Latest news with #SarahParvini
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
SAG-AFTRA files unfair labor practice charge over use of AI to make Darth Vader's voice in Fortnite
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Hollywood's actors' union filed an unfair labor practice charge against Llama Productions on Monday, alleging the company replaced actors' work by using artificial intelligence to generate Darth Vader's voice in Fortnite without notice. The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists said Llama Productions, a subsidiary of gaming giant Epic Games, 'failed and refused to bargain in good faith with the union' in the last six months. The company made unilateral changes to the terms and conditions of employment 'without providing notice to the union or the opportunity to bargain' by using AI-generated voices to replace bargaining unit work, SAG-AFTRA said. Epic Games did not immediately respond to a request for comment. SAG-AFTRA called a strike against major game companies in July after more than a year of negotiations around the union's interactive media agreement broke down over concerns around the use of unregulated artificial intelligence. In a statement, SAG-AFTRA said the union supports the rights of members and their estates to control the use of their digital replicas. 'However, we must protect our right to bargain terms and conditions around uses of voice that replace the work of our members, including those who previously did the work of matching Darth Vader's iconic rhythm and tone in video games,' the union said. Sarah Parvini, The Associated Press Sign in to access your portfolio
Time of India
15-05-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Potential US semiconductor manufacturing boom complicated by Trump's economic policies
By Sarah Parvini LOS ANGELES: Before "America First" became the Trump administration's mandate for foreign policy and trade, one sector was already working to bring business back to the United States: the semiconductor industry. Aided by government incentives, American and foreign tech companies alike have invested hundreds of billions of dollars to bolstering semiconductor operations - research and development, manufacturing and facility modernization - across the country in recent years. In few places is the growth of the U.S. semiconductor industry clearer than in the Greater Sacramento region, where tech leaders and lawmakers have, for years, sought to grow California's role in producing the chips that power everyday necessities like cars, refrigerators and smartphones. Semiconductor giants clustered in cities just outside Silicon Valley - Intel , AMD, Bosch, Samsung and Micron - are building on a tech foothold Intel first established when it opened its Sacramento-County campus in 1984. But President Donald Trump 's economic policies have complicated that growth as the administration takes its next steps toward imposing more tariffs on key imports and launching investigations into imports of computer chips and chip-making equipment - all at a time when deeper semiconductor investments were just starting to have a positive impact on changing supply chains. New tariffs, paired with the administration's threats against the CHIPS and Science Act, could dramatically slow its goal of ensuring the U.S. maintains a competitive edge in artificial intelligence development. "You're starting to see some of it now. Samsung announced a delay in the fabs in Texas," said Mario Morales, an analyst with the International Data Corp. "That facility was supposed to come online in 2024 now it's being delayed to 2028. I think some of these companies are delaying it because they now know that they're not going to likely get funding, or because of the uncertainty around the acts that we're seeing around the new trade policy." Although the U.S. is a major producer of certain types of semiconductor chips, the nation's share of global chip production - measured by volume and not dollar value - fell from 37% in 1990 to just 10% in 2022, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association. As a result, the country relies heavily on imports from Taiwan and South Korea for advanced chips. Major manufacturers like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. are investing to build up U.S. facilities, partly due to incentives put in place during former President Joe Biden 's time in office. The CHIPS Act, a law passed in 2022 with bipartisan support, was designed to revive U.S. semiconductor manufacturing while sharpening the U.S. edge in military technology and minimizing