Search Engine Land: LLMs are driving referral traffic – but what about engagement?. “The initial excitement surrounding LLMs often focuses on their ability to simplify workflows and provide instant answers. However, for businesses that rely on website traffic for leads, sales, and brand visibility, the implications are far more nuanced. While LLMs can act as powerful referral engines, […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/05/search-engine-land-llms-are-driving-referral-traffic-but-what-about-engagement/

BBC: ‘Google AI presented my April Fools’ story as real news’. “Every year, journalist Ben Black publishes a playful fake story on his community news site Cwmbran Life for April Fools’ Day…. In 2020, Mr Black published a fake story claiming Cwmbran had been recognised by Guinness World Records for having the most roundabouts per square kilometre. Despite altering the wording of his article […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/05/bbc-google-ai-presented-my-april-fools-story-as-real-news/

TechCrunch: Google is shipping Gemini models faster than its AI safety reports. “Google has yet to publish safety reports for its latest models, including Gemini 2.5 Pro and Gemini 2.0 Flash, raising concerns that the company is prioritizing speed over transparency.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/05/techcrunch-google-is-shipping-gemini-models-faster-than-its-ai-safety-reports/

Ars Technica: Most Americans think AI won’t improve their lives, survey says. “Only about 11 percent of the public says that ‘they are more excited than concerned about the increased use of AI in daily life.’ They’re much more likely (51 percent) to say they’re more concerned than excited, whereas only 15 percent of experts shared that pessimism. Unlike the majority of experts, just 24 […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/05/ars-technica-most-americans-think-ai-wont-improve-their-lives-survey-says/

Windows Latest: Microsoft Bing’s AI Search rolls out to everyone to take on Google’s AI mode. “Microsoft has been secretly working on a Copilot-powered search feature called ‘Copilot search,’ which isn’t anything like the existing Copilot or Bing search. Bing’s new AI search summarizes links from the web and tries to answer the questions.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/04/windows-latest-microsoft-bings-ai-search-rolls-out-to-everyone-to-take-on-googles-ai-mode/

Techdirt: Anchorage Police Department: AI-Generated Police Reports Don’t Save Time. “The Anchorage Police Department (APD) has concluded its three-month trial of Axon’s Draft One, an AI system that uses audio from body-worn cameras to write narrative police reports for officers—and has decided not to retain the technology. Axon touts this technology as ‘force multiplying,’ claiming it […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/04/anchorage-police-department-ai-generated-police-reports-dont-save-time-techdirt/

Nico Dekens: The Slow Collapse of Critical Thinking in OSINT due to AI. “When OSINT becomes too easy, too efficient, too comfortable… you should be worried. Tradecraft isn’t just about speed, it’s about judgment. And judgment doesn’t come from a language model. If we keep going down this path without pushing back, without actively preserving the critical habits that define our […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/04/nico-dekens-the-slow-collapse-of-critical-thinking-in-osint-due-to-ai/

Futurism, and I will swear to you on the religious volume of your choice that I did not put these two stories together intentionally: Trump Tariffs Show Signs of Being Written by AI. “President Donald Trump announced sweeping tariffs on most goods imported into the US yesterday, affecting over 100 countries — including uninhabited territories in the middle of the ocean. It’s a baffling […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/04/futurism-trump-tariffs-show-signs-of-being-written-by-ai/

Engadget: Claude’s new Learning mode will prompt students to answer questions on their own . “At the heart of Claude for Education is a new Learning mode that changes how Anthropic’s chatbot interacts with users. With the feature engaged, Claude will attempt to guide students to a solution, rather than providing an answer outright, when asked a question. It will also employ the Socratic […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/03/engadget-claudes-new-learning-mode-will-prompt-students-to-answer-questions-on-their-own/

Search Engine Land: Google AI Overviews spiked during March 2025 core update. “Google’s AI Overviews expanded greatly in three sectors – entertainment, restaurants, and travel – during the March 2025 core update.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/03/search-engine-land-google-ai-overviews-spiked-during-march-2025-core-update/

Yale Insights: When AI Is the Editor, Consumer Complaints Are More Likely to Succeed‌. “An analysis of complaints submitted to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau reveals that consumers are using tools like ChatGPT to help them articulate their concerns. Those AI-edited grievances have a higher likelihood of receiving relief, according to new research co-authored by Yale SOM’s […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/03/yale-insights-when-ai-is-the-editor-consumer-complaints-are-more-likely-to-succeed/

