• Perplexity AI has released a mobile app for Android
• The Perplexity Assistant offers voice, text, and camera-based interactions for tasks such as booking rides and identifying objects
• The assistant integrates with apps and leverages real-time information and task automation

AI conversational search engine Perplexity is going mobile on the Google Play Store with a new Android app. Peeplexity’s app pitches itself as a kind of digital Swiss Army knife that can manage tasks for you, including making reservations and identifying objects through your phone’s camera. Best of all, the app is free and speaks 15 languages.

By leveraging Perplexity’s own search engine, the assistant can also tap into real-time web information, so it’s not just regurgitating pre-programmed answers. This should, in theory, make it smarter and more versatile than many of its competitors. To juggle all of those abilities, Perplexity can maintain context across multiple tasks. That means it won’t double-book you and will remember what you like and don’t like.

Netflix plans to offer couch co-op and party games that it will stream over the cloud to TVs, co-CEO Greg Peters said as part of the company’s Q4 2024 earnings announcements this week. The company has offered cloud gaming as a beta to a “subset” of subscribers since 2023, so this news from Peters indicates that the company is going to continue to invest in it.

Peters didn’t say exactly when the co-op and party games might be available. But he did say that “we think of this as a successor to family board game night or an evolution of what the game show on TV used to be.”

Netflix will also continue to focus on “more narrative games based on Netflix IP” — Peters says those games are “consistent fan favorites and we’ve got a lot in the library to work with there.”

OpenAI says that it might store chats and associated screenshots from customers who use Operator, the company’s AI “agent” tool, for up to 90 days — even after a user manually deletes them.

OpenAI has a similar deleted data retention policy for ChatGPT, its AI-powered chatbot platform. However, the retention period for ChatGPT is only 30 days, which is 60 days shorter than Operator’s.

OpenAI says its policies around data retention for Operator are designed to combat abuse. “As agents are a relatively new technology, we wanted to make sure our teams have the time to better understand and review potential abuse vectors,” an OpenAI spokesperson told TechCrunch. “This retention period allows us to enhance fraud monitoring and ensure the product remains safe from misuse, while still giving users control over their data.”

OpenAI announced Operator on Thursday and released it in a research preview for subscribers to the company’s $200-per-month ChatGPT Pro plan. Operator is a general-purpose AI agent with a built-in browser that can independently perform certain actions on websites.

OpenAI claims that Operator can automate tasks like booking travel accommodations, making restaurant reservations, and shopping online. There are several task categories users can choose from within the Operator interface, including shopping, delivery, dining, and travel.

Operator captures screenshots of its built-in browser to help it understand how and when to take actions in apps, like when to use buttons and which forms to complete. To be clear, Operator doesn’t capture screenshots when it gets “stuck,” like when the tool needs a password. OpenAI calls this “take over” mode.

Still, some users may be wary of volunteering screenshots of their online activities to a company that may keep them for upwards of three months. OpenAI notes that, as with ChatGPT, Operator data may be accessed by “a limited number of authorized OpenAI personnel” and “trusted service providers” for purposes like investigating abuse and handling legal matters.

Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,000 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today – or scroll down further for the answers.

Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc’s Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.

Many EV manufacturers have leaned heavily on energy-gulping resistive heaters to keep the cabin and battery warm in the winter time. But heat pumps, which can cut down on battery range losses in the cold, are becoming more prevalent in EVs, and they could help EV owners in the US who are dealing with the low temperatures across much of the country this week.

EV research site Recurrent reported that heat pumps can improve drivable range in below freezing temperatures by about 8 to 10 percent. The site tested this by comparing the ranges of 2020 Model 3 and Model S vehicles that lack heat pumps against 2021 versions that have them.

Recurrent’s data shows that the Tesla Model X and the Audi E-Tron only lose about 11 to 13 percent of their range at 32 degrees Fahrenheit compared to driving them in ideal temperatures hovering around 70 degrees, as The Washington Post notes, making them among the best heat pump-equipped EVs.. However, The Washington Post says that heat pumps aren’t as effective below 15 degrees.

