By Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

I usually review products soon after I get my hands on them, but in the case of Google’s Pixel 8 Pro, which I’ve had since early October, I decided to wait. There’s nothing like living with a device for a few months when it comes to getting to know its pros and cons.

For the past three months I’ve used the Pixel 8 Pro for pictures, web searching, email, texting, keeping track of my health and fitness, making travel reservations, watching videos, checking my calendar, transferring funds between accounts, ordering products, reading news and much more. I even use its Magnifier app to zoom in on things and its Thermometer app to determine the surface temperature of objects and food. And, yes, I also use it to make phone calls and video calls.

The main reason I like Pixel phones is because of the software, including its clean user interface and its frequent software updates. All Android phones get updates, but Google’s own Pixel line is always the first to get new versions of Android. And, while I’ve seen excellent pictures from iPhones and Samsung Galaxy phones, I’m very impressed with the image quality and AI-based editing tools on the Pixel 8 Pro and other Pixel phones. I especially like Magic Eraser, which makes it very easy to remove photobombers and other unwanted things in pictures. Often, even if the part of the image is blocking what you want to keep, the feature will get rid of the unwanted content and seemingly magically show what’s behind it.  It’s not really magic, but the next best thing: artificial intelligence.

The camera also does a great job compensating for low-light conditions. I took some pictures in a dimly light concert hall and they looked like flash photography. Even if flash photos were allowed in that venue, it wouldn’t have worked, because I was too far away. I’m not a serious photographer, but CNET’s Andrew Lanxon, who expressed mix feelings about the phone’s camera, has some excellent comparative pictures from the Pixel 8 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro.

The camera has four zoom levels ranging from .7 (extra wide angle) to 5X. The video quality is also impressive as is the quality of the microphone. And speaking of sound quality, I’ve used it to watch movies and TV shows and am impressed by the sound. If you keep the phone close by, you can even hear that stereo separation. Given a choice, I’d prefer to watch video on a large screen, but I’ve enjoyed full length movies and TV shows on this device, especially when I’m traveling.

Battery life, biometrics

The phone’s battery life is more than adequate. I didn’t do formal testing, but I typically use it for an entire day without plugging it in. I rarely have to worry about charging the phone before I put it aside for the night. I have noticed forums with user complaints about the Pixel Pro 8’s battery life when using mobile data, but my experience has been positive.

One problem I’ve had with earlier phones is fingerprint and face recognition either taking too long or failing to work. With this phone, it’s nearly instantaneous. Although Google doesn’t get the credit for this, I love that my bank and health care provider allow me to log in with fingerprints or facial recognition. It’s nice not having to bother with usernames and passwords,

Tensor 3 chip 

The phone is snappy when launching and running apps due largely to its new Tensor G3 chip. Google says that the new chip, in addition to being fast, also helps with AI including photo editing, AI generated wallpaper and the live translate feature. Like just about every tech company, Google is all-in on AI and generative AI, and we can expect to see a lot more AI-driven features in the future.

Starting at $999, the Pixel 8 Pro is pricey, but you may be able to get it, or an iPhone, Samsung or other premium phone, with a carrier subsidy. Some carriers will give you essentially free phones (you usually have to pay sales tax on the full price) every two or three years either through a trade-in program or simple upgrade. Check with your carrier to see if you’re eligible. You can save $300 with the somewhat smaller Google Pixel 8, which, for $699, has most of the same features. The Pixel 8 Pro has a 6.7-inch display. The Pixel 8’s display measures 6.2 inches, which my wife actually prefers, because it’s easier to hold in one hand yet still big enough to have a comfortable onscreen keyboard, easily readable type of excellent video at close range.

The Pixel 8 Pro has a higher-end camera than the Pixel 8, but the 8 also takes excellent pictures.

While no phone is perfect, this one has served me well. That’s not to say it’s the best choice for everyone, as is evidenced by its rather tepid sales ranking compared with Apple and Samsung. In the U.S., it ranks fifth, according to Counterpoint Research, behind Apple, Samsung, Motorola, and TCL with only 2% market share compared with 53% for Apple and 49% for Samsung.

Frankly, all of those companies have excellent offerings, and I fully understand why some people refuse to budge from their iPhones, especially if they are in the entire Apple eco-system with an iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, AirPods Mac and for those with thousands of dollars to spare, the Apple Vision Pro headset that’s coming out soon. Samsung also has its devotees and its own ecosystem of compatible devices, including several watches.

If you love the phone you have, stick with that brand, because it will be less of a learning curve. Even though this new phone has some significant improvements, a phone you bought in the last few years likely has plenty of life left in it and the ability to deliver what you need in a smartphone. Your wallet will thank you.

Disclosure: Larry Magid is CEO of ConnectSafely, a nonprofit internet safety organization that receives financial support from Google and other tech companies. Contact him at larry@larrymagid.com.

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

Virtual Reality (VR) headsets have been on the market for years, including several iterations from Meta’s Reality Labs, most recently its Quest 3 headset, introduced late last year.  And while millions of VR headsets have been sold, they are still far from a mainstream product.

Hints of what’s to come

We’ve already seen hints as to what’s to come. Google Glass, which is no longer available even in beta let alone as a real product, consisted of eyeglasses with a video display.  As I write, I’m wearing a pair of Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses that don’t have a smart display but do have a microphone and speakers that allow me to get information about what I’m seeing via audio. Although useful, they’re still relatively primitive with only about four hours of battery life and limited capabilities. Eventually, Meta and its competitors will release more advanced versions of these glasses that have a smart display, better battery life and much better software that will be able to recognize buildings, guide you with maps that you can see without you having to move your eyes from what you’re looking at and much more.

There may come a time when some company releases glasses that will give you the name and a short bio of people you run into at parties, but that’s not available now or in the near-term because of technology limitations and privacy concerns. For now at least, it would be a PR nightmare for Meta to introduce that feature.

