I wondered when the name change was coming as NotebookLM felt a bit out of place brand-wise. Still would have been killer if they called it "Bard Notebook"
Guys google, I know enough people in the company to know how this decision was made, but I must say as a user if you rename or kill another thing I will stop using any Google service I still use.
This might be the one time I might forgive it but guys please don't it's annoying.
I admonish Gemini and demand explanation nearly every day of how it's possible that Google invented the thing, has the best infrastructure for inference, and somehow falls behind Anthropic and even OpenAI.
NotebookLM is pretty cool since it can hold a ton of context but this is so far below my (and frankly just reasonable) expectations of Google.
I downgraded my Gemini subscription and got Claude. Still can't believe how much better it is. Fable is way better, that's a given. But Claude even has a real .deb repo. Something Antigravity had and managed to lose.
I fear the upcoming changes... It ALWAYS starts with a name change, then more useless features, more ensh*ttification, then users flee, then the product is killed.
NotebookLM is genuinely useful for structured research workflows. My concern is not the name. It's whether the "notebook" metaphor survives the rebrand.
I'd like to have audio overviews of scientific papers, so I can "read" them while I drive. NotebookLM/Gemini Notebook sorta does this, but the two-person podcast format is kind of annoying and it can't pronounce math.
Is there something out there that will do this? I'm sure the right harness around frontier models would make it work.
I feel like the name reflect the product more. I have been using NotebookLM for studying and really like it. I wonder if with this name change, would there be a major change in Gemini Notebook ?
Any people with insight on why this happens? From my corporate experience this generally happens when two teams are working on a similar thing, they complain about turf to leadership, and leadership either makes them consolidate efforts or chooses a winner. Is that what happens at Google a lot? Or do they just constantly tweak things to the point they cease to live or be used?
You are evaluated by launches. If you have nothing of substance to launch, then launch a rebrand.
It is a sign of an organization that has nothing of substance to show off. Sadly, that's where Google is now: while its competitors are busy launching new features and improved models, Sir Demis' merry band of pranksters is busy renaming and rebranding things.
When notebookLM was new, it was interesting to listen to the podcasts. Then the novelty wore off, and I wanted something where I can interact with the podcasters but it was janky as hell.
My current “audio-learning” hack is ChatGPT Live which has become shockingly good after being awful compared to Claude Voice
(Let’s not even talk about Gemini voice which is still bad).
I go on a walk and dump a paper or article link in the chat, and ask chatGPT Live to walk me through the content in small nuggets, so I can discuss them interactively. For deeper topics I have it quiz me Socratic style so I’m not just passively listening, and actually thinking through problems or ideas.
There is actually an interrupt mode in NotebookLM now.
Overall I've found it the best AI product Google have. Only complaint I have about it is the hyper positive US corporate accents get pretty annoying pretty quickly.
The realtime voice in ChatGPT is excellent, the newer model is a big step up too.
Moving mind in a moving body. Maybe the future of coding really is a philosophical debate with a dhjinn.. i like this a lot. bravo.
I actually can see this as advertisement USP. Some lone hiker going up a mountain through nature to a peak, while the city in the valley below far away becomes functional again because of what is said in that debate about ..
walking for ideas - hunted down savanna mode similar to Darwin and all the other old thinkers.
I never got into the podcasts side but it was good for synthesizing multiple documents in a way chatgpt or google's ai overview couldn't, but now I will just dump a couple PDFs into a new chat in Ollama and then ask it questions about the content. Is there another killer app for notebookLM out there?
I can’t believe how bad Claude’s voice mode is. So much latency and it often tells me “this is rather technical” and would be better talking it out over text.
OpenAI has much less latency, can adapt to speak about any topic (though will tell you it put a code sample to look at later), and it just feels like brainstorming with a colleague.
If you haven’t tried the live voice version of ChatGPT recently, you should. I love to brainstorm ideas while on walks and it’s fabulous for that.
Ask it to summarize the conversation into a doc that will be waiting for you when you are back at your desk.
I like the podcast features still for getting an overview or orientation on a new topic where I know I need a big context dump before I can begin to do anything under my own speed.
I have tried the "walk and talk" pattern with AI, and it's okay, but I find that it can be kind of janky if the network connection isn't very good. And I find it very frustrating to use still in terms of how the interrupt feature works. For example, if I'm out hiking and there's even a little bit of wind, the voice mode of ChatGPT and Gemini both will think that I'm done talking and begin responding.
In fairness to the AI vendors, I imagine that this is a very difficult thing to get right. Humans have a very natural sense of flow in conversation, and knowing when a speaker is done talking and it's appropriate to begin responding.
My problem with NotebookLM was that you had to give it URLs or docs, you couldn't just have it search for docs and then incorporate them into your research.
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[ 3.2 ms ] story [ 73.5 ms ] threadGemini Notebook is a way better name for the masses.
This might be the one time I might forgive it but guys please don't it's annoying.
NotebookLM is pretty cool since it can hold a ton of context but this is so far below my (and frankly just reasonable) expectations of Google.
I downgraded my Gemini subscription and got Claude. Still can't believe how much better it is. Fable is way better, that's a given. But Claude even has a real .deb repo. Something Antigravity had and managed to lose.
Google:
- Hangout
- Chat
- Meets
- Duo
- ...
Is there something out there that will do this? I'm sure the right harness around frontier models would make it work.
It is a sign of an organization that has nothing of substance to show off. Sadly, that's where Google is now: while its competitors are busy launching new features and improved models, Sir Demis' merry band of pranksters is busy renaming and rebranding things.
My current “audio-learning” hack is ChatGPT Live which has become shockingly good after being awful compared to Claude Voice (Let’s not even talk about Gemini voice which is still bad).
I go on a walk and dump a paper or article link in the chat, and ask chatGPT Live to walk me through the content in small nuggets, so I can discuss them interactively. For deeper topics I have it quiz me Socratic style so I’m not just passively listening, and actually thinking through problems or ideas.
Overall I've found it the best AI product Google have. Only complaint I have about it is the hyper positive US corporate accents get pretty annoying pretty quickly.
The realtime voice in ChatGPT is excellent, the newer model is a big step up too.
It did tone it down when I asked though, but a crazy default.
I actually can see this as advertisement USP. Some lone hiker going up a mountain through nature to a peak, while the city in the valley below far away becomes functional again because of what is said in that debate about .. walking for ideas - hunted down savanna mode similar to Darwin and all the other old thinkers.
OpenAI has much less latency, can adapt to speak about any topic (though will tell you it put a code sample to look at later), and it just feels like brainstorming with a colleague.
If you haven’t tried the live voice version of ChatGPT recently, you should. I love to brainstorm ideas while on walks and it’s fabulous for that.
Ask it to summarize the conversation into a doc that will be waiting for you when you are back at your desk.
I have tried the "walk and talk" pattern with AI, and it's okay, but I find that it can be kind of janky if the network connection isn't very good. And I find it very frustrating to use still in terms of how the interrupt feature works. For example, if I'm out hiking and there's even a little bit of wind, the voice mode of ChatGPT and Gemini both will think that I'm done talking and begin responding.
In fairness to the AI vendors, I imagine that this is a very difficult thing to get right. Humans have a very natural sense of flow in conversation, and knowing when a speaker is done talking and it's appropriate to begin responding.
Maybe Google can do some search