Second is advertiser tools. If you’re a small business, you’re not thinking about all the queries people are going to type in. AI is great at figuring out which keywords to use, what’s the optimal creative, and generating all of that.

The third piece is the most nascent: ads in new experiences. The general philosophy we have is to build a great consumer product, then figure out monetization. Because the business is so strong and healthy, that’s a luxury we have.

What have you learned from experiments around ads in AI Mode?

Ads are always separate from organic results and clearly labeled. If we don’t think any ad is relevant, we don’t show any ads. Probably the biggest principle of all is that ads should be useful.

What [ads in AI Mode] have shown is mostly intuitive things. If it’s relevant, a user will click on it. If not, they won’t.

At Davos, Demis Hassabis said that Google has no plans to bring ads to Gemini. How are you thinking about it now?

The reason we focused on ads in AI Mode and AI Overviews is because we see them as extensions of the Search experience. It’s the most natural place for us to do initial experiments.

I would expect that the learnings that we get from ads in AI Mode would likely carry over to what we might want to do in the Gemini app down the road. We’re able to get all those learnings within a context and a construct that users are already aware of ads. It’s an odd thing to say, but our research shows that users actually like ads within the context of Search. Over time, we’ll figure out what makes sense in the Gemini app.

So you guys aren’t ruling out ads in Gemini completely?

No, we’re not ruling them out. It’s just not where we’ve been focusing.

Gemini is a massive product now—it’s grown quite fast. OpenAI is already trying out ads in ChatGPT. What makes you think Gemini isn’t ready for ads?

We’re super happy with how well it’s growing. I would say it’s more of a prioritization question—what’s the right area to focus right now?

Do you think OpenAI introduced ads too early?

It’s hard for me to say. I think it will really depend on how they do it. What we’ve seen is when we do ads right, it’s accretive to the product experience. But the really critical thing is to do it right, and that means relevance, quality, and not putting ads where users don’t want to see ads.

That’s hard to do. We have over 20 years of experience learning how to do that. It’s less a question of timing and more a question of doing it right, and in a way that’s respectful of users.

Google recently launched Personal Intelligence in Gemini and AI Mode. I imagine advertisers would love to get their hands on that data. How are you thinking about that?

Personal Intelligence is incredibly useful. For example, I was skiing and couldn’t see well through my goggles—it was cloudy out. I asked AI Mode a fairly vague question about what lens I needed for the conditions. From my email, it was able to say which resort I was staying at, which mountain I’d be skiing, and what the weather would be. It also pulled in a receipt my wife had forwarded me for my goggles—turns out she’d bought me an extra lens. It’s like subtle magic.

You never know when you’re going to have to bug out on short notice. The politics of the moment are less than predictable. Disasters never strike on schedule, and few stores stay open for a wildfire or an insurrection. As of early 2026, wildfires and the resulting chaos look especially likely in the American West after record-low snowpack levels in the winter will mean less water in the spring and summer.

That’s why it’s important to make plans well in advance and put together gear for an emergency kit, say experts on disaster preparedness—and to stock up on the essentials that can keep your family healthy and safe in the event of hurricane, flood, earthquake, blizzard, wildfire, or all-too-human failures.

But not every disaster is the same. There are two main scenarios you should keep your family prepared for, says Jonathan Sury, a senior staff associate at Columbia University’s National Center for Disaster Preparedness.

In some cases, you may have to jump into a car with a go bag, or a bug-out bag, outfitted with the barest essentials, such as a three-day supply of water, purification tablets or water filters, a good flashlight, and batteries. A wildfire might be a good example of this scenario. In others, like a severe snowstorm, you may be left sheltering in place, possibly without tap water or access to the power grid—and in serious need of a good power bank or two.

“You have to think in that mindset of, ‘We could have power out,’” said National Weather Service preparedness lead Charlie Woodrum when we talked in January ahead of a historic winter storm season across much of the United States. “We could lose it for a couple days, or up to even a week, and we also could lose water if pipes freeze or water mains break. You have to plan for both power outages and for the loss of water.”

Here’s how to prepare for a shorter-term emergency—and what to stock up on in advance. This isn’t a survival guide to civil war or the apocalypse, of course. But the advice and gear here should help you and your family safely weather a natural disaster such as a storm, a flood, an earthquake, or a wildfire–not to mention a systemic failure in your water system or power grid.

