Latest news with #Googling
Time Out
4 days ago
- Time Out
New York ranked 2nd for summer staycation city in the U.S.
Forget flight delays and the dreaded TSA line. It turns out, the second-best place in the country for a summer escape is, well, right here. New York City just landed the No. 2 spot in a new ranking of the best staycation cities in the U.S., thanks to its unbeatable blend of luxury, culture and good old-fashioned summer fun. The list, compiled by global online gaming provider Playstar, looked at America's biggest cities and evaluated everything from hotel and restaurant ratings to amusement parks, hiking trails, gas prices and how often people were Googling vacations there. New York City earned a vacation score of 67.27 out of 100, narrowly missing the top spot to Houston (67.76), which nabbed the crown with a surge of staycation buzz, low gas prices and tons of family-friendly hikes. But don't hang your Mets cap in shame: New York absolutely crushed it in the high-end leisure department, boasting more five-star hotels (a whopping 963) and top-rated restaurants (240) than any other city on the list. Add in 141 amusement parks and 128 hiking trails and you've got a weekend itinerary that practically writes itself. The city also ranked third overall for family-friendliness, proving it's not just for date nights and rooftop cocktails. With 50 nearby lakes, plus enough parks and playgrounds to tire out even the most sugar-fueled kid, New York makes a solid case for skipping the flight and staying put. That said, don't expect your staycation to come cheap. NYC ranked 37th for average gas prices—$3.13 a gallon—making it one of the most expensive road-trip hubs in the country. But let's be honest: When the Empire State Building is your skyline and Central Park is your backyard, who needs to go far? If your PTO is limited but your appetite for adventure isn't, consider this your excuse to treat yourself to a little hometown holiday. Whether exploring a new corner of Prospect Park, checking into a luxe hotel in SoHo or finally trying that fancy tasting menu you've bookmarked for months, there's never been a better time to see the city through vacation-tinted glasses.
Forbes
13-06-2025
- Forbes
The End Of Browsing? AI Is Rewriting The Rules Of Online Visibility
Back when I was in high school, writing an academic essay was a chore. I'm talking leave-your-house-drive-to-the-library-to-search-for-citations-pain. Once, I spent an entire Saturday thumbing through books for quotes to back up my points. Later compiling that citation list in AP style was no joy either. By the time I got to college, the web had sped the search process way up. The miracle of online databases slashed my research time. A few years after that when I worked as a journalist covering the oil industry, I could easily access multiple sources by Googling topics. By then, the tedious part had become weeding out dead-end hyperlinks—usually anything past page one of the search results. In 2025 it's worth asking: do students or professionals search anymore? Business Insight Journal has an interesting take on this question. 'Students aren't just searching differently—they're searching elsewhere. According to Everspring's new 2025 AI Search Trends Report, prospective students increasingly turn to AI tools like ChatGPT instead of traditional search engines.' Professionals are also increasingly using AI to deliver direct answers rather than sift through pages of results. ''I don't even use Google anymore—I just use ChatGPT,' said Ash Minhas, a Technical Content Manager at IBM in a piece from the company evocatively titled: 'Browsing Obsolete: Examining the AI Search Era.' In it, Minhas gushes about artificial intelligence's utility to 'scan and synthesize a vast amount of sources in a short amount of time.' This remarkable shift in how we access information in such a short span reminds me of the saying: 'When one door closes, another opens.' That's because the expression 'Googling it' hasn't just lodged its way into our lexicon—it's become a way of life. Don't know something? Google it. But in a few years hearing someone say this may sound as quaint as the AOL modem startup noise. It might become a cultural relic due to the collapse of not just traditional search but the whole Search Engine Optimization (SEO) industry. Before discussing its likely replacement, Language Model Optimization (LMO), it's time for a refresher on the previous technology. Fittingly enough, it comes from 'SEO stands for search engine optimization, which is the process of improving a website's visibility in organic search results on Google and Bing, or other search engines. SEO involves researching search queries, creating helpful content, and optimizing the user experience to improve organic search rankings.' 