Zoom’s post-pandemic Hail Mary

October 13, 2024

Zoom’s post-pandemic Hail Mary: Now that many folks are back in the office, Zoom wants to stay relevant. Their new AI Companion 2.0 has an avatar that can talk for you and adds a panel in all your meetings with notes about previous convos, plus related emails, calendar items and uploads. If it works, it sounds pretty sweet.

Tags: AI (artificial intelligence), meetings, video conferencing, Zoom

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Tech how-to: Call 911 using a smart speaker

Smart speakers tell you the weather, play music, answer trivia questions, help you prank your spouse (more on that at the end), and they just might save your life one day, too.

Make sure you know these commands to get help in an emergency by heart. Be a pal and tell your friends and family members about them, too.

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9 quick and easy ways to save money on tech

I’m a cheapskate. There, I said it. I go digging for ways to save money in my tech life, and I’m happy to pass them along to you, too.

1. Use a tool to find coupons: Searching online leads to codes that don’t work or, worse, malware-infected sites. I like Honey. It runs in the background to look for deals on what you’re already buying. CamelCamelCamel will alert you if there’s a price drop on something you’re eyeing on Amazon.

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Bird nerds: Bird-watching apps are making it easier than ever to track, identify and record sky dwellers. One of the most popular, Merlin Bird ID (iOS and Android), uses AI to identify birds by their calls. Just be careful what you post. One woman spotted a rare bird, and over 700 people showed up outside her house to see it (paywall link). Yikes!

Smart ways to make more money and find new customers

Small business owners must build trust, set trends and share their customers’ values. Connecting with customers is one of the most important ways to make money.

Success starts close to home. Before connecting with customers, you must build strong bonds with your teammates. Tap or click here for five leadership secrets every small business owner should know.

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💰 Make money on Facebook: Meta has paid out over $2 billion to Facebook content creators in the past year alone for videos, Reels, photos and text posts. To see if you’re eligible, from your Facebook for Creators page, tap Menu > Professional dashboard > Monetization. Coming soon: Facebook Content Monetization Beta, which puts your in-stream ads, ads on Reels and performance bonuses all in one spot. Right now, it’s invite-only, but you can ask to join.

🚨 Celebrity shakedown: Taylor Swift, Johnny Depp and Kylie Jenner are among the top 10 celebs fraudsters deepfake to push phony giveaways, endorsements and crypto investments. Their scams are getting harder to spot, as the deepfaked versions look and sound a lot like the real stars. Always check a celebrity’s official social pages before you buy anything they’re pitching.

💰 More cash for your old phone: iPhones retain their value much longer than models from Samsung, Google or OnePlus. Demand’s higher too. iPhone folks sell or trade in their phones 41% of the time, compared to just 17% of Android owners. Sadly, 30% of Android folks just end up tossing their old phones.

🏥 When you get a bladder infection, urine trouble: The next time you’re at the doctor, AI could be eavesdropping on everything you say and adding it to your health records. Ambient AI transcribes and organizes patient notes in real time. Sure, it cuts down on admin time, but AI can hallucinate facts and might use your sensitive data for training. You can decline it … for now. Just tell your doc, “No AI for me.”

⚠️ Don’t lose your work: A bug in Microsoft 365 Word (version 2409, build 18025.20104) is deleting local files instead of saving them. The error happens after you edit a doc and then close Word. It’s more likely to happen if your file name includes a “#” character or a capitalized extension, like “DOCX” or “RTF.” Temporary fix? Hit Save manually instead of waiting for the prompt.

Google isn’t going to hand your location to the police anymore: Location History (aka Timeline) tracks your every move, and cops were able to pull your data from Google’s servers if you were near a crime scene at the wrong time. Now it’s being stored on-device only, so police will have to come to you directly with a warrant.