GenAI & LLMs · 1 min read · Updated 2026-10-05
What is generative AI?
Making, not just sorting
Older AI mostly sorted things: is this email spam, is this a cat. Generative AI creates: write an email, draw a cat on a skateboard, compose a tune.
Two well-known kinds
Language models write text one small piece at a time. Image models start with random dots like TV static and clean them up step by step until a picture appears.
Good to know
It is great for first drafts, summaries and ideas. But it can say wrong things in a confident voice, so check anything important.
Key takeaways
- Generative AI creates new text, images, sound and code.
- It learns patterns from examples, not by copying.
- Great for drafts. Check the facts.
Quick questions
How is it different from Google search?
Search finds pages that already exist. Generative AI writes a fresh answer, which might be wrong.
Does it copy what it learned from?
It learns patterns rather than storing pages, though it can sometimes repeat things it saw a lot.
What is a prompt?
The question or instruction you give to the AI.
Keep learning
What is a large language model (LLM)?An LLM is a computer program trained on a huge amount of writing. Its main skill is guessing the next word, again and…1 min readRead →AI hallucinationsA hallucination is when an AI says something that is wrong or made up, but sounds sure of itself. It happens because the AI…1 min readRead →The evolution of generative AIAI began with simple rules in the 1950s, learned from data in the 1990s, got much better with deep learning in the 2010s…1 min readRead →