future supply chain disruptions. Because of the CHIPS Act, the U.S. is projected to more than triple its semiconductor manufacturing capacity - the highest rate of growth in the world during that period, according to a May 2024 report from the Semiconductor Industry Association and the Boston Consulting Group. Barry Broome, president of the Greater Sacramento Economic Council, said weaknesses in the semiconductor supply chain became evident during the pandemic, when the U.S. experienced a shortage in supply. It was "abundantly clear that having these chip products offshore in Vietnam, Taiwan, China for cost savings had serious implications." Those pandemic-era challenges, paired with looming tensions between China and Taiwan, have helped drive the industry to the Sacramento area, he said. Northern California's wealth of tech knowledge and established roots in the semiconductor industry are also attractive traits that have brought investment to the Sacramento region as federal subsidies begin to bolster domestic growth. German tech company Bosch, for example, announced a $1.9 billion investment in the Greater Sacramento area in 2023 to manufacture chips for electric vehicles, converting its facility in Roseville into a silicon carbide semiconductor production site. That investment, Bosch said, would create as many as 1,700 jobs in construction, manufacturing, engineering, and research and development. The project marks the largest semiconductor investment in California in three decades, according to Broome. Tech workers who started out at companies like Intel have spun out companies of their own, including Sacramento-area AI startup Blaize and data storage manufacturer Solidigm. Dinakar Munagala, cofounder of Blaize, said the company's AI chips are among the few built domestically. Their chips are made in a Samsung foundry in Texas, he said. The company's products, Munagala added, help to power systems that analyze traffic patterns and detect suspicious behavior in airports. "We're built here," he said. "That's one of the reasons we're actually getting quite a bit of interest from defense, border security, these classes of use cases." Lane Bess, board chair of Blaize, pointed to Munagala - who worked at Intel - as an example of the talent the Sacramento region can provide to tech companies. The area is primed to be a main corridor for the semiconductor industry because a lot of skilled workers are looking to develop their own companies, Bess said. The Trump administration has viewed chip production as a national security issue because it would reduce U.S. reliance on importing chips that are also used by the military. It also intends to study the risks of having computer chip production concentrated in other places and the impact on U.S. competitiveness from foreign government subsidies, "foreign unfair trade practices and state-sponsored overcapacity." Alvin Nguyen, senior analyst at Forrester, said the fluidity of the state of administration's tariffs will cause confusion about the impact on the supply chain "due to the complexity of tracking where materials and manufactured goods are produced and assembled." Video game companies, for example, have started to raise prices amid a backdrop of ongoing tariff uncertainty. "For semiconductors, we may see certain goods no longer making sense to produce due to the cost - see Nintendo Switch 2 - and the value seen from IT purchases diminishing," he said in an email. Preorders for Nintendo's highly anticipated Switch 2 were delayed in April as retailers assessed the potential impact of tariffs. Nintendo later confirmed that some Switch 2 accessories would see price adjustments, but maintained that its baseline price for the console - $449.99 - would remain the same. Nguyen said that in the medium term, the growth of foundries around the world will be beneficial to easing dependence on Taiwan for chip production. Down the road, "we should see a healthier global ecosystem for semiconductor manufacturing and more supply chain options in where chips are produced and can be procured," he said. Broome, of the economic council, said he believes the Trump administration's tariffs are aimed at restructuring global relationships. He said he hopes that "concludes quickly" because uncertainty over trade policy doesn't favor the markets. "If the tariffs are used for leverage to get better agreements in the next two or three months, then we'll come back quickly, and will benefit from it," Broome said. "If they're considered long-term policy, I think it'll really ice the capital markets from putting real money on the table."
