When it comes to smart speakers, Amazon has Alexa, Apple has the HomePod, and Google has Nest. If you want something private — that runs locally — to control your home, there weren’t many alternatives. Or there weren’t until now. To fill that gap, Nabu Casa, the sponsor of the Home Assistant open source project,...

It’s possible that Time magazine’s Person of the Year selection — which in this issue named “the AI architects” (i.e., big-tech AI CEOs) — was chosen by an AI. First clue: calling several people the otherwise singular “Person” of the Year. Second and stronger clue: only something as dumb as an AI would pick that...

Editor’s note: Job openings are a recurring topic in the Manual supporters’ WhatsApp group. In a recent conversation there were so many useful LinkedIn tips that we ended up with a kind of playbook for doing well on the platform. Thanks to everyone who contributed, especially Marcia who steered the discussion,...

Ecosia, the search engine that directs its profits to climate action, asks whether there’s a “green” alternative for generative AI in the title of this post — and in the same post’s headline answers that “the world’s greenest AI is here.” The “greenest AI,” that paradox, is the one Ecosia just launched integrated...

Part of most people’s learning curve when they start coding is trying projects that, with luck, might become useful to themselves and others. In May I wanted to get a better handle on the WhatsApp API. I set up my local environment, logged into Meta’s developer platform and started poking around. I grabbed a test...

Mustafa SuleymanCEO da Microsoft AI Mustafa Suleyman’s outburst is a reaction to Windows 11 users’ criticism of another Microsoft exec, Pavan Davuluri, who said Windows is evolving into an “agentic” operating system. “Agentic” is a euphemism tech execs use for “AI‑stuffed software that doesn’t work properly.” In the...

I was flattered to get a reply from Anil Dash to my post about the backlash Mozilla faces for its plan to add AI to Firefox. I’ve read Anil for a long time and admire his work. That said, I respectfully disagree with his arguments — here’s why. I use generative AI tools daily, but not embedded in my web browser in a...

Mozilla is developing a built‑in AI assistant for Firefox that will be offered as a third browsing mode alongside Normal and Private tabs. They’re calling it “Window AI.” Details are still scarce. Based on Mozilla’s official announcement on Thursday (13th), it looks like a deeper implementation than the existing...

The excellent KeePassXC, an offline, open‑source password manager, is at the center of a controversy over the use of AI‑generated code after the project’s collaboration policy and README added this paragraph: Generative AI is fast becoming a first-party feature in most development environments, including GitHub...

Reuters shed light on Meta’s lucrative business built on selling fraudulent ads on its platforms — Facebook and Instagram. Internal company documents obtained by the news agency show that 10.1% of Meta’s 2024 revenue, or US$ 16 billion, came from fraudulent/scam ads. A December 2024 document shows Meta running an...

A few months ago, youtubers reported unsolicited interventions by Google to “improve” their videos with generative AI. It appeared to be a test; now it’s official. Channel owners can disable this feature in Studio: go to Settings, Channel, Advanced settings and uncheck the two options under Video quality...

Jason Lefkowitz@jalefkowit@vmst.io