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Months after OceanFirst Financial settled federal redlining allegations, it received the highest possible Community Reinvestment Act rating from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. CEO Christopher Maher said the bank made a "significant effort" to introduce its lending products to markets it had recently entered via acquisition. View the full article

At Google I/O 2025, the company announced that Gemini Live Camera and Screen Sharing is rolling out to iPhone starting today. This means that you'll be able to use your phone's camera to live stream a feed to Gemini, and have a conversation about with the AI agent about what it sees. This feature has been available on Android for some time, but it's coming to iPhone for the first time starting today. This could be useful for many things, such as showing Gemini a video of something in your neighborhood and asking it to identify the item. In theory, you could ask it to identify cars, trees, or important landmarks in your neighborhood, or ask it general knowledge questions about historical landmarks while you're on holiday. Unfortunately though, Google chose an unbelievably cringey video to demonstrate what the Gemini Live Camera can do. It featured a person being deliberately obtuse and asking exceptionally...dumb...questions to the AI, presumably to demonstrate that Gemini isn't a complete idiot (or, as Google said, that it's not afraid to tell you when you're wrong). They pointed the camera at a garbage truck while calling it a "convertible," but Gemini was able to clarify that it was indeed, a garbage truck. They repeated the same routine by calling a light pole a "tall skinny building" and a shadow "someone following" them. If you were to only go by the demo to figure out the extent of Gemini Live's Camera Sharing capabilities, it'd be pretty hard to know how it holds up to stress testing. Fortunately, there are much better examples of what you can do with Gemini Live Camera on the Android blog. You can ask Gemini Live for advice on a color palette for your home, gift ideas, and much more. As long as the AI doesn't hallucinate, this could a genuinely useful tool, since it also works with screen sharing, too. Just… don't ask it if your shadow is a real person. View the full article

Secretary of state defends Donald The President’s handling of call with Vladimir Putin View the full article

To give your project the best chance of success, you need to be on constant lookout for potential project delays. Here are the nine most common causes of delays and how you can avoid and overcome them to make sure your project succeeds. The post 9 Causes of Project Delays & How To Avoid Them appeared first on The Digital Project Manager. View the full article

Google's Smart Replies are getting an AI-themed, and to me, slightly creepy update. At its Google I/O 2025 keynote, Google announced a new feature called Personalized Smart Replies. This feature uses Gemini AI, alongside the data in your Gmail and Google Drive, to reply to emails in a way that sounds like you. Google promises is can write like you would, using your tone and writing style, as learned by your Gmail history. With this new update, the Smart Replies option that shows up when you reply to an email will be a lot more powerful and a lot more contextual. On stage, Google CEO Sundar Pichai used planning a trip as an example. Let's say a friend emails you asking for details about a trip you two are going on. To manually collate everything you need to send, like your hotel stays, driving plans, rest stops, and restaurant recommendations would take a lot of time. Instead, you can use the Personalized Smart Replies feature, which has access to all your emails, your Google Maps location history, and your photos and files in Google Drive, to do the work for you. It can collate hotel bookings from your email, locations from Google Drive history, and present it all in an email that matches your writing style. According to an interview with The Verge, Google Workspace’s VP of product, Blake Barnes, says that the new Smart Replies feature will be available in English at first, on the web, Android, and iOS. It will roll out in Alpha in Google Labs in July, and will be available for public use in Q3 of this year. Unfortunately, it will be only available for paid subscribers at first. Barnes sees the feature eventually rolling out to all Gmail users, but there's no timeline for that yet. Of course, like with all AI, there's a risk that what Gemini generates might have elements of hallucination, so I'd recommend checking your replies before sending them. Plus, the feature will definitely need access to a lot of personal data to work. I'll keep an eye out for how to protect your data as the feature comes out, and update accordingly. View the full article

It's that time again, for Google to announce that real-time translation has come to one of its communication apps. This time, it's Google Meet, which can translate between English and Spanish as you speak in a video call. If that sounds familiar, it's because it's not the first time Google has announced something like this. Google Translate has had features that let you speak to someone in another language in real time for a while. For example, back in 2019, there was a real-time translation feature called Interpreter Mode built into Google Assistant. It's also been possible on Pixel phones for a while (and even Samsung phones). Most of these, however, have been either text-to-text, or speech-to-text. You can use the Google Translate app for a speech-to-speech experience, but like with Google Assistant's Interpreter Mode, that only works in person. So, what's different here? Well, during its I/O keynote, Google demoed two users in a video chat speaking in their native languages. Google Meet then translates and speaks the translation back in a relatively human-sounding voice. This new feature is available now for Google Workspace subscribers (plans start at $7/month), but unfortunately, it's not in the free version. On the plus side, additional languages are promised to start coming out in just a few weeks. While I haven't tested it out yet, it does seem to be a more convenient way to access a feature that you might otherwise have to hack together with another tab, or by opening your phone and holding it up to a speaker. Plus, it can be a bit more natural to hear translations spoken out for you, rather than having to rely on translated captions. I do wonder whether it can keep up with the natural speed and flow of a conversation, though—nobody likes to feel interrupted. View the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Motorola is set to release its latest wearable, the Moto Watch Fit, on May 22 with a price tag of $199 in the U.S. ($249 in Canada). The new smartwatch, which was initially unveiled alongside updated Razr flip phones last month, will be available through Motorola's official website at launch, with availability expanding to Amazon and Best Buy in the coming weeks. What to know about the Moto Watch FitUnlike most Android smartwatches on the market, the Moto Watch Fit runs on a proprietary operating system rather than Google's Wear OS. While this might raise some concerns for potential buyers wary of an untested system, there are a few features that could sway you in its direction. DesignThe Moto Watch Fit features a sleek design with a 1.9-inch OLED display housed in an aluminum frame. In terms of durability, the watch has 5ATM water resistance and IP68 ratings—meaning it should hold up for swimming and other water-based activities. At just 25 grams, the Moto Watch Fit offers a lightweight design that won't weigh you down during workouts or daily wear. (For comparison, most versions of the Apple Watch Series 10 sit around 30 grams). Impressive battery lifeWhere Motorola claims the watch truly stands out is its battery life. It says users can expect up to 16 days of use on a single charge and under normal conditions. However, something like constant GPS usage would naturally drain your battery much faster. However, the company promises a quick 5-minute charge can provides a full day of usage. The Watch Fit focuses on delivering reliable fitness tracking, making it best for someone prioritizing battery life and comfort over extensive app ecosystems. Limited smart featuresOn that note, it looks like the Moto Watch Fit does not support third-party apps and lacks smart assistant functionality. While this may be a dealbreaker users who want the full smartwatch experience, it's likely these limitations contribute to the device's extended battery life, not to mention it's price point—at under $200, it's one of the more affordable smartwatches. For context, the most popular versions of Galaxy, Google Pixel, or Apple watches will typically cost at least $299. So, if you're looking for heart rate monitoring, GPS tracking, and basic smartwatch functions, and you're tired of power-hungry options on the market that struggle to last even a week between charges, the Moto Watch Fit could be the right fit for you. View the full article

