Month: March 2023
Watch Kevin Hart play ‘I Hart That’
Kevin Hart sits down with us to play ‘I Hart That’ and tells us what he loves most. Die Hart 2: Die Harter will be available to stream on The Roku Channel on March 31st.
Kevin Hart sits down with us to play ‘I Hart That’ and tells us what he loves most. Die Hart 2: Die Harter will be available to stream on The Roku Channel on March 31st.
Paramount+ adds Starfleet Academy TV series to its Star Trek roster
The show will be led by a writer known for Nancy Drew and The Magicians.
Enlarge / The crew of the Enterprise in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, a film with many references to Starfleet Academy. (credit: Paramount)
There’s officially another Star Trek series on the way, and this time it’s one we’ve been hearing rumors about since 2018: Starfleet Academy.
Announced today in a press release and reported by Deadline, the CBS Studios-produced series will follow a group of teenage Starfleet Academy students as they come of age while enduring rigorous training for future interstellar missions.
The central characters will reportedly have to navigate friendships, rivalries, and romances as they face a new enemy that threatens the Federation.
E3 2023 has been canceled
Microsoft, Nintendo, Ubisoft and other major players in the game industry have all confirmed that they would have no presence on the E3 2023 show floor. Now the event itself won’t happen at all.
According to IGN, the Entertainment Software Association has begun notifying members that while the show “remains a beloved event and brand,” the plans for E3 2023 “simply did not garner the sustained interest necessary to execute it in a way that would showcase the size, strength and impact our industry.”
News on #E32023 from the source. pic.twitter.com/BK7TUlb8mZ— E3 (@E3) March 30, 2023
The ESA has also published a statement from ReedPop’s Global VP of Gaming, Kyle Marsden-Kish:
This was a difficult decision because of all the effort we and our partners put toward making this event happen, but we had to do what’s right for the industry and what’s right for E3. We appreciate and understand that interested companies wouldn’t have playable demos ready and that resourcing challenges made being at E3 this summer an obstacle they couldn’t overcome. For those who did commit to E3 2023, we’re sorry we can’t put on the showcase you deserve and that you’ve come to expect from ReedPop’s event experiences.
The event was supposed to run from June 13th to 16th in Los Angeles, and would have been the first in-person E3 event since 2019.
While the event may be cancelled, there will likely still be plenty of video game news to look forward to in June: Ubisoft previously announced that it would be hosting its own event around the same time, and Nintendo and PlayStation typically run digital events of their own in June. Microsoft previously pledged to be part of E3’s digital show, and may still have announcements in spite of the lack of an E3 event itself.
Engadget has reached out to the ESA for comment.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/e3-2023-has-been-canceled-211201976.html?src=rss
Microsoft, Nintendo, Ubisoft and other major players in the game industry have all confirmed that they would have no presence on the E3 2023 show floor. Now the event itself won’t happen at all.
According to IGN, the Entertainment Software Association has begun notifying members that while the show “remains a beloved event and brand,” the plans for E3 2023 “simply did not garner the sustained interest necessary to execute it in a way that would showcase the size, strength and impact our industry.”
News on #E32023 from the source. pic.twitter.com/BK7TUlb8mZ
— E3 (@E3) March 30, 2023
The ESA has also published a statement from ReedPop’s Global VP of Gaming, Kyle Marsden-Kish:
This was a difficult decision because of all the effort we and our partners put toward making this event happen, but we had to do what’s right for the industry and what’s right for E3. We appreciate and understand that interested companies wouldn’t have playable demos ready and that resourcing challenges made being at E3 this summer an obstacle they couldn’t overcome. For those who did commit to E3 2023, we’re sorry we can’t put on the showcase you deserve and that you’ve come to expect from ReedPop’s event experiences.
The event was supposed to run from June 13th to 16th in Los Angeles, and would have been the first in-person E3 event since 2019.
While the event may be cancelled, there will likely still be plenty of video game news to look forward to in June: Ubisoft previously announced that it would be hosting its own event around the same time, and Nintendo and PlayStation typically run digital events of their own in June. Microsoft previously pledged to be part of E3’s digital show, and may still have announcements in spite of the lack of an E3 event itself.
Engadget has reached out to the ESA for comment.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/e3-2023-has-been-canceled-211201976.html?src=rss
AI-generated video of Will Smith eating spaghetti astounds with terrible beauty
Open source “text2video” ModelScope AI made the viral sensation possible.
Enlarge / Stills from an AI-generated video of Will Smith eating spaghetti that has been heating up the Internet. (credit: chaindrop / Reddit)
Amid this past week’s controversies in AI over regulation, fears of world-ending doom, and job disruption, the clouds have briefly parted. For a brief and shining moment, we can enjoy an absolutely ridiculous AI-generated video of Will Smith eating spaghetti that is now lighting up our lives with its terrible glory.
