Hi
Firstly, apologies for the delayed post. I had thought this was set up to send but clearly not. Things have been busy with hosting guests and getting things ready for the upcoming event we’re running at RMIT University Vietnam‘s Saigon South campus this Friday! #clearfailatmultitasking
What event you ask?
Higher Education Horizons 2024: Navigating the Future of Learning is a landmark event hosted by RMIT Vietnam – bringing together HE professionals from across Vietnam, the wider region, and beyond to explore the latest innovative ideas in this this ever-evolving space. Featuring an international line-up of wonderful speakers and panelists (including Anh Vinh Le, Sean McMinn, Hoc Le Hieu, Cedric Le Quellec, and Glen O’Grady), hands-on Learning Design and AI in Action workshops by the amazing Sasha Stubbs and her award-winning team and myself and the incredible Manh Nguyen, and a spectacular exhibition showcase of student and university projects on all manner of things from AI to AR/VR to Blended Learning and beyond. Shaping up to be an excellent day and we’ve love to have you there – either in person or on Zoom. 🤩🕺🥳
Anyway, enough shameless plugs – a few headlines from the world of AI for your Tuesday:
The Future of AI: Anthropic CEO’s Dario Amodei’s Vision for a Transformed World
Dario Amodei , CEO of Anthropic (the lab behind AI fan-favourite, Claude) is a glass-half-full kinda guy when it comes to AI. In a recent essay titled Machines of Loving Grace, he explores his predictions for the transformative potential of these technologies – highlighting both the risks and immense opportunities AI offers to reshape fields such as biology, neuroscience, economic development, governance, and the future of work. While Amodei emphasises the importance of mitigating risks, he presents a frankly awe-inspiring vision of how AI could rapidly accelerate scientific discoveries, cure diseases, alleviate poverty, and enhance mental health. Looking for specifics? Amodei predicts AI could compress 50-100 years of scientific progress into just 5-10 years 🤯
This would obviously fundamentally transform how society operates – including in HE, where this vision carries profound implications. AI could significantly enhance learning and research, transforming universities into innovation hubs with AI-driven, personalised learning paths and tools for cognitive enhancement. Amodei cites opportunities to democratise education – making high-quality resources accessible worldwide; creating AI-powered virtual classrooms and labs – all wonderful, tremendously exciting stuff. BUT he acknowledges the challenges that would bring for educators – transitioning from information providers to mentors who foster creativity, critical thinking, and ethical decision-making. Either way, given that both Amodei and Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI and author of the recent essay The Intelligence Age, are predicting “powerful AI” with transformative potential in the next 5-10 years – we should probably be paying close attention.
I-XRAY: A Real-Time Privacy Nightmare or Wake-Up Call?
Two Harvard students, AnhPhu Nguyen and Caine Ardayfio, created a demo using Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses to show how easily existing technology can be used to “dox” people in real time. Their project, called I-XRAY, livestreams video via the smart glasses to Instagram, where an AI identifies faces, cross-references public databases, and retrieves personal information such as names, addresses, and relatives. Truly wild stuff – the students used it to identify classmates and even approach strangers, convincing them they’d met before with knowledge from the I-XRAY glasses 😲
The students stress their aim wasn’t misuse but to demonstrate how current tools can be abused. Despite Meta’s inclusion of a privacy light, it’s often hard to notice, especially outdoors. Personally, it’s shocking to realise how much personal data is publicly available and how easily it can be pulled from just a photo. If this was done by two students with limited resources, the implications of what governments or large corporations could do are seriously concerning…
AI in Education: Automation, Ethics, and Academic Integrity
Bit of light reading for your week – in the latest Teacher Learning Network Journal, AI’s transformative role in education takes centre stage with a variety of thought-provoking perspectives from thought leaders across Australia. Keith Heggart argues AI could alleviate teacher workloads by automating time-consuming tasks, while Leon Furze warns of the risk of AI flooding digital spaces with low-quality, AI-generated content, posing threats to academic integrity. Tamika Worrell raises a different concern—how AI could harm Indigenous knowledge systems if not handled ethically.
Other contributors like Danny Liu, Mark Bassett, and Carlo Iacono encourage educators to embrace AI as a collaborative tool to boost creativity and critical thinking. Josh Valeri advocates for a national AI framework in Australian education to ensure equitable access and ethical use. Together, these perspectives paint a nuanced picture of AI’s promise in education, balanced by the need for thoughtful, mindful implementation.
Upcoming AI Learning Resources: Workshops and Talks
Wonderful technical update from Danny Liu (University of Sydney), who’s working with TEQSA to create content showing the increasing sophistication of these tools as they present both opportunities and risks to student learning. There were a number of things I didn’t know about in there so definitely worth a look.
While we’re here, TEQSA also has some great resources both for students and staff on how best to meet the challenges and opportunities afforded by AI.
Chinese Text-to-Video Innovation: A Glimpse into the Future of Content Creation
Another week, another incredible Chinese text-to-video generator – this time from Hailuo’s Minimax (English language version here). Their latest showcase brought to mind an American-style Taboo having me wishing for more. Minimax looks super easy to use and, best part, it’s free – definitely worth exploring!
PS. Oh, and by the way – if you didn’t see the Runway Gen:48 winners – you can check them out here. Incredible to see what’s now possible with just a powerful laptop and a few AI credits 👀🍿🤩
PS. Bit of a short one – apologies for that, it’s been extremely busy. For those who’d love to hear more, I’d strongly encourage you to head along to HE Horizons – it’s shaping up to be an excellent event! 🥳
Have a great week ahead and let us know if there’s anything we’re missing that we should add to make this newsletter more useful for i) yourself and/or ii) others. This is a fast-moving, ever-evolving space and we greatly value any and all feedback. 🙏