This tool by Google Labs could become the next most widely used in a few years. If that has not caught your attention yet, read on for the next 2 minutes. With the overload of information that is around, making sense of it all is the challenge that Notebook LM solves and solves brilliantly! There are so many great features and the convenience of it all is staggering. This is currently available only on the web and is free. Notebook LM uses Gemini 2.0 LLM to do the below and more:
Use a text file, an audio file, a YouTube link, a website, google doc/drive as your source!
Truly the application for the information age, Notebook LM enables you to synthesize information from many sources of different formats. Audio, video, websites, Google docs & presentations are all valid sources for Notebook LM. Notebook LM aims to reflect how humans actually process information in the current era.
You can even make the notes that you generate using Notebook LM as sources for future documents, which mirrors how your brain synthesizes information in time.
Make instant Summary, FAQs, study guides, Table of contents, timelines
The process of report making has transformed with Notebook LM. Commonly used documents are easily generated with a click of a button. You will have to try it to believe it.
Make a podcast which you can listen to on the go to learn!
And who says you can only generate text files with notebook LM. You can create actual podcasts in the form of a conversation between two people for you to consume the information on the go. This takes a few minutes to synthesize but the final output is almost indistinguishable from a human-generated podcast. There is not much control of the user on the AI voices that are used though. So, default voices of one male & one female is used.
Use a ChatGPT like interface to talk to Notebook LM
An interface very similar to ChatGPT can be used to chat with Notebook LM, asking it various questions about its insights. Question suggestions are also provided (Of course!). While ChatGPT answers any questions from its database, Notebook LM restricts itself to the sources added by the user. You can also select & deselect sources while generating a document and Notebook LM will only use the selected sources.
Trace back to the source easily
Notebook LM takes you to the location of the source easily when asked for. Creating citations for research documents/publications is now made a breeze with this.
Collaborate
Notebook LM allows you to collaborate with others using your Google account. Your documents can now be edited, commented on or viewed by your friends, teammates, colleagues and in a very similar interface that you are used to like Google spreadsheets.
Accessibility
Notebook LM can be used across all your devices – your laptops, your desktop, your tab and also compatible with your mobile phones currently. There is also a sync feature which keeps your documents synced across your devices.
Personalisation:
Notebook LM is an AI tool after all. How can it not personalize your experience? As Notebook LM learns about you, the tool customizes your documents, summaries & podcasts based on your preferences.
Does not use your data to train the model
GoogleLabs make a clear statement to put your mind at ease that Notebook LM does not use your private data to train its model.
Use cases:
While Notebook LM is yet to become ubiquitous, here are some possible use cases for you to experiment:
- Right off the bat, this makes writing those research articles/journals a lot less painful & also summarizing other research articles
- How about uploading some annual reports, Investor calls and getting concise information for your investments?
- Audio study material for schools/universities
- Contract reviews & analysis
I used Notebook LM, some video & blog sources and asked Notebook LM to compare itself to ChatGPT. Here are the results below:
Look at that! Precise, easy to read information for your consumption in a few seconds!
Imagining the future of Note taking:
Notebook LM is still in its infancy and as we go forward, we can Google to come up with many new features like integration with other Google products like Gmail. Although the free version is very capable, Google has recently announced a Plus version for Workspace users, NotebookLM Plus aimed at power users and offers benefits such as five times more Audio Overviews, notebooks, and sources per notebook; options to customize the style and length of notebook responses; shared team notebooks with usage analytics; and enhanced privacy and security features.
Trying out NotebookLM is simple & is definitely worth the time & trouble. Are you mind blown yet?