'We're shifting from gaming Google's algorithm to engaging in real-time AI searches that respond directly to what we ask. That's the fundamental transformation unfolding right now,' said Claude Zdanow when I interviewed him to explain the impending sea change. As CEO of Onar Holding Corporation, a network of next-gen marketing and creative services agencies built to accelerate middle-market company growth via AI, he's following LMO closely. What he's noticed is the unprecedented value it brings clients. Traditional SEO often involved manipulating search rankings through keyword stuffing or an over-reliance on backlinks. There was definite utility behind such practices for companies wishing to be found, especially over their competitors. Unfortunately, end users didn't always find such stacked entries so helpful. LMO is now poised to disrupt this search model by operating as a kind of online oracle. 'Language Model Optimization is about creating content that's actually relevant and useful so that AI, not just a search engine, can interpret it, trust it, and serve it up as the best answer,' said Zdanow. 'It's no longer about finessing the system. It's about genuinely solving a user's problem.' Stepping back to contextualize this development, a logical progression is afoot. Value determines if a technology becomes widely accepted. Until web-based databases arrived, the most optimal way for high school students to source their papers was to pore through physical text. Later, search engines like Google became so popular because they worked even better. Now that LMO can accurately and efficiently deliver even more valuable answers, it's understandable that users like the Ash Minhas of the world flock to it. To grasp more of the value LMO provides, it's helpful to consult SEO Content Expert Jenny Abouobaia's LinkedIn post of the model's key prioritizations: 'Context Over Authority Signals: Unlike Google, which relies on backlinks for authority, LLMs focus on understanding the actual content.' Once more, we're talking about relevance. 'This shift isn't just about changing tactics,' said Zdanow. 'It's about changing intent. We must stop thinking in terms of algorithms and start thinking in terms of audiences. Moving forward, the question won't be 'How do I get ranked?' but rather: 'How do I help someone?'' That insight reminds me of philosopher Yuval Harari's take on the U.S.S.R.'s downfall in his book Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow. 'The Soviet Union tried to run a central economy from Moscow. And it just wasn't efficient. They brought all the information to Moscow, but there was nobody there who could process all the information fast enough and efficiently enough to make the right decisions. And this is why the distributed information system of the United States proved to be far superior to the centralized information system of the Soviet Union.' Harari's point is that America's decentralized bottom-up economy triumphed over its rival, but not through Cold War hostility. The U.S.S.R. imploded because it provided less value to its citizens. Top-down productivity collapsed alongside ideological alignment as its governance model proved incapable of meeting modern demands. The lesson here is simple: Value trumps everything in the end. Even totalitarian regimes. Companies would do well to think in these terms when it comes to getting found online. Business owners and the marketing agencies serving them can stay ahead of the search curve by producing content that's actually useful. When in doubt, stop and ask yourself: 'Would another person find this valuable?' If so, it's more likely you will get noticed under the LMO model. When it comes to content, the best advice I ever got was from my mom, back when I was still haunting the library to finish a paper on the Spartan phalanx: 'Be original.' In other words, share unique, non-derivative content, including stories or data AI cannot find anywhere else. This last point has special relevance for the times we live in. As AI automates more and more of life's drudgery and rote activities, space opens up for creativity and originality to once more be in demand. Rather than decry the shifting sands of commerce and the uncertainty it inevitably brings, we would do well to appreciate the opportunity tech provides. Especially when it allows us to deliver greater value to our fellow human beings.