We’re already seeing some promising new products. Apple’s Vision Pro is far from something you’d wear on the street, but it does allow for both virtual and augmented reality experiences. Apple says that when someone enters a room while you’re wearing the glasses, you can see them, and they can see you, including your eyes. It also allows you to watch movies on what looks like a giant screen with a form of surround sound that Apple calls “spatial audio.”  And it’s the first Apple device with a 3D camera.

At its current price point, I expect the Vision Pro to mainly be purchased by developers and wealthy tech enthusiasts, but that’s often the initial case with new technologies that may eventually get down in price or prove their worth in ways that make people willing to pay a premium price.

Enter Sony

And now Sony has entered the field with a device it describes as an “immersive spatial content creation system,” which includes an XR head-mounted display. It’s equipped with Qualcomm’s just-released Snapdragon XR2+ Gen processor, 4K OLED Microdisplays and video see-through function.  The device, which doesn’t yet have a name or a price, was introduced Tuesday at CES in Las Vegas. Aimed initially at developers and content creators, it features “spatial recognition,” with six cameras and sensors and a ring controller to manipulate virtual objects.

Other players

There are several other early examples of this emerging extended-reality technology.  Snap, the parent company of Snapchat offers Spectacles ($380), with limited AR functions, there’s Rokid Max AR Glasses, Smart Glasses with 360” Micro-OLED Virtual Theater ($329), Virtue One XR/AR Glasses ($439) and XREAL Air 2 AR Glasses ($399). PC.com picked the Rokid Max as the top contender while acknowledging, “We’re still far from fully functional, self-contained augmented reality glasses that can scan your surroundings and provide live updates and contextual information based on what you’re looking at.”

Generative AI

Generative AI, which is all the rage in Silicon Valley — is already finding its way into some of these early offerings. As Brittan Heller wrote in The Information, “emerging technologies are part of a synergistic ecosystem. Rather than heralding the demise of the metaverse, generative AI may well prove to be its catalyst, fueling accelerated development in extended reality technologies.” Although it is still relatively primitive, there is a bit of AI technology built into the Meta Ray-Ban Smartglasses, including the ability to answer basic questions with more features slated for later this year. Amazon has Alexa built into its Echo Frames, and we can expect more AI integration as augmented reality glasses continue to evolve.

Macintosh Shapes Up a Winner
by Lawrence J. Magid
Los Angeles Times
January, 24 1984

I rarely get excited over a new computer. But Apple’s Macintosh, officially introduced last Tuesday, has started a fever in Silicon Valley that’s hard not to catch. My symptoms started when I talked with some devotees from Apple and the various companies that produce software, hardware and literature to enhance the new computer. By the time I got my hands on the little computer and its omni-present mouse, I was hooked. Apple has a winner.

The Mac, which retails for $2,495 is about 14 inches tall and takes up about the same amount of desk space as a piece of 8 1/2 x 11 paper. It is smaller and lighter than most of the so called “portable” machines. The entire system can be slipped into an optional ($99) padded carrying case to be hoisted over your shoulder or placed under an airline seat. The case and computer together weigh 22 pounds.

Of course any computer’s real value is based on what you can do with it. For the first 100 days, Apple is including two valuable programs, MacPaint and MacWrite free with the machine. MacWrite has most basic word processing features with one outstanding addition. It can vary the size and style of your type on the screen and on paper, when used with Apple’s new $495 Image Writer printer. This computer/printer/software combination produces the first truly “what you see is what you get” word processing system on a moderately priced microcomputer. You can vary the type size from 9 point (about the size used in most newspapers) to 72 point headlines. You can also change your type style, selecting an Old English font or one of the more common type styles. Your type can be in bold, italic, underline or even shadow print. All this magic is controlled by the computer itself — the software merely takes advantage of it.

MacPaint is to graphic images what MacWrite is to words. I’m no Picasso, but I found myself drawing some rather pleasing images, using the mouse as a paint brush to draw pictures on the screen. You can paint with different size strokes (“brushes”), in patterns or using pre-designed shapes. It’s easy to custom design a letterhead, a map to your house, or even a self-portrait. The images you create in MacPaint can be integrated into documents produced on MacWrite, so you can create your own illustrated reports.

Until 1981, Apple, with some competition from Radio Shack, dominated the personal computer industry with its Apple II. The current version of that machine is still very popular. Apple started to loose market in 1981 when IBM introduced the first popular 16 bit computer. The IBM PC soon became an industry standard. Meanwhile the Apple Apple III was an unqualified dud and sales for its 32 bit Lisa were disappointing. Some analysists thought that Apple was a dying company.

Apple’s young Chairman, Steve Jobs blames his company’s relatively poor performance on trying to compete with IBM on its own terms rather than “getting back to our roots.” With former Pepsi president John Sculley at the helm, Apple is now focusing its marketing efforts on small businesses, home users, and colleges rather than Fortune 500 companies.

The Macintosh is as innovative today as the Apple II was in 1977. It’s one of the few computers introduced in the last 18 months that makes no attempt to imitate the IBM PC.

It does, however, draw on Apple’s experience with the larger and more expensive Lisa. Like the Lisa, it uses a hand-held “mouse” — a small pointing device which enables the user to select programs, and move data from one part of the screen to another. Also like the Lisa, Macintosh uses a black and white display screen whose resolution is so high that it can quickly draw detailed pictures while at the same time display crisp and readable text. Apple did more than scale down the Lisa. To the contrary, the Macintosh team came up with so many innovations that Apple decided to re-design the Lisa so it too can run Macintosh software. Apple has also introduced three new higher performance Lisa computers with prices starting at $3,495. The Lisa sold for about $10,000 when it was made available last spring.

The main advantage of the Macintosh is that it’s very easy to learn and use. Apple claims that novices can learn to use the Mac in as little as 30 minutes. The company is banking on the machine’s simplicity and modest price to attract “millions” of users over the next few years.

