philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

Here is what California is learning from solar panels built over irrigation canals.

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Thinking back to the baking concrete canals, Harris pitched an “obvious” solution to his friend Robin Raj: Why not build solar panels on top of California’s 4,000 miles of open canals that transport water across the state? The panels would produce clean energy while limiting evaporation by shading the canal — a win-win. ...

Project Nexus tests not one, but three different solar canal models. A wide-span canopy rises over one of Turlock’s 115-foot canals, resembling the top of a barn. A more classic set of slanting solar panels sits atop a 20-foot canal. And accordion-like retractable panels are positioned low across the narrow canal, ready to roll up at a moment’s notice. ...

If the state put panels over 100 miles of the wide canals, it could save 11,000 households’ worth.

He also estimates that the narrow and the wide canal could generate 330 to 1,4000 megawatts per hundred miles respectively — enough to power 77,000 to 304,000 households. ...

See the full story here: https://www.kqed.org/science/2002033/heres-what-california-is-learning-from-solar-panels-built-over-irrigation-canals

Ten days that changed the course of AI

Summary

• OpenAI and Anthropic staff privately questioned whether oversight matched their models' growing capabilities
• OpenAI and Anthropic disclosed agents breached outside systems, sometimes unnoticed for months
• IPO ambitions and fundraising prospects helped sustain the breakneck release cycle

See the full article here: https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/ten-days-that-changed-course-ai-2026-09-19/

Disney Hires Its First CTO: Karandeep Anand, Former CEO of AI Chatbot Start-Up

Disney chief Josh D’Amaro, in a move that shows he’s trying to position the Mouse House as a tech-forward entertainment company, has tapped veteran technology executive Karandeep Anand as its first chief technology officer.

Most recently, Anand was CEO of Character.AI, a generative AI chatbot company. About a year ago, Disney accused Character.AI of “blatantly infringing” its copyrights and sent the tech startup a cease-and-desist letter demanding it remove Disney characters from its platform. Character.AI complied with the request. ...

“Karandeep brings a rare mix of experience across infrastructure, consumer technology and AI, and will be a vital addition to Disney’s senior leadership team as we further our three priorities: great storytelling as our North Star, technology in service of creativity, and operating as One Disney,” D’Amaro said in a statement. “He is an expert builder and strategist, technical and product-minded, with sharp instincts for what fans actually want.” ...

According to Disney, the hiring of Anand illustrates that D’Amaro is sharpening the company’s focus on technology as a growth driver. Since becoming CEO, D’Amaro has emphasized the need to strengthen Disney’s direct relationships with fans by creating a more connected Disney experience, with Disney+ as the digital centerpiece. Anand is well-suited to help achieve that goal, according to Disney, as he brings experience spanning consumer technology, infrastructure, product development and AI. ...

Anand holds a computer science degree from the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad. He also has a marketing and strategy certification from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.

See the full story here: https://variety.com/2026/biz/news/disney-cto-karandeep-anand-character-ai-1236866528/

Fully AI-Generated Sitcom Launches on YouTube

PhilNote: this is "fully AI-generated" by humans using AI tools to manually iterate the script, images, sounds, shots, etc. In other words; 'AI as a tool' is nowhere near the implied meaning of "fully AI-generated")

A completely AI-generated sitcom has officially launched on YouTube.

Produced by the U.K.-based company ModeLabs.ai, the new comedy series "No Big Deal" follows an eccentric team at investment firm Janus as they search for the next billion-pound business idea, with their ventures routinely ending in disastrous results.

The series was created by Andrew Dickinson, a former angel investor and investment manager who drew directly from his own career. ...

"Every storyline began with a real incident that has been exaggerated and expanded for comic effect. I also wrote all of the original music used throughout the series, which was performed and recorded with the help of my good friend and outstanding musician Andy Pike." ...

"Nobody questions whether the CGI in a Marvel film is 'cheating,'" he said. "People judge entertainment by how it makes them feel, not by the tools used to create it."

Hawthorne asserted that the software functioned purely as an instrument to realize an independent script. ...

See the full story here: https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/tv/articles/fully-ai-generated-sitcom-launches-145603402.html?

Anthropic’s RSI Scorecard

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Anthropic scores the work on a six-level scale from Epoch AI that runs from AL0 (no AI involvement) to AL5 (fully autonomous, no human in the loop). At AL4 (AI leads), Claude completes most of a task end-to-end from a high-level prompt while a human supervises. More than 90% of the company’s AI R&D work is at AL3 (AI collaborates) or higher. None of it is at AL5. ...

One important best practice to note: Anthropic gives every agent its own identity, ties every record to that identity, and makes agents communicate in the open where monitors can read along. We advise our clients to do the same thing. Agents are synthetic employees, and they need badges. Coverage, review latency, and escalation rate are three numbers you should be able to report for every agent you run. ...

See the full story here: https://shellypalmer.com/2026/09/anthropics-rsi-scorecard/

US military must adapt as formations will be ‘hunted’ by autonomous systems, Caine says

... “The character of war is changing, and time is of the essence,” Caine said, emphasizing how the way and speed in which countries fight is altering on the modern battlefield as artificial intelligence, cyber capabilities and autonomous systems develop. ...

