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After a particularly lean week for tech news, yesterday exploded. Weve got Googles next-generation AI model, Gemini 2.0, a barrage of games to intrigue us in 2025, MasterClass is going AI and, finally, Apples most headline-grabbing AI tricks and features broke cover, built into the latest iOS update. Thats what I want to kick off with. A lot of features in iOS 18.2 are only for the iPhone 15 Pro, 16 and 16 Pro, which pack the necessary chip smarts to run Apple Intelligence. (Access is also limited to users in the US, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and the UK for now.) Image Playground, available as a standalone app and through Messages, can generate image suggestions based on your text prompts or contents of your conversations. You can use a photo from your iPhones camera roll as a starting point. Note Image Playground cant produce photorealistic images of people. Thats by design. Then theres Genmoji, to make your own custom emoji. Tap the new Genmoji button and enter a description of the character you want to make. You can even type the name of a contact, and contextually, itll ask if you want to use photos of that person (if you have them in your photos) to generate the emoji. Both Siri and Writing Tools can now call on ChatGPT for assistance, although devices will always ask permission before doing so. Anyway, back to creating an entire library of Genmoji, featuring... me. Mat Smith The biggest tech stories you missed Apple finally launches its multi-track recording tool for Voice Memos The Pokémon Company is teaming up with Wallace and Gromit studio Aardman on a mystery project Astro Bot is getting a free holiday-themed bonus level Judge rejects The Onions bid for Infowars Get this delivered daily direct to your inbox. Subscribe right here! Gemini 2.0 is Googles most capable AI model yet and available to preview today Try the lightweight Flash version in the Gemini web app. Almost exactly a week after OpenAI made its o1 model available to the public, Google is offering a preview of its next-gen Gemini 2.0 model. The company says 2.0 can offer native support for image and audio output. Rather than starting todays preview by offering its most advanced version of the model, Gemini 2.0 Pro, the search giant is instead kicking things off with 2.0 Flash. As of today, the more efficient (and affordable) model is available to all Gemini users. If you want to try it yourself, you can enable Gemini 2.0 from the dropdown menu in the Gemini web client. Alongside todays announcement of Gemini 2.0, the company also announced Deep Research, a new tool that uses Gemini 1.5 Pros long-context capabilities to write reports on complicated subjects. Continue reading. Xbox previews cloud streaming of games you own on consoles Its a beta test for now. Microsoft has started a beta test to finally bring cloud streaming to Xbox consoles. Participants in the Alpha Skip-Ahead and Alpha tiers of the Xbox Insiders program can start using this feature now on their Xbox Series X|S and even Xbox One consoles. There are still some caveats on the feature. First, its limited to Game Pass Ultimate members. Second, the game needs to support cloud streaming. Theres a shortlist of titles in the program for now, but it includes Baldurs Gate 3, Balatro, Cyberpunk 2077, Animal Well, Stray and the first six Final Fantasy games. Continue reading. MasterClass On Call gives you access to AI copies of its experts Ramseybot, engage. MasterClass MasterClass is expanding beyond prerecorded video lessons to offer on-demand mentorship from some of its most popular celebrity instructors. And if youre wondering how the company has gotten some of the busiest people on the planet to field your questions, surprise! Its AI. On Call is limited to two personas at launch: former FBI hostage negotiator Chris Voss and University of Berkeley neuroscientist Dr. Matt Walker. In the future, MasterClass says it will offer many more personas, like Gordon Ramsay, Mark Cuban, Bill Nye and LeVar Burton. Continue reading.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/the-morning-after-engadget-newsletter-121531673.html?src=rss
