Google adds AI-generated summaries to Discover
TechCrunch has reported that some Android and iOS users in the US are seeing cards containing AI‑generated summaries on their Discover page. These cards appear with news sites' logos in the top left of the card, with an accompanying snippet that is presumably generated from the body or headlines of those publishers' content. When users tap "see more," the card expands to show all the contributing articles for the summary. Each summary card carries a warning that it was generated by AI, which it notes "can make mistakes."
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A Google spokesperson told TechCrunch that this is a US launch of a new feature, not a test. The feature will first focus on trending lifestyle topics like sports and entertainment. In speaking with TechCrunch, Google claimed the summaries would make it easier for people to decide which pages they want to visit, though publishers are already vocal that Google's AI tools are tanking clickthrough traffic. Some estimates say as many as 64 percent of search results that include AI Overviews end without a click .
Google has been aggressively rolling out AI‑powered features. Tools like AI Overviews , AI mode in Search and AI‑generated video summary represent, in part, Google's determination to maintain its user base in the face of would‑be search‑engine replacements like ChatGPT.
The pace of this new rollout was not made clear.
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Yahoo
23 minutes ago
- Yahoo
This Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Trades at Just 22 Times Earnings -- and It's Growing Fast
Key Points Micron's earnings are expected to multiply substantially, and yet the stock can be bought at an incredibly attractive valuation right now. The growth opportunity in the memory chip market, driven by AI applications, should enable this chipmaker to deliver outstanding growth. 10 stocks we like better than Micron Technology › Artificial intelligence (AI) has supercharged the growth of many companies in the past two to three years, thanks to the huge amounts of money that are being spent on both AI hardware and software to train AI models and move them into production to unlock the benefits of this technology. Not surprisingly, many of the top AI names are now trading at expensive valuations. From chip giants such as Nvidia and Broadcom to software specialists such as Palantir Technologies and SoundHound AI, investors will have to pay huge premiums if they are looking to add a top AI stock to their portfolios right now. However, there's one company that's not just trading at an extremely attractive valuation, but is growing at an incredible pace as well thanks to AI: Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU). Let's see why investors would do well to buy this stock now. Data centers, smartphones, and computers are fueling this chipmaker's terrific growth Micron Technology manufactures and sells memory and storage chips that are deployed in AI graphics cards, personal computers (PCs), and smartphones. This makes the company one of the best bets on the secular growth of the AI hardware market. After all, AI chips used in data centers are equipped with large amounts of high-bandwidth memory (HBM), since they can provide substantially higher bandwidth and lower latency. These properties allow HBM chips to quickly transport a lot of data in comparison to legacy memory chips, making them ideal for tackling AI workloads. Micron management points out that the company has "deep relationships with practically every major customer of HBM." Third-party reports suggest the same, indicating that Micron sells its HBM to the top four AI chipmakers that produce both GPUs and custom AI processors. The company is reportedly looking to corner a fourth of the HBM market by the end of the year, and that could translate into a nice increase in Micron's revenue and earnings. After all, the HBM market's revenue is expected to almost double in 2025, generating $35 billion in sales, per Micron's estimates. What's more, the HBM market's revenue is expected to hit $100 billion by 2030. Assuming Micron can sustain a 25% share of this space, HBM alone could contribute around $25 billion to its top line after five years (based on the $100 billion revenue estimate mentioned earlier). That would give Micron's growth a big boost, considering that the company has generated just under $34 billion in revenue in the trailing 12 months. Meanwhile, additional growth is likely to come from the PC and smartphone markets, where the demand for memory is increasing on account of a bump in the average dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) content, thanks to AI. For instance, the mobile DRAM market's revenue could jump sixfold over the next decade, generating more than $636 billion in revenue, as AI and machine learning (ML) applications will lead to an increase in the amount of compute memory required in smartphones. Importantly, this isn't where Micron's list of catalysts ends. The company says that it occupied the second spot in the data center solid-state drive (SSD) market in the first quarter. Again, this could turn out to be a huge positive for Micron in the future, as the data center SSD market's