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Social Security Boss Reveals His DOGE Plans Are Just Getting Started Despite Musk's Exit
Elon Musk is gone but not forgotten at the Social Security Administration, as the head of the agency considers himself 'fundamentally a DOGE person.' Social Security Commissioner Frank Bisignano said in a recent interview that he plans to use the engineers Musk brought in with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to revamp the agency to rely more heavily on technology and artificial intelligence for providing customer service, the Wall Street Journal reported. The interview was conducted before Musk's spectacular falling out last week with President Donald Trump. The president is reportedly dragging all of MAGA into the war and forcing them to choose sides, meaning Bisignano could ultimately be forced to distance himself from Musk. For now, though, Bisignano says he wants to use DOGE to make his department a 'digital-first organization.' The former Wall Street executive took over the embattled agency on May 7 after Googling what the job entailed. He faces an uphill battle in winning over both the public and agency staffers after Musk's DOGE cut thousands of jobs, forced its way into databases containing Americans' personal data, and threatened to close offices, the Journal reported. The agency was already at historically low staffing levels, with average call-in wait times of about 60 minutes, USA Today reported last month. Since DOGE and the Trump administration came in, wait times are up to 90 minutes on average. Such a high average means that some people are waiting even longer—up to 150 minutes, USA Today found—or not getting through at all. Of the 380,000 people who call in each day, about half fail to get through to a representative, according to the Journal. For those visiting field offices in person, drop-ins are no longer allowed, and many people have to join a waitlist just to make an appointment, according to USA Today. In a statement to USA Today, Bisignano's predecessor blamed Biden-era work-from-home policies and diversity initiatives for the increase in wait times during the Trump administration. The increases coincided with the agency offering buyouts to 3,000 of the agency's 57,000 employees, with officials planning to shed about 7,000 more jobs, according to USA Today. Bisignano wants to use DOGE personnel to cut wait times and speed up the processing of retirement, survivor, and Medicare benefits, according to the Wall Street Journal. The agency had already been using AI to respond to 1-800 calls, with bots handling 17 percent of calls last October. In March, the number was up to 44 percent. Kathleen Romig, director of Social Security and disability policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, told the Wall Street Journal she had heard about callers getting stuck in loops with the bots. Bisignano said AI integration is 'a long journey,' but that Musk's DOGE personnel, including eight engineers, will continue to 'refine the intelligence' to provide better answers. The team includes Marko Elez, a 25-year-old engineer who once wrote on social media that he wanted to 'normalize Indian hate' and that 'you could not pay me to marry outside my race.' In the meantime, the Supreme Court this week gave DOGE access to agency records 'in order for those members to do their work.' A lower court had found that giving DOGE access violated federal law and put millions of people's data at risk. Before the ruling, Bisignano had assured the Wall Street Journal that Americans' personal data was secure, and that DOGE is only focused on the agency's technology.
Yahoo
26-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Are You Trapped In A Life You Secretly Hate? These Clues Might Be A Wake-Up Call
Sometimes the truth doesn't show up as a lightning bolt—it creeps in through quiet dread, fatigue, and the feeling that you're sleepwalking through your own existence. You tell yourself you're fine, you smile for the photos, you tick the boxes. But inside, something feels off, like you're watching your life unfold from behind a glass wall. And maybe the scariest part? You've convinced yourself that this is just how life is. If any of these signs hit you like a gut punch, it's not a coincidence. It's your life trying to get your attention. You don't have to stay trapped in a version of yourself you barely recognize. But first, you have to admit you're stuck. You wake up, go through the motions, collapse into bed, and do it all over again. Every day feels like a carbon copy of the last, and you're not sure where the time is going—only that it's slipping through your fingers. Your schedule is packed, but none of it feels like yours. You're living for other people's needs, not your own. This isn't just burnout—it's a quiet form of self-erasure. The life you're building isn't aligned with who you are, it's aligned with what you think you're supposed to be. And that disconnect? It's eating you alive. If your life feels like a to-do list you didn't write, that's a red flag. You catch yourself scrolling Zillow for homes in cities you'll never move to, or Googling 'how to disappear and start over.' It's not just daydreaming—it's a symptom of feeling trapped. Fantasies about running away are a sign that your current life feels suffocating. You don't actually want to vanish—you want to feel alive again. These escape fantasies aren't silly. They're clues. They're your subconscious begging for change, even if you're too scared to act. Pay attention—your imagination is trying to tell you what your heart already knows. When you think about five years from now, do you feel excited—or do you If your future feels like