The system comes in three pieces. The main unit houses the 9 inch screen, a built-in disk drive and all the machine’s circuits and connectors. The separate keyboard is attached to the unit via what looks like a modular telephone cord. The mouse, too, has its own cord and connector.

The system is driven by a 32 bit Motorola 68000 central processing unit. It comes with 128K of Random Access Memory (RAM), 64K of Read Only Memory (ROM) and one 400K disk drive. The 32 bit CPU and the extensive ROM are largely responsibile for its impressive graphics capability. The machine will eventually be upgradable to 512K once the new breed of 256K RAM chips become commercially available. An optional second (external) disk drive is $495.

Instead of using the 5 1/4 inch floppy disks that the Apple II helped standardize, the Mac uses 3 1/2 inch mini-floppies. These disks come with a built-in protective cover, can fit in a shirt pocket, and are far less vulnerable to damage than standard floppies. Apple will also be using the 3 1/2 inch disks on its new Lisa series.

Easy to Use

Once you’ve set up your machine, you insert the main system disk, turn on the power, and in a minute you are presented with the introductory screen. Apple calls it your “desk top”. What you see on your screen looks a lot like what you might find on a desk. Instead of just a blinking cursor you see pictures, called icons, that graphically represent the things you can do with the computer. One of them is a picture of a hand, writing on a piece of paper. That represents the MacWrite word processing program. Another shows a hand drawing on paper to represent the MacPaint graphics program. Other options are represented by equally clever icons. Any files that you have created are also graphically depicted on your electronic “desk top.”

To select a program, you move the mouse to the icon and press the button on the top of the little rodent. If there are any additional options, they are displayed at the top of the screen, so you can move the mouse to make the appropriate selection. When this process was described to me, it sounded cumbersome, especially since I’m already comfortable with using a keyboard. But the mouse is so much more intuitive. As infants we learned to move objects around our play pens. Using a mouse is an extension of that skill.

All the commands are presented and issued in the same manner. Apple has gone to great length to insure that all of its software uses the same interface. What’s more, they are using their extensive influence to assure that independent software vendors follow the lead. The intelligence that operates the mouse and creates the graphic icons is built into the machine’s ROM — making it relatively easy for software manufacturers to adhere to Apple’s standards.

The value of a standard user interface can’t be overstated. I run dozens of programs on my computer, and each software company has its own idea of how to move the cursor, erase data and save files. Even an experienced user must take frequent peaks at the programs’ help menus and reference cards. If Apple gets its way, every program you buy will use the same basic set of commands.

Microsoft Corp, in Bellvue, Washington, has announced Mac versions of its popular Multiplan spreadsheet program, BASIC language, and Microsoft Word — an innovative new word processing package. Lotus Development Corporation (Cambridge, MA) has has a forthcoming Mac version of its best selling 1-2-3 integrated spreadsheet, and Software Publishing Company (Mountain View, Calif) will release its PFS series of data base management tools. Apple provided pre-release versions of the Mac to these and more than 100 other software companies so that their products could be available soon after the release of the new machine.

Available software is critical to the success of any new computer system and Apple is counting on broad support since the machine can’t run software written for MS-DOS or any other standard operating system. The machine’s inability to run MS-DOS could be its salvation or its downfall.

Machine specific magazines help spread the excitement of a new computer. PC World Communications, Inc. (San Francisco) has already released the first issue of Macworld, an attractive and well written user magazine. The 145 page premier issue includes a photo essay on the Mac’s hardware, several software reviews, tips for using the new machine, and a behind the scenes series of profiles on the people responsible for “Making the Macintosh.” Within a few months there will be other magazines and scores of books about the new computer.

Whether Apple can take a byte of out IBM’s sales remains to be seen. But the new Macintosh has gotten off to a delicious start.

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

Wednesday marked the 40th anniversary of the Apple Macintosh. It came out about a year into my tenure as a syndicated tech columnist, and even back then, I had seen a lot of new personal computers. But when Steve Jobs showed it to me weeks before the announcement, I was blown away.

My column, which ran in the Jan. 29, 1984, edition of the Los Angeles Times and other papers, started with the words, “I rarely get excited over a new computer. But Apple’s Macintosh, officially introduced last Tuesday, has started a fever in Silicon Valley that’s hard not to catch.” I added, “By the time I got my hands on the little computer and its omni-present mouse, I was hooked. Apple has a winner.”

That original Mac, which cost $2,495 ($7,510 in today’s dollars) was about 14 inches tall and took up about the same amount of desk space as a piece of 8½ x 11 paper. Long before there were laptops, it was “smaller and lighter than most of the so-called ‘portable’ machines. The entire system can be slipped into an optional ($99) padded carrying case to be hoisted over your shoulder or placed under an airline seat.”

What impressed me most was its graphical user interface, not unlike what we still have on today’s Mac and Windows PCs.  The new Mac came with “two valuable programs, MacPaint and MacWrite free with the machine,” as I wrote in that original review. I was impressed that it let you “vary the size and style of your type on the screen and on paper, when used with Apple’s new $495 Image Writer printer,” resulting in the first truly “what you see is what you get” word processing system on a moderately priced microcomputer.  I called it “magic,” because it really did seem like magic at the time.

Saved money on graphics and typesetting

In addition to being a computer columnist, I was co-founder and vice president of a small company that taught corporate clients how to use IBM PCs and software like VisiCalc, dBase II, Lotus 1-2-3 and WordStar. I was one of the first to buy an IBM PC (I wrote one of its manuals and was an early editor of PC Magazine) and my company owned more than a dozen IBM PCs. But, as soon as I could buy one of those new Macs, I got one for the company that we used to create graphic-rich training materials, saving us a great deal of money on typesetting and artwork, especially after Apple released its first laser printer in 1985.

