サムスン、ＡＩ搭載のデジタルアバター「ＮＥＯＮ」を発表

【ラスベガスＡＦＰ＝時事】韓国のスマートフォン・半導体大手、サムスン電子の研究開発部門は7日、米ラスベガスで開催されている国際コンシューマー・エレクトロニクス・ショー（CES）の開幕式で、人工知能（AI）を搭載したデジタルアバターを発表した。「人工人間」と紹介されているこのアバターは、本物の人間のように「会話や共感」することができるという。（写真は米ネバダ州ラスベガスで開催された国際コンシューマー・エレクトロニクス・ショーで、「NEON」をPRするポスター）
　今回公開されたのは、サムスンの独立研究開発部門「スター・ラブス」が開発した「ＮＥＯＮ」。
　カリフォルニア州に拠点を置くスター・ラブスによると、この技術を活用してデジタルアバターをカスタマイズし、モニターに映したりビデオゲームに登場させたりすることができる。「テレビのアナウンサーや広報担当者、映画俳優」として、また単に「話し相手や友人」として設定することもできるという。
　スター・ラブスのプラナフ・ミストリー代表は「ＮＥＯＮはわれわれの友人、協力者、そして話し相手になり、常に学習し、進化し、交流を通じて記憶を構築する」と説明している。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2020/01/08-08:42）

A Samsung lab on Tuesday unveiled a digital avatar it described as an AI-powered artificial human, claiming it is able to converse and sympathize like real people.
The announcement at the opening of the 2020 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas touted a new kind of artificial intelligence called NEON, produced by the independent Samsung unit Star Labs.
The technology allows for the creation of customized digital beings that can appear on displays or video games and could be designed to be TV anchors, spokespeople, or movie actors or even companions and friends, according to the California-based unit of the South Korean giant.
NEONs will be our friends, collaborators and companions, continually learning, evolving and forming memories from their interactions, said Pranav Mistry, chief executive of the lab.
The NEON creators said the new virtual humans are the product of advances in technologies including neural networks and computational reality.
According to Star Labs, NEON is inspired by the rhythmic complexities of nature and extensively trained with how humans look, behave and interact.
The avatars create life-like reality that is beyond normal perception to distinguish, with latency of less than a few milliseconds.
While digital avatars have long been able to be programmed for specific tasks such as role players in games, NEON goes further by enabling interactions that can incorporate human emotion.
Although the artificial humans may borrow features from real people, each NEON has his or her own unique personality and can show new expressions, movements, and dialogs, the company said.
- New kind of deepfake? -
The announcement comes amid a proliferation of AI-manipulated computer videos known as deepfakes, and growing concerns how they could be used to deceive or manipulate.
Some analysts fear these fakes could be misused during an election campaign to exacerbate political tensions.
Jack Gold, analyst at J. Gold Associates, said Samsung may be ahead of the pack if it can develop avatars that can show emotions and expressions.
We have to wait and see what this means, Gold said.
But it has major implications for many fields like customer service, help desk functions, entertainment, and of course could also be used to 'fake' a human interacting with a live person for bad or illegal purposes.
Avi Greengart of the consultancy Techsponential said the avatars could be realistic but also creepy.
Leaving aside how impressive the technology is, will NEON be used in ways that people like, just tolerate, or actively hate? he said.
According to Samsung and Star Labs, NEON offers avatars with lifelike reality that is beyond normal perception to distinguish.
The company envisions commercial opportunities to create avatars to be service representatives, financial advisors, healthcare providers or concierges.
We have always dreamed of such virtual beings in science fictions and movies, Mistry said.
NEONs will integrate with our world and serve as new links to a better future, a world where 'humans are humans' and 'machines are humane.'
The laboratory was launched in 2019 by Mistry, who had previously been a senior Samsung vice president and head of innovation at Samsung Mobile.
He was known for developing Sixth Sense, a gesture-based wearable technology system built at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The India-born Mistry also worked on projects with Microsoft and Google and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.