a blank page you don't care to fill in, that's not just a rut. It's emotional disconnection. You're so checked out of your own life that even imagining a better one feels impossible. According to Psychology Today, disconnection from the future is a major sign you're not living authentically. That numbness is a red flag. You weren't meant to live in autopilot mode. Your future deserves more than passive acceptance—it deserves vision. You show up for everyone else—the partner, the kids, the boss—but when's the last time you showed up for you? If your life feels like a series of side quests for other people's dreams, that's a problem. You're not the star of your own story—you're a background character in theirs. And the longer you play that role, the harder it is to reclaim your narrative. Your needs aren't selfish—they're necessary. If you're always supporting others but never yourself, you're not living—you're existing in service of everyone else's plot line. And that's not sustainable. You matter too much to stay small. Exhaustion is a language your body speaks when your soul is running on empty. If you're tired all the time, no matter how much you sleep, that's a signal. According to Harvard Health, chronic fatigue can be a sign of emotional burnout, not just physical depletion. It's your body saying, 'This isn't working for us.' Don't dismiss the heaviness—it's not laziness, it's misalignment. When you're forcing yourself through a life that drains you, your body will rebel. Listen to it. It's telling you that something has to change. It's not just envy—it's a quiet, gnawing bitterness that creeps up when you see others living boldly, unapologetically. You find yourself rolling your eyes at their joy, but deep down, it's not about them—it's about the version of yourself you've abandoned. Their freedom feels like an indictment of your stuckness. And that resentment is a mirror you might not want to look into. You can't fake happiness by hating it in others. That discomfort is trying to teach you something: you want what they have, but you don't know how to get it. You can either keep resenting—or you can start reimagining. The choice is yours. Excitement isn't a luxury—it's a sign of life. If you can't remember the last time you felt that electric yes feeling, it's not because you're boring—it's because you're bored with a life that doesn't fit you. Routine has become your prison, not your rhythm. And you're starving for something more. This isn't about chasing adrenaline. It's about making space for desire, curiosity, and possibility. Your spark isn't gone—it's buried. And you owe it to yourself to dig it out. When people ask how you're doing, you launch into long explanations about how 'it's just a busy season' or 'everyone feels like this, right?' That's not normal—it's rationalization. You're trying to convince yourself as much as them. And the more you over-explain, the more it shows that you know something's off. Silence speaks louder than words. If you're explaining your life more than you're living it, that's a clue. You don't owe anyone an excuse for wanting more. And you don't have to apologize for being honest about your own unhappiness. It's a brutal feeling—knowing you built the life you're in, but now it feels like a cage. The job, the relationship, the house, the routine—you chose them, but now they're suffocating you. It's hard to admit when the dream you worked so hard for doesn't fit anymore. But holding onto something just because you chose it once isn't loyalty—it's self-betrayal. You're allowed to change your mind. You're allowed to outgrow what used to fit and there are ways to stop feeling stuck as Psych Love points out. The trap isn't your life—it's the story you tell yourself about what you 'have' to keep. Let it go. You fill every moment with noise—podcasts, TV, scrolling—because silence feels too dangerous. When you slow down, the truth bubbles up, and you're not ready to face it. So you keep yourself busy, distracted, numbed out. But the longer you avoid the quiet, the louder the unrest gets. Being alone with your thoughts isn't the problem—it's the unspoken feelings you're avoiding. That restlessness is your soul knocking. Stop running from it. It's trying to tell you the life you've built isn't the life you want. When you catch a glimpse of what you really want, you dismiss it as impractical, silly, or selfish. You shrink your desires before they even have a chance to breathe. That's not humility—it's fear. You're afraid of wanting something so badly that the thought of not getting it feels unbearable. But here's the thing: wanting isn't the problem. Denying your desires is what keeps you stuck. Your dreams are a map, not a mistake. Stop editing yourself out of your own life. You're not steering the ship—you're just along for the ride. Decisions get made, days pass, and you barely remember how you got here. It's like you're a passenger in a car that's speeding toward a destination you didn't choose. And every time you try to grab the wheel, you second-guess yourself into silence. This is how life drifts away: one passive moment at a time. But it doesn't have to stay that way. You can't change the past, but you can take the wheel now. Start small—steer in the direction that feels like you. This is the biggest sucker punch of all—that quiet ache that says, this can't be it. You keep waiting for something to happen, for someone to give you permission, for the perfect moment to arrive. But the truth is, no one's coming to save you. Your real life isn't on the horizon—it's waiting for you to claim it. The waiting is a trap. Life doesn't start when the conditions are perfect. It starts when you stop waiting. And that moment? It's now.