Using an early Mac felt like both an upgrade and a downgrade from the IBM PC on my desk at home, which I had upgraded with a 10-megabyte hard drive, lots of memory and plenty of software, compared with that little Mac with its 128K of Random Access Memory (RAM), 64K of Read Only Memory (ROM) and one 400K disk drive. When it came to performance, memory, storage and available software, it was a big step backward, but when it came to productivity and the sheer joy of using a whimsical and fun new machine, it was a big upgrade.

Competing with IBM

Before the Mac came out, Apple’s main product was the Apple II, which had given up a great deal of market share to the IBM PC. As I wrote in my review, “Apple’s young Chairman, Steve Jobs blames his company’s relatively poor performance on trying to compete with IBM on its own terms rather than ‘getting back to our roots.'” He told me that Apple would focus its marketing efforts on small businesses, home users, and colleges rather than Fortune 500 companies. Although Apple’s initial Mac sales paled compared with those of IBM at the time, Apple is still in the personal computer business. IBM, which had to compete with dozens of “clones” that worked exactly like its PC, eventually stopped making PCs after its market share fell below that of some of its competitors. Unlike Apple, which wrote its own operating system for the Mac, IBM relied on Microsoft’s PC-DOS operating system, which Microsoft was able to license to other companies under the name MS-DOS. To this day, if you want to buy a machine that runs any Apple operating system, you have to buy it from Apple.

Evolution of Apple

The Mac is still far from the most popular PC, though it is growing in popularity with 30.6% market share in 2023, according to Statista. But even though Windows machines collectively outsell the Mac, Apple has been able to cash in big-time with its other products, including the iPhone, which has helped turn Apple into a $3 trillion company, the biggest company in the world in terms of market capitalization. In 2007, Apple dropped “computer” from its name and is now a major player not just in phones, PCs and other devices but also in music, video streaming and even original movies and TV shows. Apple is about to enter the world of extended reality with its Apple Vision Pro, available Feb. 2, for $3,495. That’s a lot of money for a headset, but adjusted for inflation, it’s just a little over half the cost of the original Mac.

Whether you own a Mac, a Windows PC, an iPhone or an Android, you owe some gratitude to “Apple’s young chairman,” Steve Jobs (1955-2011), who had the vision and the guts to bet his company and his career on unproven products that helped change the world.

Larry Magid is a tech journalist and internet safety activist. Contact him at larry@larrymagid.com.

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

Along with our counterparts in more than 100 countries, my colleagues at ConnectSafely and I are busy getting ready for Safer Internet Day, which gets underway Feb. 6. Exactly 10 years ago, ConnectSafely became the official U.S. host of this global event. Our first event was in Washington, D.C., where Sen. Chuck Schumer addressed the audience, which was made up mostly of high school students. Then California Attorney General Kamala Harris spoke at our second event in Silicon Valley.

Programs for home and school

Our last big in-person event, at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, took place about a month before the lockdown. Since then, it’s all been virtual, which, as it turns out, makes it a lot easier to reach more students and family members who can participate from school or home.  This year, we are planning programs in schools and communities across the country, on track to reach about 100,000 students. But there are also plenty of Safer Internet Day resources that parents, grandparents, teens and children can use to educate themselves and others about how to use the internet in the safest way possible. As with nearly every technology from kitchen appliances to airplanes, you can’t eliminate all risks, but you can manage risk to reduce the likelihood of problems and recover if one emerges.

So, in addition to the events at schools, we’re encouraging families to have their own “events” at home. Have a conversation, perhaps at dinner, about how each family member uses connected technology and what they can do to make it safer. Our primary goal is to help protect children and teens, but even if you don’t have kids at home, it’s also a day for adults to think about how they’re using technology in ways that are safer, more civil and more productive.

Categories

The program this year focuses on six major categories: Generative AI, Civility, Picking on Peers (aka cyberbullying), Wellness, Identity & Self Respect, Scams, Predators & Creeps, and Media Literacy & Critical Thinking.  Each category has its own web page with resources for both schools and families, includi

ng posts, lesson plans, guides, Quick-Guides and, in some cases, slide presentations.

Some of these categories have been part of the program for years because they represent ongoing concerns, but generative AI is a new category, reflecting what is the fastest growing and, in my opinion, one of the most exciting developments in my more than four decades as a technology journalist and three decades as an internet safety advocate. Generative AI has the potential to change the way we learn, work and go about our lives, but it also comes with plenty of risks, as we outline in this slide presentation and in our Safer Internet Day Family Program, where we provide general advice for parents and other caregivers, including tips on how to try services like ChatGPT, Google Bard and Microsoft Co-pilot.

In partnership with National PTA, there is a recorded video webinar featuring ConnectSafely Education Director Kerry Gallagher and PTA Connected National Ambassador Mikki Wilson. On Feb. 8, we will hold a live event at 7 p.m. PST, with My Digital Tat2, a Bay Area-based digital education program. You can register for both events at saferinternetday.us/get-involved.

Senate hearing

This year’s Safer Internet Day comes a few days after the CEOs of Discord, Meta, Snap, TikTok, and X (formerly Twitter) testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about online child sexual exploitation and online safety in general. It was a contentious hearing, with senators from both parties demonstrating rare unity over demands that big tech take more responsibility for child protection, including that they endorse a number of pending child safety bills as well as calls for the repeal or modification of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which provides these companies with immunity from civil liability from those harmed by user-generated content that appeared on their services.

I’ll leave it to subsequent columns to comment on these and other proposals, but it’s important to recognize that there is definitely a role for Congress to play in helping to protect children and adults from online harms. As is always the case with legislation, details matter. Well-meaning and seemingly beneficial legislation may or may not improve the situation and can sometimes make matters worse.

Our behavior matters

ConnectSafely’s Safer Internet Day program won’t solve all the problems associated with connected technology, nor will it make anyone 100% safe. But, as the name suggests, following the lessons you can learn or reinforce on that day – or any day – can make us all safer by learning to understand and manage risks.

