AI in practice Archive

Mar 12, 2026

Google has introduced "Ask Maps," a conversational feature powered by its Gemini models. Users can ask questions in plain language, like "Is there a public tennis court with lights on that I can play at tonight?" or "My phone is dying — where can I charge it without having to wait in a long line for coffee?" The feature taps into data from more than 300 million locations and reviews from over 500 million contributors.

Results show up on a personalized map based on past searches and saved places. Users can book tables, save or share locations, and jump into navigation directly. Ask Maps is rolling out first in the US and India on Android and iOS, with a desktop version on the way.

Google also announced "Immersive Navigation," a revamped turn-by-turn system with a 3D view of surroundings, including buildings, overpasses, and lane markings. Gemini models generate the visuals by analyzing Street View and aerial imagery.

Immersive Navigation launches first in the US, expanding to more iOS and Android devices, CarPlay, Android Auto, and cars with built-in Google over the coming months.

Comment Source: Google

Matthias Bastian

Mar 12, 2026

Short News

OpenAI is reportedly planning to fold its video AI Sora directly into ChatGPT. So far, Sora has only been available as a standalone mobile and web app. OpenAI originally pitched it as a viral hit and potential TikTok alternative, a strategy that seemed to work early on, partly thanks to massive copyright infringements.

That momentum didn't last. According to The Information, the app has slid from No. 1 to No. 165 in the Apple App Store since launching last fall. CEO Sam Altman reportedly admitted internally that hardly anyone was sharing videos publicly. Rolling Sora into ChatGPT might fix that: with around 920 million weekly active users, the move would naturally drive more video generation. The standalone app will stick around for now, The Information reports.

Google already offers video generation in Gemini, though with tight capacity limits and only for paying subscribers. OpenAI will likely go a similar route: the company is strapped for compute, burns through cash supporting the roughly 95 percent of free ChatGPT accounts, and video generation is especially resource-hungry.

Comment Source: The Information

Matthias Bastian

Mar 12, 2026

AI in practice

Meta unveils four generations of custom AI chips to cut inference costs for billions of users

Jonathan Kemper

Mar 11, 2026

AI in practice

Google unifies text, image, video, and audio in a single vector space with Gemini Embedding 2

Google’s first native multimodal embedding model brings text, images, video, audio, and documents into one vector space, cutting out the need for separate models in AI pipelines.

Read full article

Comment

Matthias Bastian

Mar 11, 2026

AI in practice

Half of AI-written code that passes industry test would get rejected by real developers, new study finds

Maximilian Schreiner

Mar 11, 2026

Short News

Anthropic is updating its Claude add-ins for Excel and PowerPoint with shared context, reusable workflows, and broader cloud support.

Anthropic is adding three new features to its Claude for Excel and Claude for PowerPoint add-ins. The two add-ins now share conversation context, so Claude can read cell values, write formulas, and edit slides in a single session without users having to repeat information.

The company is also introducing what it calls Skills, reusable workflows that teams can share as one-click actions for tasks like financial model reviews or deck analysis. A preinstalled starter set covers common use cases.

Both add-ins are now available through Amazon Bedrock, Google Cloud Vertex AI, and Microsoft Foundry, letting companies pick the cloud provider that works best for them. All features are available to paying users on Mac and Windows.

Many of these capabilities are already built into the Claude app itself, particularly in Cowork mode, which is now also part of Microsoft's Copilot.

Comment

Jonathan Kemper

Mar 11, 2026

Short News

Grammarly is apparently using the names of journalists and authors without permission for an AI feature called "Expert Review." The feature offers writing tips that are supposedly "inspired" by experts like Stephen King or Neil deGrasse Tyson. Even people who have already died, such as Carl Sagan, are reportedly included. As The Verge, Platformer, and Wired report, the feature also lists numerous tech journalists, including Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel and other editors. None of them were reportedly asked beforehand.

Screenshot: Grammarly Expert Review-Panel mit AI-Schreibvorschlägen von Technologie- und Stil-Experten. — The Expert Review panel in Grammarly provides context-based writing recommendations.

After the backlash, Grammarly reportedly offered only an opt-out option via email - no apology. Alex Gay, vice president of product marketing at parent company Superhuman, said the feature never claimed direct involvement from the experts. According to The Verge, some of the feature's source links pointed to spam sites or completely unrelated content. Expert descriptions also contained outdated job titles. The AI suggestions show up in Google Docs looking like real user comments, which can easily mislead people.

Comment Source: The Verge | The Verge | Wired | Platformer

Maximilian Schreiner

Mar 11, 2026

AI in practice

An AI agent hacked McKinsey's internal AI platform in two hours using a decades-old technique

Security firm Codewall turned an offensive AI agent loose on McKinsey’s internal AI platform Lilli, a system used by over 43,000 employees for strategy work, client research, and document analysis. No credentials, no insider knowledge, no human assistance. Within two hours, the agent had full read and write access to the production database.

Read full article

Comment

Matthias Bastian

Mar 10, 2026

Short News

A federal court in San Francisco has granted Amazon an injunction against AI startup Perplexity, barring it from using its AI browser agent Comet to make purchases on Amazon.

Amazon sued Perplexity in November, accusing the startup of fraud because Comet didn't disclose when it was shopping on behalf of a real person and ignored Amazon's demands to stop. The case raises a growing legal question: how should courts handle AI agents taking on complex tasks like online shopping?

Judge Maxine Chesney ruled that Amazon presented strong evidence that Perplexity was accessing users' password-protected accounts with their permission but without Amazon's authorization. Perplexity must also delete any collected Amazon data and has one week to appeal.

There's an interesting wrinkle here: Amazon recently became a major investor in OpenAI, which also sees product research and online shopping as key AI chat features. So far, though, OpenAI reportedly hasn't cracked direct checkout in its chat interface. Amazon may be positioning itself to step in and own that piece of the puzzle.

Comment Source: Bloomberg

Matthias Bastian

Mar 10, 2026

Short News

OpenAI is rolling out dynamic visual explanations for more than 70 math and science concepts in ChatGPT. Users can tweak variables in real time and see the effects on graphs and formulas instantly. For now, the topics are geared mainly toward high school and college students, covering things like binomial squares, exponential decay, Ohm's law, compound interest, and trigonometric identities.

According to OpenAI, the interactive explanations are available now to all logged-in users worldwide, regardless of their subscription plan. Over time, OpenAI plans to expand the learning modules to cover additional subjects.

Comment Source: OpenAI