On Monday, a Reddit user named “chaindrop” shared the AI-generated video on the r/StableDiffusion subreddit. It quickly spread to other forms of social media and inspired mixed ruminations in the press. For example, Vice said the video will “haunt you for the rest of your life,” while the AV Club called it the “natural end point for AI development.”
We’re somewhere in between. The 20-second silent video consists of 10 independently generated two-second segments stitched together. Each one shows different angles of a simulated Will Smith (at one point, even two Will Smiths) ravenously gobbling up spaghetti. It’s entirely computer-generated, thanks to AI.
NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 4070 will reportedly cost $599
RTX 40-series graphics card prices may soon come down to Earth… if ever so slightly. VideoCardzsources claim NVIDIA will price the standard GeForce RTX 4070 at $599. That’s decidedly more affordable than the $799 RTX 4070 Ti, but just as much as the RTX 3070 Ti from 2021. The days of paying $500 or less for an x070 GPU are over, apparently.
You may get more for your money than any 3070 card, at least. The GeForce RTX 4070 will reportedly have the same 5,888 CUDA core count as the regular 3070 and a narrower 192-bit memory bus, but a much higher 1.92GHz base clock speed (even the 3070 Ti tops out at 1.58GHz), more RAM (12GB versus 8GB), and a higher 29 teraflops of 32-bit floating point computing power (versus 22 for the 3070 Ti). And did we mention that it should use less power than a 3070? While the core tally and clock speeds are noticeably lower than for the 4070 Ti, it could still provide tangible gains over the last generation.
NVIDIA is said to be releasing the ‘plain’ GeForce RTX 4070 in mid-April. If accurate, the $599 price tag could finally make Ada-based GPUs more accessible to gamers who’ve balked at paying $799-plus just to get DLSS 3 upscaling and other benefits from the latest GeForce lineup. However, it would also continue the trend of increasing prices across the range. Every RTX 40 GPU to date has a reference price at least $100 higher than its RTX 30 equivalent. That’s not a huge issue if you’re simply looking for the best card within your budget, but it could prove painful if you want the closest-possible parallel to an earlier high-end model.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/nvidias-geforce-rtx-4070-will-reportedly-cost-599-210058860.html?src=rss
RTX 40-series graphics card prices may soon come down to Earth… if ever so slightly. VideoCardzsources claim NVIDIA will price the standard GeForce RTX 4070 at $599. That’s decidedly more affordable than the $799 RTX 4070 Ti, but just as much as the RTX 3070 Ti from 2021. The days of paying $500 or less for an x070 GPU are over, apparently.
You may get more for your money than any 3070 card, at least. The GeForce RTX 4070 will reportedly have the same 5,888 CUDA core count as the regular 3070 and a narrower 192-bit memory bus, but a much higher 1.92GHz base clock speed (even the 3070 Ti tops out at 1.58GHz), more RAM (12GB versus 8GB), and a higher 29 teraflops of 32-bit floating point computing power (versus 22 for the 3070 Ti). And did we mention that it should use less power than a 3070? While the core tally and clock speeds are noticeably lower than for the 4070 Ti, it could still provide tangible gains over the last generation.
NVIDIA is said to be releasing the ‘plain’ GeForce RTX 4070 in mid-April. If accurate, the $599 price tag could finally make Ada-based GPUs more accessible to gamers who’ve balked at paying $799-plus just to get DLSS 3 upscaling and other benefits from the latest GeForce lineup. However, it would also continue the trend of increasing prices across the range. Every RTX 40 GPU to date has a reference price at least $100 higher than its RTX 30 equivalent. That’s not a huge issue if you’re simply looking for the best card within your budget, but it could prove painful if you want the closest-possible parallel to an earlier high-end model.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/nvidias-geforce-rtx-4070-will-reportedly-cost-599-210058860.html?src=rss
Best Moz Alternatives of 2023
Every entrepreneur and small business owner needs to get SEO right if they want to be competitive in both the online and local markets in which they operate. Making sure your website gets seen by the right people—your prospects—at the right time—when they’re ready to buy—is just the first-level challenge. You also need to make sure
The post Best Moz Alternatives of 2023 appeared first on ReadWrite.
Every entrepreneur and small business owner needs to get SEO right if they want to be competitive in both the online and local markets in which they operate.
Making sure your website gets seen by the right people—your prospects—at the right time—when they’re ready to buy—is just the first-level challenge. You also need to make sure your site is optimized for local search traffic and ranking well organically to prospects who are in an earlier stage of the buyer’s journey.
