Gmail’s new AI features are finally available to everyone.

It launched for Android in August, but now you can dive in, too. Wondering how it works?

I’ve got all the details for you, plus some other exciting AI stories you’ll love.

Here’s what you’re going to explore in this post:

• AI in Gmail

• Character AI

• Meta smart glasses

• Apple released Depth Pro

📧 GOOGLE UPDATE:

Gmail users on iOS can now chat directly with Google's Gemini about their inbox, making email management smarter and faster.

Initially available to Android users, this feature, dubbed Gmail Q&A, is now rolled out for iOS users with Google One AI Premium subscriptions or Google Workspace accounts that have Gemini Business, Enterprise, or Education plans.

The Details:

• Ask Gemini about specific emails: You can ask questions like, “How much did we spend on the last marketing event?” or request unread messages from a specific sender.

• Email summaries: Gemini can summarize emails on a particular topic, such as "Give me a summary of all quarterly planning emails."

• Future integration with Google Drive: While currently limited to inbox searches, Gemini will eventually be able to pull information from Google Drive, expanding its functionality even further.

• Gmail search bar remains: The traditional search bar will still be there, with a Gemini button added beside it for AI-driven search options.

These updates are part of Google's broader strategy to integrate AI into its services, keeping Gmail competitive. It follows on the heels of Apple's recent Mail app enhancements, which introduced features that rival Gmail's functionality.

Read here more.

🧍Character AI:

Character AI’s Big Shift After $4B Google Deal: A New Focus on Chatbots

Character AI is making a big move. After a major $4 billion deal with Google, the company is shifting away from developing large AI models. Instead, they’re honing in on their strength—building an engaging chatbot platform for everyday consumers.

The details:

• The rising cost of AI training pushed Character AI out of the large AI model race. Competing with tech giants like Google and Microsoft became financially impossible.

• Character AI's interim CEO, Dominic Perella, explained that training cutting-edge AI models is insanely expensive—something smaller companies can’t sustain.

• The company is pivoting to its consumer chatbot platform, which already has over 20 million monthly users, mainly young people between 13-25 years old.

• Google acquired a one-time license to Character.ai's technology in the deal. They also hired 20% of Character.ai’s staff, including its founders, Noam Shazeer and Daniel De Freitas.

• Despite the changes, Perella assured that Character.ai is still thriving, with funding secured for the next 18 months. Their main focus now is growing their chatbot platform, a service that has seen incredible success with young users.

The Future of Chatbots 

Character.ai’s decision reflects the broader challenges in the AI industry. Developing frontier AI models is a costly endeavor. For companies like Character.ai, the future lies in leveraging existing technologies, not reinventing the wheel.

Read here more.

👓 Meta smart glasses:

Students Use Meta’s Smart Glasses to Expose Alarming Privacy Risks

A chilling demo from two Harvard students shows how Meta's Ray-Ban smart glasses can be used to invade privacy by identifying people and accessing their personal information in real-time. What makes this even more unsettling? The technology involved is already widely available to the public.

The Details:

• Facial Recognition: Students AnhPhu Nguyen and Caine Ardayfio demonstrated a program called I-XRAY, which uses Meta's smart glasses and AI to recognize faces in real-time.

• Public Databases: The glasses capture images of people, and the program links these faces to names, phone numbers, addresses, and relatives by searching public databases.

• Real-Time Doxing: In the demo, Nguyen and Ardayfio identify classmates and even strangers, collecting personal details with ease, all while pretending to know them.

• Tech Involved: I-XRAY connects technologies like PimEyes, a face search engine, and large language models (LLMs) to gather data automatically.

• Ethical Concerns: Despite their disturbing application, the students claim their intent is to raise awareness about the risks of such technology.

While Nguyen and Ardayfio aren't releasing this tool, their demo exposes the dark side of smart glasses. Meta advises users to respect privacy, but the reality is clear, wearable tech, combined with AI, presents a growing threat to personal privacy. Opt-out features exist, but they don't fully protect you.

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🍎 Apple released Depth Pro:

Apple Unveils Depth Pro: Redefining 3D Vision with AI

Apple's AI research team has just changed the game in 3D vision technology. With Depth Pro, a cutting-edge AI model, machines can now perceive depth in ways never before possible, with massive potential across industries like augmented reality and autonomous vehicles.

The Details:

• Real-Time 3D Maps: Depth Pro generates sharp, high-resolution 3D depth maps from just a single 2D image in under 0.3 seconds. No need for traditional camera data.

• Precision Meets Speed: This model processes fine details, like hair and fur, faster and more accurately than anything before it.

• Zero-Shot Learning: Depth Pro doesn’t need extensive domain-specific data, making it adaptable to various images and applications without extra training.

• Metric Depth: It estimates both relative and absolute depth, providing real-world measurements that are crucial for augmented reality and other fields.

• Boundary Tracing: This AI excels in edge detection, making it perfect for 3D reconstruction, image segmentation, and medical imaging.

• Open-Source and Ready to Use: Available on GitHub, developers and researchers can now build on this technology, exploring applications in robotics, healthcare, and more.

From e-commerce to autonomous vehicles, Depth Pro’s precision in generating real-time depth maps could revolutionize how machines perceive their surroundings. Imagine virtual objects fitting seamlessly in real-world environments, or self-driving cars navigating with unmatched accuracy.

With its blazing speed and exceptional precision, Depth Pro is setting new standards in AI-driven depth perception. By pushing the boundaries of 3D vision, Apple is paving the way for innovative applications across industries, transforming how we interact with technology in spatial environments.

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