size is expected to grow by over 7x through 2033 from last year's levels. In all, it is easy to see that Micron has solid secular growth opportunities that could help it remain a top growth stock in the long run, and that's why buying the stock right now is a great idea, considering its valuation. The biggest reason to buy Micron stock hand over fist Consensus estimates are expecting a 6x jump in Micron's earnings in the current fiscal year, which will end next month. This astronomical growth can be attributed to skyrocketing memory prices caused by tremendous end-market demand -- fueled by AI -- in the multiple areas discussed. What's more, Micron is expected to clock a 54% jump in earnings in the next fiscal year as well. The good part is that investors can buy Micron stock at just 22 times earnings. That's a steal, considering that the U.S. technology sector has an average earnings multiple of 51. Another thing worth noting here is that Micron is undervalued when we take into account its long-term earnings growth potential. The stock has a price/earnings-to-growth ratio (PEG ratio) of just 0.15, based on its five-year projected earnings growth, per Yahoo! Finance. The PEG ratio is a forward-looking valuation metric that's calculated by dividing a stock's earnings multiple by its estimated annual earnings growth rate over the next five years. A reading of less than 1 means that a stock is undervalued when its future growth is considered. Micron's PEG ratio suggests that it is significantly undervalued. So, this AI stock is a no-brainer buy right now, as the remarkable growth that it has been clocking of late seems here to stay for a long time. Should you invest $1,000 in Micron Technology right now? Before you buy stock in Micron Technology, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Micron Technology wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $674,281!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $1,050,415!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 1,059% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 180% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join Stock Advisor. See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of July 15, 2025 Harsh Chauhan has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Nvidia and Palantir Technologies. The Motley Fool recommends Broadcom. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Trades at Just 22 Times Earnings -- and It's Growing Fast was originally published by The Motley Fool
Tom's Guide
25 minutes ago
- Tom's Guide
Hide.me Free review
premium version is fairly decent as a VPN, with the Malaysia-based offering decent streaming support and speeds. Unfortunately its free plan, Free, does away with much of what makes it so strong. While it's understandable the company wouldn't want to give away so much of its fantastic functionality for free, it's seriously limited what it can achieve by throttling its speeds at 1 Mbps. Not only does this mean streaming is entirely ruled out, it also means its performance simply cannot hold to candle to other free services. Windscribe Free's speeds can reach almost five hundred times its maximum. On top of this, Free offers a much smaller pool of server locations than its premium compatriot, almost all of which are based in Europe. It's a shame because its apps are nicely designed, there are plenty of features like a kill switch and more, and there's a focus on privacy that's appreciated. Without the speed issue, its likely that Free could reach the ranks of our best free VPNs. If you're looking for a free VPN for private browsing and don't mind a smaller number of server locations, Free is worth a look, but for anything more demanding we'd recommend looking elsewhere. Number of servers Undisclosed Server countries 7 locations in 7 countries Supported platforms Windows, Mac, Android, iOS Simultaneous connections 1 Split tunneling Only on Windows, Android and Mac Kill switch Only on Windows, Android Protocols supported WireGuard, OpenVPN, IKEv2, SSTP, SoftEther Country of registration Malaysia Support 24/7 live chat, ticket submission, support site and community forum For a quick explanation of any VPN-related terminology, check out our VPN glossary. Plan length Overall cost Monthly cost 1 month $9.99 $9.99 1 year $54.95 $4.57 2 years $69.95 (26 months' coverage) $2.69 has a free tier, and unlike some rivals, there are no arbitrary data limits. Still, there is plenty more of the service that is significantly hampered, with a much smaller number of locations being one. Perhaps most importantly, speed is slowed to a 1Mbps crawl, meaning it's great for a spot of web-browsing as long as you're not looking to watch even low-resolution YouTube videos, but it's unlikely to be usable for anything else, including streaming or downloads. We're focused on the free version of but the service also has a paid tier that offers many of the features missing for $9.99 per month, which is one of the cheapest monthly VPN plans on the market. also offers discounts over its annual and two-yearly plans, with the two-year plan working out at $2.69 per month ($69.95 upfront for 26 months' coverage). This adds a whole host of extra features like unlimited download speeds, up to 10 simultaneous connections, and