I made an AI version of Bilbo Baggins using Goggle Gemini for free, and shared a pipe with him outside Bag End – here’s what you can now do with Gems
- Gems are now available in the free version of Gemini
- Each Gem can have its own personality and expertise, allowing you to create custom AI tools
- You can create your own Gems or use Google’s pre-made ones
Google is rolling out Gems, its customizable AI models, to all Gemini users for free. Gems have been around for a while now as part of Gemini Advanced, but now everybody gets to play with them.
Gems are customized AI models. They can be fictional AI characters you’ve always wanted to talk to, like my hero Bilbo Baggins, or Jack Reacher, or you can roleplay an AI character you want to get advice from, like a fitness coach, or language tutor.
They’re actually pretty easy to create and can be a great time saver. If you frequently ask Gemini to perform tasks like enhancing your writing or role-playing as your boss for practicing tough conversations, you’re likely spending time preparing it to behave a certain way before the conversation begins.
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For example, you might be writing, “I want you to pretend to be a mid-50s middle executive at a software company who hates small talk and loves the Philadelphia Eagles”, before every interaction.
With a Gem, you can save time by creating your AI expert and saving them for next time, so you can jump straight into the conversation.
Premade Gems
Gemini comes with a few premade Gems that are really worth exploring, including ‘Chess champ’ (play using standard moves like ‘pawn to d4’). Brainstormer, a Gem that’s there to assist you in coming up with ideas. ‘Career guide’ who wants to help you on the job front. ‘Coding partner’ for leveling up your coding skills. ‘Learning coach’ who is created to help you learn pretty much anything, and ‘Writing editor’ who wants to improve your grammar and sentence structure.
Just pick a Gem and start to chat. You’ll pick up how it works as you go.
If you want to create your own Gem then, you’ll need to access Gemini through the web interface at gemini.google.com, rather than the mobile app. Once you are there, click on ‘Gem manager’ in the left-hand menu, then ‘New Gem’.
Give your Gem a name – I went for Bilbo Baggins in an effort to create one of my childhood heroes, so I could quiz him about his adventures in the Misty Mountains. Next, you need to give your Gem some instructions. Here I entered details of Bilbo’s life and his personality. In the Knowledge section, you can upload any files or PDFs you have which offer more background information.
Once you’re done click save and you’re ready to start chatting with your new Gem. I had a nice fireside chat with Bilbo, but he seemed reluctant to let me hold his magic ring…