We also need some help from both industry and government. Lessons on how to more safely drive cars have been around since the early days of the automobile, but it took public outcry, federal and state legislation and industry compliance to make cars safer than they were in the days of the Tin Lizzie. Seat belts, airbags, anti-lock braking and many other car safety features weren’t around during my childhood, but now we take them for granted, along with all sorts of regulations on the auto industry and those of us who drive cars.  But neither technology nor regulation is a substitute for safe, or should I say “safer” driving. The same goes for our use of connected technologies.

Disclosure: Larry Magid is CEO of ConnectSafely, a nonprofit internet safety organization that receives financial support from Discord, Meta, Snap, TikTok and other technology companies. 

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

Sunday’s Super Bowl will have many exciting moments, but sorry sports betters, I am not able to predict what will happen on the field. But one prediction I can make is that we’ll see at least a few commercials about generative AI and plenty of commercials that were created, in part, using AI tools.

Some of these ads are already available to watch online, including the ad for Microsoft Copilot (“everyday personal AI companion”) and Google’s Pixel 8 commercial that shows how their new phone uses AI to make it easier for people with blindness or low vision to capture photos.  Coca-Cola even makes fun of AI in its Field of Fake BodyArmor Sports Drink commercial that shows fake football videos followed by “nothing in sports should be artificial,” along with a pitch for its drink with “real” ingredients.

The use of generative AI by professional ad creators, and the Microsoft commercial promoting a generative AI tool for the rest of us, is likely to have an impact on at least some of the estimated 200 million people predicted to watch Sunday’s game.

Brief history of generative AI

The term “artificial intelligence” and even some early musings about generative AI have been around since the 1950s, but GAI didn’t make it into most people’s vocabulary until about a year ago after the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT.  Microsoft is a major investor in OpenAI. Microsoft’s Copilot AI, formerly known as Bing Chat, shares technology with ChatGPT, including the use of OpenAI’s Large Language Model, which is the underlying technology that understands and generates natural language.

Shortly after OpenAI and Microsoft showed the promise of generative AI, Google forcefully put its hat into the GAI ring with the release of Bard, a chatbot that shares characteristics of ChatGPT and Copilot.

Copilot integrated into Microsoft products

One differentiator for Copilot is its integration into Microsoft 365 (also known as Microsoft Office) products including Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook. Microsoft Word, for example, can now help users come up with wording or phrases to improve their documents. PowerPoint users can use Copilot to help create slides. Outlook can now help suggest wording for emails.

Copilot is also integrated into Windows 11. Look for a Copilot icon in the lower left of your taskbar. If you don’t see it, search for “how to install copilot in Windows” for instructions.

You can also use Copilot on the web at copilot.microsoft.com.

Drawings

One of the most compelling and fun aspects of generative AI is the ability to create images. I have zero artistic talent, but I do know how to enter prompts into GAI products, which has empowered me to create all sorts of images, including my introduction to generative AI slide show that you can view at connectsafely.org/genaislides.

Microsoft Copilot, Google Bard and the paid version of ChatGPT 4 all enable you to create illustrations simply by describing what you want. I asked Copilot to “draw a dog riding a pink and blue bicycle” and got four initial drawings. The same prompt on ChatGPT 4 generated its own version of that bike-riding dog.  When I used ChatGPT to create illustrations for my presentation, I was sometimes unhappy with the first result, but typing “try again” would give me another iteration, so eventually, it gave me something I could use.

Other Uses

One of my favorite uses of GAI is recipe planning. You could, for example, ask any of these services to plan five meals a week that take under 30 minutes to prepare and then ask follow up questions like “make at least one of them vegetarian.”  You can also give it a list of ingredients that you have at home, and more likely than not, wind up with a recipe for a pretty decent meal.

I have also used GAI to get product recommendations, to learn how to use a software program or a device or household tasks such as “how do you unclog a kitchen sink.”

I’m extremely cautious when asking GAI services for medical advice and would never take medication or submit to a procedure without getting advice from a competent medical professional. I’m even nervous about asking it about symptoms or medical test results for fear that I’ll get information that might scare me or cause me not to take something seriously enough. For those types of issues, I’m much more likely to message or call a doctor. However, it can be a useful way to get more information about conditions or procedures such as “how much radiation do you get from a chest X-ray, but even then, I would verify that information from a known and reputable medical source.

All of the popular GAI services will tell you who is playing in the Super Bowl, where and what time to watch it on TV and online and suggest what snacks to serve, but sadly, none of them will predict who will Super Bowl LVIII or how many times the camera will focus on Taylor Swift. For that, you’ll have to wait till Sunday night.

Larry Magid is a tech journalist and internet safety activist. Contact him at larry@larrymagid.com.

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

As regular readers of this column know, I am pretty bullish on generative AI (GAI). I’ve spent many hours using products like ChatGPT, Google Gemini and Microsoft Copilot to make travel plans, get product information, get ideas for meal planning along with recipes and lots more. I’ve also used DALLE-2, the image generation program built into the $20 a month version of ChatGPT to create images for my website, holiday cards and illustrations for presentation slides.

And while I’m convinced GAI is the wave of the future, I have mixed feelings about the fact that Google, Microsoft and other companies are embedding it into programs and web apps like Gmail, Outlook, Microsoft Word, Excel and other applications. I don’t mind using GAI for research, to get ideas for writing projects, to create outlines, to help edit my work or even to suggest a sentence or two, but I’m not enthusiastic about it popping up the moment you open a new document where it invites you to use the GAI service to help compose emails, essays and other writing projects. Google Gemini’s “Help me write” feature, for example, asks you to pick a topic and then generates the entire project, be it an email or even a newspaper article.

Originality

I worry most about its impact on originality. While not everyone is an accomplished writer, I do believe that most people have original things to say whether it’s about their own lives or areas of expertise. When you’re inputting the words on your own, you have to come up with not only original thoughts but a unique way of phrasing them. With GAI, the algorithm does that for you in ways that may be palatable, but not original or reflective of your unique feelings, personality or knowledge.

