MetaTrends #0004: Claude 3.5 Sonnet, V2A Audio, Hedra Character-1

Welcome to your MetaTrends Report, a guide to help you navigate the 5 forces shaping our world.

In each issue, we look at recent technology breakthroughs and emerging opportunities. We use the Five Forces Framework. Which was built on recurring themes discovered through 5,000+ hours of research and over 100+ Trends Reports.

Whether you're a founder, investor or just curious about the future, the Five Forces Framework will help you understand the forces shaping our world.

The Five Forces:

• 🦾 Individual Leverage: Individuals are increasingly able to shape and impact the world. See our reports on AI Agents, No-Code and Million-Dollar, One-Person Businesses.
• 🔓 Permissionless Innovation: The erosion of barriers to entry. Which allows anyone to build and share ideas. See our reports on Paid Podcasts, The Creator Economy and Self-Publishing.
• 🔻 Specialization: The growing importance of expertise and niche solutions. See our reports on Micro-SaaS, Micro-Marketplaces and Audience-First Products.
• 🏛️ Centralization: The consolidation of power and control by  platforms and institutions. See our reports on Programmatic SEO, YouTube Channels and Faceless Social Media Accounts.
• 🌐 Decentralization: The shift towards distributed systems and technologies that empower individuals. See our reports on Open-Source AI, DAOs and Decentralized Finance.

MetaTrends Reports will help you:

• Stop Reacting, Start Shaping: Become an active player in shaping the future, rather than a passive observer of events.
• Gain Clarity in a World of Chaos: The Five Forces Framework gives you a sense of order in an otherwise overwhelming world.
• Turn Disruption into Advantage: See challenges as opportunities to build solutions that others haven't imagined.

Now let’s see the forces in action…

This free issue dives into recent technology breakthroughs and emerging opportunities. We use the MetaTrends framework to find opportunities and prepare for risks.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet: The New AI Coding Helper

The Facts:

• Claude 3.5 Sonnet beat all publicly-available AI models.
• Its new “Artifacts” and “Projects” features turn chats into collaborative tools.

Opportunities:

• Create a coding tutorial series using Claude 3.5 Sonnet. Teach creative people without a coding background how to code using AI. See YouTube channels such as Tiff in Tech and Thu Vu data analytics.
• Build a web-based code generator. Help non-technical founders turn images, pseudocode or natural language descriptions into real products. See Fronty and TeleportHQ.
• Add Claude 3.5 Sonnet to your AI wrapper. Upgrade your app with the best model on the market. See TypingMind and Thinkbuddy for examples of UIs.

Haters:

“AI-assisted coding will lead to a generation of developers who can’t solve complex problems on their own.”
Jensen Huang says coding will become obsolete. Until then, AI coding tools can be used to learn best practices. Even if coding from scratch will become obsolete, businesses may still need humans for higher-level tasks.

“AI models can only write code that resembles its training data.”
Researchers just made AI surpass the expert sources used to train it. AI that codes on its own is not far away.

MetaTrends Analysis:

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is an example of 🦾 Individual Leverage, since it boosts developer productivity. The model is made by a closed-source company which points to 🏛️ Centralization. Since AI coding assistants will help non-technical people act as developers, this is a sign of 🔻 Specialization.

V2A: Generating Audio For Video

The Facts:

• DeepMind's V2A creates soundtracks for videos using visuals and text.
• It works with motion graphics and real footage.

Opportunities:

• Offer a service to indie game developers to create custom sound effects and background music for their games using V2A. This is an alternative to hiring freelance sound designers on Fiverr or using libraries such as BOOM.
• A/B test your ads. Make multiple variations of audio for A/B testing to find which soundscape resonates best with viewers. The automatic nature of V2A is perfect for scaling experiments. See tools like AdCreative.ai.

Haters:

“AI audio is not as good as audio tailored to the video by sound professionals.”
AI may struggle with subtle emotions, but it can already make emotive music. Sound designers can use V2A and similar tools to test ideas fast — then refine them using their expertise. With the current rate of AI improvement, the sound quality will not be a problem for long.

MetaTrends Analysis:

V2A fits with 🔓 Permissionless Innovation by making audio easier for everyone without expensive equipment. It also gives creators more power which is an example of 🦾 Individual Leverage.

Hedra Character-1: AI Characters for Videos

The Facts:

• Hedra's Character-1 turns images into videos of people that can sing, rap and talk.
• The model can make videos of any length but the public preview is limited to 30 seconds.

Opportunities:

• Offer personalized video greetings for special occasions. Use AI characters to deliver custom messages. Think Cameo, but with AI.
• Make a platform for creating virtual spokespersons. Help small businesses get virtual representatives for marketing and social media content. Cameo For Business does this, but with real people.
• Build personalized video marketing campaigns. Generate hundreds of videos for specific audiences, cultures or individual customers. See how Mondelēz International made an avatar of Shah Rukh Khan for ads and personalized videos.

Haters:

"AI-generated characters will lead to more misinformation and deepfakes. It will be hard to trust video content."
The concern is valid. But technology is neutral — we are responsible for how we use it. Generative AI companies are also working on ways to detect AI-generated content. This is a mutual responsibility of developers and users.

“AI characters won’t replace real people.”
True. But hiring real people may not fit your budget.

MetaTrends Analysis:

Character-1 helps creators make videos without recording themselves or hiring other people. This is a sign of 🦾 Individual Leverage and 🔓 Permissionless Innovation. Character-1 is closed tech by Hedra which is a sign of 🏛️ Centralization.

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