A reader writes: I have a coworker, Fred, who once told me the best work advice an older coworker gave him was “don’t be good at a job you don’t want.” In our three years working together, Fred has really shown he’s taken this advice to heart — unfortunately, at the expense of his team and myself. He often avoids doing entire parts of his job, leaving the rest of us to pick up the slack. Fred and I report to the same boss and work in a small R&D team at a larger company that makes widgets. The job generally entails designing, optimizing, and testing new widget designs and widget-making processes. Each team member, assigned by my boss, owns one part of the widget-making flow: one person focuses on metal cutting, another on polishing, etc. Fred often abandons his metal-cutting processing duties and sticks to analyzing widget test data only. My boss loves the graphs he makes of this data and often gushes about them, which I guess causes him to forget or ignore that Fred hasn’t addressed excursions in the metal-cutting process. The team then has to scramble to do Fred’s process analysis job since it ultimately affects the entire team’s work product. The team and I have expressed these concerns to my boss, and they’re met with meek promises to talk to Fred. My boss continues to heap praise on Fred and his graphs, though, and metal-cutting process data remains unanalyzed unless someone else does it. So does Fred have it all figured out? Can I ignore parts of my job I don’t like to focus on the parts I do, and do them really well? Do jobs usually work like this? Apparently it works like that for Fred. Does that mean it could work like that for you too if you were willing to be as audacious as Fred? Maybe. But sometimes Freds get away with it because of particular characteristics — like that they’ve been there forever, or the manager is intimidated by them, or they’re good enough at X (or believed to be good enough at X) that they’ve given slack everywhere else, or they’re a huge jerk if confronted and the manager is too weak to do anything about that, or the manager really likes them personally, or they remind the manager of themselves (which is not infrequently tied up with things like age/race/gender/religion). Other times, it’s the sort of thing that is allowed as long as only one person is doing it, but once other people start doing it too, the situation becomes untenable and finally gets addressed. But unfairly, sometimes it’s the person who starts the behavior most recently who ends up the biggest target of that — and so while it might be a good strategy to finally get some attention on Fred, it’s not without a potential risk to you. The advice “don’t be good at a job you don’t want” does have a more ethical application, which is not to be good at things that aren’t part of your job but which you’re getting asked to do anyway and don’t like. For example, it’s often smart for women to be strategically not good at the gendered “housekeeping” parts of work that tend to get assigned to women more than men regardless of their respective jobs (like taking notes or cleaning up after meetings, even if it has nothing to do with your job). But that’s a whole different thing than declining to do core parts of your job description just because you don’t like them. To your question, though: could you ignore parts of your job like Fred does? Maybe. You could try it and see what happens. It carries some risk, though, because whatever unconscious protections that are in place for Fred might not be in place for you. I’d rather see you and your coworkers continue to push your manager to deal with Fred instead. If the issue is that your boss is too meek/passive to act, sometimes the trick with that sort of manager is to make it more uncomfortable for them to do nothing than to just do their job and deal with Fred. That might mean continually pushing as a group to get your boss to tell Fred to do his job. (I’m stressing “as a group” so that you personally don’t become the aggravation in your boss’s eyes.) The post my coworker ignores the parts of his job he doesn’t like — could I do that too? appeared first on Ask a Manager. View the full article

Chief Sundar Pichai also reveals autonomous agents at annual event as tech giant seeks to re-establish AI leadershipView the full article

Google AI Mode rolls out in US Search with Gemini 2.5 integration, AI overviews expand to more languages. + more announcements from I/O. The post Google Expands AI Features in Search: What You Need to Know appeared first on Search Engine Journal. View the full article

Google Gemini upgrades include Chrome integration, Live visual tools, and enhanced 2.5 models. Learn how these AI advances could reshape your marketing strategy. The post Google Gemini Upgrades: New AI Capabilities Announced At I/O appeared first on Search Engine Journal. View the full article