To solve those business website challenges, many owners and entrepreneurs turn to reputable online SEO tools. For many years, Moz has been considered to be at the top of that list.
Moz and What It Can Do for Entrepreneurs
Moz Pro is a suite of SEO tools that includes keyword research, site audit, rank tracking, link building, and much more. One of the first SEO tools to hit the market, Moz Pro remains quite popular with businesses of all sizes.
However, some find Moz Pro to be prohibitively expensive, and many find its value—that is, what it offers in exchange for those high prices—to be less compelling than some of its competitors. While it does offer a free plan, that level provides access to limited features. Additionally, many users find the UI/UX (user interface/user experience) non-intuitive, with a steep learning curve.
These are just a few reasons why entrepreneurs might want to seek a different alternative to resolve their SEO challenges. In addition to tools offered by search engines, such as Google Search Console (a free tool that Google offers to help monitor site performance, indexing issues, and more), consider some of the Moz alternatives we’ve listed below.
1. Semrush
Semrush is a comprehensive suite of SEO tools that offers keyword research, competitor analysis, site audit, backlink analysis, and more. Like Moz, it will help you research and analyze keywords, including search volume, related keywords, and more.
Both sets of tools also help you choose keywords that are accessible and competitive, but SEMrush helps you assess how many links you’ll have to build in order to rank for that specific keyphrase. While Moz offers ranking data for results from Google, Bing, and Yahoo! Search engines, SEMrush only provides Google data.
SEMrush may also provide more help in the field of social media analysis with SM content optimization, management, and performance analysis tools. It offers a free trial, plus a free version with limited functionality as well as three paid plans.
Click here to try Semrush for free for 14 days.
2. Ahrefs
A popular SEO tool, Ahrefs offers keyword research, site audit, competitor analysis, backlink analysis, and more. Ahrefs lets you audit your own site for top keywords and performance, backlinks and anchor text, overall domain performance, and competitive domains.
Many users find the Ahrefs interface to be more simply designed and intuitive to navigate and use. It also provides robust domain data, including estimated domain traffic with the ability to view changes to a site’s performance over time.
Ahrefs will also show you keyword research data for ten search engines, not just Google. Like SEMrush, it lets you know how many backlinks you’ll need to build in order to rank well for selected keywords. Websites can use a free Webmaster tool’s version, or you can sign up for one of four paid plans.
3. Raven Tools
Raven Tools is a suite of SEO tools that includes site audit, keyword research, backlink analysis, rank tracking, and more. Users rank it especially highly for its keyword analysis and SERP (search engine results pages) rank tracking. Unlike some other alternatives on our list, it doesn’t offer a free version, but it does provide a free full-feature trial for seven days.
As part of its suite of tools, Raven Tools gives you access to SEO audits, on-page SEO analysis, SERP analytics, and page speed data. In addition, you can find tools for keyword tracking, backlinks tracking, and paid ad tools. With five paid plan levels from $50 to $480 a month, you can find the package that suits your business site’s needs.
4. Majestic SEO
Majestic SEO provides a backlink analysis tool that yields information on backlinks, anchor text, and referring domains. That’s the primary difference between Majestic and Moz. Whereas the latter site aims to provide a fully featured suite of SEO tools, Majestic is aimed at a narrower slice of the market. It does backlink analysis very well, however, including analysis of top incoming backlinks, tools to help you build more incoming links, comparison tools for your competitors’ domains, and other relevant metrics such as anchor texts and referring domains.
There are no free versions (and no free trial offers either, for that matter). Majestic SEO does offer three paid plans, which doesn’t provide as much choice as other sites we’ve profiled here. However, if you’re looking for help with your backlinks, it’s definitely one to consider.
5. Screaming Frog
Screaming Frog SEO Spider is a site crawler that helps you identify technical SEO issues on your site. It manually analyzes each page on your site for broken links, duplicate content, missing title tags, and much more. You can also connect it with your Google Analytics account to get the most out of the data your GA account generates for you.
Unlike many of the other Moz alternatives here, which operate on an SaaS web-based model, Screaming Frog is a desktop program for both PCs and Macs. It offers a free version and a single paid version that costs about $260 for a license that must be renewed yearly.
6. BrightLocal
BrightLocal provides a targeted set of tools that help you manage your local business listings, monitor customer reviews, and track your local search rankings. It’s a good choice if you’re looking primarily for local SEO and reputation management tools, with access to local SEO and Google business profile audit reports.
BrightLocal offers a two-week free trial with access to all features, as well as three paid levels to its all-in-one suite of tools. In addition, you can pay-as-you-go for access solely to its Citation Builder tools, starting at $2 per website, including submission to hundreds of sites, removing duplicate listings, and repairing errors in existing listings.