Time of India
12-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
How Candy Crush uses AI to keep players coming back to its puzzles
By Sarah Parvini Players swiping their way through more than 18,700 levels of Candy Crush Saga might be surprised to learn they're solving puzzles designed with an assist from artificial intelligence . The app that helped make gamers out of anyone with a smartphone uses AI to help developers create levels to serve a captive audience constantly looking for more sweets to squash. King, the Swedish video game developer behind Candy Crush , also uses AI to update older levels to help ensure players don't feel bored, stuck or frustrated as they spend time with the game. Todd Green, general manager of the Candy Crush franchise, said using AI in that way helps free up developers' time to create new puzzle boards. It would be "extremely difficult," he said, for designers to update and reconfigure more than 18,000 levels without AI taking a first pass. Within the video game industry, discussions around the use of AI in game development run the gamut. Some game makers see AI as a tool that can assist with menial tasks, allowing designers and artists to focus on bigger projects. AI, they say, can help build richer worlds by creating more interactive non-player characters, for example. But there are also those who strongly oppose the use of AI, or who see the tech as a threat to their livelihoods - be it as video game actors and performers, or as workers who help make games. Concerns over AI led game performers with the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists to go on strike in late July. "We're not putting chatbots into the game. We're not putting AI-powered design experiences into the game for players directly to play with," Green said, adding that the tech is not being used to replace game workers. "Instead, we're trying to deploy AI on existing problems that we have in order to make the work of the teams faster or more accurate, and more accurate more quickly." In the United States, consumer spending on video game content increased to $51.3 billion in 2024, up from $49.8 billion in 2023, with mobile games accounting for about half of all video game content spending, according to data from the Entertainment Software Association trade group. Mobile is now the leading game platform among players aged 8 and older, the ESA says. Candy Crush - first launched on Facebook in 2012 - is constantly updating. King recently released its 300th client version of the game. Gaming giant Activision Blizzard acquired King in 2016 for $5.9 billion. The free-to-play game is in a unique position, said Joost Van Dreunen, author of "One Up: Creativity, Competition, and the Global Business of Video Games." Candy Crush is more than a decade old, boasts millions of users and caters to a "ravenous set of players," he said. Demand is so high for new content that it makes sense to use AI to offset the work it takes to create so many levels, Van Dreunen added. "To supply that at scale, you absolutely can rely on a sort of artificial intelligence or generative AI to create the next set of forms," he said. "The thing about Candy Crush is that every level is technically a single board that you have to solve or clear before you can advance. With AI and the existing library of human-made boards, it makes total sense to then accelerate and expand the efforts to just create more inventory. People play more levels." King uses AI to target two separate areas: developing new levels and going back to older levels, in some cases, puzzles that are several years old, and reworking them to ensure they're still worth playing. On new levels designed for people who have played the game for a long time, the company wants to ensure the puzzles are fun "on first contact." "That's hard for us to do, because we don't get the benefit of having many players test or play through the levels and give us feedback. We have to sort of try and pitch it right at first," he said. "There's a really important group for us in between people who maybe played before and perhaps took a break for a while, and then coming back because they saw or heard of or were curious about what might be new." Green said King uses AI as a behind-the-scenes assistant in the design "loop" of the game, rather than as a tool that immediately puts something new in front of players. "Doing that for 1,000 levels all at once is very difficult by hand," he said. "So the most important thing to understand here is that we are using AI as like a custom design." For most players, Green said, the fun in solving the puzzles lies in the "up and down." Levels aren't designed in order of difficulty. An easy level can follow a few difficult levels - or vice versa - to give the game a sense of variety. Leveraging AI means that instead of the team working on several hundred levels each week, they could potentially improve thousands of levels per week because they're able to automate the drafting of the improved levels, he added. "We talk to players all the time," he said. "We also get the quantitative feedback. We can see how players respond to the levels... How easy are the levels? Do they get sort of stuck, or are they progressing in the way that we hope?" To determine whether gamers and playing through the way the designers intended, King looks at several factors, including pass rate - how many times a player passes a level out of every 100 attempts - and how often a board is "reshuffled," or refreshed with all candies rearranged. Some metrics are also intangible, like whether a level is simply fun. "It's also, to some extent, obviously subjective," Green said. "It's different for different people."