Google AI Overviews are now available in more countries and regions and in more languages. Google announced today at Google I/O that AI Overviews are now available in over 200 countries and territories and more than 40 different languages. AI Overviews for more Google searchers. Google said they have expanded access to AI Overviews within Google Search to more searchers. In October, Google released them in over 100 countries and regions, now they are available in over 200 countries and regions. Google added more support for languages including support for for Arabic, Chinese, Malay, Urdu and more. You can see the full list of countries and territories that Google AI Overviews are available in within this help document. Google said there are now 1.5 billion monthly users getting AI Overviews within Google Search. “We’re delivering this at the speed people expect of Google Search – Al Overviews delivers the fastest Al responses in the industry, Liz Reid, VP head of Google Search said. This shouldn’t come as a surprise, as over the past week or so, we’ve seen Google testing AI Overviews in regions they were not officially supported in. AI Overviews increase searches. Google said that AI Overviews lead to a 10% growth in the number of searchers do. “This means that once people use Al Overviews, they are coming to do more of these types of queries, and what’s particularly exciting is how this growth increases over time,” Liz Reid told us. Google said the percent increase is measured by an experiment that compares two cohorts over time. One that is shown Al Overviews and one that is not. The numbers shown compare query volumes between the two cohorts, for the subset of queries that would show Al Overviews. Why are people searching more? Google says users want to dig deeper and interact with these AI Overviews. Google also gave the line that search results with AI Overviews get higher quality clicks. Meaning that searchers spend more time on those websites that they click over from via AI Overviews, than they do from normal search results. Google’s Liz Reid said searchers dig in to these responses. Gemini 2.5. Google also upgraded the model they use to generate these AI Overviews. Now AI Overviews are using a custom version of Gemini 2.5, so is AI Mode, by the way. Gemini 2.5 will also enable Google to provide answers to even harder questions, Google told us. AI Overviews look. Here is how AI Overviews look, but I suspect most of you have seen these by now: Why we care. Google is making it clear, AI Overviews are not going anywhere. More and more Google searchers are going to see it in more countries, more territories and more languages. While it is not supported everywhere just yet, Google does continue to expand these to more searchers. Plus, the results should be higher quality but I am waiting to hear from the community if those results are better or not. Dig deeper. More Google I/O news from today: Google launches AI Mode to all U.S. searchers with new features Google Search goes ‘Live’ with real-time camera help Google Search adds AI try-on, previews agentic checkout View the full article

Google AI Mode is now available to all U.S. searchers without having to opt into it within Search Labs. When Google announced AI Mode in March, it was only available to U.S. users to opt into via Search Labs, now you no longer need to opt into it. A new tab for AI Mode will appear under the search bar on Google.com and in the Google Search apps for US searches this week. Google did say recently they have begun testing AI Mode in the wild, without opting into it. But starting today, as announced at Google I/O, AI Mode in the US no longer needs you to opt in to see it. AI Mode has “graduated” Search Labs. Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai, said at Google I/O that AI mode leads to searches two to three times the length of traditional Google Searches, and sometimes even five times that length. Google also announced a number of updates to AI Mode: Deep Search in Al Mode Complex analysis and data visualization in Al Mode Search Live Personal context in Al Mode Shopping in Al Mode Try it on Agentic checkout Gemini 2.5 For a deep dive on how AI Mode works, see our story from March. Liz Reid, Google’s head of search, wrote: Under the hood, Al Mode uses our query fan-out technique, breaking down your question into subtopics and issuing a multitude of queries simultaneously on your behalf. This enables Search to dive deeper into the web than a traditional search on Google, helping you discover even more of what the web has to offer and find incredible, hyper-relevant content that matches your question. Deep Search. The name “Deep search” sound familiar? Well, it should, it is what Microsoft called its AI search feature – Deep Search with Bing back in December 2023. Microsoft has since renamed it Copilot Search in Bing. Deep search in Google AI Mode gives you a deeper search experience with a much longer form response, that are fully cited, like an expert-written report. All with lots of citations and links, Google said. “Deep Search uses the same query fan-out technique but taken to the next level. It can issue hundreds of searches, reason across disparate pieces of information, and create an expert-level fully-cited report in just minutes, saving you hours of research,” Liz Reid said. Here is how Deep Search works in AI Mode: Complex analysis. Plus, rolling out in Search Labs in the coming months is a new feature for complex questions. This will create charts and analysis on-the-fly using real-time data, and the Google knowledge graph. This will be a Search Labs opt in feature for sports and financial queries. Here is how the complex analysis dynamically creates these charts: Agentic in AI Mode. Google will also add some early elements of agents (Agentic) to AI Mode. Google’s Project Mariner capabilities will be rolled into Al Mode. So these agents can help you complete tasks such as dealing with event tickets, restaurant reservations, and appointments for local services. The example Liz Reid provided was for a search on “Find 2 affordable tickets for this Saturday’s Reds game in the lower level” and “Al Mode will kick off a query fan-out, looking across sites to analyze hundreds of potential ticket options with real-time pricing and inventory, and handle the tedious work of filling in forms,” Reid told us. Then Al Mode will provide the searcher with ticket options, and you can complete the purchase on whichever site you prefer. Here is how this looks: Google won’t automatically buy anything without you specifically clicking a button, but Google will bring that buy button to you without you having to do all the work to get to that page. Personal Context in AI Mode – Google will also be adding tailored recommendations within AI Mode. This requires Google to connect to your personal logged in and private Google services. So Google is adding options to connect Google apps, starting with Gmail. You will be able to turn this off (or on) at any time. This is coming to Search Labs later this Summer. The example Liz Reid provided was when you are searching for “things to do in nashville this weekend with friends, we’re big foodies who like music” ahead of an upcoming trip. Here Al Mode can show you restaurants with outdoor seating based on your past restaurant bookings and searches. “And you can get suggestions for events while you’re in town, with many near where you’re staying, based on your flight and hotel confirmations,” she added. Gemini 2.5. Plus, AI Mode has been upgraded to a custom Gemini model, Gemini 2.5 is now powering AI Mode, as it is with AI Overviews. Why we care. AI Mode, according to some, is what Google likely should have launched instead of AI Overviews. Having a separate tab to see AI responses, instead of being forced it within Google Search, is a better user experience for some. Now that AI Mode is available to all U.S. users, it will be interesting to see how real searchers, in the real world, opt to use AI Mode over Google Search. How your sites and brand names show up in AI Mode will also be a big question. Can you drive traffic that converts from AI Mode is a question most in our industry are asking and testing. Google says, like they do with AI Overviews, say searchers who click from these AI responses are spending more time on your sites, which they say leads to better users. Ultimately, it is up to us to test this and see how we can leverage these new AI features to drive business to our customers. Dig deeper. More Google I/O news from today: Google AI Overviews expand to more users Google Search goes ‘Live’ with real-time camera help Google Search adds AI try-on, previews agentic checkout View the full article

