This Week in AI: NVIDIA Becomes World's Most Valuable Company

It's official: Artificial Intelligence has taken over Wall Street. Well, at least one of the most popular AI companies has.

NVIDIA this week became the world's most highly valued company, surpassing Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, Alphabet, and... well, everyone. On Tuesday, as the US was holding its election, NVIDIA's value rose to $3.43 trillion, ahead of Apple's $3.4 trillion at the time. NVIDIA's shares have tripled so far in 2024.

Of course, stock market value is often an indication about how excited people are about a company. And for sure, people are excited about NVIDIA. Over the past few weeks, companies like Microsoft and Amazon have indicated they intend to continue investing in AI technology, which likely means they'll be buying more chips from NVIDIA.

NVIDIA has also joined the Dow Jones Industrial Average of companies, likely bringing more attention to it from investors.

Of course, Wall Street investors are still looking for signs of how AI investment is actually doing, and whether this is a real industry trend or another tech bubble. Whatever it is, for now, NVIDIA's rising share price will probably help further grow the leather bike jacket enthusiast community too. (IYKYK)

Jarvis leaks

Google's new AI prototype, Jarvis, was apparently leaked to the public this week through the Chrome Web Store. The app is described as a "helpful companion that surfs the web for you through web browsers to perform common tasks like buying groceries, booking flights, and researching topics." 

"But wait!" I hear you say, "Isn't that what Gemini, Copilot, ChatGPT, and LLama do now?"

Yes and no. Apparently, according to reporting from The Information, the software is designed to surf the web through a web browser, basically taking control of the computer. Google is expected to announce Jarvis before the end of the year.

Interestingly, the Marvel Universe no longer calls Tony Stark's AI "J.A.R.V.I.S." (now it's F.R.I.D.A.Y.), but you either already know that or are rolling your eyes right now.

Speaking of Marvel...

Disney, the entertainment giant that owns a sizable share of the content behind childhood pop culture for Generation X, Millennials, and Gen-Z, has announced a new group called the Office of Technology Enablement. The group's goal is to explore and deploy next-generation technologies like AI, and to do it in a "responsible" way.

"The pace and scope of advances in AI and XR [extended reality] are profound and will continue to impact consumer experiences, creative endeavors, and our business for years to come — making it critical that Disney explore the exciting opportunities and navigate the potential risks," Disney Entertainment Co-Chairman Alan Bergman said in a memo obtained by Reuters. 

Amazon AI expands

Amazon's Prime Video is introducing a new AI feature for viewers who might need some help catching up on a new season or episode of a show they haven't watched in a while. 

The company's new AI feature, called X-Ray Recaps, will analyze video segments, subtitles and dialogue to generate descriptions of key events, all apparently without sharing too many spoilers. Amazon says X-Ray Recaps is "a generative AI-powered feature that creates brief, easy-to-digest summaries of full seasons of TV shows, single episodes, and even pieces of episodes, all personalized down to the exact minute of where you are watching."

The feature is in testing, and available on Fire TV devices now.

Read more: AI Tools and Tips 

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• Meet Claude, the Best AI You've Never Heard of
• How to Get NVIDIA Chat with RTX: Local AI for Everyone

Ian Sherr is a widely published journalist who's covered nearly every major tech company from Apple to Netflix, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and more for CBS News, The Wall Street Journal, Reuters, and CNET. Aside from writing, he tinkers with tech at home, is a longtime fencer -- the kind with swords -- and began woodworking during the pandemic.