AI: Serve

Power Surge

News this week: There is a steep rise in U.S. household electricity bills—over 60% in some areas—that is linked to a combination of outdated infrastructure, global energy market dynamics, extreme weather, and surging AI-powered data center demand. There are no definitive solutions at this time, and some blame the high prices on the defunding of wind farms. Here is a brief PBS transcript (Sept. 5, 2025) of an interview with Ari Pescoe, Electricity Law Initiative Director, Harvard Law School, about the possible outcomes. If you’re keen on updates, follow Ari on X.

New Apps that Serve

A01: YOUR PERSONAL NEWS AGENT

The PM (Professor Me) often wonders about “Join the Waitlist,” which generally means, “Just wait a second (we’re trying really hard to look cool).” In that vein, I suppose you’re also willing to wait to “Just Follow anything” with the free A01: “Your Personal News Agent” which launched this week. In brief: this is one of those time-saving apps I just don’t have time for.

LET’S GET PERSONAL: ENDLESS APPS TO SERVE YOU

There are many. “Converse: Get Converse: Your Personal Reading Companion.” (Personal is trending right there with Waitlist.) “Recall AI: Your Personal AI Encyclopedia. Chat with All Your Content and Your Knowledge Base.” And there is Google Notebook LM, which I think is the gold standard. Its tagline is “Understand Anything.” All of these apps purport to summarize, regurgitate the information, and recall things. In fact, most of them claim to “work on your memory!”

When I first tried Google Notebook LM, I was blown away. For my course, Public Relations: The Power of Storytelling, an undergraduate elective, the first class focuses on the key elements of story. My average presentation for class is 20 slides. I uploaded the Class One deck to Google NotebookLM — just that, no explanation — and it returned, in seconds, the most delightful eight-minute podcast, narrated by funny and lively fictional talk show hosts. Here is the NotebookLM Podcast. Just play the opening and listen to the first presenter, at the very least. You can’t tell me you’re not immediately engaged. For you to try: upload that long, maybe boring, article you’ve been meaning to read.

WSJ Section on Everyday AI

This week, The Wall Street Journal published an Artificial Intelligence Journal Report (Thursday, September 4, 2025) titled: The Best Way to Use AI for…Financial Planning, Starting a Hobby — and more. The articles cover the broad spectrum of uses and give some nice examples, but it’s a lot to absorb in one sitting. Here is a free link to one of the stories on how to ensure ChatGPT doesn’t make you dumber!

Until Next Time

Stay curious, and if the tension on and off the court is almost too much this afternoon, download Comet, “a personal AI assistant,” new from Perplexity. I’ll cover it in the next newsletter.

Connie