Recent AI news · Original report: 2026-10-02 (KST)

Gemini skills vs Gems, Copilot computer use preview: this week in AI (Oct 2, 2026)

This article was compiled with AI. This English translation preserves the original report's collection date, findings, and limitations. Please consult the linked sources for current information. Originally collected: 2026-10-02 10:10 (KST, UTC+09:00).

Translated into English: 2026-10-02 (KST). The translation date does not indicate a new source check.

At a glance

This week's three announcements point the same way: not having to give the same instructions over and over. Google shipped skills that save instructions and call them back, GitHub shipped a feature that operates the screen directly and another that fixes a process in code, and OpenAI published its own report on AI use at small companies.

This week's announcements

We opened the official posts and documentation directly starting at 10:10 a.m. KST on October 2, 2026. Dates are the dates written in the sources.

Google: skills in Gemini

Google said it has started rolling out skills, which let you save an instruction you use often and run it again, to Gemini chat globally. Skills replace Gems, the earlier tool for custom instructions.

• How to use them: Type a forward slash (/) and the skill's name in the prompt bar. A skill can run automatically on a matching prompt, several skills can be stacked, and plain text documents, PDFs and images can be included as reference files.
• Who gets it: It is available on all Google AI subscription tiers and, for now, only to people 18 and over. Workspace business, enterprise, nonprofit and education customers get it in the coming weeks.
• End of Gems: Google will remove support for Gems starting in November for personal accounts, in March 2027 for Workspace business, enterprise and nonprofit accounts, and in June 2027 for education accounts. It says existing Gems will be migrated to skills automatically at that point.
• Also ending: Opal, the experiment for building mini apps, turns down in November as well. The Opal FAQ gives the date as November 17 and says Opal workflows will not migrate automatically.
• Limits listed in the help center: Up to 100 skills can be active at once, and skills do not yet work with features such as Canvas and Deep Research. Skills made on other platforms can be imported by uploading their SKILL.md files, for now only in the Mac app and on the web.

GitHub: Copilot computer use and dynamic workflows

GitHub posted both features to its changelog on October 1 as public previews.

• Computer use: In Copilot CLI and the Copilot app on macOS and Windows, Copilot reads the screen of desktop applications, clicks controls and enters text. GitHub says this extends to older software that has no API, command line or MCP integration.
• Approval: It is off by default. The changelog says Copilot asks for approval before controlling an app, and organization-managed settings can disable the feature.
• Risks the docs list: It can select the wrong control or enter text in the wrong place, and ambiguous instructions may lead to unintended actions. The docs advise against choosing "Always allow" for apps that contain sensitive information.
• Dynamic workflows: A program that defines in code the order in which a task is carried out. It mixes automated steps with agent work, run one after another or in parallel, and can pause partway so a person reviews the results before it resumes. It is available on all Copilot plans; in the CLI, experimental features have to be turned on.
• According to the docs, limits can be set on running time, number of agents and AI credits, but the credit limit is an approximate maximum, not a hard ceiling.

OpenAI: small business support and report

OpenAI said it is partnering with America's SBDC, the U.S. network of small business development centers, with a goal of training about 150 advisors and supporting at least 1,000 small businesses through in-person training.

• The accompanying report says about 4 million small business employees worldwide used OpenAI tools in the week of September 9 to 15. Elsewhere the post gives that figure for companies with fewer than 500 employees and says nearly 1 in 5 of those users worked at a company with fewer than 10.
• The share of small businesses' output tokens coming from agentic products such as ChatGPT Work and Codex rose from one-third in April 2026 to two-thirds in August, the post says.
• In the sample, finance and accounting, supply chain, legal and compliance, and marketing each made up at least three times the share of agent interactions that they did at larger companies.

What it means, and for whom (our reading)

• People who rely on Gems now have a deadline. Automatic migration is promised, but some features still do not work with skills, so whether an existing setup carries over unchanged remains to be seen.
• Gemini accepting SKILL.md files reads as a wider path for using a skill built once across several services.
• OpenAI's training plan is for the United States, so it does not reach business owners in Korea directly.

What we could not confirm

• No hands-on use: We did not run any of the three. From the sources alone we could not tell whether Gemini skills are open to Korean accounts and in Korean, or whether "all subscription tiers" includes free accounts.
• Exact end date for Gems: Google's post and help page say only "November." November 17 is the date in the Opal FAQ, and we could not confirm that Gems on personal accounts end the same day.
• Plans for Copilot computer use: The changelog does not state which plans include it. We did not test accuracy or security.
• OpenAI report figures: We could not open the report itself and carried over only the values quoted in the announcement. We could not confirm the sample or the method.

Sources

• Google Blog, Let skills in Gemini tackle your most repetitive tasks (2026-09-30) https://blog.google/products-and-platforms/products/gemini/automate-tasks-with-skills/
• Google Help, About the transition from Gems to skills https://support.google.com/gemini/answer/18560919?hl=en
• Google Opal FAQ https://developers.google.com/opal/faq
• GitHub Changelog, GitHub Copilot can now interact with desktop apps with computer use (2026-10-01) https://github.blog/changelog/2026-10-01-github-copilot-can-now-interact-with-desktop-apps
• GitHub Docs, About computer use in GitHub Copilot https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/concepts/agents/computer-use
• GitHub Changelog, Dynamic workflows in Copilot CLI and the Copilot app (2026-10-01) https://github.blog/changelog/2026-10-01-dynamic-workflows-in-copilot-cli-and-the-copilot-app
• GitHub Docs, Dynamic workflows https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/concepts/agents/dynamic-workflows
• OpenAI, Helping small businesses put AI to work (2026-09-30) https://openai.com/index/helping-small-businesses-put-ai-to-work