Google today announced Search Live, a new feature that lets users have real-time conversations with Search using their smartphone camera. The tool builds on Google’s work in visual search and AI, combining the capabilities of Google Lens and Project Astra. How it works. Users can tap a new Live icon in either Lens or AI Mode. After pointing their camera at an object, they can ask questions about it. Search Live responds in real time with explanations, suggestions, and links to relevant websites, videos, and forums. What it looks like. Here’s a video showing how Search Live works: Why we care. Search Live highlights Google’s ongoing push toward multimodal search, where text, images, and now live video with voice are all combined. (Google says more than 1.5 billion people use Lens to search visually each month.) Search Live adds a new conversational layer to Google that helps searchers understand not just what they ask, but what they see. Dig deeper. More Google I/O news from today: Google AI Overviews expand to more users Google launches AI Mode to all U.S. searchers with new features Google Search adds AI try-on, previews agentic checkout View the full article

Google today announced Shop with AI Mode. This new AI-powered shopping experience combines visual inspiration, real-time product data, and a virtual dressing room – all embedded within Search. Why we care. This tool could be good news for brands, as it should make it easier for shoppers to discover products you sell, try them on virtually using personal photos, and buy them at the right price. How it works. AI Mode uses Gemini AI and Google’s 50-billion-item Shopping Graph to help users search, compare, and refine purchases. Users can describe what they want (e.g., “a cute travel bag for Portland in May”) and AI Mode will generate personalized product panels and filter options based on context, style, and practicality. A dynamic pane on the right updates in real time with relevant product visuals and listings. The virtual try-on tool now supports personal photos, letting users see how clothes fit their own body. A new fashion-specific image generation model mimics how materials drape, stretch, and fold based on pose and shape. Try-on works for shirts, dresses, skirts, and pants. This will be available today in the U.S. in Search Labs. What’s next. An agentic checkout will let users track prices, set preferences (like size or color), and use “buy for me” to complete purchases via Google Pay without leaving Search. Agentic checkout will roll out in the U.S. in the coming months. Dig deeper. More Google I/O news from today: Google AI Overviews expand to more users Google launches AI Mode to all U.S. searchers with new features Google Search goes ‘Live’ with real-time camera help View the full article

Google is rapidly expanding its AI search capabilities, as reflected in the announcements it made Tuesday at its Google I/O developer conference. The search giant announced the general availability of AI Mode, its chatbot-format AI search product; some changes to its AI Overviews search results; and its plans to add new visual and agentic search features this summer. Google’s biggest announcement in the realm of search was the general availability of its AI Mode, a chatbot-style search interface that allows users to enter a back-and-forth with the underlying large language model to zero in on a complete and satisfying answer. “AI Mode is really our most powerful version of AI search,” Robby Stein, Google’s VP of Product for Search, tells Fast Company. The tool had been available as an experimental product from Google Labs. Now it’s a real product, available to all users and accessible within various Google apps, and as a tab within the Google mobile app. AI Mode is powered by Gemini 2.5, Google’s most formidable model, which was developed by DeepMind. The model can remember a lot of data during a user interaction, and can reason its way to a responsive answer. Because of this, AI Mode can be used for more complex, multipart queries. “We’re seeing this being used for the more sophisticated set of questions people have,” Stein says. “You have math questions, you have how-to questions, you want to compare two products—like many things that haven’t been done before, that are probably unique to you.” The user gets back a conversational AI answer synthesized from a variety of sources. “The main magic of the system is this new advanced modeling capability for AI Mode, something called a query fan-out where the model has learned to use Google,” Stein says. “It generates potentially dozens of queries off of your single question.” The LLM might make data calls to the web, indexes of web data, maps and location data, product information, as well as API connections to more dynamic data such as sports scores, weather, or stock prices. New shopping tools Google also introduced some new shopping features in AI Mode that leverage the multimodal and reasoning capabilities of the Gemini 2.5 models. Google indexes millions of products, along with prices and other information. The agentic capability of the Gemini model lets AI Mode keep an eye out for a product the user wants, with the right set of desired features and below a price threshold that the user sets. The AI can then alert the user with the information, as well as a button that says “buy for me.” If the user clicks it the agent will complete the purchase. Google is also releasing a virtual clothing try-on function in AI Mode. The feature addresses perhaps the biggest problem with buying and selling apparel online. “It’s a problem that we’ve been trying to solve over the last few years,” says Lilian Rincon, VP of Consumer Shopping Products. “Which is this dilemma of [where] users see a product but they don’t know what that product will look like on them.” Virtual Try-on lets a user upload a photo of themself, then the AI shows the user what they’d look like in any of the billions of clothing products Google indexes. The feature is powered by a new custom image generation model for fashion that understands the nuances of the human body and how various fabrics fold and bend over the body type of the user, Rincon says. Google has released Virtual Try-on as an experimental feature in Google Labs. New features coming to AI Mode this summer Google says it intends to roll out further enhancements to AI Mode over the summer. For starters, it’s adding the functionality of its previously announced Project Mariner (an AI agent prototype that works with the Chrome browser) to AI Mode. So the LLM will be able to control the user’s web browser to access information from websites, fill out and submit forms, and use websites to plan and book tasks. Google is going to start by enabling the AI to do things like book event tickets, make restaurant reservations, and set appointments for local services. The user can give the AI agent special instructions or conditions, such as “buy tickets only if less than $100, and only if the weather (if its an outdoor event) forecast looks good.” The AI will not only find the best ticket prices to a show, but will also submit the data needed to buy the ticket for the user. (The user gets final sign-off, of course.) Google will be adding a new “deep search” function in which the model might access, and reason about, hundreds of online, indexed, or AI data sources. The model might spend several minutes thinking through the completeness of its answer, and perhaps make additional data queries. The end result is a comprehensive research report on a given topic. At last year’s I/O, Google revealed its Project Astra, a prototype of a universal AI assistant that can see, hear, and reason, and converse with the user, out loud, in real time. The assistant taps into search in several ways. A user could show the assistant an object in front of the phone camera and ask for more information about it, which the agent would get from the web. Or the assistant might be shown a recipe, and help the user shop for the ingredients. Google also plans to launch enhanced personalization features to AI search as a way of delivering more relevant search results. “The best version of search is one that knows you well,” Stein says. For example, AI Mode and AI Overviews soon might consult a user’s search history to use past preferences to inform the content of current queries. That’s not all. Google also intends to consult user data from other Google services, including Gmail, to inform searches, subject to user opt-in. Finally, the company will add data visualizations to search results, which it believes will help users draw meaning from data returned in search results. It will start by modeling sports and financial data this summer, Stein says. AI Overviews now reaches almost all Google users AI Overviews is Google’s original AI search experience. For some types of search queries, users see an AI-generated narrative summary of information synthesized from various web documents and Google’s information graphs. Stein says Google is now making AI Overviews available to 95 more countries and territories, bringing the total to around 200, and in 40 languages. Google claims that AI Overviews, its generative AI search experience, now has 1.5 billion users. Where search is concerned, Google is a victim of the “inventor’s dilemma.” It built a massive business placing ads around its search results, so it has a good reason to keep optimizing and improving that experience, rather than pivoting toward new AI-based search, which nobody has reliably monetized with ads yet. Indeed Google’s core experience still consists of relatively short queries and results consisting of ranked websites and an assortment of Google-owned content. But development of AI search products and functions seems to be accelerating. Google is protecting its cash cow (traditional search with ads) while keeping pace with the chatbot search experiences offered by newcomers like OpenAI’s ChatGPT. But it’s more than that. Google’s VP and Head of Search Liz Reid suggests that we may be looking at the future of Google Search—full stop. “I think one of the things that’s very exciting with AI Mode is not just that it is our cutting-edge AI search, but it becomes a glimpse of what we think can be more broadly available,” Reid tells Fast Company. “And so our current belief is that we’re going to take the things that work really well in AI Mode and bring them right to the core of search and AI Overviews.” View the full article