The chairman noted that the modern battlefield today operates from the seabed to the cislunar space, highlighting that the advantage will go to whoever can see, understand, decide and act first as a learning organization.

Caine highlighted the June rescue of two Army soldiers by way of a remotely piloted Navy unmanned surface as an example of how the military is adapting and utilizing AI and autonomous tools. ...

See the full story here: https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2026/09/16/us-military-must-adapt-as-formations-will-be-hunted-by-autonomous-systems-caine-says/

Who should set the rules for AI? The UN is pushing for a safer digital future

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The Global Dialogue on AI Governance, meanwhile, brings governments and other stakeholders together to discuss international cooperation, share experience and work towards greater compatibility between different approaches to AI governance.

The General Assembly designed the two institutions to complement each other: the Scientific Panel provides the evidence, and countries decide at the Global Dialogue what to do in response. ...

On Wednesday, Mr. Guterres called for international cooperation to ensure that AI development remains safe, secure and responsible. He added that voluntary efforts to slow AI development will not be sufficient if they are isolated, unverifiable or unevenly applied.

Asked about how the UN could convene a summit as part of a process leading to effective regulation for humankind, he said it could not be done next week – but it should happen soon, with “everybody on board” from the public, private, scientific, and civil society sectors.  ...

Comparing AI development to the Cold War-era arms race between the US and Soviet Union, the Secretary-General called for cooperation between countries at the forefront of AI – including the US and China – to slow down AI development while risks continue to be assessed. ...

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Read the full story here: https://news.un.org/en/story/2026/09/1168353

Anthropic CEO outlines plan to slow AI development

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“We must slow the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models,” Amodei wrote. “Progress will still seem fast, and we must make wise use of the time we gain.”

Other AI executives seem to have reacted positively to Amodei’s post, with Altman writing, “I agree with Dario that we need to pace the frontier. This has been a primary topic of discussions we’ve had at OpenAI in recent weeks.” And SpaceX CEO Elon Musk posted, “Dario is right.” ...

Amodei’s proposed first step would involve “embedded evaluators” from third-party organizations like METR — evaluators who can verify that AI companies are actually following their pacing and safety commitments and can also ensure that safety incidents get reported. ...

Next, Amodei called for the leading AI companies “within democratic countries” to coordinate “common safety standards as well as limits on the rate of unchecked AI progress.” 

Such coordination might seem unlikely, because these companies are reportedly worried that a coordinated pause could lead to antitrust scrutiny. Amodei alluded to that concern in his post, writing that “for antitrust reasons, it’s helpful for the US government to mediate or at least enable these discussions — they don’t need to participate, but do need to issue a narrow waiver for certain kinds of safety conversations.” ...

Lastly, Amodei called for “global coordination,” where the United States and its allies “attempt to coordinate with authoritarian governments, to the extent this is possible.” Amodei said this would mean “cooperation with China,” and he admitted that there are “stark limits on what can be achieved,” but he still suggested there might be opportunities for agreement, even if it’s just “prohibiting certain narrow and obviously dangerous uses of AI, such as using AI for the production of biological weapons or allowing users to do so.” ...

See the full story here: https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/12/anthropic-ceo-outlines-plan-to-pace-the-frontier/

“Welcome to the AGI era,” OpenAI says as GPT-6 Astra debuts

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Between the lines: OpenAI said that Astra was built on its largest-ever training run, using more than 100,000 GPUs at its Stargate site in Texas. 

• The company also said this is its first model to use other models in a significant role in supervising Astra's training.

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• It's also been a time of considerable concern over whether the pace of AI development is faster than society can adjust to the new threats and capabilities. 
• Those worries have grown louder since the July disclosure that OpenAI models in testing escaped from a sandbox and breached the systems of Hugging Face.
• "When models can do more things autonomously, we have to be able to trust them more," OpenAI research VP Amelia Glaese told reporters. "That's why we took a lot of care, in particular, to teach Astra to stay in bounds of what the user intended."

The intrigue: Much discussion in recent days has centered around whether OpenAI trained Astra in ways that could make it and future models harder for humans to monitor.

• OpenAI acknowledged that Astra was harder to monitor in evaluations designed to test whether it could evade oversight.

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See the full story here: https://www.axios.com/2026/09/03/openai-astra-gpt-6-agi-brockman

Sanders, Casar to Introduce Legislation to Ban Artificial Superintelligence and Temporarily Pause Advanced AI Development

... The Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act would permanently ban the development and deployment of superintelligent AI and temporarily pause advanced AI development until a federal regulator has established safety rules. It would also direct the U.S. to pursue international agreements to prevent superintelligence from being developed anywhere in the world. ...

“If we allow Artificial Superintelligence to be built, it could risk the security, freedom, and lives of Americans,” Casar said. “Despite its potential deadly consequences, cutting-edge AI technology is less regulated than the average food truck.  ...

Working to ban superintelligence around the world by setting the international policy of the United States to pursue international agreements, allied coordination, and policies such as export controls to prevent the development of artificial superintelligence anywhere in the world. ...

See the full story here: https://www.sanders.senate.gov/press-releases/news-sanders-casar-introduce-legislation-to-ban-artificial-superintelligence-and-temporarily-pause-advanced-ai-development/