A heat pump works by efficiently transferring heat generated by the car to the cabin and other components. Similarly, gas cars have long used a heater core to transfer wasted heat energy from its internal combustion engine into the cabin.

Heat pumps have made their way into popular EVs like Teslas as early as 2021 and are coming to other top models like Ford’s Mustang Mach-E for the 2025 model year. They also are already in many EVs on the road today, including the Polestar 2, Honda Prologue, Chevy Equinox EV, Kia EV6, Rivians, and even some Nissan Leaf models as early as 2013. Recurrent has a complete list of EVs that have heat pumps.

Older EVs with smaller batteries that lack heat pumps demonstrate cold range loss more vividly. For instance, my sister, who is driving a 2017 Ford Focus Electric, is only getting about 80 miles of range in the freezing cold with its resistive heaters off and only about 50 with it on. That could be the difference between being able to do a full work commute roundtrip without stopping or needing to find a (hopefully working) DC fast charging station on the way back.

We’ve previously shared some tips on how to handle EVs in the winter that can help you through icy situations on the road. Some tips include preconditioning your vehicle while plugged in before leaving and brushing snow off more often since it won’t melt off the hood like a gas car.

The nonprofit Center for AI Safety (CAIS) and Scale AI, a company that provides a number of data labeling and AI development services, have released a challenging new benchmark for frontier AI systems.

The benchmark, called Humanity’s Last Exam, includes thousands of crowdsourced questions touching on subjects like mathematics, humanities, and the natural sciences. To make the evaluation tougher, the questions are in multiple formats, including formats that incorporate diagrams and images.

In a preliminary study, not a single publicly available flagship AI system managed to score better than 10% on Humanity’s Last Exam.

CAIS and Scale AI say they plan open up the benchmark to the research community so that researchers can “dig deeper into the variations” and evaluate new AI models.

Strands is the NYT’s latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it’s great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc’s Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

Following last month’s test, Threads will now let everyone schedule posts, Instagram head Adam Mosseri announced on Thursday. You can use the feature by creating a new post, selecting the three-dot menu in the top-left corner, and selecting “Schedule.”

Once you get your post timed up, you can view, delete, or edit it from your drafts folder. Threads will let you schedule your posts up to 75 days in advance, but it won’t allow you to schedule replies.

Mosseri also said that Threads is adding a way to “markup” a post you’re resharing. Based on early versions of the feature shared by users, it looks like it will let you draw over, highlight, or add arrows to an existing post. This feature is rolling out to a “few countries with more to come soon.”

President Donald Trump on Thursday ordered the formation of a working group to propose federal regulations for “digital assets” — including cryptocurrencies, digital tokens, and stablecoins — and evaluate a national crypto stockpile.

Ex-PayPal COO and founder of VC firm Craft Ventures David Sacks, Trump’s pick for crypto an AI ‘czar,’ will lead the working group. The group will also include the Treasury Secretary, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Commerce, and other top officials.

Trump’s latest executive order — titled “Strengthening American Leadership in Digital Financial Technology” — comes two days after the Securities and Exchange Commission, currently led by crypto-friendly Republican Mark Uyeda, launched a crypto task force to “draw clear regulatory lines” for the market. Uyeda will also be a part of the presidential working group.

Former SEC Chair Gary Gensler had a reputation in the crypto community for pursuing stricter regulation of cryptocurrencies.

Trump’s order also protects individuals’ rights to access, use, develop, and transact on public blockchain. This would formally protect blockchain activities as lawful.

The EO signed Thursday repeals Biden-era rules around cryptocurrencies and digital assets. Specifically, it repeals an executive order from former President Joe Biden signed in 2022 to address the risks and harness the potential benefits of digital assets and their underlying blockchain technology, while emphasizing the need to protect consumers and investors. Trump’s order also repeals a framework published by the Treasury Department in 2022 for international engagement in crypto and blockchain development.

While Biden-era policies focused on risk mitigation and international collaboration, Trump’s order prioritizes economic liberty and U.S. sovereignty.