Time of India
12-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
How Candy Crush uses AI to keep players coming back to its puzzles
By Sarah Parvini Players swiping their way through more than 18,700 levels of Candy Crush Saga might be surprised to learn they're solving puzzles designed with an assist from artificial intelligence . The app that helped make gamers out of anyone with a smartphone uses AI to help developers create levels to serve a captive audience constantly looking for more sweets to squash. King, the Swedish video game developer behind Candy Crush , also uses AI to update older levels to help ensure players don't feel bored, stuck or frustrated as they spend time with the game. Todd Green, general manager of the Candy Crush franchise, said using AI in that way helps free up developers' time to create new puzzle boards. It would be "extremely difficult," he said, for designers to update and reconfigure more than 18,000 levels without AI taking a first pass. Within the video game industry, discussions around the use of AI in game development run the gamut. Some game makers see AI as a tool that can assist with menial tasks, allowing designers and artists to focus on bigger projects. AI, they say, can help build richer worlds by creating more interactive non-player characters, for example. But there are also those who strongly oppose the use of AI, or who see the tech as a threat to their livelihoods - be it as video game actors and performers, or as workers who help make games. Concerns over AI led game performers with the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists to go on strike in late July. "We're not putting chatbots into the game. We're not putting AI-powered design experiences into the game for players directly to play with," Green said, adding that the tech is not being used to replace game workers. "Instead, we're trying to deploy AI on existing problems that we have in order to make the work of the teams faster or more accurate, and more accurate more quickly." In the United States, consumer spending on video game content increased to $51.3 billion in 2024, up from $49.8 billion in 2023, with mobile games accounting for about half of all video game content spending, according to data from the Entertainment Software Association trade group. Mobile is now the leading game platform among players aged 8 and older, the ESA says. Candy Crush - first launched on Facebook in 2012 - is constantly updating. King recently released its 300th client version of the game. Gaming giant Activision Blizzard acquired King in 2016 for $5.9 billion. The free-to-play game is in a unique position, said Joost Van Dreunen, author of "One Up: Creativity, Competition, and the Global Business of Video Games." Candy Crush is more than a decade old, boasts millions of users and caters to a "ravenous set of players," he said. Demand is so high for new content that it makes sense to use AI to offset the work it takes to create so many levels, Van Dreunen added. "To supply that at scale, you absolutely can rely on a sort of artificial intelligence or generative AI to create the next set of forms," he said. "The thing about Candy Crush is that every level is technically a single board that you have to solve or clear before you can advance. With AI and the existing library of human-made boards, it makes total sense to then accelerate and expand the efforts to just create more inventory. People play more levels." King uses AI to target two separate areas: developing new levels and going back to older levels, in some cases, puzzles that are several years old, and reworking them to ensure they're still worth playing. On new levels designed for people who have played the game for a long time, the company wants to ensure the puzzles are fun "on first contact." "That's hard for us to do, because we don't get the benefit of having many players test or play through the levels and give us feedback. We have to sort of try and pitch it right at first," he said. "There's a really important group for us in between people who maybe played before and perhaps took a break for a while, and then coming back because they saw or heard of or were curious about what might be new." Green said King uses AI as a behind-the-scenes assistant in the design "loop" of the game, rather than as a tool that immediately puts something new in front of players. "Doing that for 1,000 levels all at once is very difficult by hand," he said. "So the most important thing to understand here is that we are using AI as like a custom design." For most players, Green said, the fun in solving the puzzles lies in the "up and down." Levels aren't designed in order of difficulty. An easy level can follow a few difficult levels - or vice versa - to give the game a sense of variety. Leveraging AI means that instead of the team working on several hundred levels each week, they could potentially improve thousands of levels per week because they're able to automate the drafting of the improved levels, he added. "We talk to players all the time," he said. "We also get the quantitative feedback. We can see how players respond to the levels... How easy are the levels? Do they get sort of stuck, or are they progressing in the way that we hope?" To determine whether gamers and playing through the way the designers intended, King looks at several factors, including pass rate - how many times a player passes a level out of every 100 attempts - and how often a board is "reshuffled," or refreshed with all candies rearranged. Some metrics are also intangible, like whether a level is simply fun. "It's also, to some extent, obviously subjective," Green said. "It's different for different people."
Yahoo
26-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Slack platform down as users report service outage
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Workplace communications platform Slack experienced an outage Wednesday morning as thousands of users reported they were unable to use the service. The tech company, based in San Francisco, said it was investigating reports of trouble connecting or loading Slack. On an update on the company's website, Slack said it had 'determined a variety of API endpoints, sending (and) receiving messages, and some threads loading" were impacted. A spokesperson for Slack said updates on restoring services will be posted to At the peak of the outage, more than 3,000 users reported they couldn't access the platform, according to the website DownDetector. Some services appeared to be coming back online by mid-morning Wednesday, including group and direct messaging as well as emoticon reactions. Sarah Parvini, The Associated Press Sign in to access your portfolio
