Google’s Gemini app will now be powered by news from the Associated Press (AP).
Announced yesterday (15 January) by the tech giant, the AP will now deliver a feed of “real-time information to help further enhance the usefulness of results” displayed within Geminini Google’s AI-powered chatbot.
In a blog post, Jaffer Zaidi, VP of Global News Partnerships at Google, stated: “As we develop new AI offerings and product[s], we’re identifying specific types of information and data that can help improve our products and services for people everywhere.
“This will be particularly helpful to our users looking for up-to-date information.”
Previously the AP has collaborated with Google to provide up-to-date information for features in Google search and Kristin Heitmann, Senior VP and Chief Revenue Officer at the AP, said that the expansion of its partnership with Google is “based on working together to provide timely, accurate news and information to global audiences”.
She added: “We are pleased Google recognises the value of AP’s journalism as well as our commitment to nonpartisan reporting, in the development of its generative AI products.”
AI companies have long used news content from publishers to train their systems. In 2023, the AP signed a deal with Open AI, allowing the creator of ChatGPT to train its AI with the AP’s archive of news stories. Additionally, OpenAI also made similar deals with NewsCorp, which includes the Wall Street Journal and The Times among its publications.
However, AI still has a way to go if it is to fully grasp the content of news.
Earlier this week, the National Union of Journalists told Sky News that Apple’s feature which uses AI to summarise notifications “must be revoked” over notifications misleading users.
According to Apple, the feature condenses notifications “so you can scan them for key details” but the AI has been found to incorrectly summarise news stories from newsrooms and create misleading and inaccurate headlines that miss the news element of the story.
