As if there isn’t enough of a problem with artificial intelligence ‘hallucinations…or in plain language…lying…now we find that Google has been making Gemini contractors to rate AI responses outside their areas of expertise. Techcrunch.com reports that these people behind the proverbial curtain…sometimes called ‘prompt engineers’ and analysts, have been pushed to evaluate AI responses outside their area. Google has been using some contractors from GlobalLogic, an outsourcing firm owned by Hitachi. Until recently, they were able to ’skip’ certain prompts, and opt out of evaluating various AI-written responses to those prompts, if the prompt was way outside their domain expertise. For example, a contractor could skip a prompt that was asking a niche question about cardiology because the contractor had no scientific background. Well, as of last week, they won’t be allowed to skip prompts, even if they have no clue about the area being queried about. Contractors can now only skip prompts in two cases: if they’re “completely missing information” like the full prompt or response, or if they contain harmful content that requires special consent forms to evaluate, the new guidelines show. So far, Google hasn’t commented about this. 

It’s not a total reprieve, but now TikTok will get its day in court…in the Supreme Court…to argue why it should not be banned in the US. According to gizmodo.com, the Supremes will hear arguments on January 10th, only 9 days before the ban on TikTok is set to go into place. Most court watchers expect the Supreme Court to make a decision before the January 19th ban date. ByteDance already lost in the DC Court Of Appeals, where the Court said that the First Amendment exists to protect free speech in the United States, and the ban represents the government acting “solely to protect that freedom from a foreign adversary nation and to limit that adversary’s ability to gather data on people in the United States.”

Apple has dropped plans to offer a hardware subscription service for iPhones. Macrumors.com says that Cupertino had considered a service that would let users ‘subscribe’ to get a new iPhone every year…something that had been in the works since 2022. It appears that Apple has decided that such a plan is not feasible due to regulatory concerns, software bugs, and other issues. You can still buy an iPhone from them with a 12 or 24 month payment plan at zero interest, which really isn’t much different from the subscription idea.

Although there have been sightings/issues elsewhere, New Jersey has seemed to be the hub of late for freakouts over drone activity. Now, the Federal Aviation Administration has stepped in. Bloomberg.com reports that the FAA has prohibited drone flights over parts of the Garden State as public hysteria over sightings has continued. The FAA just published 22 temporary flight restrictions over critical infrastructure in the state. The agency said  it was instituting the ban “at the request of federal security partners.”

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.