Updated
Updated · 9to5Google · Aug 20
Google Expands News Personalization With 2 Custom Audio and Discover Tools
Updated
Updated · 9to5Google · Aug 20

Google Expands News Personalization With 2 Custom Audio and Discover Tools

3 articles · Updated · 9to5Google · Aug 20

Summary

  • Google is rolling out a broader personalization update that adds prompt-based tuning for Discover and topic selection for the Google News daily audio briefing.
  • Discover now lets users tell Google in natural language what they want more or less of, with follow-up questions, on-the-fly feed changes, and saved preferences in the Google app.
  • Google News audio briefings can now be tailored across categories including Headlines, Business, Sports, Science and technology, with finer choices such as Movies, Music, Theater and TV under Entertainment.
  • Publishers also get a new embeddable Preferred Sources button that adds a site to a reader’s preferred list and returns them to the page; it applies to Top Stories, AI Overviews and AI Mode.

Insights

Will typing your exact desires into Google Discover finally fix your feed, or just feed the algorithm more of your personal data?
As Google introduces AI summaries that hide links, can a simple preferred sources button truly save publishers from losing their traffic?
Does hyper-personalizing your news feed with natural language chat destroy the serendipity of discovery, trapping you in a perfect echo chamber?