The Verge: “In 2015, Google hatched a plan to save the mobile web by effectively taking it over. And for a while, the media industry had practically no choice but to play along…Sites were too slow, too hard to use, too filled with ads. As a result, he warned, people were flocking to the better… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: Search Engines
How to Delete Your House’s Pictures From Sites Like Zillow, Redfin, and Realtor
Lifehacker: “Our personal data shows up in so many public online spaces. But while there are ways to review and delete your data from social media profiles or even Google search, one place you may not think to check is your property’s listing on sites like Redfin, Zillow, or Realtor.com. While it’s unlikely someone will… Continue Reading
How to ask OpenAI for your personal data to be deleted or not used to train its AIs
TechCrunch: “Users of ChatGPT in Europe can now use web forms or other means provided by OpenAI to request deletion of their personal data in order to stop the chatbot processing (and producing) information about them. They can also request an opt-out of having their data used to train its AIs. Why might someone not… Continue Reading
Mozilla acquires review-checking, scammer-spotting service Fakespot for Firefox
Ars Technica: “Fakespot, a useful service that explains how products you’ve never heard of could have 12,000 reviews with a 4.6-star average, has been acquired by Firefox-maker Mozilla, and Mozilla plans to integrate it into Firefox…After you install Fakespot’s extension for Chrome, Firefox, iOS, or Android, it changes the makeup of product pages on Amazon,… Continue Reading
The Hidden Cost of Cheap TVs
The Atlantic (free link) – Screens have gotten inexpensive—and they’re watching you back.”…But the story of cheap TVs is not entirely just market forces doing their thing. Perhaps the biggest reason TVs have gotten so much cheaper than other products is that your TV is watching you and profiting off the data it collects. Modern… Continue Reading
Evaluating Verifiability in Generative Search Engines
Evaluating Verifiability in Generative Search Engines – Nelson F. Liu, Tianyi Zhang, Percy Liang, arXiv 19 Apr 2023: “Generative search engines directly generate responses to user queries, along with in-line citations. A prerequisite trait of a trustworthy generative search engine is verifiability, i.e., systems should cite comprehensively (high citation recall; all statements are fully supported… Continue Reading
Google Announces 8 New Top Level Domains Including One For Lawyers
Search Engine Journal: “Google announced the release of eight new top level domains (TLDs), including one which may have a high commercial potential for law firms, others that are useful for academics and two top level domains that are based on file extensions, which might be problematic from a security standpoint..” Continue Reading
Does Googling Justice Work? Auditing Search Engines’ Performance as Intermediaries of Legal Help Online
Hagan, Margaret and Al Haider, Nóra, Does Googling Justice Work? Auditing Search Engines’ Performance as Intermediaries of Legal Help Online (October 10, 2022). UCLA Journal of Law & Technology, Forthcoming, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4414305 “Online search engines are key providers of legal information. Their responses to people’s search queries can influence whether and how people… Continue Reading
You Can’t Trust Your Browser’s ‘Lock’ to Tell You a Website Is Safe
Lifehacker – “Google is doing away with the lock, because it never meant what you thought it meant. When you browse the internet, you probably notice a small lock icon that appears in the URL bar. It’s common internet security advice to look for this lock whenever visiting a new site, to make sure your… Continue Reading
AI Tools for Lawyers: A Practical Guide
Schwarcz, Daniel B. and Choi, Jonathan H., AI Tools for Lawyers: A Practical Guide (March 29, 2023). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4404017 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4404017 “This Article provides lawyers and law students with practical and specific guidance on how to effectively use AI large language models (LLMs), like GPT-4, Bing Chat, and Bard, in legal research and… Continue Reading
Twitter’s Killer App: Real-Time Search. Anyone can search the past, but only Twitter can unearth the present
Every: “Real-time search. Google doesn’t have it. Neither does ChatGPT. Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, and Facebook probably wish they had it, but they don’t. Twitter, Silicon Valley’s favorite shitshow, is the only one with this power. And for some inexplicable reason, it’s not doing anything with it. Twitter has a tremendous amount of live, real-time data… Continue Reading
Upgrade Your Browser With a ChatGPT Sidebar
Lifehacker: “Microsoft Edge, and only Microsoft Edge, employs artificial intelligence as your browser co-pilot, thanks to the integrated Bing sidebar. But nothing is stopping you, or clever developers, from adding a ChatGPT sidebar to any Chrome-based browser—a tool that will help you generate summaries, ask research questions, find similar pages, and more. The ChitChat ChatGPT… Continue Reading
