Since Google introduced the “Audio Review” function to the Notebooklm research tool, I experiment with feeding the bodies of the text that I did not want to sit and read: stereo instructions, Wikipedia rabbit holes, my review of Q1 Performance, etc.
Thanks to this AI tool, two amazing robots are generated to the valley to “dive deep” into any documents that I send – adding metaphors, puns and even a free joke to a summary conversation. Click Pick up, and what you hear sounds very similar to a stereotypical podcast.
After a few sound reviews in my week I realized that I was in no hurry to listen to podcasts made by real people. As a producer of podcasts, it was both disturbing and fascinating.
I hate to admit how an impressive sound review. He organizes topics in segments as a real podcast would do, and introduces in the external context to better understand the material. I generated a podcast from the Spanish recipe of Paella, which I found online, and the hosts noted the difference in the texture of rice between Paella and Risotto, without risotto, which is mentioned in the recipe.
Like any AI product I have ever used, you need to be careful about the accuracy of content – it has hallucinations. I sent notes from the story I was working on, and the AI hosts came up with fictitious quotes from my sources that were not in my document.
What makes a review of sound unique in the world of artificial intelligence is that it is not necessarily saving time. The hosts often vampire for a few minutes before they reach crucial things (which, having said, very similar to a real podcast).
Product director at Notebooklm Simon Tokumine tells me that this free format is according to design. Initially, the product was very brisk and competent with information until the team heard feedback from outside Google.
“Only when we began to share what we built with others and received feedback from people who are not necessarily obsessed with creating every second of the day as efficient as possible, but more based on the back and listening and just going with a wave of information, we realized that there are two different populations that we built here,” said Tokumine. “And the population for which we built was not necessarily Googlers.”
Watch our full video to see how my journey is testing the sound review and my conversations with Simon Tokumine, Vulture Critic of Podcast Nicholas Quah and our own podcast manufacturers HERE The Verge.