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Use AI![]() Preview:Recent advances in AI could be the most significant development ever made and one of the easiest to use. Many AI Bots are available for free with some premium benefits missing, but even free they are useful. In this article, I give many examples of its use, and present some bots I like. A conceptual framework for understanding some of our options is also presented.
Warning 1This was written in March 2025. This field is changing fast, so, expect that when you read this, some information will no longer be true. However, given that warning, it should be useful. I've written about the benefits of using AI bots before, but I'm going to re-emphasize it. It is one of the most significant advances ever made and one of the easiest to use. Many are available for free with some premium benefits missing, but even free they are useful. I frequently use AI as I'm working with a client to solve the client's problem. I've almost entirely replaced my searches with some AI bots. It does the search for me, then it summarizes the search results as they relate specifically to my question. It presents the results to me and also provides its sources so I can dive deeper or check its summary. Often it suggests follow-up questions as well. ExamplesHere are some things I've done recently:
I no longer look for answers to computer software questions on the company's website, or use their manual, or help files. My first place to check is with an AI bot. I am so dependent on it, that I leave a Perplexity.ai browser tab open at all times. Three tiersMany of these services have at three tiers for users. Some, though free, require an account.
About AI Services and EnginesExcept for Grok, all of my recommended AI bots are services, not engines. EnginesThe engines are enormously expensive large language models that develop an intelligent engine and also a way to interface with and question it. Sometimes, these are made open source, so everyone can see the code and adapt it. Sometimes they are strictly commercial. These engines include: Sonar (Perplexity), Claude (Anthropic), GPT-4 (Open AI), Gemini (Google), Grok (xAI), Llama (Meta - Open Source), Mistral (Open Source), Leo (Brave Browser), Hugging Chat (Hugging Face), and DeepSeek (High-Flyer - Partially Open Source). Each of these engines has many variants. They can be faster, slower, older, or newer. They can use more or fewer resources. I've only listed the major current versions. ServicesSince there are a plethora of engines, which are best and for what? Will you subscribe to one, just to have it become obsolete? Is it easy to interface with, and will it offer multiple services? For these reasons and more, most of my favorite bots are not the engines themselves, but rather a service that makes a nicer user connection and often subscribes to multiple engines and lets you choose which you want to use. Since they can purchase their subscriptions with large quantity discounts, you can often subscribe to a service that offers multiple engines for the same price or less than a single engine. There is always a tradeoff between how fast it can respond and how deeply it analyzes your question and how thoroughly it researches it. Does it adjust for complex or simple questions? Another problem with some models / services is that they may train the models with data until a certain date and then stop. In March 2025, I asked the Hugging Face DeepSeek model a question about something Donald Trump did as President. It didn't even know he was President! My favorite AI botsI have the premium version of Perplexity.ai, but its free version is also excellent.
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Warning 2Though magical and wonderful, these bots are also human. Well, human-like. They make mistakes. Just like TV, newspapers, magazines and whoever writes stuff on the Internet. AI summarizes what's there. It compromises between thoroughness, carefulness, and speed. It will frequently present answers that appear somewhere on the Internet, but are wrong. It can also misunderstand what you want. They have also, like humans, been known to make stuff up to appear smarter than they are. Today (March 8, 2025) I asked my current favorite bot, perplexity.ai, if a special offer for a free service was still available from Xfinity. It answered, yes. It is available and will remain available until January 31, 2025. It didn't put together the fact that March 8 is after Jan. 31. It can be incredibly stupid, like a kid. On the other hand, I asked it a complex theoretical question, and it gave me a wonderful, brilliant 4-page analysis with 36 referenced sources. I consider them like wonderful, energetic and smart youngsters who act as my research assistants. They aren't as careful as older people like to be. So, you must be careful and verify critical information. Reader FeedbackIf you are using these or other AI bots, please let me know. Are you using other bots you recommend? Are you using them in ways I haven't mentioned? Let me know and I'll share your recommendations with my readers. Even if you just use some I've mentioned, I'd like to know which ones you use and how you like them. Date: April 2025
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