I had another pair of experiences with Google’s Gemini AI assistant this week.

One was a resounding success, although not without a few minor errors.

The other was a grand example of an AI hallucination, a total FAIL in what should have been a straightforward task.

Today, I’ll describe Gemini’s assistance in understanding the wiring that brings Hawaiian Telcom’s fiber optic cable into our home, prompted by a “FINAL NOTICE” warning that we’ll lose our current tv service as the company moves to a new digital platform that they call Fioptics. And I’ll save Gemini’s hallucination for a future post.

We’ve been on an older system installed over a decade ago that relied on an old-fashioned cable box, although we updated to fiber optic cable when it became available in Kahala after moving back to what had been my parents house back in 2015. A very good tech caught our assignment at that time and was able to bring the fiber into our attic crawlspace, then through an interior wall into a shelf high in the closet in our small spare bedroom. During remodeling, we had phone jacks and internet connectors hardwired in a few key places in the house, and our fiber installation included equipment to “back feed” the signal from the fiber input back to the existing wall jacks. The result was, from my perspective, an unruly jumble of wiring involving four digital devices up on that shelf.

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While writing yesterday’s post about the demise of the last JOA, I used Google to search for some of the history. Results varied wildly, especially the AI search summary that precedes the display of individual links.

Here’s a good example.

I was looking back to 1992-1993, and trying to recall when Gannett dumped the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, which it had purchased back in 1971, and instead bought the Honolulu Advertiser, which had become the larger newspaper as American reading habits changed in favor of morning papers.

So I had a simple search query that I put to Google: “When did Gannett buy the Honolulu Advertiser?”

The response came back quickly.

Gannett didn’t buy The Honolulu Advertiser; rather, they sold it in 2010 to Black Press, which then merged it with the Honolulu Star-Bulletin to create the current Honolulu Star-Advertiser, with Gannett having previously owned both papers before the sale.

Had I been a high school student using AI to write a paper, I would have probably run with this answer and ended up in serious trouble.

But, luckily, I knew enough to know that Google’s summary was simply wrong. Period.

Today I went back and made a slight change in the search. This time around I put the question a little differently.

“When did Gannett take control of the Honolulu Advertiser?”

And this time, Google’s response got it right, contradicting its earlier answer.

Gannett took control of The Honolulu Advertiser in January 1993, purchasing it from the previous owners to keep it within its corporate fold, even as it sold the rival Star-Bulletin to maintain a Joint Operating Agreement for a few more years before the papers eventually merged in 2010. 

I haven’t give any deep thought to what this means, beyond “buyer beware” when it comes to using AI to get easy answers.

In a couple of weeks, we’re flying to Long Beach, California, to visit with a few cousins and other old friends. My dad grew up in Long Beach, and his younger brother’s daughters stayed in Long Beach, and his sister’s sole surviving son lives only a short drive away.

So as part of our planning, I asked Google something that seemed pretty straight forward. I searched for “Elks lodge closest to Long Beach California.”

Google quickly returned a direct answer. The closest Elks lodge is located in downtown Long Beach, according to Google. Elks Lodge 1937.

Just one small problem with Google’s answer.

Elks Lodge 1937 is located in Long Beach, Washington. That’s more than 1,000 miles from Long Beach, California.

Different state. Not even a contiguous state.

I’m finding out that every answer I receive from Google needs to be independently vetted.