Robotics

Screenshot by Lance Whitney/ZDNETX’s new Grok 3 AI-powered chatbot is now free for anyone to use. Launched earlier this week, the latest flavor of Grok initially required a paid subscription, but that restriction has now been lifted, according to a new post from xAI, the AI company created by Elon Musk.Beyond the usual AI chat features, Grok 3 offers a DeepSearch mode. Similar to the Deep Research option from ChatGPT Pro, Gemini Advanced, and Perplexity AI, this capability uses a virtual agent to search the web on your behalf and present a detailed report about your topic. The latest version of Grok also provides a mode called Think, which uses a reasoning model to tackle challenging problems in math, science, and coding.Also: Yikes: Jailbroken Grok 3 can be made to say and reveal just about anythingThough the new AI is free for all X users, paid subscribers will still enjoy some advantages. X Premium+ and SuperGrok subscribers will score increased access to Grok and advanced features like Voice Mode. Due to be officially rolled out soon, Voice Mode will let the AI speak using different voices, transcribe audio, and share the transcriptions if you wish. But these subscriptions won’t come cheap.This week, X bumped the cost of X Premium+ More

<!–> ZDNET’s key takeaways The Blackview Tab 90 WiFi (2025) is on sale now for $110 on Amazon. It punches above its price point in terms of hardware. Expanded memory does need to be pushed to the max to get the best performance. –> Blackview, a brand primarily recognized for its rugged smartphones, has also […] More

Matthew Busch for The Washington Post via Getty Images Some people think tens of millions of dead people are collecting Social Security checks. That’s not true. What’s really going on is people don’t understand its old, underlying technology.  The saga of 150-year-old Social Security recipients is a tale that intertwines aging technology, government systems, and modern […] More

<!–> ZDNET’s key takeaways The Withings Scanwatch Nova is available for pre-order now, starting at $599. It’s an elegant smartwatch with a one-month battery, water resistance up to 10ATM, and various health-tracking metrics. A $10/month subscription is required for some advanced metrics, and the watch is only available in one 42mm diameter. –> Healthy heart […] More

ZDNETIf you’re tired of seeing misinformation online, here’s your chance to be part of the fight against it.Also: How to delete Facebook, Messenger, or InstagramLast month, Meta announced that it was ditching its third-party fact checkers in favor of X-style community notes on its social media platforms: Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. Meta will officially roll out the feature in a few months, but you can join the waitlist now to be among the first community notes editors.  How to sign up and what the role entailsIf you’re not familiar, Meta will soon add community notes to posts with misleading information or missing context. A group of community editors will decide what notes a post will get. When editors see a misleading post, Meta says, they can “write a note with background info, a tip, or an insight people might find useful.” If the note is rated helpful by enough editors, Meta will add it to the post. Meta says it will not decide which posts get community notes. All community notes must follow Meta’s Community Standards. Notes must be under 500 characters and include a link. Also: How to protect your privacy from Facebook – and what doesn’t workThe general idea is that a group of individuals with different beliefs will provide better fact-checking than individuals. “Just like they do on X,” Meta explained, “Community Notes will require agreement between people with a range of perspectives to help prevent biased ratings.” For a community note to be published on a post, users who would normally disagree (based on how they’ve rated notes in the past) will have to agree that a note is helpful. Community notes will not be available for ads. To sign up, visit Meta’s community notes page. You’ll see a brief explanation of the program along with options to sign up for each individual platform. More

ZDNETThose of you who use Google Gemini for free can now take advantage of a feature formerly limited to paid subscribers. On Thursday, the Google Gemini account on X announced that the document upload capability is now available to all Gemini users.How it worksUsing this option, free users can upload a variety of file types to Gemini for analysis. These include PDFs, text files, Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, and Google Docs files. After Gemini processes your uploaded file, you can request an AI-generated summary and ask questions about the content in the file. Also: How to use Gemini’s Deep Research to browse the web faster and betterThe new feature comes courtesy of Gemini 2.0 Flash, which aims to be faster and more robust than previous models. To use this feature, head to the Gemini website or launch the iOS or Android app. Click or tap the plus sign at the prompt. To upload a file from your PC or device, select Files. To upload a file from Google Drive, select Drive. Choose the file you want analyzed. Back at the prompt, you can start by asking Gemini to summarize the file. Beyond that, submit any question you want about the content to see how the AI responds. More

ZDNETAnother day. Another cloud service changing the rules on stuff we already bought and paid for.This time, Amazon is removing a feature that’s been part of the Kindle experience for more than a decade: downloading files to your computer. Also: The best Kindles of 2025: Expert tested and reviewedI’m not going to bury the lede: You have until Feb. 26, 2025, to download copies of your Kindle books to your computer. After that, Amazon will remove the ability to download books to files you can control yourself. I’m a little disappointed that Amazon doesn’t say anything about this in its main Digital Content management interface. More

Getty Images / Andrii Dodonov Applying for jobs is hard work, but, before you get to that stage, you must figure out what roles to apply to. For many, this is challenging due to factors such as pivoting careers, returning to the workforce after years off, or unfamiliarity with the job-search process. Google has launched […] More