Another big difference is that Biden’s executive order directed various federal agencies to explore the development of a U.S. Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). Trump’s order prohibits CBDCs, meaning the government can’t create a digital version of the dollar directly controlled by the central bank. At the same time, the order promotes privately issued U.S. dollar-backed stablecoins, with the goal of bolstering the dollar’s dominance in global trade and digital finance.

In other words, Trump is signaling his commitment to keeping cryptocurrencies under a decentralized financial system.

It’s worth noting that Trump launched a memecoin $TRUMP days before his inauguration. The memecoin stood at an $6.84 billion valuation as of Thursday afternoon. Critics have warned that Trump’s token erodes boundaries between the president’s political and business interests, and some have argued it has the makings of a classic pump-and-dump scheme.

Previous administrations have approached the crypto world with caution due to concerns that it can easily be used in association with illicit and illegal activities, like ransomware payments and money laundering. One of the most prescient examples of the dangers of crypto is the downfall of crypto trading platform FTX, which exposed massive fraud, misappropriation of customer funds, and a lack of regulatory oversight.

Many in the crypto industry argue that FTX’s crash is exactly why clearer regulation designed for the industry is needed. And there are some companies, like Chainalysis, that have made strides in creating trust in crypto by providing compliance and investigation software and track virtual currencies.

With laptop and smartphone makers like Samsung spreading generative AI across all aspects of their devices, OpenAI is trying the same with an agentic tool announced on Jan. 23. The tool, called Operator, runs on the same basic technology as ChatGPT but resides within a proprietary web browser. This enables it to autonomously perform actions such as ordering groceries or booking tours.

OpenAI suggested in a blog post Operator could “ope[n] up new engagement opportunities for businesses,” but did not elaborate.

What is OpenAI’s Operator?

Operator is an application that includes a web browser and the generative AI model GPT-4o. It’s the result of an OpenAI project to train GPT-4o’s vision capabilities on the graphical user interfaces found on typical web pages. Its ability to make multi-step plans and correct mistakes independelty if needed set it apart from other efforts to create agentic AI, OpenAI boasted. Operator’s Computer-Using Agent (CUA) model is trained specifically on the buttons, forms, and menus likely to be found on a web page.

Operator is in beta. OpenAI said feedback from early-stage users will be used to improve it.

ChatGPT Pro subscribers can sign up for Operator starting today.

OpenAI plans to provide Operator to Plus, Team, and Enterprise soon. The tech giant also intends to integrate its capabilities into ChatGPT generally. They’ll include the CUA in their API “soon,” according to the blog post.

How does Operator work?

The company says the CUA’s reasoning technique, which they call an “inner monologue,” helps the model understand intermediate steps and adapt to unexpected input. Under the hood, CUA takes screenshots of web pages and uses a virtual mouse and keyboard to navigate.

As with ChatGPT, users can add custom instructions that Operator will remember, such as the user’s preferred airline.

SEE: Threat actors can jailbreak generative AI to automatically create phishing emails and other malicious content.

Users can prompt Operator in natural language the same way they can prompt ChatGPT. Operator is trained to balk at logging in to sites, providing payment details, or passing CAPTCHAs, so it will hand control back to the user for those steps. Operator is programmed not to accept requests — such as making banking transactions — or to weigh in on high-stakes situations, such as deciding whether to hire an employee.

If the Operator encounters an interface it can’t predict how to interact with, it will hand the task back to the user. OpenAI collaborated directly with the following companies to make sure Operator can interact with their sites:

• DoorDash.
• Instacart.
• OpenTable.
• Priceline.
• StubHub.
• Thumbtack.
• Uber.

OpenAI notes that the early iteration of Operator tends to struggle with “complex interfaces,” including creating slideshows or adding items to calendars.

Operator enters into a crowded generative AI landscape

Some of Operator’s functionality overlaps with competitor tools, such as Google Gemini or Apple Intelligence.

Operator invites comparison with Microsoft’s much-maligned Recall feature, which uses screenshots to navigate a PC. Operator also shares some capabilities with Google Lens on Chrome. However, its ability to navigate websites autonomously could be a point of differentiation. Agentic AI, in which generative AI models perform multi-step errands on the user’s account, is either the hot new thing in tech or a new way to package the still-limited products.