On Computers

Some lawyers abuse AI, by allowing it to cite fake cases. But BrentWorks has a solution.  Unlike AI, its “CiteSentinel” tool doesn’t guess if a case is real, then lie about it when confronted. It cross references cases against verified legal databases, by scanning a legal brief and identifying every string of text.  Here’s one it would have caught before it ever went to court. In 2023, a man sued an airline after a metal cart struck his knee. His legal team used ChatGPT to generate arguments. The result was six fake citations. Even so, the team couldn’t resist turning to AI again when the judge asked for verification. Later, they had to pay a $5000 fine and send a […]

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Filed under: AI, Internuts, kids, news, passwords, photos, trends, wearables | Comments Off on AI AND THE LAW

Which is better, Android or iPhone? Whatever team you’re on, you’re unlikely to switch. Unless your family is on the other side. An Android-loving grandfather said he switched after his son-in-law couldn’t send video of his child, born seconds before. “He said the video wasn’t sending and he figured out it was me,” the reader wrote. “When he deleted me from the group, it sent, and every iPhone got it.”  There would have been no compatibility issue if everyone had been using the free WhatsApp. So I asked Granddad why he didn’t suggest it, since he’d used it to send texts to his friends in Haiti. He said he didn’t want to make everyone else use a different app just […]

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Filed under: AI, Android, Apple, games, Google, health, inventions, iPhone, news | Comments Off on ANDROID VERSUS IPHONE

We’re moving to the highest floor in our apartment building. There’s less storage space but a great view. Do we want to take 300 CDs with us? No way!  We’ll use MusicShifter.com to digitize them. We hardly ever play CDs anymore anyway, because we’re too lazy to look through them. It’s easier to say, “Alexa, play Benny Goodman.” But that’s a shame because we’ve got lots of CDs worth playing. When was the last time we played the soundtrack for the movie “The Imposters” for example? Far too long ago. Digitizing solves that problem.  MusicShifter.com will digitize all your CDs onto a thumb drive for 69 cents a CD. When you get your drive back, full of music, there are […]

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Filed under: health, music, news, wearables | Comments Off on MOVING UP IN THE WORLD

Remember those time-lapse documentaries that showed a seed sprouting, pushing up through the ground and blossoming with leaves and sometimes flowers? You can do that. Our Google Pixel smartphones have time-lapse photography built in, and so do newer Samsung, HTC, LG and iPhones. We did it in four taps. If your phone doesn’t have time-lapse photography, try “Lapse-it,” free from Lapseit.com. A pro version lets you capture video in higher resolution, and adds special effects and other features. You can see lots of examples of time-lapse photography on YouTube. Go to YouTube.com and search on “time lapse.” We saw flowers unfolding, roots shooting out, stars flashing by and clouds moving quickly across the sky. Some of the best were from […]

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Filed under: apps, gadgets, news, trends | Comments Off on TIME-LAPSE PHOTOGRAPHY

Here’s the big reason we get so much junk email. Marketers can see which email we open and respond with an avalanche of new solicitations. If we open email on our phone, as 70 percent of us do,  we might even trigger a call. In the jargon it’s called a “read receipt.” Without your knowing, marketers use these to  tell which email you open. To combat this, we’ve started using “Edison Mail” whenever we’re on our phones.  It works with Yahoo, Gmail, Apple Mail or whatever email service you use, by bringing your mail inside its app.  Besides blocking marketers, Edison neatly categorizes any info about package arrivals, bills and flight changes, while also letting you unsubscribe from any email […]

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Filed under: apps, email, Google, news, podcasts, radio, security, Windows | Comments Off on STOPPING JUNK MAIL

One of the best pieces of advice we ever got was: “Read the comments following a review.” Not only are they enlightening, they’re entertaining. Take the screen-protector review we read at HowToGeek.com. The reviewer said he couldn’t get a screen protector on his iPhone without a massive bubble under the surface. So he bought one at an Apple store for $40, because it came with free installation. We see his point. We’ve never installed a screen protector without leaving bubbles. But in the comments, the readers dumped all over the reviewer. One guy said this is “not your ordinary dumb, this is some special kind of dumb. I call it ‘iDumb.’” Another pointed out that you could go to a […]

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Filed under: Amazon, news, printer, trends | 2 Comments »

It used to be that aerial photography was available only to the richest newspapers. When Bob was the food critic for the Chicago Tribune, he remembers a photo shoot from a helicopter costing $10,000. Now with cheap drones, anybody can get an aerial shot. It’s called “Drone Journalism.” Two researchers from the University of Jyväskylä in Finland have a new book by that name. Besides the usual tips, they point out that a journalist’s drone can be stopped by the government. Dictatorships are famous for this, but even the U.S. government sometimes calls a halt. In 2016, Sioux Indians staged a major protest against a proposed oil pipeline in North and South Dakota. When the first dramatic aerial images of […]

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Filed under: Amazon, apps, Internuts, news, phones | Comments Off on DRONE JOURNALISM

Pressed for time or feeling sleepy? “Pocket” is a free app for saving articles and pictures to look at later. The app is available for Windows, Macs, phones and tablets. That’s everything but billboards. To get started on your computer, go to GetPocket.com and install it. If you use Firefox as your browser, it comes with it. Once installed, you can click the tiny picture of a pocket in the upper right of your screen any time you want to save an item for later viewing. To find the stuff you’ve saved, click on the pocket and “view list.” It might also save whatever you’re looking at right at that moment at the same time, but live with it. So […]

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Filed under: Android, environment, health, magazines, news, numbers, web | Comments Off on SEE IT LATER

Google Home plays music, brings you news, puts videos on your TV and answers questions. “Internuts:” (interesting websites) include Lighter.world and a site for writers.

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Filed under: gadgets, Google, health, news, TV, video, voice recognition | Comments Off on SOMEONE IS LISTENING

Reuters TV is a free app for Android and iPhone, as well as iPad, Apple TV and the web. On the web, go to Reuters.TV for what looked to us like even-handed coverage; they are especially strong on international news.

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Filed under: news, video | Comments Off on REUTERS TV