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Gemini Spark is the most impressive and terrifying AI experience I’ve had yet
According to every product demo from the last four years, planning a trip is a killer use case for AI. Just tell it where you're going, they all promise, and your chatbot / agent / other buzzword will exhaustively search travel options, read up on all the fun things to do, check all the local […]
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AICloseAIPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All AITechCloseTechPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All TechGoogleCloseGooglePosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All GoogleGemini Spark is the most impressive and terrifying AI experience I’ve had yetIt’s a remarkable piece of technology. But the future sure is creepy.by David PierceCloseDavid PierceEditor-at-LargePosts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All by David PierceJun 2, 2026, 12:38 PM UTCLinkShareGiftSpark is Google’s new agentic answer for everything. | Image: GoogleAICloseAIPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All AITechCloseTechPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All TechGoogleCloseGooglePosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All GoogleGemini Spark is the most impressive and terrifying AI experience I’ve had yetIt’s a remarkable piece of technology. But the future sure is creepy.by David PierceCloseDavid PierceEditor-at-LargePosts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All by David PierceJun 2, 2026, 12:38 PM UTCLinkShareGiftDavid PierceCloseDavid PiercePosts from this author will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All by David Pierce is editor-at-large and Vergecast co-host with over a decade of experience covering consumer tech. Previously, at Protocol, The Wall Street Journal, and Wired.According to every product demo from the last four years, planning a trip is a killer use case for AI. Just tell it where you’re going, they all promise, and your chatbot / agent / other buzzword will exhaustively search travel options, read up on all the fun things to do, check all the local hotspots, and offer you a fully fledged itinerary. So far, I’ve found this to work only in the most generic ways: If you want to do the six most obvious things in any city on planet Earth, AI has you covered, but that’s about as far as it goes.I had a very different experience using Spark, Google’s new always-on AI agent. Spark is a hugely ambitious thing: Google intends it to be the interface through which you can use external apps, and over time even operate your computer. (“OpenClaw with better internet access” is a not-wrong way to describe it.) Spark is currently rolling out to Google’s $99 / month AI Ultra plan, but Google allowed me to try it early. I tested some simple action-oriented stuff, like having Spark go through my Gmail inbox and suggest a bunch…
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AICloseAIPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All AITechCloseTechPosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All TechGoogleCloseGooglePosts from this topic will be added to your daily email digest and your homepage feed.FollowFollowSee All GoogleGemini Spark is the most impressive and terrifying AI experience I’ve had yetIt’s a remarkable piece of technology. But the future sure is creepy.by David PierceCloseDavid PierceEditor-at-LargePosts from this…
Amazon bucked its usual tradition of having Prime Day in July. Prime Day 2026 is happening in June, kicking off in just a few weeks. Prime members will get access to many deals starting June 23rd at 3:01AM ET through June 27th at 3:01AM ET. As with Amazon’s previous events, you don’t need to be […]
A unicorn Beanie Baby. A 15-pound green bowling ball. A pair of dentures. These are just some of the items left behind in robotaxis in the past year, according to Uber's annual Lost and Found Index. For the first time, the company is expanding its annual of accounting of things forgotten in Uber vehicles to […]
Gemini’s new AI agent is about as good as Google’s demo. He joined The Verge in 2019 after nearly two years at Techmeme.Google’s new “24/7” AI agent, Gemini Spark, can be shockingly good at doing things on your behalf.
Thermacell has launched Liv 2.0, the next generation of its Wi-Fi-connected smart mosquito protection system. It features new hardware and can cover a larger area, and Thermacell says its formula can now deter no-see-ums. But it's also more expensive and requires professional installation. Liv 2.0 uses the same setup as the original Liv - a […]