a whole host more servers, as well as impressive unblocking of streaming apps (except for Amazon's Prime Video). Free plans expire after 30 days, but you can instantly renew from the account page, with no money required to extend it. On the one hand, it's nice to see a service offer a free tier that's so easy to try, but on the other hand, the download limit makes it hard to recommend for anything more than adding a layer of anonymity while you browse the web. Score out of 10: 7 It's not uncommon for some VPNs to offer different settings and features based on platform, but it would be fair to say that Windows and Mac are the main focus for Free with additional protocols and features that aren't available on phones or tablets. Both support WireGuard, OpenVPN, IKEv2, SSTEP and SoftEther on Free. Android offers all but SoftEther, while iOS only supports WireGuard, OpenVPN, and IKEv2. That's all just on the Free plan, too, but naturally, you'll gain access to more servers and vastly improved speeds by paying for the premium version. Access to additional protocols makes little difference, speed-wise, with the included throttling, but it does allow for bypassing firewalls that may only protect against, say, OpenVPN. While offerings like SoftEther are geared toward speed, it's nice to have it in case nothing else is working to access the page you need. One thing that is on all platforms is a kill switch. Usually only the best iOS VPN apps offer this because it essentially involves the app running in the background and Apple traditionally doesn't allow third-parties to adjust network settings without user input. It's also offered on Android (which is more common) but you'll need to dig into its settings to find it. In testing, it performed well on all platforms, preventing any internet access when the VPN dropped out, but Free's Windows app gets the best deal here. That's because the Windows app gets a more customizable kill switch that can be used in automation scripts, essentially triggering just about anything you want it to when it's activated. Need an alert or to launch an app when the VPN drops out? That's all possible here, even at the free tier. So, if you're after one of the best Windows VPNs but don't want to shell out, might be an option for you. Split tunnelling is included, too, letting you decide which traffic goes via the VPN on an app-by-app basis. Given the 1 Mbps throttle, that means you can send the bare minimum that you need via Free and still run the rest of your traffic normally, which is a huge boon. If you want more granularity with multi-hop functionality, as well as streaming support and port forwarding, you'll have to upgrade to premium offering. Another surprise advantage of that speed throttle is that since data packets are encrypted twice when using OpenVPN to help with obfuscation, the speed drop that would normally occur doesn't really exist because it's already throttled so low. That slow speed can also help get around VPN blockers, so it's not without merit. Even at the free tier, automated connection is some of the best we've seen. Users can set rules when connected to Wi-Fi whether it's secured or unsecured, and Ethernet, including automatic connections, disconnections, and even ignoring all networks. If the VPN does make a decision because of a rule you've set up, the app will log this so you can understand why that choice was made, letting you check the list regularly and make changes if you need to. Windows and Mac are the main focus for Free, with additional fetaures not available on it mobile apps. That all combines to mean that in my home, the VPN won't engage, but it will at my local coffee shop. Then, at the end of the week, I can review the list of times the VPN connected automatically and make a decision on whether I trust any of those unsecured networks or not as yet. It's also good to see that apps have full IPv6 support. Most VPNs, if they do anything about IPv6 at all, have some vague checkbox feature about preventing IPv6 leaks. is the only one to give you full control over the tunnel protocol (the layer below the VPN protocol) with options including: IPv4 only, IPv6 only; both, but IPv4 preferred, or both, but IPv6 preferred. The long and short of it is that your browsing will remain anonymous regardless, but IPv6 allows for robust end-to-end encryption, while IPv4 is more commonly supported and should therefore be more compatible with just about any site or service. There's also a search bar for quickly digging through settings, which is nice. If you're searching for a specific setting, you can search directly rather than spending time going into various menus, something not enough VPN apps offer. This makes it ideal for less experienced VPN users who may know the setting they need, but just don't know where to find it. Score out of 10: 7 Continent Countries Europe 6 North America 1 South America 0 Asia Pacific 0 Africa 0 While the full version of has 2,600 servers in 91 locations, the server network for Free is much smaller. That's to be expected, of course, but it's interesting to note that of the eight server locations available, seven are located in Europe, with just one in the US. In our testing, we found the locations to look something like this: Location name in the