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Make your holiday plans now, because Sony has announced which games will be joining the Playstation Plus Game Catalog starting in December. The biggest highlight for PlayStation Plus Premium and Extra subscribers is Forspoken, a parkour and magic-filled RPG released by Square Enix in 2023. We didnt think the PS5 game fully matched the eye-popping visuals of other games like Horizon Forbidden West when we reviewed it, but a holiday vacation seems like the perfect time to bop around and experiment with some spells. For a different take on open-world running and jumping, Sonic Frontiers is also joining the catalog. The game fuses high-speed platforming with a Breath of the Wild-inspired open world full of enemies and collectables. If you miss more of the traditional Sonic experience, there are bespoke challenge levels inspired by past Sonic games to run through too. Both those games should hopefully be rewarding time sinks, but the two additions that most caught my eye were A Space for the Unbound and Coffee Talk. Ive basically heard nothing but good things about A Space for the Unbound since it came out in 2023, primarily because of its unique setting in late 90s rural Indonesia. Its a slice-of-life adventure game, according to Sony, but with some supernatural elements for added drama. Coffee Talk has been kicking around since 2020, and has some shared cultural DNA since its developer, Toge Productions, published Unbound and is based in Indonesia. Coffee Talk is a visual novel about running a coffee shop where you talk to patrons about their problems and make them drinks, a delightfully pleasant premise for a game. Toge Productions Rounding out the new additions to the catalog are a grab bag of sequels, racing games, multiplayer puzzle games, and more than one title where you play as a rabbit: Coffee Talk Episode 2: Hibiscus & Butterfly, Rabbids: Party of Legends, WRC Generations, F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow, Jurassic World Evolution 2, PHOGS and Biped. If youre a PlayStation Plus Premium subscriber, and like me, youre looking to blow the dust off your PSVR 2, Sony is also throwing in Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxys Edge. Its a virtual reality experience that gives you a sampling platter of Star Wars things to do in immersive first-person, like training to be a Jedi, blasting enemies, and palling around with droids. It's much more cost effective to live Star Wars than going to Disneyland. Premium members will also get to stream a few new games in the Classics Catalog, with the shared theme of PlayStation mascot duos: Sly Cooper 2: Band of Thieves, Sly Cooper 3: Honor Among Thieves, and Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy. Im more of a Ratchet & Clank fan myself, but this is a great opportunity to play the very first Jak and Daxter game. PS Plus Premium and Extra subscribers will be able to play these games starting December 17. If youre a Premium subscriber with a PlayStation Portal, youll be able to stream some of them directly to your handheld as part of Sonys cloud streaming beta test, too.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/playstation/playstation-plus-game-catalog-additions-for-december-include-forspoken-sonic-frontiers-and-vr-star-wars-232621272.html?src=rss
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MasterClass is expanding beyond pre-recorded video lessons to offer on-demand mentorship from some of its most popular celebrity instructors. And if youre wondering how the company has gotten some of the busiest people on the planet to field your questions, guess what? The answer is generative AI. On Wednesday, MasterClass debuted On Call, a new web and iOS app that allows people to talk with AI versions of its instructors. As of today, On Call is limited to two personas representing the expertise of former FBI hostage negotiator Chris Voss and University of Berkeley neuroscientist Dr. Matt Walker. In the future, MasterClass says it will offer many more personas, with Gordon Ramsay, Mark Cuban, Bill Nye and LeVar Burton among some of the more notable experts sharing their voices and knowledge in this way. This isnt just another generic AI chatbot pulling data from the internet, David Rogier, the CEO of MasterClass, said on X. Weve built this with our experts training the AI on proprietary data sets (e.g. unpublished notes, private research, their lessons, emails, [and] expertise theyve never shared before). Per Inc., MasterClass signed deals with each On Call instructor to license their voice and expertise. Judging from the sample voice clips MasterClass has up on its website, the interactions arent as polished as the one shown in the ad the company shared on social media. In particular, the voice of Chris Voss sounds robotic and not natural at all. On Call is also a standalone product with a separate subscription from the companys regular offering. To use On Call, users will need to pay $10 per month or $84 annually.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/masterclass-on-call-gives-you-on-demand-access-to-ai-facsimiles-of-its-experts-215022938.html?src=rss
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