Also take note of my colleague Adrienne So’s advice that the best form of emergency prep involves getting to know your neighbors, and WIRED’s Guide to Surviving Extreme Weather. More worried about losing your job? Check out WIRED’s guide to a Digital Go Bag for when you’re forced to bug out from work.

Update March 2026: I added advice from National Weather Service Preparedness Lead Charlie Woodrum. We also added air purifiers, a camp stove, a log-splitting wedge, and a filtered water bottle from Clearly Filtered, and added context on both wildfires and cold-weather emergencies. I also updated pricing and descriptions, and swapped out available products where necessary.

What Should You Put in Your Emergency Go Bag?

Often, you have a bit of warning before an emergency lands on your doorstep. But an evacuation order can arrive with unsettling suddenness—and by the time everyone in your area is raiding the local supermarkets for water and purification tablets, it may be too late to secure your own. This is especially true in case of a sudden boil-water notice.

Your list of essential items for your emergency preparedness kit will depend on your circumstances, your family, and your needs. As of October 2025, the Federal Emergency Management Agency keeps an emergency kit checklist on its website. Columbia University also maintains online resources on how to prepare or respond to specific disasters and emergencies, including an online preparedness wizard to help each family understand their own emergency needs.

Zoom Communications has broadened the reach of its enterprise agentic artificial intelligence (AI) platform, introducing new workflow orchestration capabilities across Zoom Workplace, Zoom Phone and Zoom CX.

Outlining why it has made the expansion, the AI-first work platform provider noted that as enterprises scale artificial intelligence initiatives, many remain limited to AI assistants that summarise conversations but rely on manual follow-through across disconnected systems. Moreover, it argued that while traditional collaboration tools capture dialogue and systems of record store data, execution often remains fragmented.

Fundamentally, Zoom said its agentic AI platform is designed to close this gap by embedding workflow automation directly into meetings, calls, chat and contact centre interactions so conversations automatically trigger action across enterprise systems. The updates are designed to extend the company’s system of action for modern work, enabling organisations to automate tasks, trigger cross-system workflows, and turn meetings, calls and customer interactions into completed business outcomes.

“The next phase of enterprise AI will be defined by the ability to move from conversation to action,” observed Velchamy Sankarlingam, president of product and engineering at Zoom. “Zoom’s agentic AI platform is designed to orchestrate action across systems, turning every meeting, call and customer interaction into a trigger for workflow automation.”

Key highlights include upgrades to the AI Companion, Zoom Phone and Zoom Workplace products. As regards the former, Zoom has introduced new capabilities for its Custom AI Companion add-on to empower organisations to build custom AI agents. The new AI-first work app is designed to help teams convert meeting conversations and insights into structured documents, data analysis and presentation content, working within Zoom Meetings for real-time co-creation without switching tools. 

Zoom Phone’s new AI-powered capabilities have been built to enable automated post-call workflows, including generating customer records, drafting emails or SMS follow-ups and executing tasks. This is alongside enhanced customer engagement features to help teams prioritise high-value interactions and track performance. 

Meanwhile, the next generation of Zoom Workplace is looking to introduce a streamlined user experience, featuring a central AI Companion workspace and real-time voice translation to break down language barriers and advanced deepfake risk detection to strengthen meeting security.

New features and updates in this domain include user experience simplification with a “cleaner”, more consistent interface across desktop, mobile and web that is said to reduce friction and cognitive load. AI Companion will have its own tab, providing a central, conversational work surface for real-time queries, writing and workflow automation. A new advanced meeting security technology intelligently detects synthetic audio or video in meetings and provides real-time alerts.

As AI Companion 3.0 rolls out across the Zoom Workplace app, Zoom Business Services and Workvivo, it will look to accelerate conversation-to-completion workflows via the 3.0 AI tech stack. Previously available only in a web browser, the upgrade uses Zoom’s expanded federated AI platform to securely connect conversations, enterprise data and apps, and drive meaningful outcomes.

Zoom revealed that the platform’s success can be gauged by the growth of AI Companion monthly active users, having more than tripled year-over-year in the fourth quarter of its 2026 financial year.