there. And it looks gorgeous. A playbook for New Zealand? I'm available to help launch hello.govt.nz ;)   

Google's quest for data centres in space has begun  

The literal liftoff was this week with a prototype 'data centre' on board the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.   

Project Suncatcher is Google's ambitious project that has all kinds of unknowns. Firstly, there's no guarantee this will even work, or the project will make economic sense. There are many obstacles they're going to need to figure out how to overcome, including the radiation their chips will be subjected to, how to disperse heat, and how to handle the risk of other satellites crashing into a data centre. They've done about as much testing as they can do on Earth, so now their chips will be under the harsh conditions of space.