TechXplore: Experiments show adding CoT windows to chatbots teaches them to lie less obviously. “In a new study, as part of a program aimed at stopping chatbots from lying or making up answers, a research team added Chain of Thought (CoT) windows. These force the chatbot to explain its reasoning as it carries out each step on its path to finding a final answer to a query. They then tweaked […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/03/techxplore-experiments-show-adding-cot-windows-to-chatbots-teaches-them-to-lie-less-obviously/

Search Engine Roundtable: Google Ranking Reddit AI Translated Pages Too Well. “It appears that Google is letting Reddit’s AI translated pages rank too well within its search results. This is in addition to Google letting Reddit get a lot of other search visibility, but AI translation, well, that should really not perform so well.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/03/search-engine-roundtable-google-ranking-reddit-ai-translated-pages-too-well/

arXiv: Proof or Bluff? Evaluating LLMs on 2025 USA Math Olympiad. “Using expert human annotators, we evaluated several state-of-the-art reasoning models on the six problems from the 2025 USAMO within hours of their release. Our results reveal that all tested models struggled significantly, achieving less than 5% on average. Through detailed analysis of reasoning traces, we identify the most […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/02/arxiv-proof-or-bluff-evaluating-llms-on-2025-usa-math-olympiad/

INFORMS: AI Thinks Like Us – Flaws and All: New Study Finds ChatGPT Mirrors Human Decision Biases in Half the Tests. “Can we really trust AI to make better decisions than humans? A new study says … not always. Researchers have discovered that OpenAI’s ChatGPT, one of the most advanced and popular AI models, makes the same kinds of decision-making mistakes as humans in some situations […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/02/ai-thinks-like-us-flaws-and-all-new-study-finds-chatgpt-mirrors-human-decision-biases-in-half-the-tests-informs/

Digital Trends: Chrome code confirms Gemini is coming to simplify your browsing. “Thanks to newly discovered code, Google’s plans to add Gemini to Chrome’s sidebar are now more concrete, as spotted by Windows Latest. The feature mirrors Microsoft Edge’s Copilot. We previously reported that Google was testing the feature in the latest Chrome Canary build. Now, a Chromium post mentioning […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/01/digital-trends-chrome-code-confirms-gemini-is-coming-to-simplify-your-browsing/

Search Engine Journal: AI Researchers Warn: Hallucinations Persist In Leading AI Models. “Despite billions in research investment, AI factuality remains largely unsolved. According to the report, even the most advanced models from OpenAI and Anthropic ‘correctly answered less than half of the questions’ on new benchmarks like SimpleQA, a collection of straightforward questions.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/01/ai-researchers-warn-hallucinations-persist-in-leading-ai-models-search-engine-journal/

Gizmodo: AMC Premiering Swedish Movie In English Using AI-Powered ‘Visual Dubbing’. “AMC Theaters, always one to hop on the latest trend, is premiering a Swedish movie that uses a new form of AI-based dubbing to make it appear as if the actors are speaking in English. Instead of merely replacing the voice tracks with ones recorded by actors in another language, the movie Watch the Skies […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/01/gizmodo-amc-premiering-swedish-movie-in-english-using-ai-powered-visual-dubbing/

Virginia Commonwealth University: Belief in AI as a ‘Great Machine’ could weaken national security crisis responses, new VCU research finds. “Virginia Commonwealth University researcher Christopher Whyte, Ph.D., investigated how emergency management and national security professionals responded during simulated AI attacks. The results reveal that the professionals were more hesitant and […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/01/virginia-commonwealth-university-belief-in-ai-as-a-great-machine-could-weaken-national-security-crisis-responses-new-vcu-research-finds/

And Now It’s All This: SQL help from ChatGPT. “I had a couple of SQL database queries that I wanted to improve. Instead of going my usual route of searching for the answer in SQLite’s documentation, I decided to give ChatGPT a crack at it. I hoped that I would not only get better queries, but that I’d also learn something about SQL by studying the answers. It took a couple of tries, but I […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/03/31/and-now-its-all-this-sql-help-from-chatgpt/