app Likely real Location Finland Finland or Estonia France Paris Germany Frankfurt Netherlands Amsterdam Switzerland Zurich UK UK USA USA In previous years, we've seen this list include just five locations. While Free promises eight locations now, we were only able to identify seven on the free tier. The clustering of the servers we did find in Europe make it one of the better free VPNs for number of locations, but it's limited when compared to Windscribe's free plan, which includes 10 locations across a wider range of regions, including Hong Kong and Canada. As far as our testing can tell, each of these listed is a physical server, too. This means that if you connect to the Netherlands server, you can rest easy knowing that's where your data is actually going, rather than a server in, say, Belgium that's telling you it's somewhere else. Ensuring a server is more accurately located makes a big difference with unblocking geo-locked content. Finally, it's worth noting that you can only have one connection in your free plan at a time. While you could circumnavigate by making additional free accounts with additional email addresses, that's against terms of service and an awful lot of work for speeds of 1 Mbps. Upgrading to the premium tier allows for ten connections simultaneously. Score out of 10: 4 If we're talking about the premium service, yes. It's able to unlock Netflix, Disney+ and most other libraries across the globe consistently, although it isn't listed on our ranking of the best streaming VPNs due to its inability to unblock Amazon Prime Video. Its free version fares even worse though, with its 1Mbps speed throttle means streaming is essentially out of the question. does handily point out that you need the paid tier for 'streaming support' in any case. If you're looking to torrent, that 1Mbps limit will also be a wall too high to climb. P2P servers are supported, but that low download speed will mean it'll take an age to download anything. Score out of 10: 1 As we've mentioned a few times already, free tier has a huge stumbling block with its 1 Mbps streaming limit. That means, regardless of server choice, you're always going to be running at a snail's pace, and that places it drastically behind even its free rivals. While there's no measurable difference between protocols and locations, we've compared the 'nearest location' results and its rivals. VPN Service Dublin-UK Download Speed Free 1 Mbps PrivadoVPN Free 671 Mbps Windscribe Free 496 Mbps HotSpot Shield Basic (WireGuard) 385 Mbps HotSpot Shield Basic (Hydra) 108 Mbps Cloudflare 196 Mbps We did our best to stream low-quality clips on YouTube at 360p (yep, it still goes that low!), but it just wasn't possible. That makes hard to recommend for anyone looking for any respectable speeds without shelling out for a paid plan. Score out of 10: 1 Naturally, geo-unblocking and speed are valid concerns, but for many people, a VPN needs to be private for them to be able to continue communicating with the world. On that front, the 1 Mbps speed limit doesn't factor in as much as it does in prior sections, and the company is making the right noises about keeping its traffic secure. Still, while its support page talks a good game, some of its claims are relatively tricky to prove. Here's what it says: Our servers are hand-picked, security-hardened and self-maintained…To protect our users' privacy, we control and run a self-managed VPN network without any involvement of outsiders. Every server stores sensitive cryptographic keys in a temporary storage to minimize attack surface. It'd almost be more strange if servers weren't 'hand-picked' and 'security-hardened', for example, while a promise of not working with outsiders suggests the service has its own data centres, but there's almost always physical access to these. Servers storing keys 'in a temporary storage' would fit with these being RAM-based, but if that were true, it would just say it. Maybe it just means keys are stored in a folder of temporary files, which is always emptied when the server closes or starts, but the verbiage is curious. Post-quantum encryption, which is a new wave of cryptography that works to defend against quantum computers in the future that can parse huge volumes of user data in a short period, isn't included explicitly, but does have its own WireGuard configuration to assist—but only for premium subscribers. That brings us nicely to protocols, including ChaCha20 and AES-256 via WireGuard. OpenVPN, IKEv2, SSTP and SoftEther are also included, meaning there are plenty of options to try if you're having compatibility issues with any specific one. A 'no logs' policy can be a tricky thing for a VPN company to prove on its own (how can it provide evidence it doesn't do something?) so like many others, has had an external audit in order to verify this. Security firm Securitum checked server configurations, interviewed staff, reviewed deployment procedures and more, and while hasn't published the full report, the conclusion leaves little room for doubt (translated from Polish): As a result of the audit, it was confirmed that declared no-logs policy is indeed applied, and the audit did not reveal any issues on the VPN container that could lead to a compromise of user privacy. This is achieved by Free