Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and owner of Twitter, recently announced his latest venture, an AI startup called xAI. His plan is to collaborate with both companies to advance AI technologies. Musk’s primary goal is to utilize Tesla’s expertise in the “silicon front” and “AI software front” to accelerate the development of self-driving capabilities. Additionally, he intends to use public tweets from Twitter to train xAI’s AI models, with the ultimate ambition of achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI) and providing a viable alternative to established players like Microsoft, Google, and OpenAI.
During a live audio session on Twitter Spaces, Musk voiced his concerns about other AI companies not adequately considering the risks posed to humans by their technology. He stressed the importance of regulating the AI field responsibly and revealed his efforts to meet with government officials in the United States and China to advocate for responsible AI development.
Musk acknowledged that xAI would leverage Twitter data for training its AI systems, following a practice adopted by other companies. He emphasized xAI’s focus on building AI systems and products that exhibit maximum curiosity and interest in text, image, and video training. Musk also highlighted the need for AI to understand the physical world beyond just the Internet, and he believes Tesla’s driving data can contribute significantly to achieving this objective.
As for the collaboration between xAI and Tesla, Musk stated that Tesla would be better suited to provide specific details. However, he mentioned Tesla’s custom silicon and highlighted the company’s in-vehicle hardware, such as Autopilot and Full Self Driving capability, which rely on advanced driver assistance systems.
Musk’s xAI initiative aligns with his broader vision of revolutionizing AI development and ushering in transformative advancements. By collaborating with Tesla and Twitter, he aims to overcome the limitations of existing AI models and create AI systems capable of problem-solving akin to humans. Nonetheless, he acknowledges that the resulting AI language model might generate controversial answers, as it won’t necessarily be “politically correct.”
The potential partnership between xAI, Tesla, and Twitter marks a significant step forward in AI technology development and underscores Musk’s dedication to pushing the boundaries of innovation in this field.