[RoosterRedux]

It’s fine to be cautious about any tech company, but it’s important to separate facts from emotional framing.

Listing real facts with a negative spin is a classic example of "poisoning the well" — creating distrust without proving actual wrongdoing.

Perplexity AI offers optional apps, sells merchandise (like many companies do), and collects emails for account management — just standard practice, not evidence of anything shady.

It’s better to focus on real practices, not insinuations.

And as to this:

They want their app(s) to be loaded onto your devices.

That statement is misleading. You can use Perplexity AI entirely through a web browser without installing any app.

[Worldtraveler once upon a time]

Not "poisoning the well," per se, and most assuredly not being emotional. Just being skeptical. "Distrust" is my starting position for much in media and in the internet, with trust being something to be earned over time.

I spent about fifteen minutes nosing around the site and related items. As to "real practices," one can read their terms of service to see they are serious as are all about such things.

As to "misleading. You can use Perplexity AI entirely through a web browser without installing any app." Many, many sites offer this alongside the apps they offer. They sell "pro" and "enterprise" and API products, because their business is to sell something of course.

Do their "Discover" link and find bunches of news items. One stop shopping for news?

All LLMs evidence "bias," as does so much of media these days. So it's a nice toy, but the company aims to make you 1) its data, and 2) its paying customer over time. Nothing wrong with the latter, and "caveat emptor."