… for Cardiff u3a
I hear it rather too often, and have commented on strategies to delay upgrades until Microsoft get the bugs out of a release, but here’s an article that might help you improve performance if your machine seems to be running slower after an upgrade …
https://www.howtogeek.com/windows-pc-sluggish-after-an-update-try-these-fixes-to-speed-it-up
Always good to get a review of the latest scams, and to put your mind at rest too. I intend to write another post for the Cardiff u3a website soon, and this article will be useful background …
Originally posted by David Harrison on the Thought Grazing Forums
I’m only posting this to indicate just how open and fair I am (HaHa) …
https://www.howtogeek.com/before-you-commit-to-the-apple-ecosystem
It was less than 12 months ago that we had a session looking at the emerging technology of Large Learning Models (LLM) and in particular Chat-GPT and Dall-E from Open AI. In fact it was the meeting we had on the 23rd March, and this was the article I created for that meeting; I also put a slightly different version of it on the public Cardiff u3a website. Sianed and I also debated the topic in September, an experience neither of us would willingly go through again!!!! So with so much having happened in such a short period of time, it certainly seemed right to revisit the topic and see what’s happened.
First some background, some developments and some resources for you to follow-up, then some notes and content from three member contributions. We have Jonathan, Iain and Phil to thank for these.
What do we mean by Artificial Intelligence. Well, nothing that’s really appeared in the past 15 months it would have to be said. Some articles for you to consider …
Race to AI: the origins of artificial intelligence, from Turing to ChatGPT – in this article from The Guardian the background to what is, and what is not, artificial intelligence is explored and whilst recognising that a step-change has occurred, we have not yet reached the “nirvana” of artificial intelligence.
A simple guide to help you understand AI – in this animated webpage from the BBC, you have the “Janet and John” introduction to artificial intelligence. That’s not meant as an insult in any way, it’s a very straightforward introduction to the subject and if you switch the animations on you will get a full-experience.
It is however the Royal Institution’s Christmas Series of Lectures fronted by Mike Wooldridge that perhaps best defines the scope, the possibilities and the future of artificial intelligence. I seriously recommend that you watch all three lectures on BBC’s iPlayer.
Much of the attention in the past year or so has been focussed on LLM and Chat-GPT. Which? attempts to answer the question – “is it safe to use” in this article, but comes up with more questions than answers, but it does a bit of explaining along the way, but actually the best way to find out what Chat-GPT can do, is to try it yourself, which you can do here, after signing-up for an account on the Open AI servers.
Some experiments and experiences. We kicked-off here with Jonathan telling us about his experience of using Microsoft Copilot.
Microsoft Copilot
Microsoft has released several AI “Copilots” that can complete different tasks for different purposes.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/what-is-microsoft-copilot-heres-everything-you-need-to-know/
https://www.tomsguide.com/how-to/how-to-use-copilot-to-control-windows
Of all the commercial developments in the past year it’s Microsoft that’s led the way, but Google’s working hard to keep-up, first with it’s Bard model, and latterly with it’s Gemini software.
Iain led us through some of the features of Bard and this article indicates the differences between Bard and Chat-GPT. Iain was particularly struck by the way the system seemed to learn from one day to another. An inappropriate response to a question of taking your grandchildren somewhere in Cardiff, had been replaced by a much more acceptable answer. How does this happen? Has it learnt something? Or, is it’s previous answer become part of the resource that it uses to find responses. I guess we’ll never know!!
Since the meeting Iain has also shared with us in the Artificial Intelligence Forum a really interesting and potentially useful use of AI in interpreting scrolls recovered from the eruption of Vesuvius. There are many really useful uses of AI, as the Royal Institution lectures showed us. I aim to add Topics to that Forum over the next few weeks (and months) as they emerge, and I encourage you to do the same.
We then had an illuminating presentation from Phil, that I encourage you to look at.
It starts off with Phil’s interest in Family History and his ancestor’s death from cholera which prompted him to enquire about that epidemic.
He then asked Chat-GPT to write an essay (which he’d had to do in an earlier life) on the topic “Liberal and Utilitarian Educational Thinking in 19th Century Great Britain: A Comprehensive Analysis with Reference to Cardinal Newman”
He felt that the attempt was worth at least a B+
He then shared with us some images created by Image2Go.com not all of which totally hit the brief he’d requested.
In conclusion, I shared a few issues …
Volkswagen says it’s putting ChatGPT in its cars for ‘enriching conversations’ – really? The first recording of a Tesla driver wearing Apple’s Vision Pro headset has already been posted to the internet. Where’s the common sense, in common sense?