Having said that, I must admit that sometimes it does come up with phrases that are sometimes as good or better than what I could write myself. For this article, I asked Google Doc’s Help to write about what is wrong with features like “help me write,” and it admitted that it can be “formulaic and clichéd because generative AI is trained on large datasets of existing text, and it learns to generate text that is similar to what it has seen before,” even acknowledging that it, as well as other GAI products, “often produces content that is bland and uninspired.”  That’s not a bad way of phrasing the issue, and I do have to give the algorithm some credit for being self-critical.

Inaccuracies and bias

There is, of course, the risk of what it comes up with being inaccurate or biased. Features like Google Gemini have gotten better since I started using them only a few months ago and will continue to improve, but they still make mistakes and still reflect the biases of the humans who created the technology. Google this week paused the human image generation feature in Gemini after being criticized for what the company admitted were “inaccuracies in some historical image generation depiction,” where it tried so hard to depict diversity that it wound up creating images of Black Nazi-era German soldiers. A query for “generate a picture of a US senator from the 1800s,” came up with pictures of people who were Black, Native American and female, which would have been great had it been true. On X, the company wrote, “We’re working to improve these kinds of depictions immediately. Gemini’s AI image generation does generate a wide range of people. And that’s generally a good thing because people around the world use it. But it’s missing the mark here.”

Citing the source

I’m sure Google can and will fix that, but I still worry about GAI’s impact on creativity. So far, I feel that it’s helped expand my creativity by giving me ideas that I express in my own words, but it’s also very easy to simply copy and paste words from these services as if they are your own. I admit to having done that a couple of paragraphs earlier in this column, but, in my defense, I put those words in quotation marks and cited the source.

One of my beefs with most GAI systems is that they often don’t cite the source of the information they create. Aside from the possibility of plagiarism, there is often no easy way to verify the accuracy of what they come up with. If you use their words in what you’re writing, you will be the one guilty of misleading your readers. That’s not to say that sources can’t be wrong, but as bad as it might be to quote an inaccurate source, it’s even worse to say something inaccurate indirectly as if the misinformation originated with you.

And, finally, I think that I’ll miss that sensation I had many years ago staring at a blank piece of paper or blank screen. There is something about composing from scratch — having to come up with an idea and struggle with the best way to say it — that makes our creations more human and less formulaic. Sure, Gmail can write a well-worded email on just about every subject, including breaking up with a romantic partner, but as hard as it may be, there are some things best said in your own words.

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

Gmail’s free email service is extremely popular, but many people don’t take advantage of some of its more powerful features like the ability to schedule emails into the future, snooze emails you don’t want to deal with right now, filter out emails from people or companies you don’t want to hear from, put stars on emails from certain people, filter and label emails into their own folders and separate your emails into “important” and “everything else.”

Schedule send

One feature I use a lot is the ability to schedule when to send an email. The nice thing about doing this in Gmail is that the scheduling is done via the cloud so that the email will go out regardless of whether your device is turned on at that time.  You create your email the usual way, but instead of clicking on the Send button, you click on the down arrow to the right of Send on a PC or select Schedule send from the vertical three-dot menu on the Gmail mobile app. At that point, you can select when you want to send it from a list of suggested times, or you can pick any date and time up to 49 years into the future. I use this for sending birthday or anniversary messages to arrive at the appropriate time, sending emails on weekends or evenings, scheduled to arrive during the business day and sending reminders to myself about events or deadlines, like renewing my homeowners insurance or canceling a trial subscription. I’ve also used it to send reminders to people I’m meeting with so that they get an email just before the event.

Snoozing and marking as unread

You might get a message that is important, but you can’t read it or respond to it right away.  I sometimes intend to get back to a message, but it slips my mind. There are two easy ways to remind you about that email. One is to mark it as unread, so it remains in bold in your inbox. Another is to “snooze” the email and have it re-arrive at a later time. When you snooze, the message goes away but reappears at the appointed time.  You’ll find a Snooze link above your inbox on the web version, or you can swipe right on the mobile version to snooze an email.  I find this very useful when I get an email on my mobile device but want to respond from my PC with a physical keyboard.

Unsending an email

If you click the send button and quickly realize you might not want to send it or might want to take another look, you can click undo and return to the edit window to fix anything that might be wrong or simply close the email and not send it. But there’s an important caveat. You should first go into settings, look for the Undo send option and select how many seconds for the cancellation period. The minimum is 5 seconds and the maximum, which I recommend, is 30 seconds, which gives you enough time to think about it. Once that period has gone by or if you don’t click undo, the message goes out, and there is nothing you can do to keep it from arriving at its destination.

Filters, labels and forwarding

Labels allow you to organize your email by category. By default, Gmail applies labels like Inbox, Spam, Trash, Sent, Unread and Important, but you can create your own labels like Family, Work, Book Club or whatever. Once you create a label, you’ll see it listed below the default labels with emails that apply to that label showing up when you click on it.  On the web version of Gmail, you can add a label to any email by opening it and clicking on Labels above the inbox. When you apply a label, that email will remain in your inbox and also show up when you click on the label’s name to the left of your inbox on the web version or from the menu on the mobile version.

Filters give you even more control over incoming email, including the ability to block emails from certain people, automatically star emails, automatically apply a label, always mark the email as important or forward it to someone else.  You can filter emails based on who they are from, who they are to, subject matter, words that appear, words that don’t appear, the size of the message or whether it has an attachment.

Blocking and reporting spam

You don’t need to go through the hassle of creating a filter to block emails from people. On any incoming email, you can select the three-dot menu and select the Block option, which will also include the name of the sender. From then on, any emails from that address will be automatically blocked. You also have the option to report spam for that sender, which sends a copy of the message to Google for them to consider whether to take action against the send.  You can always unblock a person by going into Settings, clicking on Filters and Blocked Addresses and unblock them.

