Nothing Telephone (2a) Plus with AI-powered information widget: specs, costs, availability

Nothing has a brand new smartphone – Telephone (2a) Plus-almost equivalent Telephone (2a) it was launched earlier this yr, however with barely improved specs. It prices $399 and is accessible within the US by means of the identical beta program. However it’s not new Android cellphone We discover the corporate’s new widget most attention-grabbing.

The Information Reporter widget, accessible by default on all Nothing and CMF Smartphones plus different android and iOS gadgets by way of Nothing X apppermits you to shortly play a information abstract compiled by synthetic intelligence. It’s learn by a synthesized voice Tim Holbrowthe corporate’s monetary director. (Nothing makes use of ElevenLabs Applied sciences (for synthesizing and outputting sound.) When you click on on the widget, you can be greeted by a soothing British voice:

“Welcome to Nothing Information, the place the one factor we take critically is taking nothing critically. I am Tim, your CFO and reluctant information reader. In the present day, we’re making one thing out of nothing, as a result of that is actually our job.”

The widget will start biking by means of a number of information tales – you possibly can long-press the widget and faucet Edit so as to add or take away classes that curiosity you, reminiscent of enterprise, leisure, know-how and sports activities. These tales are pulled from “trusted English-language information sources” by way of Information APIutilizing Meta’s Massive Language Fashions Llama to sum up.

Nothing’s Information Reporter widget is accessible on all Nothing and CMF telephones by default. For those who obtain the Nothing X app, you can too entry it on Android and iOS.

Picture: Julian Chokkattu

You may swipe down on the notification bar and faucet the Subsequent button on a media playback notification to skip a narrative, to which Holbrow will add a joke. “Don’t like this one? Let’s discover one other one.” After I’d skipped fairly just a few information tales in a row, Holbrow’s AI requested, “Do you even just like the information?”

The abstract is one minute lengthy (roughly), and also you get eight tales per day. Each morning the widget is up to date with a brand new batch. Sadly and disappointingly, the widget would not offer you a lot data to learn additional. There isn’t a hyperlink to the place it bought the information from, and no hyperlinks to learn straight from the supply.

This yr, each smartphone firm has touted some form of generative AI characteristic of their new gadgets Samsung Galactic AI; Google has its personal Gemini Chatbot and lots of AI capabilities in Pixel telephones; Motorola offered Moto AI not too long ago; and even OnePlus is teasing just a few AI Capabilities on their telephones, like AI Eraser, which helps you to take away undesirable objects from pictures. Nothing launched ChatGPT integration on its headphones earlier this yr, and this widget is the newest generative AI characteristic to reach.