A frankly rather surprising Judges in England and Wales are given cautious approval to use AI in writing legal opinions.
A totally unsurprising Britain’s MI6 chief says his spies are using AI to disrupt flow of weapons to Russia.
3 reasons why AIs like Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT will only get worse — and why it doesn’t have to be this way – a suggestion that as more and more AI-generated content floods the internet, and as more and more reliable content providers stop the “bots” from trawling their sites, that the quality of information on the web will decrease. AI eating itself is a phrase that might come to mind.
Finally a very thought-proking article – AI Needs to Be Both Trusted and Trustworthy – a theme picked-up by Ian (not Iain) on Signal with his reference to the fact that Chinese academics wary of their reputations have moved towards implementing new guidelines to protect the quality of their research.
I’ve put quite a few articles up on Flipboard in the past couple of months. I aim now to move some of them into the Artificial Intelligence Forum on Thought grazing with a brief commentary, and I invite your replies/comments. I think this move indicates that I will be using the Forum more for reference, and Flipboard more for news. I think that makes sense.
Remember the digital chip that was inserted into the Covid 19 vaccine….the one that would kick into action at some unspecified date and force you to do things that you might not have considered before? Mine forces me to buy tech products. That digital chip even knows my P.I.N. number. An Apple Watch was one of my most recent purchases but I might say that I’m absolutely delighted with the device. It looks after me; a bit like having Jiminy Cricket on my shoulder. It does things for me that are really useful, potentially even vital.
Things to be aware of.
The Apple Watch works in conjunction with your iPhone. It won’t do much on its own.
I haven’t looked in to this, but I’m pretty sure that there are alternatives in the Android world that will do pretty much the same thing.
There are other, far cheaper brands of Smart Watch available. I tried a £40 model but I had to stop using it because it made my wrist itch.
Oh, and just one more thing, especially for the gentlemen in the group.
From How An Older Man Should Dress | Older Man’s Clothing Tips 2024
Older Man Clothing Tip #4: Own the Latest Technology
If you watched Rip Off Britain on January 15th [Episode 35 of Series 15 at c. 29mins 45secs into the programme] you will see an expert describe the Scam that one of our members has experienced recently and which has led me to write this post which may well be the first of a number on the subject of Scams.
This scam manifests itself by your computer screen being taken over by a popup which also freezes your screen. You are instructed by a voice-over not to turn off your machine but instead to ring a telephone number where you will be “assisted” to unlock your computer which has been locked – in this case supposedly by Microsoft, but it could be any large tech company – for your protection.
This alarming message plus the fact that your screen has frozen may lead you into thinking you better click on the button to seemingly connect to Microsoft. This will lead to a telephone conversation where you will be requested to supply information that will undoubtedly lead to fraud.
Do nothing!
Note well: No tech company will approach you in this way. They will not be doing this form of online monitoring of your devices. In this case the scam is preying on the fact that you are being led to think that your Windows Defender Security package is not working properly. No tech company would readily admit to its users of a deficiency in their programs in this way – that could lead potentially to legal action being taken against them. For a genuine issue they might issue an alert on their webpages and a request to upgrade (or whatever), or they might be forced to send an email to registered users, but they would not send unsolicited messages in this way.
It is important to realise that with this scam, at this stage, the scammers know NOTHING about you. The scam works by malicious code having been added to a website you are visiting, or to an advert on the website you are visiting. The simple solution is to press F11 to unlock your screen, note the website address and make a note not to go to that site again. [I would probably also recommend clearing your internet cache and history from your browser before closing down your computer; waiting a few moments; and then re-booting it.]
The more long-term solution is to install an Ad Blocker such as AdBlock Plus as an extension to your browser. This would act in conjunction with your standard security software which on a Windows machine could well be Windows Defender.
Happy, safer surfing.
If you want to see the recording of the message that our Digital Matters member made of the scam, watch the video below …
Apologies from Christine, Jo & Paul, Jeanne & Mick, Kate, Jen, Jonathan, David Hughes, Tony and Sianed.
We welcome Iain King to his first meeting.
Thanks to Phil for his presentation on his visit to Bletchley Park.
I then went through a variety of “interesting” items that I’d put up on Flipboard, highlighting the ones on Meta introducing a possible subscription model to avoid sanctions from the EU on data sharing; an article from Which? on printer ink; useful things you can do with a smart plug; and how to keep your iPhone safe from thieves.
Before we adjourned to The Gatekeeper for a Christmas drink, we had a quick run round the room for issues.
Anne still hadn’t found a solution to her McAfee in Spanish language problem.
Phil enquired how many members had a screen protector on their phones, and whether they had been installed in-store, or not. Quite a few members had and they reported that they worked well.
