Google AI Gemini is getting better.

[webenda]

I ran across this image on Reddit:

[webenda]

Google AI Overview:
The "kenova's 0-4-0T" refers to a specific Vulcan Iron Works 0-4-0T steam locomotive that was on display in Kenova, West Virginia, but has now been moved to the Kentucky Steam Heritage Corp. for restoration. Built in late 1918/early 1919, its original owner was W.E. Callihan Construction, and it later became the #1 locomotive for Potomac Edison Company. After decades on public display, its deteriorating condition led to its relocation in June 2024 to be restored to operating condition.
Manufacturer: Vulcan Iron Works
Builder's Number: #2886
Original Use: Built for W.E. Callihan Construction as its #1
Later Use: Became Potomac Edison Company's #1 in Williamsport, MD, operating until the early 1960s
Previous Display: Displayed for many years by the Kenova Historical Commission in Kenova, WV, before being sold
Current Status: Moved to the Kentucky Steam Heritage Corp. in Ravenna, KY, for restoration

Found it through Google Maps:


The above was location 1 given by AI. The date was 2021.

Same location 2025:

[webenda]

Second location by AI:

Reference: https://www.kentuckysteam.org/

Yea, Google AI Gemini!

Grammarly AI Overview
It depends on the context: "Yay" is an interjection for joy, while "yea" is a formal "yes" used in voting. The correct word depends on whether you are expressing excitement or casting a vote.

Yes, Grammarly AI, I meant, Yes, for Gemini. Good catch though. Readers of this forum would not have been able to tell if I meant Yay or Yea if you had not brought it up.

Edit 1: corrected, "Good catch through" to "Good catch though."

[sarge]

Wayne, you sound like a proud Millennial (stereotyping, I know) parent. "Oh, very good! Somebody's getting pudding!"

Two right answers out of a million don't make for a particularly precocious child.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Two right answers out of a million don't make for a particularly precocious child.

Even a broken clock is right twice a day,

[sarge]

Readers of this forum would not have been able to tell if I meant Yay or Yea if you had not brought it up.

More of us are literate than you might think. I, for one, certainly do not require the likes of some AI thing "correcting" my writing to sanitised American English, especially an AI program ironically using "grammarly" as a word.

[webenda]

I, for one, certainly do not require the likes of some AI thing "correcting" my writing to sanitised American English, especially an AI program ironically using "grammarly" as a word.

I do.

[sarge]

Wayne, I believe you are better off thinking for yourself, mate.

You're fine the way you are.

[sarge]

Currently, Google AI is a real problem for me.

I can't successfully search using Google anymore. If I want to search images for a modelling project, for example, I get intercepted by Google AI who knows I used to edit OST amongst other things, thinks Lionel, MTH, Atlas are of "scale" interest, is directed by Google's accounts to push paid product placements, assumes I am shopping no doubt because the family uses my eBay and Amazon accounts, in short has built an inflexible profile of "me".

The result, should I want to find images of, say, a PRR G32 as a lettering reference, is pages of images of hirail and HO for sale from a hundred small vendors after eBay, Amazon, Worthpoint, Lionel, have all weighed in. Scores of images of these things don't have anything to do with the search parameters, either PRR or G32. It rarely shows an image of the prototype (even when I put the word "prototype" in the search) and, when it does, it might easily be a photo of a Santa Fe hopper or an Aeronca Champ.

The usual search protocols no longer apply. Put either in quotes and nothing changes. Put a minus sign in front of Lionel or HO (in quotes) and no effect.

I can go to RailPicture or Rail Picture Archives and find what I want, so I know it exists and can be found easily. Not using Google.

Google sometimes will ask "Do you mean..." when it thinks I need coaching as to spelling when I'm searching something, especially if what I'm searching bears resemblance to a paid product placement client. Then it gives an endless list having to do not with what I entered but what AI "thinks" I meant. Put my search in quotes since it won't allow me to answer its "Do you mean..." query and it repeats the entire result verbatim.

Then, not very far down the listings, AI has a fit, goes off the reservation, and starts showing images of any old bollocks having absolutely nothing to do with anything.

For fun, I've tried the same searches on my wife's machine, and the results are very different though just as useless.

It appears Amazon is using AI in its search function as well. I can search something very specifically, that search easily pushes their AI search engine off top dead centre, and I get pages of totally non-germane products.

I can't turn Google AI off, Google has become completely useless for purpose, but Google has a monopoly in the US apparently. Quite frankly the internet as a research tool has become quite literally useless to me because of Google and its use of monetised artificial intelligence. If I don't have a specific site bookmarked, I'm back to books for specific searches and even have had to resort a printed encyclopaedia for overviews of a general nature.

Currently, AI is a half-baked research project being foisted upon us as a real product and some sort of improvement to our lives. It has ruined our ability to access knowledge on the net.

Oh, for a competitor to Google. Even better, one that actually works like in the old days of the net.

[HONDO74]

THE PENNSY MODELER
https://jbritton.pennsyrr.com/index.php ... r-modelers

[sarge]

Thanks, but I was using the G32 only as an illustration of the far larger problem, that of Google AI making the internet almost unsearchable and I have no voice or choice whether I want it, no input regarding how it works or doesn't for me, nor apparently is there any alternative to Google.

Google AI's rather hurried and draconian application has made the majority of useful knowledge on the net just this side of inaccessible, at least for me, and there seems to be no on-line alternative. I've actually seriously considered pulling the plug on it all. There are plenty of book stores around! GRIN!

[gregj410]

This thread is why we need the CCL

[sarge]

Nah.

It's modelling research oriented.

[HONDO74]

Gemini AI video generator powered by Veo 3.1
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Google's recently launched AI video tool can generate realistic clips that contain misleading or inflammatory information about news events.
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[Rufus T. Firefly]

I'm not having these issues anywhere near to the extent that you describe for yourself. I'm not having much in the way of AI insertion into my Google searches at all; it's there but easily ignored. I've also not availed myself of the use of any AI, so that door is not quite opened.

Yes, there are alternatives to Google. They're just not very good and/or worse.....I had to explicitly block all of them from being used by either browser.

I'd wonder about your operating system, version of the same, and then your IPS......

Reading over a very interesting editorial opinion bit to review that I'll be getting into print shortly. Makes some rather salient observations about where this is all headed and none of it reads positively. Good stuff, but I have to wonder if anyone will ever read it or just ask their favorite AI to do their thinking for them.