These are some of my favorite Gmail tips, but there are plenty of other options that you can explore by searching “Gmail tips.”

And here’s a tip that applies to any email or messaging app. If you’re angry at someone or have something to say that you might possibly later regret, your best bet is to send it to yourself rather than that person and then read it the next day to see if you still want to send it. Better yet, don’t send it at all but instead call the person or meet with them in person.

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

I have a confession to make. I sold my 2018 mid-range Model 3 and bought a 2024 Tesla Model 3, formerly code-named “Highland,” which offers greater range, a much quieter and more comfortable ride and other refinements.

The reason I bought it this month was to take advantage of a temporary offer to transfer my so-called Full Self Driving (FSD) software from my old Tesla to the new one without having to pay $12,000 or $200 a month for the software. I’ll save the reason for my confession till I’m done reviewing the new car and the latest version of Tesla’s FSD software.

More luxurious and less expensive

Despite some minor outside cosmetic changes, the new 2024 Model 3 looks similar to the previous model, which has been mostly unchanged since it was introduced in 2017. The headlights are a bit slimmer, the fog lights have been removed and the car is more aerodynamic, which makes it more efficient. The car just seems better built. You can even hear and feel a difference when you close the door. It’s a lot more luxurious than it was when I bought mine in 2018. They even added ambient internal lighting, which is a bit of a gimmick but still nice.

The $38,990 starting price for the rear-wheel drive Standard Range model, which the EPA estimates having a 272-mile range, is about $10,000 less than what Cars.com says is the average price of new cars it lists. Even the all-wheel-drive (AWD) long-range version, at $47,700, is below that $49,000 average new car price. Two years ago, the long-range Model 3 cost just under $60,000.

Two models identical in most ways

In most ways, the new standard and long-range Model 3s are identical. The long-range has an EPA rating of 341 miles, an upgraded audio system with 17 vs. 9 speakers and accelerates a little faster (4.2 seconds vs 5.8), although both have the same top speed of 125 MPH.  Personally, I don’t care about speed. I’ll never accelerate that fast, nor will I ever drive anywhere near 125 MPH. The long-range all-wheel drive, which has a separate motor for each axel, is said to provide better traction in snow, but I haven’t tried that, nor do I have any plans to voluntarily find out if it can get me out of a ditch or a major snowstorm.

I bought the long range to eliminate range anxiety on long trips to out-of-the-way locations, but I admit that the anxiety is mostly in my head. My old mid-range Model 3 had an even lower range than the new standard range, and I never came close to running out of juice, although I did have to plan some of my trips carefully. There were a couple of times when I had to forgo a side trip because of fear of running out of electricity.

Because Tesla has an extensive network of Superchargers, you can drive almost anywhere and back so long as you’re near a major highway. Most people will not achieve the EPA estimated range, especially in cold weather or at fast highway speeds.

One other difference between the standard and the long-range model is that the standard’s battery can be regularly charged up to 100%. The long-range’s battery chemistry, to reduce degradation, is designed to be charged to 80% for daily use and 100% only for road trips. As a result, they both have about the same practical range for daily driving, so the long-range is only necessary for those who plan to use it on long trips or the rare commuter who has to drive more than 100 miles each way or those who can’t charge at home and want to avoid frequent use of public chargers.  All rechargeable batteries degrade over time, although Tesla batteries degrade slowly and LFP batteries used in the standard model are said to degrade at an even slower rate.

Awkward turn indicators

The one thing I don’t like about the new Model 3 is that Tesla has eliminated the stalks on both sides of the steering wheel that were used as turn indicators on the left side and shifting between drive and reverse on the right. Instead, you shift by swiping up (for drive) or down (reverse) at the left edge of the car’s touch screen. You indicate a turn or lane change by pressing a button on the left side of the wheel. I quickly got used to the gear shifting but am still trying to develop muscle memory for indicating turns. I wish Tesla had left the stalks where they were, but will eventually get used to the changes.

Software is superb

What really sets Tesla apart is its software. One exciting thing about owning a Tesla is that you typically get new software updates about once a month and sometimes they come with major improvements, though they are often just minor fixes. Tesla’s big differentiator is its autopilot and FSD. Autopilot, which is free on all models, does more than keep you centered in the lane on the highway. It actually steers for you and slows down or stops based on traffic. I find it incredibly useful on highways. You have to keep your hands on the wheel to prove that you’re sitting there, but the car truly does steer itself and, after tens of thousands of miles, I’ve had hardly any problems with the autosteer not only on major highways but on backroads as well. Unlike other cars’ auto-steering, Tesla’s works on any roads and highways, not designated ones.

Full Self Driving, despite its name, does not make the car autonomous but it does change lanes either automatically or in response to the turn indicator, stops at lights and stop signs, changes or exits highways to stay on your route and makes turns on city streets. Although you have to carefully monitor it and occasionally intervene, it mostly does drive itself. Glitches in early versions along with a lot of vocal critics have given FSD a bit of a bad reputation, but I’ve had pretty good luck with it.

FSD just got better

This month, Tesla started rolling out a new version of FSD (12.3) which is a big improvement.  Unlike the previous versions, it makes stops and turns smoothly, much in the same way I would if I were driving manually. I’ve driven about 100 miles on it so far. With the exception of one unwanted detour through a parking lot, it’s been great. For new buyers, FSD remains a $12,000 add-on, but Elon Musk announced this week that all Tesla owners will get a free one-month trial in an effort to convince them that it’s worth the upgrade cost.

My confession

A couple of years ago, I told friends that I would never buy a new Tesla because of Elon Musk’s antics. I know he has his admirers (and I still admire some of his accomplishments), but I’ve been very critical of his dismantling of Twitter’s moderation team, his disbanding of Twitter’s safety advisory council that I served on, and some of his more extreme statements. But after test driving the new Model 3 and thinking about Tesla’s amazing software, its impact on vehicle electrification and its progress toward self-driving, which may eventually save thousands of lives a year, I started to reconsider. The clincher was when a friend reminded me that the Model 3 is assembled in Fremont and partially designed in Palo Alto, employing thousands of my neighbors. So, I decided instead to donate to a couple of prosocial nonprofits that serve as antidotes to some of Elon’s more toxic actions.