generating a random username and IP address that's internally-assigned and not public. All session data ties back to that username and IP, and there's nothing kept once you log off. That includes crash data and app telemetry, which is also anonymized to help identify more widespread issues rather than working out what you're specifically trying to accomplish during that browsing session. Overall, we'd like to see full audit reports in the future, but it's hard to find fault out of 10: 9 As with many of its rivals, does a great job of meeting its users wherever they are. There are apps for the majority of major platforms, meaning iOS, Android, Windows, Mac and Linux are all supported. Apple TV, Android TV, and Amazon Fire TV are supported, too, but given the well-documented lack of streaming functionality, it's hard to see why you'd run the free version from those. There are browser extensions for Chrome, Edge, and Firefox, too. Whichever platform you use it on, you'll hit those 1Mbps speed limits, but at least three major browsers are covered. It's easy to get started, too. Loading up the app is nice and simple, and you can hit the big button to connect, but there are advanced features available for premium plan subscribers along the edge. The free version is just as easy to use, but naturally offers fewer server locations to pick from and, as with just about any VPN worth its salt, the Mac version has a drop-down menu bar option, too, so you can make quick changes without the app being the only thing you can see. On the Windows version, its widget-focused approach was a little more complex than I'd anticipated. Although being able to move pieces of the app around is certainly flexible, it's also almost entirely unnecessary. I'm not sure anyone really needs an app dashboard which permanently tells you you're using the Free account, or a window to take them to Free's X account. If you prefer to use a map to view your locations and connect, there's already a map link in the left-hand sidebar. Sometimes, the app will even pop up when you change some network features like activating another VPN, but only on the Windows app in our testing. Mac and mobile apps didn't have the same problem. Free isn't intended for use with routers, and although it might just about be possible to cobble something together, it's not worth the effort. doesn't give free users access to manual OpenVPN or other configuration files, for instance, and even if you could set up your router, speeds of 1Mbps mean there's not enough bandwidth for one device, let alone to share with several. Score out of 10: 8 We've been testing free plan on multiple platforms, and had no issues with using it on any of the apps on offer. Free access expires every 30 days, and users can simply renew at no charge via the app. That's something to consider if you're running Free on multiple platforms because each month you'll need to essentially renew each one. The free version does have some other quirks. For one, if you've used the paid version before, the app will try to log you straight back in and essentially take away your option to simply use the free version. Eventually, I double-clicked a location in the location list, and a new 'Trial Expired' screen appeared with a 'Downgrade to free plan.' We hit 'Downgrade' and, finally, were able to use the free version. These are small issues, but one thing we really appreciate is the app making it clear which servers and features are tied to a premium subscription. Some apps have a tendency to only signpost these things once you try to use it, so the transparency is appreciated here.. Overall, is easy to use on most platforms, but there's more of a learning curve on Windows, and you'll need to renew your free monthly access every 30 days no matter which app you use. Score out of 10: 6 is based in Labuan, Malaysia, and the company has explained why it's not located in a country better known for its data privacy laws, such as Switzerland. VPN is a product of eVenture Ltd, a Malaysian-based IT Security Company. Our team comprises of people who have worked with well-known IT Corporations. We know how companies and ISPs, under the law, are forced to monitor and keep a record of your online activities. Not to be bound by such circumstances, we chose Labuan, Malaysia to be the headquarters for VPN. While it does have an office in Croatia, the VPN isn't involved with the Five Eyes Coalition between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States, and there are no third parties involved. matches up to some of the best VPNs like Express VPN when it comes to offering a 24/7 live chat service, as well as a support site and community forum for users who want to diagnose problems themselves. Sadly, traffic is slow on own forum pages, so if you do ask a question there we wouldn't expect a response anytime soon (or at all). Its support site is seemingly aimed at more established VPN users, too. The FAQ page warns that 'port 25 is blocked for security reasons', for instance, but didn't attempt to explain why that's important or why you should care (it may prevent you from sending emails). We weren't particularly impressed with its assertion that 'No, usually an unencrypted connection is as fast as an encrypted VPN connection.' Not only