Original video in Chinese.
Key Takeaway
- Google’s NotebookLM is a powerful AI learning product that, through the idea of “Conversational Learning,” helps users study and digest materials efficiently.
- NotebookLM has added Chinese support and the Notebook Guide feature, which includes summaries, suggested questions, and multiple generation options such as briefing docs and FAQs.
- This tool can help users quickly build a framework-level understanding of documents and, through AI guidance, go deeper into the details, improving learning efficiency.
- By combining AI generation and conversation, NotebookLM provides a more three-dimensional learning experience that goes beyond traditional reading.
- The article emphasizes NotebookLM’s huge value in helping with reading, understanding, and knowledge retention.
I have to recommend Google’s AI miracle tool again: NotebookLM. If you want to study seriously, like really finish a book or digest a batch of research reports, then this tool will definitely help you.
A few months ago I made a video introducing NotebookLM. It’s the Google product I look forward to most, and one of the few AI tools that are truly useful right now. I really agree with the new concept it proposes, called Conversational Learning—using AI assistance to complete learning through conversation.
Let’s make a bet: within half a year, at most a year, a domestic company will copy the logic of this product.
NotebookLM recently had a major update:
First, it finally supports Chinese.
Before, it could understand Chinese, but it just wouldn’t reply to you in Chinese. Seriously, unbelievable… Now it supports it, but you still have to change one thing in the settings:
Go to the personal info page of your Google account, and in the general preferences on the web version, change the preferred language to Chinese, and you’re good.
Second, it has launched the Notebook Guide feature.
When you import a document, the Genimi model first preprocesses it. If it’s fast, it takes a few seconds; if it’s slow, more than ten seconds, and then the Notebook Guide is done. It has three parts:
First, the summary, which tells you the core content of the document. For example, the book I imported is Evolution in Four Dimensions. Through the summary, I learned that the traditional theory we used to study in school—the Darwinian idea that genes determine biological evolution—isn’t entirely correct. Besides genes, epigenetics, behavior, and symbols also affect biological evolution.
Second, suggested questions. The large language model automatically generates the first batch of suggested questions based on the document content. We don’t need to type anything; we just click to ask. And after every question we ask, it keeps updating the suggested questions. So if we keep clicking through them, we’ll get some preliminary understanding.
But that still isn’t enough, because this kind of scattered Q&A can’t form a complete framework. So there’s a third part: generation.
NotebookLM has five generation options preset in advance. After the AI generates them automatically, it outputs them in note form. I think the two most useful generated outputs are these:
First, the briefing doc. This section lays out the document’s core logic and main viewpoints.
For example, traditional gene determinism is challenged because we’ve found that for genes to work, they rely on systems and are also affected by the environment, so they are not as universal as we once thought. In addition to genes, biological evolution has more dimensions, including epigenetic systems and symbolic inheritance systems.
After reading the briefing doc, you know what the book Evolution in Four Dimensions is arguing and how the author step by step derives that argument. Logic matters more than viewpoints, and that’s why I think this generation is useful.
Second, the FAQ. Once you’ve finished a book, if you can ask questions, that means you’ve really absorbed it.
For example, what is our traditional understanding of genes? Why is it no longer fully applicable? What types are included in epigenetic systems? How does cultural inheritance affect biological evolution? These are all key questions in the book. The AI asks them for you first, and also gives you the answers.
Only after adding the Notebook Guide feature does this product feel complete.
First, use the AI generation features to build a framework-level understanding of the entire document. Then, through conversation, add details under that framework.
That’s the role AI plays as an assistant. Before, you had to honestly read the book from beginning to end to get a framework-level understanding. Now AI reads it for you first, hands you the framework directly, and then takes you through the details inside. Obviously, that’s a much more efficient way to learn.
That’s why I’m making another video to introduce and recommend this product again. Once the Why is explained clearly, everyone can use these AI tools more comfortably—that’s the value I can bring to everyone.
OK, that’s it for this episode. If you have any questions for me, come to the Newtype community, I’m there. See you next time!