Technologies

Trump Media Is Testing an AI Search Engine Powered by Perplexity

The president’s media company is beta-testing Truth Search AI, but will the results lean toward conservative opinions?

President Donald Trump’s media company, Trump Media, is beta-testing a new AI search feature, Truth Search AI, on the Truth Social platform. The Florida-based company announced the news on Wednesday in a press release.

Trump Media and Technology Group is perhaps best known for its social-media program Truth Social. The company is separate from the New York-based Trump Organization.

«We’re proud to partner with Perplexity to launch our public Beta testing of Truth Social AI, which will make Truth Social an even more vital element in the Patriot Economy,» Trump Media CEO Devin Nunes said in the statement. «We plan to robustly refine and expand our search function based on user feedback as we implement a wide range of additional enhancements to the platform.»

Truth Search AI is now available on the Web version of Truth Social and will begin public beta testing on the Truth Social iOS and Android apps at an unnamed future date.

Representatives for Trump Media and Perplexity didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Will results be politically biased?

In today’s divided political landscape, one immediate concern is that a search engine from a conservative president’s media company will select only search results that favor conservative opinions.

UAE state-owned newspaper The National conducted searches using the new product and reported that the AI-generated answers, perhaps unsurprisingly, source conservative-leaning media outlets.

But 404Media was able to get some possibly surprising results. When reporters asked how the American economy is doing, the new search engine said it was «currently facing significant headwinds, with signs of slowdown.»

The media outlet pressed further, asking if the president’s international tariffs are to blame.

«Recent tariff increases in the United States have generally had a negative effect on economic growth and employment, raising costs for businesses and consumers while providing only limited benefits to some manufacturing sectors,» Truth Search AI replied.

Read more: What Is Perplexity? Here’s Everything You Need to Know About This AI Chatbot

Perplexity’s history

San Francisco-based Perplexity was founded in 2022. As CNET noted in a review, it calls itself the world’s first «answer engine,» and instead of showing a list of links, it pulls info directly from the sources and summarizes that information.

The company has made headlines for how it acquires its content. In June, the BBC threatened to sue Perplexity for unauthorized use of its content, alleging the artificial intelligence company reproduced BBC material «verbatim.»

At the time, Perplexity gave a statement to the Financial Times calling the BBC’s claims «manipulative and opportunistic» and that the broadcasting giant fundamentally doesn’t understand how the technology, internet or IP law works. Perplexity also alleged that the threat of litigation shows «how far the BBC is willing to go to preserve Google’s illegal monopoly for its own self-interest.»

As 404Media notes, Forbes, the New York Times, New York Post and the Dow Jones have all accused Perplexity of plagiarism, and News Corp’s Dow Jones & Co., which publishes the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post sued Perplexity in 2024 for copyright infringement.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Wednesday, Dec. 24

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for Dec. 24.

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? I’m Irish-American, but yet 6-Down, which involves Ireland, stumped me at first. Read on for all the answers.. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.

Mini across clues and answers

1A clue: Wordle or Boggle
Answer: GAME

5A clue: Big Newton
Answer: ISAAC

7A clue: Specialized vocabulary
Answer: LINGO

8A clue: «See you in a bit!»
Answer: LATER

9A clue: Tone of many internet comments
Answer: SNARK

Mini down clues and answers

1D clue: Sharks use them to breathe
Answer: GILLS

2D clue: From Singapore or South Korea, say
Answer: ASIAN

3D clue: Large ocean ray
Answer: MANTA

4D clue: ___ beaver
Answer: EAGER

6D clue: Second-largest city in the Republic of Ireland, after Dublin
Answer: CORK

Don’t miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source.

Technologies

Quadrantids Is a Short but Sweet Meteor Shower Just After New Year’s. How to See It

This meteor shower has one of the most active peaks, but it doesn’t last for very long.

The Quadrantids has the potential to be one of the most active meteor showers of the year, and skygazers won’t have long to wait to see it. The annual shower is predicted to reach maximum intensity on Jan. 3. And with a display that can rival Perseids, Quadrantids could be worth braving the cold to see it.

Don’t miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source.

The show officially begins on Dec. 28 and lasts until Jan. 12, according to the American Meteor Society. Quadrantids is scheduled to peak on Jan. 2-3, when it may produce upwards of 125 meteors per hour. This matches Perseids and other larger meteor showers on a per-hour rate, but Quadrantids also has one of the shortest peaks at just 6 hours, so it rarely produces as many meteors overall as the other big ones.

The meteor shower comes to Earth courtesy of the 2003 EH1 asteroid, which is notable because most meteor showers are fed from comets, not asteroids. Per NASA, 2003 EH1 is a near-Earth asteroid that orbits the sun once every five and a half years. Science posits that 2003 EH1 was a comet in a past life, but too many trips around the sun stripped it of its ice, leaving only its rocky core. The Earth runs through EH1’s orbital debris every January, which results in the Quadrantids meteor shower.

How and where to see Quadrantids

Quadrantids is named for the constellation where its meteors appear to originate, a point known as the radiant. This presents another oddity, as the shower originates from the constellation Quadrans Muralis. This constellation ceased to be recognized as an official constellation in the 1920s and isn’t available on most publicly accessible sky maps.

For the modern skygazer, you’ll instead need to find the Bootes and Draco constellations, both of which contain stars that were once a part of the Quadrans Muralis. Draco will be easier to find after sunset on the evening of Jan. 2, and will be just above the horizon in the northern sky. Bootes orbits around Draco, but will remain under the horizon until just after 1 a.m. local time in the northeastern sky. From that point forward, both will sit in the northeastern part of the sky until sunrise. You’ll want to point your chair in that direction and stay there to see meteors.

As the American Meteor Society notes, Quadrantids has a short but active peak, lasting around 6 hours. The peak is expected to start around 4 p.m. ET and last well into the evening. NASA predicts the meteor shower to start one day later on Jan. 3-4, so if you don’t see any on the evening of Jan. 2, try again on Jan. 3.

To get the best results, the standard space viewing tips apply. You’ll want to get as far away from the city and suburbs as possible to reduce light pollution. Since it’ll be so cold outside, dress warmly and abstain from alcoholic beverages, as they can affect your body temperature. You won’t need any binoculars or telescopes, and the reduced field of view may actually impact your ability to see meteors.

The bad news is that either way, the Quadrantids meteor shower coincides almost perfectly with January’s Wolf Moon, which also happens to be a supermoon. This will introduce quite a lot of light pollution, which will likely drown out all but the brightest meteors. So, while it may have a peak of over 100 meteors per hour, both NASA and the AMS agree that the more realistic expectation is 10 or so bright meteors per hour.

Technologies

Today’s Wordle Hints, Answer and Help for Dec. 24, #1649

Here are hints and the answer for today’s Wordle for Dec. 24, No. 1,649.

Looking for the most recent Wordle answer? Click here for today’s Wordle hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Wordle puzzle is a little tricky, with a double letter that could confuse players. If you need a new starter word, check out our list of which letters show up the most in English words. If you need hints and the answer, read on.