Tech Friday: The wokesters at Google have stepped in it again

| March 8, 2024

Google exec Prabhakar Raghavan explained, Gemini “may not always be reliable,” so “we recommend relying on Google Search, where separate systems surface fresh, high-quality information on these kinds of topics from sources across the web.” Google is scrambling to tamp down a political uproar after its recently launched Gemini artificial intelligence app depicted the pope, […]

Tech Friday: Be careful with Bing’s AI image creator

| November 24, 2023

A week or so ago, I went looking for an image of a Killer Whale (Orca) … and wanted one that had the happy look of a smiling Shamu, etc. It didn’t need to be a “real photo” so thought it would be a simple task for one of the artificial intelligence assistance. Microsoft’s Bing […]

A day for Gratitude: A Journey Through History

| November 23, 2023

Thanksgiving traces its origins to the 1621 harvest celebration held by the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag people in Plymouth, Massachusetts. This historic gathering marked a season of abundance and marked the beginning of a tradition that would become a cornerstone of American culture. Thanksgiving serves as a universal reminder to thank our Creator for our […]

The Texas Rangers win the 2023 World Series in 5 games

| November 2, 2023

Both Brenda and I enjoyed the World Series between the Texas Rangers and Arizona Diamondbacks this year. I really didn’t think I was going to get so emotionally involved considering the teams were not ones that I followed through the season … BUT, as with previous October playoff baseball, I did get fired up … […]

Tech Friday: What do you mean when using the buzz term AI?

| October 27, 2023

“In other news” as the 6PM nightly news talking head would say, Rich broke his Fitbit Versa 2 watchband last night while raking the first drop of the leave this year. Bummer … but thankfully replacements on Amazon are just $7.99 or $9.99 for THREE (two of the three are the wrong colors for me, […]

Tech Friday: Really just testing a WP theme and Bing AI Chat

| September 22, 2023

It is time to start cleaning up my older WordPress blog install and preparing for an eventual update … once again. I’m beginning to realize that part of the problem is that I hang onto old themes that are no longer updated and I continue to tweak them myself. As the components that run WordPress […]

Tech Friday: Artificial Intelligence photos, video and voice

| June 16, 2023

Technology advancements and AI photo and video editing has been around a few years (FaceApp photos) … but some of the newer fakes or clones are a bit “too” convincing (link to a “human generated” one, but not necessarily convincing). 😉 As a society, there’s no turning back once artificial intelligence abilities are here, but […]

Google advertising and Gmail, if you believe it (+AI voice)

| April 28, 2023

Do you trust that Google isn’t using your emails to push advertising to you? Personally I’m thinking this might be a “sleight of hand” considering the cookies and the fact you are signed into your Google account and search are used in advertising. Perhaps they aren’t using the content of Gmail to generate advertising, but […]

ART-ificial Intelligence generated images can be disturbing

| April 2, 2023

There is growing concern over AI from some of the brightest and best “human” minds in our society today. The more realistic the images (like “Puffy Pope”) and the more they fool even those seeing the AI advancements everyday, the more I’m concerned as well. Sure, artificial intelligence is speeding up our writing, generating canned […]

ChatGPT and Bard AI poetry-writing prowess compared

| March 28, 2023

While experimenting with Google’s Bard last weekend, Katelyn had the AI software write a poem about her husband. Impressive although questionable when it comes to being personal?  For the fun of it, I asked Bard to write a poem about my “Wonderful Daughter” and then sent it back to her for the fun of it. […]

Embracing Change: How to Thrive in an Ever-Changing World

| March 12, 2023

This past week my son Taylor and I had a father-son dinner together at Chili’s and enjoyed some “desultory” conversation … from the Ukraine-Russia war to ChatGPT. Eventually he commented, “Dad, you should let the AI system write or rewrite your blog posts.”   Hm … how about I just ask the Chatbot to write […]

Tech Friday: Amazon’s AI notifications needs improvement

| July 3, 2020

As often as I gripe about ordering from Amazon or more to the point, complain about their delivery and updating, one would think I would opt for another online ecommerce portal? Unfortunately there aren’t better options or more dependable deliveries. This past week a small order came a day early, yet the app notification that […]

Tech Friday: Growing pains with “person detection” AI at Wyze

| November 29, 2019

With the advent of decent quality inexpensive home security products and cameras, it has never be easier to keep an eye on “motion” that happens around a business or home. The key for most of us is to find the least expensive quality “small” product … in our case the Wyze cams have beat out […]

Pretty soon we won’t need to think at all – WIRED article

| November 16, 2019

Here’s a WIRED article that made me think … although it has a misleading title line, even if that is what caught my attention and started me reading it.  When does user-friendliness, algorithms and anticipatory artificial intelligence that is designed to help us make decisions, end up becoming "I don’t need to think at all" […]

Are you a Luddite or are you prepared for automation and AI?

| November 8, 2019

We often use the term “Luddite” whenever we refer to people resisting new technology or mechanization. Recently a Wall Street Journal article detailed a timeline of changes as much of the world is faced with yet another wave of robotic automation and artificial intelligence (AI) changing career and taking over many of the jobs we […]

Desultory - des-uhl-tawr-ee, -tohr-ee

  1. lacking in consistency, constancy, or visible order, disconnected; fitful: desultory conversation.
  2. digressing from or unconnected with the main subject; random: a desultory remark.
My Desultory Blog