is it highly unlikely bouncing your traffic via a VPN wouldn't affect traffic, but itself throttles down to a paltry 1 Mbps on the free plan but makes no effort to clarify this. Thankfully, free users still get full access to live chat support. We tested it and found ourselves instantly at the front of the queue and chatting to someone within seconds. And when we raised a ticket, we had a helpful reply in under half an hour, a much faster response time than we see with many paid VPN plans. Score out of 10: 6 As we touched on earlier, privacy audit report wasn't published in full in mid-2024, but it did leave a positive impression. Individual apps weren't audited, sadly, and there's still no way to read the entire thing. That's a shame, especially because other VPN rivals have done just that, and it can lead to exploits being found within platform-specific apps. In our research, we found an entry in the National Vulnerability Database (NVB) that suggested a bug on the Mac version in 2019 that could have allowed malware to help itself to additional rights on your system, making the platform-based app audit worth doing. Still, in the importance of context, NordVPN (one of the most popular VPN services around) suffered three such breaches in 2018. In terms of customer reviews, (in its entirety, including paid plans) is also ahead of some rivals like Surfshark, ExpressVPN and NordVPN. While their customer service scores on Trustpilot range from 4.1 out of 5 to 4.4, hits a very respectable 4.5. Its mobile apps are also sitting on a 4.5 average score on their respective platforms. Score out of 10: 8 free service is a privacy-minded VPN that won't cost you a penny, but it's almost entirely hamstrung by its commitment to the 1 Mbps speed limit that makes it tough to use for anything other than very light browsing. Final rating: 57/100 Subscribe if: ✅ You need servers in one of its seven specified locations. ✅ You're looking for a free VPN that doesn't skimp on privacy. ✅ You want a super-secure free VPN. Don't subscribe if: ❌ You want a free VPN with decent speeds. ❌ You want a free VPN that supports streaming. PrivadoVPN Free Privado's free offering has some streaming functionality and 13 servers, but has a 10GB data limit per month. Proton VPN Free Proton offers fewer servers (just five) and lacks P2P support, but it's much faster than free plan. Check out our Proton VPN Free review for more detail. Windscribe Free Windscribe's free VPN plan offers additional server locations and a much faster traffic speed because it doesn't throttle. Read our Windscribe Free Review for more info. Because runs on a monthly free plan, you can simply leave it and it'll expire after 30 days. We spoke to the company's support team and they said members can also delete their data within their member settings page using their username and password. Free has servers predominantly in Europe, with one in the USA. This means its servers are too far away from China to be effective as a China VPN. I'd also recommend avoid using any free VPN service in China because the obfuscation offered is never as effective as paid offerings. If you want the best VPN for China, check out our ranking. is based in Labuan, Malaysia, with a second office in Zagreb, Croatia, according to the company's LinkedIn page. It has a second office in Zagreb, Croatia, according to its LinkedIn page. It was founded in 2011 or 2012, but its LinkedIn page doesn't confirm which. It's also now owned by eVenture Ltd, a Malaysia-based IT security company. We have a full explainer on how we test VPNs, but, in short, it goes something like this. Firstly, we test the sign-up process. How easy is it to pay, and what options are there? From there, we install the VPN on a number of devices, make notes on the simplicity of the process, and whether there are any extra steps that introduce complexity. Then comes the fun part. We use all the features, running tests to detect any problems like DNS leaks or faulty kill switches. We'll dive into the code if it's available, and see if there are any anomalies we think you might be interested in reading about. We test the speed – 120 individual tests, daytime and evening – and connect to various servers to get a good idea of how robust the server network is, and what speeds you can expect to get in normal usage. Streaming comes next. We test a wide range of global and regional streaming services to see how well each VPN can unblock content. Customer support is also very important. So, if we have any queries along the way, we'll follow the avenues provided to see how well-prepared the support team is. This includes live chat, email, and ticketed systems. Once we've done all of this, we'll have a good feel for the apps and will have found out if there are any usability quirks, or unique features that we really like. We test and review VPN services in the context of legal recreational uses. For example: 1. Accessing a service from another country (subject to the terms and conditions of that service). 2. Protecting your online security and strengthening your online privacy when abroad. We do not support or condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. Consuming pirated content that is paid-for is neither endorsed nor approved by Future Publishing.