If the US president is walking away from Ukraine, other allies must step up View the full article

I never considered myself a walking girl. I never engaged in the "hot girl walk" trends on social media or went on "mental health walks" during the pandemic lockdown. In fact, I long thought walking—the milestone most of us reach as babies, the activity the majority of us do each day to accomplish all the other basic tasks of living—had a little too much PR hype, especially after learning that the much-ballyhooed "10,000 steps" we're supposed to take every day relied on an arbitrary, made-up figure for marketing pedometers. If I am going to do cardio, I reasoned, I'm going to do cardio: cycling, running, swimming, or playing sports with my friends. If I'm not sweating, what's the use? After trying out Peloton's guided walks, available in the at-home fitness giant's incredibly versatile app, I have learned the use. I am now, finally, a walking girl. Is walking good cardio?The reductive view I formerly held of cardio—that I have to be sweaty and tired for it to matter—is and was always false, which I knew, intellectually. As Lifehacker senior health editor Beth Skwarecki has explained before, walking is cardio—and it's actually a pretty good form of it, too. How fast you walk can even be used to measure your health and capacity. Different intensities of cardio do different things for your body, but at its most basic level, walking still burns calories. It's also a great, easy way to work a little extra movement into your life, especially if you're a fitness beginner or have an injury. The catalyst for me checking out Peloton's walking offerings was actually my mom being "prescribed" walking as a treatment for an issue she's been having with her back. The issue prevented her from walking long periods of time or walking fast, so after addressing it medically with doctors and physical therapists, her at-home assignment was to walk longer and longer durations on a walking pad in the living room. As an able-bodied person living in a walkable city (by which I mean a city where I am basically forced to hit my arbitrary 10,000 steps per day whether I want to or not), I have definitely taken the ability to walk for granted. I decided to check out Peloton's walking workouts to see if they'd be useful for my mom—but they ended up being useful for me. What are Peloton's walking workouts all about?To find walking workouts on the Peloton app, select Walking from the top of your home screen or type "walking" into the search bar. Peloton's walking workouts are designed for use on their Tread treadmills (or any treadmill, really)—but I've found that I enjoy them just as much if I go outside, although I obviously can't control the incline if I do that. The guided walks available in the app are like any class Peloton offers: They come in a variety of lengths and formats, are led by a certified instructor who encourages you and reminds you of safety cues, and feature playlists of music that keep the energy going. I start off nearly every weekday morning by walking to Dunkin' Donuts and then to the post office to drop off whatever I've sold on resale apps, so I queue up a Peloton walk for my journey. While I don't necessarily need to have an instructor in my ears reminding me to, well, walk, it encourages me to keep my pace up; I just ignore whatever they're saying about messing with incline and resistance buttons, as I'm not on a treadmill. This morning, I walked along with a five-minute warmup walk routine from instructor Logan Aldridge, who shared encouraging reminders that walking, even if it feels easy, is "massively worth it" for a person's health. He also gave speed cues using practical, real-world examples instead of just relying on cues built around treadmill functions. At one point, he described the pace goal as "not Manhattan walking, not New York City walking," which was funny because I was, in fact, Manhattan-walking my way to a Dunkin', so I slowed down a bit. You can enable location sharing for more accurate measurements and, of course, I have my Apple Watch paired with my Peloton app to give me better data on my heart rate, output, and speed, too. I forgot to enable my location tracking at the beginning of the walk (I don't have it set to automatically track that, though you can), so at the end, it prompted me to enter in my distance walked for better measurements. I glanced at my watch, which told me how far I'd walked, entered in that number, and was taken to a screen where I could review my output. You can absolutely do this on a treadmill, too, and the workouts are more or less designed for you to. There are live classes available, which enter the on-demand archive when they're finished, and you can choose from cool-down walks, power walks, hikes, walks set to certain kinds of playlists (like '90s music or EDM), or even "walk & talk" walks that have two instructors if you like that chatty, podcast kind of feel. Some classes feature walking and running and their titles tell you that upfront. As you're scrolling the options, you'll mostly see title cards with instructors on Treads in the Peloton studio, but you'll also see a few where the instructors are outside. These guided walks are designed more for outdoor walks and the instructors will call out the half-way point so you always know when to turn around and head home (or back to the office or whatever). The workouts come in all kinds of lengths, from five minutes up to 75, with the longer ones often incorporating both walking and running. Why I like Peloton's walking workoutsThese workouts are an easy way to slot some extra intentional movement into my day. I'm already walking around a lot, but I'm not always doing it with purpose. Having an instructor reminding me to connect with my steps and a playlist designed to keep me on a certain pace turns a standard coffee run into a mindful exercise. Walking is also low-impact and accessible, so even on a day you're tired or even if other forms of cardio are beyond your reach, this opens up a whole world of fitness opportunities. Perhaps most importantly, this is the most accessible kind of workout on the app because you really don't need anything special. You don't need a floor mat, yoga blocks, or weights, let alone a fancy treadmill. As long as you have some good shoes, you can walk around all you want while still getting the company's signature encouragement and guidance from trained pros. View the full article

