Author: IQ TIMES MEDIA

OpenAI on Thursday introduced a group chat feature for ChatGPT. The feature, currently being tested in select regions including Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, and Taiwan, lets users collaborate directly within the app. The group chat is available to Free, Plus, and Team users on both mobile and web platforms. OpenAI says the pilot is designed to explore how people use group conversations in ChatGPT. The announcement comes after earlier reports that OpenAI had been testing a direct-message-style tool. The ChatGPT maker describes this pilot as just a “small first step” toward creating a more “shared experience” in the app.…

Remember when Reels was dismissed as Meta’s attempt to clone TikTok?Well, now the five-year-old app is on track to generate $50 billion a year. It’s turned into a huge win for Meta, and it has become one of the biggest “creator economy” businesses in the world.But that number also makes something else clear: The creator economy’s biggest winners aren’t creators. It’s the platforms that depend on them.That’s because almost every one of those platforms depends on the labor of creators — a shorter way of describing “people who make and/or own content” — but shares very little of the revenue…

The US is racing ahead in artificial intelligence, but its biggest obstacle is more than chips, rare earths, or talent — it’s electricity, according to a new report from Goldman Sachs.The US power grid is already straining under the surge of data centers fueling AI models, with these massive facilities now accounting for about 6% of total US electricity demand.That share is expected to nearly double to 11% by 2030, pushing parts of the country’s grid past critical limits, Goldman’s analysts estimate.”As AI demands massive power, a reliable and ample power supply is likely to be a key factor shaping…

NEW YORK (AP) — Lawyers representing OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, branches of the Sackler family that own it, cities, states, counties, Native American tribes, people with addiction and others across the U.S. are expected to deliver a nearly unanimous message for a bankruptcy court judge Friday: Approve a plan to settle thousands of opioid-related lawsuits against the company.If U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane abides, it will close a long chapter — and maybe the entire book — on a legal odyssey over efforts to hold the company to account for its role in an opioid crisis connected to 900,000 deaths…

Jensen Huang says one of his key leadership lessons came from learning English from his mother.In a talk with the Cambridge Union released on Wednesday, the Nvidia CEO shared how his mother encouraged him as a child. Her mindset stuck with him, and he said he reminds himself to take the same approach at his company.”My mom taught me English, and she doesn’t speak English,” Huang said. “And that kind of tells you all.”Huang was born in Taiwan, and his family moved to Thailand before he and his older brother were sent to the US when he was nine for…

WASHINGTON (AP) — Unapproved peptide drugs have become a trendy new hack among wellness influencers, fitness coaches and celebrities, pitched as a way to build muscle, shed pounds and look younger.Online stores will offer injectable vials for $300 to $600 each. Longevity and wellness clinics offer in-office evaluations and injections, sometimes with membership fees of thousands of dollars per month.But many of the products have never been extensively studied in humans, raising concerns that they could cause allergic reactions, metabolic problems and other dangerous side effects.Here’s a closer look at the science, the hype and the potential risks surrounding the…

Associated Press (AP) — More Americans are injecting themselves with unapproved chemicals that are pitched as ways to build muscle, rejuvenate skin and extend life, the latest example of the nation’s fascination with alternative therapies and wellness hacks.Behind the trend is the surging popularity of GLP-1 weight loss medications, a class of so-called peptides approved to help users quickly shed pounds.But the peptides being promoted by influencers, celebrities and wellness gurus are different: Many have never been approved for human use and much of their purported evidence comes from studies in rats and other animals. Several peptides, such as BPC-157…

If you’re missing the social media glory days of the second Obama administration, you’re in luck.DiVine, a decentralized reboot of Vine backed by Jack Dorsey, is resurrecting the long-lost super-short-form video platform.Behind the revival is one of the original Twitter employees who worked closely with Dorsey, Evan Henshaw-Plath, who goes by the alias Rabble.For the founder, diVine isn’t just a nostalgia play for bringing back old six-second viral videos, but a sort of protest against the walled garden of “black box” algorithms that social media apps have become, with algorithms feeding users AI-generated content.”There’s this bullshit that we’re seeing from…

An airline pilot from New Jersey is the first person to have died of alpha-gal syndrome, a red meat allergy triggered by tick bites, researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine announced on Nov. 13.The 47-year-old man, who was not identified, had two severe reactions hours after eating beef in the summer of 2024 — when he had been bitten multiple times by Lone Star ticks, according to research published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. The man died after the second allergic attack.The cause of his death “had been a mystery” until Dr. Thomas Platts-Mills,…

ATLANTA (AP) — When families are evicted, it can lead to major disruptions to their children’s schooling. Federal law includes provisions to help homeless and evicted kids stay at their schools, but families don’t always know about them — and schools don’t always share the information. Beyond the instability that comes with losing their home, relocating also can deprive kids of networks they rely on for support. AP followed the year-long quest of one Atlanta mother, Sechita McNair, to find new housing after an eviction. The out-of-work film industry veteran drove extra hours for Uber and borrowed money, eventually securing…