If you’re one of the people out there that has found a way to use AI and connect it with your life, you might be using it for the passing query, a little bit of research that probably needs some extra fact checking (you definitely shouldn’t skimp on that), and maybe flex its tech to help you code, make some images, or any one of the many things the pattern-learning systems can do.
Depending on just how much you use, there’s a chance you might be using apps and software associated with it. For instance, ChatGPT’s maker OpenAI has a web browser, while Google’s Gemini is clearly integrated into nearly everything the company offers these days.
Gemini is in Android phones. It’s in the Pixel Watch wearables. A variation of the smart assistant is in the Nest speakers, but it’s not quite Gemini, though you can see where it’s all heading: AI everywhere in much of what we see, even when you search.
And in Google’s latest effort, the company will aim to bring some of the apps used on its devices together with Gemini to learn and link aspects of your life together.
The concept is called “Personal Intelligence”, and essentially makes it possible to connect what Google knows about your YouTube viewing history, how you search, some of what you email, and even the information it knows about your photos, all designed to better help you, or that’s the theory.
For instance, if you’ve been researching travel plans, the idea is you can ask Gemini about something personal, and it will know to look up your Gmail, your video history on YouTube, and potentially photos or screenshots of maps, building all the information in the one place.
In short, the idea is a way for Google to join the dots for the apps you already use, and link them together in a chat assistant.
If parts of this sound a little scary, Google notes that Personal Intelligence is built with privacy in mind, and this feature — and connected apps — have it turned off by default. You can turn it on and Google’s Gemini assistant can then access it, telling you where the information comes from.
That last point is actually important, because in an era where AI easily hallucinates based on what it doesn’t know yet matches a pattern, knowing that information has come from one of your accounts is very useful. Essentially, the AI answers haven’t just been hallucinated to match what the AI thinks you want, but come from somewhere concrete, and Google is pointing it out.
It’s worth pointing out that Google’s Personal Intelligence isn’t entirely new, having launched last year in the US. Australia is now getting it, though, and it is optional. That said, the first people to get it will be on the paid AI subscriptions for the company, with free users to get this feature later, working across Android, iOS, and even the web.
