On Computers

When I tried the new Alexa Plus back in March, she seemed dumber than the old Alexa. But after a friend raved about her, I decided to give her another chance. Now I agree. Plus is a plus.  Alexa Plus works with the Echo Dot, Echo Show, Amazon Fire tablet and Fire TV stick or cube, version 2019 or newer. To upgrade, just ask your old Alexa for Alexa Plus. Then try asking any open-ended question, the kind Old Alexa can’t handle. I requested “music as cheery as the Music Man musical.” She gave me “Broadway Classics with a Twist.” Odd, but OK. I also asked Plus if it was true that in the American Revolutionary War, Britain moved a […]

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Filed under: AI, Internuts, Mac, text messaging, Windows | Comments Off on ALEXA GETS A BOOST

As I stood outside a California restaurant waving goodbye to a friend, my phone stopped working. Had I been hacked?  Even before it stopped working, it had slowed to a crawl. Then, just as suddenly, it sprang back to life. That’s how I was able to order a Lyft to get back to my sister’s house. Before I could enter my destination, however, the app thanked me for scheduling a ride with my pet. It also assumed I was going to a Monarch Beach resort. Weird. I don’t have a pet and I wasn’t headed for the resort. I hopped into the Lyft anyway, explaining to the driver, who spoke limited English, that I was going to a different address. […]

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Filed under: Android, Internuts, security, text messaging, Virtual Reality, virus | Comments Off on HACKED!

I just made a website with the help of artificial intelligence. It was fun, but far from perfect. AI did a good job creating a site for my magician friend, but a lousy job helping me tweak it. I had to start over. For example, when I asked AI to replace a photo with one of my own, it told me to click a non-existent “replace” button. I tried asking for more help, but the site just got worse and worse. By then, it warned me that I’d used 28 prompts, and the free trial only comes with 30. So I started over, and got a new batch of 30. This time, I used only the first prompt, by asking […]

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Filed under: AI, gadgets, photos, robots, text messaging | Comments Off on LET AI CREATE YOUR NEXT WEBSITE

Most seniors stick to Google, but young people increasingly turn to artificial intelligence. It’s great for financial questions. For example, a relative was interested in a reverse mortgage, but wasn’t sure how it worked. So I clicked the Copilot icon in Windows (also available at copilot.microsoft.com and in a free mobile app.) Then I typed: “How much would a reverse mortgage on a fully-paid-off $400,000 house pay to a 75-year-old New Hampshire man over the next 20 years?” Assuming an average rate of five percent, the estimated annual payout would be $15,000 to $20,000 a year and even more if he waited until he was 78, Copilot said. Next I asked what would happen if he died before getting his […]

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Filed under: AI, Internet, text messaging, Wikipedia, Windows | Comments Off on GETTING FINANCIAL INFO FROM AI

A reader asked me how he might safely donate a computer to a local refurbishing group. “Our son-in-law takes the hard drive out and destroys it with a hammer,” he said. “Is that the best way?” Unless you have business secrets or a celebrity past, you probably don’t need to destroy or remove perfectly good equipment. Instead, try the free Windows program “Eraser,” which uses Department of Defense-level data destruction algorithms to get rid of files permanently. For Macs, there’s “Clean My MacX Shredder,” $40. Both are highly recommended by TechRadar. But for most people, a factory reset is enough. Even for an expert, it would take specialized software to restore your files after a reset, which often doesn’t work. […]

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Filed under: 3D Printing, AI, apps, art, career, printer, robots, science, security, text messaging, trends, voice recognition | Comments Off on GIVING AWAY OLD COMPUTERS

For her 11th birthday, my niece got a $36 Bluetooth speaker that plays music, lights up in multiple colors and calls her friends. The Hetyre Night Light Bluetooth Speaker is a 6-inch tall reading lamp, nightlight, music player and alarm clock. My niece said the alarm woke her up with the sound of birds. “My parents thought there were birds outside fighting,” she said. “It sounded like a battle.” She figured out all the features without reading the manual or asking her parents for help. For the toddler crowd, there’s the PlayMonster “OK to Wake,” $20 on Amazon. It has multiple colors, five levels of brightness and turns green when it’s okay to get out of bed. I first heard […]

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Filed under: AI, analytics, astronomy, gadgets, health, Linux, social networks, text messaging | Comments Off on KID TECH

I asked an artificially intelligent version of Elon Musk what his most embarrassing moment was. He said it was sending a message to the whole office about “naughty snacks.” If you want to talk to him too, he’s at the website Character.ai. Character.ai, also a free app, offers a range of AI celebrities and professionals. Winston Churchill told me how the war in Ukraine will end. Signmund Freud told me not to feel guilty. An AI Frenchman helped me practice my language skills. A librarian gave me a great book suggestion. It’s addicting. You can create your own AI character for free.  I named mine “Health” and wrote a one-paragraph description on what it means to be a “Nutritarian.” After that, it […]

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Filed under: AI, apps, batteries, computers, Google, Internuts, passwords, photos, security, text messaging | Comments Off on AI CELEBRITIES TO CHAT WITH

Artificially-intelligent bots are plagiarizing known authors. It happened to author Jane Friedman, who reports on the publishing industry. A copycat version of her work was reviewed on Goodreads. Friedman told ZDnet that an author she found on Twitter.com has been plagiarized by AI bots 29 times. It could be a growing problem. Suppose, for example, that you insert the text of a published novel into a site like ChatGPT, and ask for it to be rewritten in the bot’s own words. Next you run the result through an AI content detector. If it scores 100 percent, it’s 100 percent fakey-sounding. So you tweak it a bit before uploading to Kindle Direct Publishing. I decided to test this idea myself. I […]

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Filed under: AI, environment, games, Google, health, Internuts, kids, security, text messaging, video, word processing | Comments Off on PLAGIARISM BY CHATBOTS

Sometimes, an artificially-intelligent search bot doesn’t know beans about beans. It can even confuse poison with food. ArsTechnica bloggers went to saveymeal-bot.co.nz, where a robot creates recipes from what you have on hand. When the bloggers typed “ammonia, bleach and water,” they got a recipe for “the perfect non-alcoholic beverage to quench your thirst.” To avoid disasters, the site now asks you to choose ingredients from a list. From my humorous choices, they created “Pickled Spaghetti Surprise.” It included jam, olives, pickles and mayo. Turning serious, I got a surprisingly tasty “Creamy Peanut Noodle Stir Fry.” To try it yourself, go to saveymeal-bot.co.nz, and click “Get Savey.” Then choose your ingredients. Happy cooking. Sharing Your Location I love sharing my […]

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Filed under: AI, Android, apps, cheap calls, Internuts, maps, photos, security, text messaging, virus | Comments Off on MORE PROOF THAT AI ISN’T ALWAYS INTELLIGENT

When a neighbor’s 12 year-old stayed with me for a week, she stayed up past midnight every night to shop on her phone. Where were parental controls when I needed them? It turned out she was buying cheap items from China. The same $12 necklace from Target was only $1 online, she pointed out to me while we were in the store. Once, she came to me at 2 a.m. to ask if she could use my PayPal password for a $20 shipping charge. Another time, she didn’t go to sleep until 9 a.m. the next day. Short of taking her phone away, I wish I’d had a Gryphon. The Gryphon is a router that lets you strictly monitor how […]

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Filed under: apps, environment, Internuts, kids, text messaging, YouTube | Comments Off on HOW TO PREVENT TECH ADDICTION IN KIDS