Maybe you have the problem backwards - we accidentally end up listening to non NotebookLM podcasts?
It was factually accurate, and presented the topic in a manner that was easy to digest and kept it interesting.
I didn't plan to but ended up listening to the whole thing, and I normally don't enjoy the podcast format.
For someone new to the topic, it'd be a pretty great intro compared to reading the official pages.
In terms of actual usefulness, it’s one of the AI tools that most impressed me.
The main issue is, of course, privacy.
I have tried to reproduce something similar using AnythingLLM and the low tier Llama models, but of course the experience is much worse, both in terms of results, response times and UI. If someone knows of a better local setup, I’m all ears.
I would consider a Workspace subscription if I could actually trust Google to make good on the commitment of not reading your stuff, which I’m finding hard to do…
I've always absolutely hated the focus on the individual humans and their personalities behind the podcast, and wished they'd be a better source of well-structured "information".
I never listened to a podcast I didn't get frustrated with, even at 2x speed. These NotebookLM podcasts have been exactly what I've always wished podcasts were.
I may have to re-task my paperclip making AI on generating podcasts...
On the plus side, the speech is almost perfect; so good, that I sincerely hope the voices themselves are never fully under user control.
With regards to the actual summary of the content I gave them, I would say they are grade B: only mostly correct, they're still inventing things I didn't say and missing things I did say.
That's not to say humans don't make mistakes, I still consider this objectively impressive, that is able to reach even this level was SciFi when I was a kid — but why waste time on a grade-B podcast when the AAA-tier costs you as a consumer a 30 second advert?
If a AAA-tier podcast on the subject you want to listen to a podcast about exists (and you know about it), then that's probably a better (and obvious) choice for your listening time.
However, if you want to listen to someone discuss or explain something and you don't know about a AAA-tier podcast, it's possible that a generated podcast is better than nothing.
On the other hand, it's also possible that the generated podcast will miss or hallucinate a key detail, and herein lies the dilemma. Is it better to listen to something that might get something wrong, or not to listen and perhaps someday to learn about the subject through some other form that is less likely to include mistakes?
If AI texts have a similar effect then AI = bad is quite correct.
Edit: If I'm understanding it correctly after some googling, supposedly the "name" of all podcasts generated by NotebookLM is "Deep Dive"? That's just confusing.
Its trained on too many shallow podcasts. Go compare any of NotebookLM podcast with an episode of Hardcore History. The latter goes into much more depth (even when you account of it being much longer).
If AI ends up destroying humanity, it isn’t going to be through weapons and death robots, but just by entertaining and placating us all to death.