The Hill
25 minutes ago
- The Hill
ChatGPT helps write this mayor's speeches. Now he wants a thousand city workers using AI
Before the mayor of San Jose, California, arrives at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new business, his aides ask ChatGPT to help draft some talking points. 'Elected officials do a tremendous amount of public speaking,' said Mayor Matt Mahan, whose recent itinerary has taken him from new restaurant and semiconductor startup openings to a festival of lowriding car culture. Other politicians might be skittish admitting a chatbot co-wrote their speech or that it helped draft a $5.6 billion budget for the new fiscal year, but Mahan is trying to lead by example, pushing a growing number of the nearly 7,000 government workers running Silicon Valley's biggest city to embrace artificial intelligence technology. Mahan said adopting AI tools will eliminate drudge work and help the city better serve its roughly 1 million residents. He's hardly the only public or private sector executive directing an AI-or-bust strategy, though in some cases, workers have found that the costly technology can add hassles or mistakes. 'The idea is to try things, be really transparent, look for problems, flag them, share them across different government agencies, and then work with vendors and internal teams to problem solve,' Mahan said in an interview. 'It's always bumpy with new technologies.' By next year, the city intends to have 1,000, or about 15%, of its workers trained to use AI tools for a variety of tasks, including pothole complaint response, bus routing and using vehicle-tracking surveillance cameras to solve crimes. One of San Jose's early adopters was Andrea Arjona Amador, who leads electric mobility programs at the city's transportation department. She has already used ChatGPT to secure a $12 million grant for electric vehicle chargers. Arjona Amador set up a customized 'AI agent' to review the correspondence she was receiving about various grant proposals and asked it to help organize the incoming information, including due dates. Then, she had it help draft the 20-page document. So far, San Jose has spent more than $35,000 to purchase 89 ChatGPT licenses — at $400 per account — for city workers to use. 'The way it used to work, before I started using this, we spent a lot of evenings and weekends trying to get grants to the finish line,' she said. The Trump administration later rescinded the funding, so she pitched a similar proposal to a regional funder not tied to the federal government. Arjona Amador, who learned Spanish and French before she learned English, also created another customized chatbot to edit the tone and language of her professional writings. With close relationships to some of the tech industry's biggest players, including San Francisco-based OpenAI and Mountain View-based Google, the mayors of the Bay Area's biggest cities are helping to promote the type of AI adoption that the tech industry is striving for, while also promising guidelines and standards to avoid the technology's harms. San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie announced a plan Monday to give nearly 30,000 city workers, including nurses and social workers, access to Microsoft's Copilot chatbot, which is based on the same technology that powers ChatGPT. San Francisco's plan says it comes with 'robust privacy and bias safeguards, and clear guidelines to ensure technology enhances — not replaces — human judgment.' San Jose has similar guidelines and hasn't yet reported any major mishaps with its pilot projects. Such problems have attracted attention elsewhere because of the technology's propensity to spew false information, known as hallucinations. ChatGPT's digital fingerprints were found on an error-filled document published in May by U.S. Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr.'s 'Make America Healthy Again' commission. In Fresno, California, a school official was forced to resign after saying she was too trusting of an AI chatbot that fabricated information in a document. While some government agencies have been secretive about when they turn to chatbots for help, Mahan is open about his ChatGPT-written background memos that he turns to when making speeches. 'Historically, that would have taken hours of phone calls and reading, and you just never would have been able to get those insights,' he said. 'You can knock out these tasks at a similar or better level of quality in a lot less time.' He added, however, that 'you still need a human being in the loop. You can't just kind of press a couple of buttons and trust the output. You still have to do some independent verification. You have to have logic and common sense and ask questions.' Earlier this year, when OpenAI introduced a new pilot product called Operator, it promised a new kind of tool that went beyond a chatbot's capabilities. Instead of just analyzing documents and producing passages of text, it could also access a computer system and schedule calendars or perform tasks on a person's behalf. Developing and selling such 'AI agents' is now a key focus for the tech industry. More than an hour's drive east of Silicon Valley, where the Bay Area merges into Central Valley farm country, Jamil Niazi, director of information technology at the city of Stockton, had big visions for what he could do with such an agent. Perhaps the parks and recreation department could let an AI agent help residents book a public park or swimming pool for a birthday party. Or residents could find out how crowded the pool was before packing their swim clothes. Six months later, however, after completing a proof-of-concept phase, the city didn't buy a full license for the technology due to the cost. The market research group Gartner recently predicted that over 40% of 'agentic AI' projects will be canceled before the end of 2027, 'due to escalating costs, unclear business value or inadequate risk controls.' San Jose's mayor remains bullish about the potential for these AI tools to help workers 'in the bowels of bureaucracy' to rapidly speed up their digital paperwork. 'There's just an amazing amount of bureaucracy that large organizations have to have,' Mahan said. 'Whether it's finance, accounting, HR or grant writing, those are the kinds of roles where we think our employees can be 20 (to) 50% more productive — quickly.'
