AI assistants are so back
Image: Alex Parkin / The Verge
AI. AI? AI! AI… A. I. This has been a week filled with AI announcements from some of the biggest and most important companies in tech, all of whom seem totally convinced that we’re due for a revolution in virtual assistants. If Silicon Valley gets its way, you might never have to write an email, a line of code, or a joke ever again. All you’ll do is ask your all-knowing, ultra-helpful, maybe slightly too flirty virtual assistant, and it’ll get everything done for you.
On this episode of The Vergecast, we discuss all the AI assistant stuff OpenAI announced at its Spring Update event and the very similar stuff Google announced at its I/O developer conference the next day. Since the early days of Siri, Google Assistant, and Alexa, the tech industry has been moving toward the same goal. Are flirty AI assistants really the future of computing?
After that, we talk about the rest of Google I/O, which was just the Gemini show all the way through. We try to make sense of the new AI Overviews and what they’ll do to the way the web works. They’re going to change things, there’s no question about it — the only thing left to find out is what’s on the other side.
Finally, in the lightning round, we talk about laptops and emulators and self-driving cars and iPads and the undeniable ways in which the app model is changing. With a bunch of developer conferences to come, too, there might be more change afoot.
If you want to know more about everything we discussed in this episode, here are a few links to get you started, beginning with OpenAI:
OpenAI releases GPT-4o, a faster model that’s free for all ChatGPT users
ChatGPT will be able to talk to you like Scarlett Johansson in Her
ChatGPT is getting a Mac app
OpenAI’s custom GPT Store is now open to all for free
Google and OpenAI race to build the feature of search
OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever is officially leaving
We have to stop ignoring AI’s hallucination problem
And on Google Gemini:
Project Astra: the future of AI at Google is fast, multi-modal assistants like Gemini Live
Google’s Gemini AI is getting a chatty new voice mode
Google will let you create personalized AI chatbots
And on Google Search:
Google is redesigning its search engine — and it’s AI all the way down
Google now offers ‘web’ search — and an AI opt-out button
Gemini is about to get better at understanding what’s on your phone screen
Google’s Gemini video search makes factual error in demo
And on everything else from Google I/O:
Google I/O 2024: everything announced
Android apps will soon let you use your face to control your cursor
Android is getting an AI-powered scam call detection feature
Google Photos is getting its own ‘Ask Photos’ assistant this summer
And in the lightning round:
David Pierce’s pick: Dell leak details next-gen Windows on Arm chips, 29-hour laptops, and more
Alex Cranz’s pick: PPSSPP brings PSP emulation to the iPhone
Nilay Patel’s pick: For self-driving cars, the free ride is over
Nilay’s other pick: Apple iPad Pro (2024) review: the best kind of overkill
And don’t forget to subscribe to Notepad, Tom Warren’s newsletter on all things Microsoft!
Image: Alex Parkin / The Verge
AI. AI? AI! AI… A. I. This has been a week filled with AI announcements from some of the biggest and most important companies in tech, all of whom seem totally convinced that we’re due for a revolution in virtual assistants. If Silicon Valley gets its way, you might never have to write an email, a line of code, or a joke ever again. All you’ll do is ask your all-knowing, ultra-helpful, maybe slightly too flirty virtual assistant, and it’ll get everything done for you.
On this episode of The Vergecast, we discuss all the AI assistant stuff OpenAI announced at its Spring Update event and the very similar stuff Google announced at its I/O developer conference the next day. Since the early days of Siri, Google Assistant, and Alexa, the tech industry has been moving toward the same goal. Are flirty AI assistants really the future of computing?
After that, we talk about the rest of Google I/O, which was just the Gemini show all the way through. We try to make sense of the new AI Overviews and what they’ll do to the way the web works. They’re going to change things, there’s no question about it — the only thing left to find out is what’s on the other side.
Finally, in the lightning round, we talk about laptops and emulators and self-driving cars and iPads and the undeniable ways in which the app model is changing. With a bunch of developer conferences to come, too, there might be more change afoot.
If you want to know more about everything we discussed in this episode, here are a few links to get you started, beginning with OpenAI:
OpenAI releases GPT-4o, a faster model that’s free for all ChatGPT users
ChatGPT will be able to talk to you like Scarlett Johansson in Her
ChatGPT is getting a Mac app
OpenAI’s custom GPT Store is now open to all for free
Google and OpenAI race to build the feature of search
OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever is officially leaving
We have to stop ignoring AI’s hallucination problem
And on Google Gemini:
Project Astra: the future of AI at Google is fast, multi-modal assistants like Gemini Live
Google’s Gemini AI is getting a chatty new voice mode
Google will let you create personalized AI chatbots
And on Google Search:
Google is redesigning its search engine — and it’s AI all the way down
Google now offers ‘web’ search — and an AI opt-out button
Gemini is about to get better at understanding what’s on your phone screen
Google’s Gemini video search makes factual error in demo
And on everything else from Google I/O:
Google I/O 2024: everything announced
Android apps will soon let you use your face to control your cursor
Android is getting an AI-powered scam call detection feature
Google Photos is getting its own ‘Ask Photos’ assistant this summer
And in the lightning round:
David Pierce’s pick: Dell leak details next-gen Windows on Arm chips, 29-hour laptops, and more
Alex Cranz’s pick: PPSSPP brings PSP emulation to the iPhone
Nilay Patel’s pick: For self-driving cars, the free ride is over
Nilay’s other pick: Apple iPad Pro (2024) review: the best kind of overkill
And don’t forget to subscribe to Notepad, Tom Warren’s newsletter on all things Microsoft!