Larry Magid is a tech journalist and internet safety activist. Contact him at larry@larrymagid.com.

by Larry Magid
This post first appeared in the Mercury News

I turned on the TV on Tuesday to catch the afternoon news, but I couldn’t get a “signal.” In my case, it had nothing to do with an antenna or a cable. Mine is a smart TV where everything, including broadcast and cable channels, are delivered through the internet via my home Wi-Fi network.

So, I commenced a series of tests and attempted fixes, most of which didn’t work. But I’m going to go through all of them because it represents a reasonable way to diagnose and fix a problem with your home network. You don’t necessarily have to go through each step in this order, but it’s how I generally approach a slow down or an outage.

Start with the device

The first thing I did was to determine if the problem was with my device, in this case, a Roku box attached to the TV. I used Roku’s Check connection tool and noticed it was extremely slow – far too slow to stream video. Then I used Roku’s “Set up connection” option to reconnect my Wi-Fi network but, again, the same result. Like many problems with digital devices, sometimes this can be fixed with a reboot, so I removed the power cable from the Roku, waited 30 seconds and plugged it back in.  Unfortunately, this didn’t help.

My next step was to figure out what was going on with my Wi-Fi network. I put my smartphone into airplane mode to disconnect the cellular connection and made sure Wi-Fi was turned on. Then I ran a speed test, using the Speedtest by Ookla app on my phone, which showed that my internet speed was extremely slow. I even walked over to my router with my phone to see if that would help, but it was still far slower than it should be. That confirmed that the problem was with the internet connection and not my Roku device.

Checking gateway and router

I have AT&T fiber, which comes with an AT&T gateway or, “modem” as we said in the old days. It’s the device that’s connected to the AT&T fiber cable. Many people only have a gateway because it can serve as a Wi-Fi device and a way to plug in computers and other wired devices, but mine happens to be connected to an Eero router, which is part of a mesh network of four Eero routers around my house to ensure connectivity in every room. Often unplugging and reconnecting (called “power cycling”) both the gateway and the router will solve internet problems. So, I unplugged both devices, waited 30 seconds and then plugged them back in. The same process works regardless of whether you have a fiber, cable or DSL connection. If you don’t have an external router, you would simply power cycle your gateway or whatever your internet service provider calls the device between its wire and your devices.

It takes several minutes for both the gateway and router to reconnect to the internet and my home devices, and in my experience, power cycling often solves problems ranging from slow internet to no internet.  But not this time. When it was back online, I was still experiencing very slow Wi-Fi and even my desktop PC, which is connected by wire to the router, was slower than usual.

Calling internet service provider

In most cases, when there’s a problem with my internet connection, it’s with the internet service provider, which might be experiencing an outage or a slowdown, so my next step was to call AT&T.

Whenever you’re dealing with any company that can access your network, it’s important to be sure you’re calling them directly and not a third party, so verify that the number you’re calling is really their number, especially if you find it via search. The best way to do that is to get it from their website or from a bill or other document from the company.

My first question to the person who answered was whether there’s an issue in my neighborhood. Sometimes they are aware of an outage or crews working in the area. She said there was no evidence of problems on their end, so she began to troubleshoot my gateway.  The customer service people at Comcast, AT&T and most other internet service providers have tools that allow them to diagnose problems with their equipment, and in some cases, to restart their devices or change configurations. With my permission, she did a series of tests and restarted my gateway but wasn’t able to solve the problem. My Wi-Fi was still quite slow.

The next step was to see if the problem was with the internet signal itself or just the Wi-Fi network, so at her suggestion, I unplugged the Eero router from the gateway and plugged my PC directly into one of the gateway’s ethernet ports. I waited a couple of minutes for the PC to get a stable connection and did another speed test, this time getting a download speed of about 950 megabits per second (Mbps), which is very close to the highest possible speed of 1,000 Mbps. This test confirmed that the problem was related to Wi-Fi and not the internet connection itself, which meant that there was nothing more AT&T could do to help. The problem had to be somewhere on my network.

Checking the router

My next step was to look at Eero’s app to see if I could find any problems with my Eero routers. I could see they were connected, and I could also see the name of every device on my network, but it didn’t give me other helpful information, so I called Eero’s support department. To my pleasant surprise, I got through quickly and reached a very helpful support person who, again with my permission, had the necessary tools to evaluate the network and make changes to my configuration.

It was a very long call with lots of steps, including unplugging all of my Eero routers and reconnecting them one at a time. That temporarily took all Wi-Fi devices off the network, which ensured that the problem wasn’t related to another device. Things were still slow, so she suggested I press the reset button on the bottom of each Eero router for 7 seconds to do a “soft reset.”  As I reconnected the various Eero devices around the house, I used my tablet to do speed checks from each room and eventually things started looking up. Be careful before pressing reset buttons. In this case, a 7 second press was fine, but if I held it down too long, it would have done a factory reset.

You’ll almost never get your connection’s full speed via a Wi-Fi connection, but I started seeing about 75 MBPS in rooms several feet from the nearest Wi-Fi connector, which is more than enough for any typical application, including streaming video. The problem was solved.

The technician wasn’t completely sure what caused things to improve, but she speculated that it was that soft reset.

My final test was to turn on the TV to see if I could stream my afternoon news program. It worked and all was good. Until, that is, I started listening to the news itself, which was not so great.

I’m glad I was able to solve my connection problems. Solving the world’s problems that I was hearing about on my TV will take a lot more effort.

Larry Magid is a tech journalist and internet safety activist. Contact him at larry@larrymagid.com.