Google Ads costs surged across nearly every industry in 2025, with 87% of sectors seeing higher cost-per-click rates. But the pain is being offset by significantly better conversion rates — 65% of industries are turning more clicks into actual customers. That’s according to a LocalIQ analysis of 16,446 campaigns. Overall 2025 benchmarks: Average cost per click: $5.26 (up 12.88% YoY) Average click-through rate: 6.66% (up 3.74% YoY) Average conversion rate: 7.52% (up 6.84% YoY) Average cost per lead: $70.11 (up 5.13% YoY) Big winners and losers: 87% of industries saw cost-per-click increases 65% of industries improved conversion rates Beauty & Personal Care saw biggest CPC spike (60% increase) Education & Instruction conversion rates jumped 44% Industry leaders Lowest cost per lead: Auto repair/service: $28.50 Restaurants & food: $30.27 Arts & entertainment: $30.27 Highest cost per lead: Legal services: $131.63 Furniture: $121.51 Business services: $103.54 Cost per click reality check. The average click now costs $5.26, up nearly 13% from last year. Some industries got hit harder than others: Biggest increases: Beauty & Personal Care: +60% Education & Instruction: +42% Shopping/Collectibles: +34% Most expensive clicks: Legal services: $8.58 Dental services: $7.85 Home improvement: $7.85 Cheapest clicks: Arts & entertainment: $1.60 Restaurants: $2.05 Travel: $2.12 The big picture. Rising costs aren’t necessarily bad news. While clicks cost more, they’re converting better, suggesting improved ad relevance and targeting. “Costs are rising, but so is performance — 65% of industries saw better conversion rates in 2025,” said Cliff Sizemore of LocaliQ. Why we care. Small businesses rely heavily on Google Ads, with 76% satisfied with their search advertising tactics. As costs rise, understanding performance benchmarks becomes crucial for budget allocation decisions. What’s driving changes. SERP evolution. Google now allows multiple ads from the same brand on one search page, increasing competition and costs. AI integration. Performance Max, Demand Gen, Local Services Ads and other automated campaigns are changing how businesses approach search advertising. Economic factors. A stable 2024 economy boosted conversion rates, though market uncertainty has returned. Bottom line. Smart strategy beats cheap clicks. Focus on conversion quality over quantity, invest in first-party data, and regularly audit campaign performance to stay competitive. Go deeper: The analysis covers 16,446 campaigns from April 2024-March 2025 across 23 industries. View the full article

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and health officials in several states are investigating a multistate Salmonella infection outbreak linked to whole cucumbers grown in Florida and shipped around the country. As a result of the ongoing investigation, health officials have recalled whole cucumbers grown by Bedner Growers Inc. and distributed by Fresh Start Produce Inc. between April 29, 2025, and May 19, 2025. As of Monday, 26 people have been infected with the outbreak strain of Salmonella. Cases have been reported in 15 states. Nine people have been hospitalized; no deaths have been reported. Several people reported feeling ill after being on cruises that departed from Florida. Which products were impacted? The outbreak is linked to whole, nonorganic varieties. Cucumbers may have been sold individually or in smaller packages and may be within shelf life for the rest of this week. Cucumbers were distributed to stores, restaurants, and other facilities. The FDA is working to determine where potentially contaminated products were distributed. Businesses that purchased whole cucumbers grown by Bedner Growers Inc. and distributed by Fresh Start Produce Inc. between April 29 and May 19 should not sell or serve them and should notify their customers of the potential health concern, health officials said. Illnesses were reported in the following states: Alabama California Colorado Florida Illinois Kansas Kentucky Michigan New York North Carolina Ohio Pennsylvania South Carolina Tennessee Virginia Additional information regarding the outbreak can be found here. What if I bought whole cucumbers recently? If you have whole cucumbers at home and don’t know where they’re from, throw them out. You should also wash and sanitize surfaces and items that they may have come in contact with. If you experience severe symptoms of Salmonella, such as diarrhea and a fever higher than 102°F, or diarrhea that doesn’t improve after three days, contact a healthcare provider. Most people recover within a few days. Why does this sound familiar? This is not the first time that produce grown by Bedner Growers, Inc. has been linked to a Salmonella outbreak. A 2024 investigation found that cucumbers from Bedner Growers, Inc. and Thomas Produce Company, of Boca Raton, Florida, were likely sources of a Salmonella outbreak that resulted in 551 illnesses across 34 states and the District of Columbia. As part of a follow-up investigation, the FDA said it collected an environmental sample from Bedner Growers, Inc. in April 2025. The sample was positive for Salmonella and matched recent clinical samples of sick individuals impacted by the current outbreak. Fast Company has reached out to Bedner Growers for comment. We will update this post if we receive a response. View the full article