Yahoo
09-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
AI is eroding what Reddit says is the site's greatest competitive advantage
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman says that Reddit's human-led communities are what set the company apart. AI bots, however, are threatening that advantage by taking over forums and comments. Reddit has acknowledged the problem and is introducing new checks to ensure its users are human. Is nothing sacred anymore? Reddit is one of the last places on the internet where posts and comments don't feel like an endless pit of AI slop. But that is starting to change, and it's threatening what Reddit says is its competitive advantage. Reddit CEO Steve Huffman says that what keeps people coming back to the site is the information provided by real people, who often give thoughtful answers to questions. As the internet becomes saturated with AI-generated content, Huffman says that Reddit's communities, curated and managed by real people, set it apart from other social media platforms. "The world needs community and shared knowledge, and that's what we do best," Huffman told investors last week on an earnings call. Traffic to Reddit has grown considerably over the past year, thanks in part to users Googling specifically for Reddit posts related to their questions. Reddit's business model has seen increased attention since the company went public in March of last year. Since then, Reddit has amped up advertising on its forums and inked deals with both OpenAI and Google to allow their models to train on Reddit content. In April, Reddit's stock dipped after some analysts shared fears that the company's success could be inextricably tied to Google Search. "Just a few years ago, adding Reddit to the end of your search query felt novel," Huffman said in a Q3 earnings call in February. "Today, it's a common way for people to find trusted information, recommendations, and advice." But now, some Reddit users are complaining that the uniquely human communities the site is known for are being infiltrated by AI bots, or users relying on tools like ChatGPT to write their posts, which can often be spotted by the formatting. ChatGPT loves a bulleted list and an em-dash, and these days tends to be effusive in its positivity. One user in the community r/singularity, which is dedicated to discussion about advancements of AI, recently flagged a post from what they believed was an AI-generated user spreading misinformation about the July 2024 attempted assassination of President Donald Trump. "AI just took over Reddit's front page," the poster noted. And on April 28, Reddit's chief legal officer said the company was sending "formal legal demands" to researchers at the University of Zurich after they flooded one of the site's communities with AI bots for a study. Moderators of the forum r/changemyview said in a post that researchers conducted an "unauthorized experiment" to "study how AI could be used to change views." The researchers who conducted the experiment said in a Reddit post that 21 of the 34 accounts they used were "shadow-banned" by Reddit, meaning the content they posted would not show up for others. But they said they never received any communication from Reddit regarding Terms of Service violations. The moderators called the experiment unethical and said that AI targeted some users in the forum "in personal ways that they did not sign up for." The post says the AI went to extreme lengths in some posts, including pretending to be a victim of rape, posing as a black man opposed to Black Lives Matter, and even posing as a person who received substandard care in a foreign hospital, among other claims. "Psychological manipulation risks posed by LLMs is an extensively studied topic," the community's moderators wrote. "It is not necessary to experiment on non-consenting human subjects." A spokesperson for the University of Zurich told Business Insider that the school is aware of the study and is investigating. The spokesperson said that the researchers decided not to publish the findings of the study "on their own accord." "In light of these events, the Ethics Committee of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences intends to adopt a stricter review process in the future and, in particular, to coordinate with the communities on the platforms prior to experimental studies," the spokesperson said. For Reddit's business strategy, which is largely focused on advertising and its belief that it provides some of the best research around because it's based on real human reactions, the increased presence of AI on the platform is a threat. And Reddit has noticed. On Monday, Huffman said in a Reddit post that the company would start using third parties to "keep Reddit human." Huffman said that Reddit's "strength is its people" and that "unwelcome AI in communities is a serious concern." "I haven't posted in a while — and let's be honest, when I do show up, it usually means something's gone sideways (and if it's not gone sideways, it's probably about to)," Huffman said. The third-party services will now ask users creating Reddit accounts for more information, like their age, Huffman said. Specifically, "we will need to know whether you are a human," he said. A spokesperson for Reddit told BI that the Zurich experiment was unethical and that Reddit's automated tools flagged most of the associated accounts before the experiment ended. The spokesperson said that Reddit is always working on detection features and has already further refined its processes since the experiment came to light. Still, some Reddit users say they are fed up with what they see as a "proliferation of LLM bots in the last 10 months." "Some of them mimic the most brain-dead of users, providing one-word responses with emojis at the end," one user wrote. "They post with unnatural frequency, largely in subreddits known for upvoting just about anything." Read the original article on Business Insider