7. SpyFu
SpyFu is a competitive analysis tool that provides insights into your competitors’ SEO strategies, including their organic search rankings, paid search campaigns, and more. If you’re mostly in search of tools for competitor analysis, rank tracking, and domain comparison functionality, SpyFu is a good alternative to Moz Pro.
SpyFu offers both a free trial and a free version, as well as three paid versions that let you run customized monthly reports.
The Bottom Line
If you need a comprehensive set of SEO tools but Moz Pro is a little out of your price range, or more than what you need, there are lots of Moz alternatives you can choose from. Consider exactly what SEO needs your site is currently experiencing before you choose an alternative SEO tool to try. For example, if competitor analysis is more important to you, look at Ahrefs or SpyFu. If you’re more concerned about local SEO and SEM, consider BrightLocal.
Check for a trial period or a free plan in order to test out the interface and UX generally, since you’ll want to pick an option that feels intuitive to use and that you can navigate with relative ease. Make sure the plan you’re considering meets both your business needs and your budget. That’s the best way to make sure you’re using the right SEO tools for your business and website.
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Featured Image Credit: Photo by Oleksandr Pidvalnyi; Pexels; Thank you!
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Midjourney didn’t flinch at fake Trump images, but platform abuse motivated free trial halt
Midjourney recently halted free trials for its image generator, but not because of the Donald Trump deepfakes circulating online.
Deepfake photos are fast approaching the point where many can’t tell the difference between them and real images. It’s a lesson AI image generator Midjourney learned the hard way when some used its platform to create several recent images, including several fakes of former US President Donald Trump being arrested. After the images went viral, many thought they were real, sparking conversations and controversy based on completely fabricated information.
According to The Washington Post and reported on by The Verge, these deepfakes became so widespread, they prompted Midjourney to halt free trials on March 28. However, when TechRadar reached out to Midjourney CEO and founder David Holz for clarification, he insisted that there was a different reason for the halt: “Users signing up for multiple free trial accounts was bringing down the service for paid users so that’s why we temporarily halted free trials.”
This correlates with a previous statement Holz made to The Verge concerning the free trials, that it was due to “extraordinary demand and trial abuse.” Previously, Midjourney’s free trial allowed for 25 free images a month before users had to pay at least a $10 per month subscription fee.
When asked about the creation of these controversial deepfakes created through Midjourney, Holz told TechRadar “I think we’re still trying to figure out what the right moderation policies are. We are taking feedback from experts and the community and trying to be really thoughtful. We already have some new systems coming which should ship soon.”
Now, though, it looks like Midjourney will be keeping free trials disabled, at least for the immediate future. “We tried turning trials back on again with new safeties for abuse but they didn’t seem to be sufficient so we are turning it back off again to maintain the service for everyone else,” Holz told us.
He added that free trials will be coming back eventually, but the company is still considering how to go about it. “We’re still trying to figure out how to bring free trials back, we tried to require an active email but that wasn’t enough so we’re back to the drawing board.”
What is Midjourney?
Midjourney is just one of several AI image generators, with others including Dall-E, Jasper Art, Starry AI, Stable Diffusion, and plenty of others. These sites exist to create new and entirely fabricated images that are trained on existing online images and data. The images can be photorealistic, fanciful images of animals, surreal images, pixel art, and more. What originally set Midjourney apart from other generators was the more painting-like quality of its images compared to others. At least until version 5 was released on March 15.
Initially, Midjourney-created images were easily spotted thanks to common signs like wonky hands (too many fingers). But once version 5 of its software launched, images became vastly superior in quality, which meant that people could create images with more realistic hands, as well as better lighting and fabric. Essentially you can make tons of deepfakes of celebrities and other public figures thanks to the combination of better technology and the sheer number of real-life images available for training Midjourney.
Deepfakes, or photos created using AI technology for the purpose of spreading misinformation with fake images, have become a growing problem. Beyond the Donald Trump arrest deepfakes, others created with Midjourney featured Pope Francis wearing a puffy, white down coat, French President Emmanuel Macron walking through the ongoing protests in Paris, and Twitter CEO Elon Musk holding hands with U.S. representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
This isn’t the first time that AI-generated creations have been at the center of controversy, as tech leaders and AI experts recently released an open letter calling for the halt of training AI chatbots like ChatGPT.
The future of AI-generated image sites like Midjourney is uncertain. While the technology holds great potential to aid humans, it can and has already been used in more destructive ways. Only time will tell whether safeguards, from lawmakers to the companies themselves, can manage safety and public good, while still allowing AI to flourish and grow.