On April 14, 2025, Blue Origin launched six women—Aisha Bowe, Amanda Nguyễn, Gayle King, Katy Perry, Kerianne Flynn and Lauren Sánchez—on a suborbital journey to the edge of space. The headlines called it a historic moment for women in space. But as a tourism educator, I paused—not because I questioned their experience, but because I questioned the language. Were they astronauts or space tourists? The distinction matters—not just for accuracy, but for understanding how experience, symbolism and motivation shape travel today. In tourism studies, my colleagues and I often ask what motivates travel and makes it a meaningful experience. These women crossed a boundary by leaving Earth’s surface. But they also stepped into a controversy about a symbolic one: the blurred line between astronaut and tourist, between scientific achievement and curated experience. This flight wasn’t just about the altitude they flew to—it was about what it meant. As commercial space travel becomes more accessible to civilians, more people are joining spaceflights not as scientists or mission specialists, but as invited guests or paying participants. The line between astronaut and space tourist is becoming increasingly blurred. In my own work, I explore how travelers find meaning in the way their journeys are framed. A tourism studies perspective can help unpack how experiences like the Blue Origin flight are designed, marketed and ultimately understood by travelers and the tourism industry. So, were these passengers astronauts? Not in the traditional sense. They weren’t selected through NASA’s rigorous training protocols, nor were they conducting research or exploration in orbit. Instead, they belong to a new category: space tourists. These are participants in a crafted, symbolic journey that reflects how commercial spaceflight is redefining what it means to go to space. Space tourism as a niche market Space tourism has its origins in 1986 with the launch of the Mir space station, which later became the first orbital platform to host nonprofessional astronauts. In the 1990s and early 2000s, Mir and its successor, the International Space Station, welcomed a handful of privately funded civilian guests—most notably U.S. businessman Dennis Tito in 2001, often cited as the first space tourist. Space tourism has since evolved into a niche market selling brief encounters to the edge of Earth’s atmosphere. While passengers on the NS-31 flight did not purchase their seats, the experience mirrors those sold by commercial space tourism providers such as Virgin Galactic. Like other forms of niche tourism—wellness retreats, heritage trails or extreme adventures—space travel appeals to those drawn to novelty, exclusivity and status, regardless of whether they purchased the ticket. These suborbital flights may last just minutes, but they offer something far more lasting: prestige, personal storytelling and the feeling of participating in something rare. Space tourism sells the experience of being somewhere few have visited, not the destination itself. For many, even a 10-minute flight can fulfill a deeply personal milestone. Tourist motivation and space tourism’s evolution The push-and-pull theory in tourism studies helps explain why people might want to pursue space travel. Push factors—internal desires such as curiosity, an urge to escape or an eagerness to gain fame—spark interest. Pull factors—external elements such as wishing to see the view of Earth from above or experience the sensation of weightlessness—enhance the appeal. Space tourism taps into both. It’s fueled by the internal drive to do something extraordinary and the external attraction of a highly choreographed, emotional experience. These flights are often branded—not necessarily with flashy logos, but through storytelling and design choices that make the experience feel iconic. For example, while the New Shepard rocket the women traveled in doesn’t carry a separate emblem, it features the company’s name, Blue Origin, in bold letters along the side. Passengers wear personalized flight suits, pose for preflight photos and receive mission patches or certificates, all designed to echo the rituals of professional space missions. What’s being sold is an “astronaut-for-a-day” experience: emotionally powerful, visually compelling and rich with symbolism. But under tourism classifications, these travelers are space tourists—participants in a curated, short-duration excursion. Representation and marketing experience The image from the Blue Origin flight of six women boarding a rocket was framed as a symbolic victory—a girl-power moment designed for visibility and celebration—but it was also carefully curated. This wasn’t the first time women entered space. Since its inception, NASA has selected 61 women as astronaut candidates, many of them making groundbreaking contributions to space science and exploration. Sally Ride, Mae Jemison, Christina Koch and Jessica Meir not only entered space—they trained as astronauts and contributed significantly to science, engineering and long-duration missions. Their journeys marked historic achievements in space exploration rather than curated moments in tourism. Recognizing their legacy is important as commercial spaceflight creates new kinds of unique, tailored experiences, ones shaped more by media performance than by scientific milestones. The Blue Origin flight was not a scientific mission but rather was framed as a symbolic event. In tourism, companies, marketers and media outlets often create these performances to maximize their visibility. SpaceX has taken a similar approach with its Inspiration4 mission, turning a private orbital flight into a global media event complete with a Netflix documentary and emotional storytelling. The Blue Origin flight sold a feeling of progress while blending the roles between astronaut and guest. For Blue Origin, the symbolic value was significant. By launching the first all-female crew into suborbital space, the company was able to claim a historic milestone—one that aligned them with inclusion—without the cost, complexity or risk associated with a scientific mission. In doing so, they generated enormous media attention. Tourism education and media literacy In today’s world, space travel is all about the story that gets told about the flight. From curated visuals to social media posts and press coverage, much of the experience’s meaning is shaped by marketing and media. Understanding that process matters—not just for scholars or industry insiders, but for members of the public, who follow these trips through the narratives produced by the companies’ marketing teams and media outlets. Another theory in tourism studies describes how destinations evolve over time—from exploration, to development, to mass adoption. Many forms of tourism begin in an exploration phase, accessible only to the wealthy or well connected. For example, the Grand Tour of Europe was once a rite of passage for aristocrats. Its legacy helped shape and develop modern travel. Right now, space tourism is in the exploration stage. It’s expensive, exclusive and available only to a few. There’s limited infrastructure to support it, and companies are still experimenting with what the experience should look like. This isn’t mass tourism yet, it’s more like a high-profile playground for early adopters, drawing media attention and curiosity with every launch. Advances in technology, economic shifts and changing cultural norms can increase access to unique destinations that start as out of bounds to a majority of tourists. Space tourism could be the next to evolve this way in the tourism industry. How it’s framed now—who gets to go, how the participants are labeled and how their stories are told—will set the tone moving forward. Understanding these trips helps people see how society packages and sells an inspirational experience long before most people can afford to join the journey. Betsy Pudliner is an associate professor of hospitality and technology innovation at the University of Wisconsin-Stout. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. View the full article

Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. This week, Zillow economists published their updated 12-month forecast, projecting that U.S. home prices—as measured by the Zillow Home Value Index—will fall by 0.9% between April 2025 and April 2026. After a series of downward revisions—beginning in January, when Zillow’s 12-month national home price forecast was +2.9%, and subsequently lowered each month until reaching -1.7% last month—Zillow has finally stopped downgrading its outlook. That said, it’s fair to call the Zillow economist bearish, given that for this forecast to be correct, 2025 would mark the first calendar-year home price decline since 2011. Why did Zillow downgrade its forecast for national home prices so many times this year? “The rise in [active] listings is fueling softer price growth, as greater supply provides more options and more bargaining power for buyers,” Zillow economists wrote in March. “Potential buyers are opting to remain renters for longer as affordability challenges suppress demand for home purchases.” Zillow thinks strained housing affordability—caused by U.S. home prices rising over 40% during the pandemic housing boom and mortgage rates spiking from 3% to 6% in 2022—is weighing on price growth. “Affordability is still challenging buyers. A mortgage payment on a typical home in March required about 35.3% of median household income nationwide when using a 20% down payment,” wrote Zillow chief economist Skylar Olsen last month. “That’s a slight improvement over last year, but is still unaffordable. Spending more than 30% of income on housing is considered a financial burden, and a 20% down payment is a steep entry fee, coming out to about $72,000 on the typical U.S. home.” According to Zillow’s home price model, the listing site also believes that weakening and softening housing markets across the Sun Belt will weigh on nationally aggregated home prices this year. Among the 300 largest U.S. metro area housing markets, Zillow expects the strongest home price appreciation between April 2025 and April 2026 to occur in these 10 areas: Atlantic City, NJ: 3.2% Kingston, NY: 2.6% Torrington, CT: 2.4% Knoxville, TN: 2.3% Rochester, NY: 2.2% Syracuse, NY: 2.0% Vineland, NJ: 2.0% Fayetteville, AR: 1.9% Concord, NH: 1.9% Hilton Head Island, SC: 1.8% And these are the 10 housing markets where Zillow expects the weakest home price appreciation over that time period: Houma, LA: -10.2% Lake Charles, LA: -8.4% Alexandria, LA: -7.5% New Orleans, LA: -7.1% Lafayette, LA: -7.0% Shreveport, LA: -6.9% Beaumont, TX: -6.2% Midland, TX: -6.1% Monroe, LA: -5.5% Odessa, TX: -5.3% Below is what the current year-over-year rate of home price growth looks like for single-family and condo home prices. Florida is currently the epicenter of housing market weakness right now. View the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Deal pricing and availability subject to change after time of publication. For anyone looking for a straightforward, budget laptop for school, writing, or browsing, this open-box Microsoft Surface Laptop SE sale is worth a look. It’s priced at $189.99 right now on StackSocial, down from its original $378.99 listing. Even Amazon has it for about $20 more at the moment. Being an open-box item means you're not getting the out-of-the-plastic wrap experience—these units were likely returned, displayed, or pulled from shelves—so the box might be bruised or have a sticker or two, but the product itself is tested, verified, repackaged, and it still comes with a one-year warranty. This 11.6-inch model runs on the Intel Celeron N4120 chip and comes preloaded with Windows 11 SE—a version of the OS designed for school environments. It's lightweight and compact, making it ideal for students or anyone looking for something they can carry around all day. The screen isn’t high-res and you’re not getting a touchscreen here, but for folks who don’t need that and prefer typing on a traditional keyboard, it does the job. Battery life is rated at up to 16 hours, which sounds great on paper, though real-world use is probably a few hours shy of that if you’ve got multiple tabs or videos going. It's not a powerhouse, but with 8GB RAM and 128GB SSD, it should hold up fine for most basic tasks like video calls, typing assignments, or streaming. That said, it’s not ideal for anyone needing apps outside the Microsoft Store or planning to multitask heavily. You’re not getting premium design or high-end specs, but you are getting a lightweight, functional machine with solid battery life and basic performance. For under $200, that’s not a bad trade-off. View the full article

Plenty of consumer electronics device categories are next in line for a major connectivity boost with Wi-Fi 7, Qualcomm says. The post FastConnect C7700 brings Wi-Fi 7 to “every kind of compute and consumer electronics device,” Qualcomm says appeared first on Wi-Fi NOW Global. View the full article

Profits for Big Four firm come in ‘below our original plan’, says internal memoView the full article