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Category Archives: Microsoft

Introducing ChatGPT search

OpenAI: “ChatGPT can now search the web in a much better way than before. You can get fast, timely answers with links to relevant web sources, which you would have previously needed to go to a search engine for. This blends the benefits of a natural language interface with the value of up-to-date sports scores, news, stock quotes, and more. ChatGPT will choose to search the web based on what you ask, or you can manually choose to search by clicking the web search icon. Search will be available at chatgpt.com(opens in a new window), as well as on our desktop and mobile apps. All ChatGPT Plus and Team users, as well as SearchGPT waitlist users, will have access today. Enterprise and Edu users will get access in the next few weeks. We’ll roll out to all Free users over the coming months…Chats now include links to sources, such as news articles and blog posts, giving you a way to learn more. Click the Sources button below the response to open a sidebar with the references…”

  • See also MIT Technology Review: “At stake is the future of AI search—that is, chatbots that summarize information from across the web. If their growing popularity is any indication, these AI “answer engines” could replace traditional search engines as our default gateway to the internet. While ordinary AI chatbots can reproduce—often unreliably—information learned through training, AI search tools like Perplexity, Google’s Gemini, or OpenAI’s now-public SearchGPT aim to retrieve and repackage information from third-party websites. They return a short digest to users along with links to a handful of sources, ranging from research papers to Wikipedia articles and YouTube transcripts. The AI system does the reading and writing, but the information comes from outside….At its best, AI search can better infer a user’s intent, amplify quality content, and synthesize information from diverse sources. But if AI search becomes our primary portal to the web, it threatens to disrupt an already precarious digital economy. Today, the production of content online depends on a fragile set of incentives tied to virtual foot traffic: ads, subscriptions, donations, sales, or brand exposure. By shielding the web behind an all-knowing chatbot, AI search could deprive creators of the visits and “eyeballs” they need to survive. ..”
  • See also ArsTechnica – Not just ChatGPT anymore: Perplexity and Anthropic’s Claude get desktop apps

LinkedIn launches its first AI agent to take on the role of job recruiters

TechCrunch: “LinkedIn, the social platform used by professionals to connect with others in their field, hunt for jobs, and develop skills, is taking the wraps off its latest effort to build artificial intelligence tools for users. Hiring Assistant is a new product designed to take on a wide array of recruitment tasks, from ingesting scrappy… Continue Reading

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, October 26, 2024

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, October 26, 2024 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and… Continue Reading

Microsoft brings AI-powered overviews to Bing

TechCrunch: Microsoft has launched its answer to Google’s AI-powered search experiences: Bing generative search. On the heels of a pilot in July, Bing generative search — albeit still under development — began rolling out to all U.S. users this morning. The easiest way to invoke it is by searching “Bing generative search” on Bing; Microsoft also… Continue Reading

How I Use Microsoft Word to Instantly Check Documents for Plagiarism

How to Geek: “Microsoft Word isn’t just for typing documents; it has a built-in feature called the Similarity Checker that checks your document plagiarism right from your word editor. This tool not only highlights potential plagiarism but also guides you in citing sources correctly. [This is a front line use case, and other applications are… Continue Reading

Slack, Teams, Google Chat: Is There Any Safe Place to Complain About Work Online?

WSJ via MSN: “Workers are getting too comfortable venting on their employers’ chat apps. We tend to forget that nothing we say there is private. Disney last week said it was quitting Slack, after a hacker gained access to an executive’s account and leaked millions of intraoffice messages. They included computer code, details about unreleased… Continue Reading

LinkedIn Is Training AI on User Data Before Updating Its Terms of Service

TechCrunch: “LinkedIn may have trained AI models on user data without updating its terms. LinkedIn users in the U.S. — but not the EU, EEA, or Switzerland, likely due to those regions’ data privacy rules — have an opt-out toggle in their settings screen disclosing that LinkedIn scrapes personal data to train “content creation AI… Continue Reading

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, August 31, 2024

Via LLRX – Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, August 31, 2024 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on… Continue Reading

4 Reasons the Free Version of Microsoft 365 is Good Enough

How to Geek: “…While you require a Microsoft 365 subscription to use the desktop apps (e.g., Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook), the web versions are completely free. As long as you have a constant internet connection and are using a modern browser, you can access them without installing anything. Even though some advanced features found… Continue Reading

Microsoft Tweaks Fine Print To Warn Everyone Not To Take Its AI Seriously

The Register – “Microsoft is notifying users that its AI services should not be taken too seriously, echoing prior service-specific disclaimers – an update to the IT giant’s Service Agreement, which takes effect on September 30, 2024, Redmond has declared that its Assistive AI isn’t suitable for matters of consequence. “AI services are not designed,… Continue Reading

Most Adults are Not Confident They Can Tell Whether Information from AI Chatbots Is True or False

KFF: “…Most U.S. adults are not confident that they can tell what is true versus what is false when it comes to information from AI chatbots, such as Chat-GPT and Microsoft Copilot. Fewer than half say they are either “very confident” (9%) or “somewhat confident” (33%) that they can tell the difference between true and… Continue Reading