Sheila requested a reminder on how SIM Locks worked and were set up. I’ll add a Topic to the Hardware and Software Forum.
Jenny reported that she was shortly leaving Cardiff to return to London, but was having email problems that we talked through with her.
Iain enquired whether he (as a Windows 10) should upgrade to Windows 11, or not. I said that it was a very personal decision, that might be guided by how old his PC was. As Microsoft are still supporting that version of Windows it was not as pressing as earlier versions.
Yvonne had an iPhone 8 – I think she was enquiring whether it should now be replaced. Well … if you can afford it, yes; otherwise if it’s still doing all you require then, no. But gradually some apps will stop being supported and you’ll need to consider replacing it.
The group was asked to share their thoughts on the best (or worst) experience with computers they have used.
So many of the group said their experience of computers first arose as a necessity in the workplace. These was often computers that had huge servers needing a whole room to house them.
Most found these systems initially challenging, but have come to appreciate that living in the modern era demands knowledge and competency in their use.
Here is a summary of their comments:
Jenanne – Likes her Apple and is very happy with it.
Jo – Liked the Hewlett- Packard Filofax – uses computers out of necessity
Paul – Used a Data Processor @work punch tape/card – print out
Uses an Apple power bar – 40 “ hard drive
Ian Liked the Apple Classic – original.
Kate Did not have any positive or negative thoughts/experience
Ralph Really liked the Spectrum 48 as one could programme it
S 128 – very good the software games in the form of floppy discs
Nita Used the Unix system at work – not a big fan, the computer took up a whole . room due to their massive servers
Used a dell machine with a dot matrix printer
Now uses a Apple and is happy with it.
Sheila introduced to computers @work in the Civil Service – ZX Spectrum (again an . enormous sized machine).
Now is an Apple fan ++ uses i mac.
Lynnett At work First used a Bletchley Park IBM type computer.
Now uses computers as they are a necessity.
Yvonne First used a BBC computer with 5” floppy disc – ‘Find Spot’ games found them
useful with the family
Anne Just uses computers does not like them particularly – “them and us”
Mike First used computers at work in the Civil Service. He wasnt their bigest fan as he
did not fully understand them but were a necessity. Thinks of them as are tools,
and would be lost without his i-pad
Phill Likes the smart phones. Finds the QR codes very useful -especially for parking
(millenium Centre – but tickets for show and parking at the same time.)
I leave it to Phil to add any commentary, if he so wishes.
Apologies (yet again) for not getting the Notes written up for the last couple of meetings. Fortunately there was not too much to record 🙂
Apologies for the 12th were received from David Hughes, Don, Jeanne & Micky, Sianed, Tony, Sheila, Jonathan and Mary. We welcomed Dave and Nita.
Apologies for the 26th were received from Jenny, Renee, Sianed, Jeff, Yvonne, Jonathan, Kate and Margaret.
I went through the procedure to update Member Records on the Cardiff u3a Membership Portal – I can’t change email addresses, or very few other personal details. I described the tools that the group uses – this website, the forums, the Signal group and Flipboard magazine. I also showed the Group page on the main Cardiff u3a website where calendar/meeting information is shown, and where occasionally you will find a blogpost from the group.
I explained that I would not be able to lead the meeting on the 23rd November but was delighted that Phil (supported by Sianed) would lead the session. Phil will give a presentation on his recent trip to Bletchley Park and I have suggested that Sianed leads a discussion on “Computers I have known and loved (or hated); or both!”
I also announced that the session on the 26th would be on “Digital Music” and invited members to come prepared with contributions on apps, hardware and services they used and their experience of using them.
Phil told us all about Cyberclean – yellow gloop – that was really good to clean keyboards – this was a follow-up to the maintenance session held previously.
Anne had a cursor problem with the mouse freezing. Unfortunately we were not able to provide any definitive reason why this might be. Could be a driver problem; an interupted Windows update … who knows. Anyway the problem seems to have gone away.
Stella had a new phone and we discussed how you transfer the old SIM to the new phone to keep your old phone number and how to get a PAC to enable you to move from one provider to another.
Phil was very keen on an app called Zotto which enable you to make Notes.
Ralph raised the problematic issue of the analogue to digital phone changeover and Paul commented on how long it had taken for BT to resolve this issue for him.
Dave asked a question about secure email and I confirmed that I felt Proton was a very secure service (I think that was what the issue was!!). He also advised us that he’d be seeing us again in the spring upon his return from the US. In the Digital Music session he told us about his use of an app called Clipgrab to get pieces of music from the internet, but that he was now using VLC Media Player.