🐤 Building a better bot

🏦 Markets: After the earlier consumer price index report indicated that inflation is remaining higher than analysts expected, Thursday’s release of the producer price index bolstered that position. The data showed a 0.7% increase, which is nearly twice the rate that most economists had predicted.

The news sparked pessimism on Wall Street where all three major indexes closed down. The Nasdaq Composite was the day’s biggest loser and the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s losses were influenced by big declines by companies including Microsoft and Disney. Tesla’s 5.69% dip helped fuel the S&P 500’s 1.38% loss.

❄️ Under the weather: Nearly 60 million Americans in at least 20 states are under advisories ahead of expected severe weather conditions. In areas of Kentucky, Alabama, and Tennessee, meteorologists issued a tornado watch on Thursday morning. A similar warning was subsequently announced in parts of Mississippi. Arkansas and Tennessee saw large balls of hail fall between Wednesday evening and Thursday morning. Elsewhere, there’s a high chance of serious winter storms — including the potential of heavy snowfall from Illinois all the way down to New Mexico. In parts of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska, as much as two inches of snow could fall per hour. Much of the Southwest and areas up into the Great Lakes region are on alert for possible high wind.

📱 TikTok jackpot: Trivia night is a big draw at various locations around the world as folks show off their knowledge and compete for cash prizes. Social media platform TikTok is revolutionizing the tradition, though, by allowing participants to play from the comfort of their own homes while playing for a share of a huge $500,000 prize pool. The event will begin on Wednesday and last four days with different rounds being live-streamed on the app throughout that period. Like more traditional trivia competitions, there will even be a live host. Expect questions about various categories from sports to pop culture — and probably some questions about John Wick, since the event is sponsored by the upcoming “John Wick: Chapter 4” movie and film studio Lionsgate.

🛻 Truck stop: The electric version of Ford’s F-150 pickup truck has seen production abruptly halted in response to a battery fire that sparked during a quality check. The blaze damaged a total of three vehicles but no one was injured. Although the company doesn’t believe current owners of the “Lightning” model should be concerned about a possible fire, the Dearborn, Michigan, plant has shut down production for at least a week. In the process, company officials will be conducting a probe into the situation that spokesperson Emma Bergg said “could take a few weeks.” Reports indicate the batteries are assembled in a Georgia factory by a Korean supplier. Almost 200,000 signed up for a waiting list to purchase the electric-powered truck before Ford stopped taking reservations more than a year ago.

🏈 Ryan’s return: Rex Ryan, who served as the New York Jets head coach between 2009 and 2014, could be returning to the NFL soon. Reports indicate he met with Denver Broncos executives recently and “has emerged as a top candidate” to be the franchise’s next defensive coordinator. Prior to taking on the lead coaching position for the Jets, Ryan had been the defensive line coach during the Baltimore Ravens’ championship 2000 season and served as the team’s defensive coordinator from 2005 to 2008. Although his tenure with the Jets netted two AFC championship appearances, he went on to coach the Buffalo Bills where he amassed a barely winning combined record of 16-15. He indicated that his stint with the Bills would be his final gig as a pro football coach. Since leaving the league, he has been an analyst for ESPN.

Although the potential applications of artificial intelligence appear practically limitless, there are some serious concerns surrounding the mounting popularity of the ChatGPT platform.

In order to address complaints that the chatbot has provided offensive or biased responses to user inputs, its developer, OpenAI, released a statement seeking to offer a bit of context to the way it was designed to operate.

A work in progress

To begin, OpenAI acknowledged that there are still some wrinkles to iron out. That is due primarily to the fact that its base of information is not directly programmed by its developers but is actually learned from various external sources.

“Though not a perfect analogy, the process is more similar to training a dog than to ordinary programming,” the company wrote.

First, OpenAI provides “pre-training,” which is then followed by a period in which developers “fine-tune” the entire process. As such, users shouldn’t expect a flawless result for every inquiry — at least not yet.

Addressing the bugs

Since ChatGPT builds on “billions of sentences” it can scour across the internet, OpenAI confirmed that the chatbot can integrate biases that it picks up from that content.

Here’s how the company is reacting to that potentially troubling fact:

• Better defaults: By taking user feedback into account, OpenAI says it’s creating a better “out of the box” performance for the platform with more relevant and reliable responses.
• Stricter rules: Although users want a system that is as customizable as possible, OpenAI believes that structuring the program around a series of values and limitations will provide a more reliable and unbiased interface.
• Firmer boundaries: Once OpenAI implements new rules, it’s crucial to put parameters in place that will keep ChatGPT from violating them, including third-party audits to confirm compliance with these policies.

Footwear brand Nike is the subject of the upcoming movie “Air,” but recent developments are giving the company some attention executives probably don’t want.

Like lightning

Nike is known internationally for its “swoosh” design, and it has repeatedly shown a willingness to protect that trademark element at all costs. Most recently, the firm sued a much smaller company — By Kiy LLC — for using a design that Nike thinks is too close to its own. Nike also took similar action against a company called Omi.

But By Kiy is not taking the challenge lying down. This week, the company filed a countersuit explaining why it doesn’t think Nike has any room to complain.

Here are the main arguments:

• By Kiy says its shoes are “a different type of product” than Nike’s athletic footwear.
• Its lightning bolt design doesn’t share any elements of Nike’s patented “swoosh.”
• The shoes are sold via different outlets and for a different price than Nike products.

In its complaint, By Kiy wrote: “There is no conceivable way that any reasonable consumer would think he or she is buying Nike products when the consumer buys a By Kiy product, whether in the primary or secondary sales market. Nike has presented zero pleading or evidence to the contrary.”

Other issues

Designer John Geiger was successful in forcing Nike to withdraw its trademark infringement complaint in August against his footwear.

The mega-corporation is also facing a legal challenge from NFL wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr., who claims that Nike “failed to live up to its promises and refuses to abide by its contract.”

He claimed in November that Nike, a company he has been associated with for nearly a decade, was “wilfully withholding millions of dollars” and wants a judgment in his favor of more than $20 million.

The universe is a dynamic place filled with massive explosions that boggle the minds of even the brightest astrophysicists. Researchers at the University of Copenhagen, however, think they might have witnessed one such spectacular collision that will help us understand the age of the cosmos.

What are kilonovae?

There’s a word for the massive energy created when two neutron stars crash into each other: kilonova. Aside from producing an awe-inspiring explosion, it is this type of collision that is responsible for creating many other important elements of the universe.

A kilonova can produce enough energy to form a black hole and scientists believe it is also through these enormous explosions that many heavy metals — gold, uranium, platinum, etc. — are able to be formed.

While astrophysicists have been able to glean quite a bit of information by studying these explosions, there are a lot of details that remain unknown. That’s where researchers Albert Sneppen and Darach Watson come into the picture.

An unexpected discovery

When the two experts took a close look at a 2017 kilonova, they expected to find “a flattened and rather asymmetrical shape” as demonstrated in previous models, Sneppen explained.

Instead, they determined that the resulting cloud was an almost perfect sphere.

“No one expected the explosion to look like this,” Watson added. “It makes no sense that it is spherical, like a ball. But our calculations clearly show that it is.”

So what does this mean? For starters, the scientists appear to have proven that common assumptions about kilonovae were wrong.

More importantly, understanding how the elements created in this explosion are distributed gives experts a better idea of how fast the universe is expanding and, in turn, a more accurate measurement of its age.