Google’s Bard AI chatbot A New Player in the AI War
Google’s Response to ChatGPT
Google has announced the launch of its latest AI chatbot, Bard, in response to the growing popularity of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Sundar Pichai, Google’s CEO, wrote in a blog post that Bard is currently available to a select group of trusted testers and aims to bring the vast knowledge of the world to a conversational interface. Google’s new chatbot uses a smaller version of LaMDA, the powerful AI model first announced in May 2021, which is similar in technology to ChatGPT.
Enhancing Conventional Search
Google has not announced plans to integrate Bard into its search box, which is the source of its profits. Instead, the CEO showcased a unique and cautious approach to using the underlying AI technology to enhance conventional search. For questions without a single agreed-on answer, Google will provide a response that reflects the different opinions.
API Availability for Developers
Google also plans to make the underlying technology behind Bard available to developers through an API, similar to OpenAI’s approach with ChatGPT. However, no timeline has been provided for this release.
The AI Challenge
Text generation software, while sophisticated, is prone to fabrication and can replicate unsavory styles of speech found online. This poses a challenge for the development of powerful and profitable products, including chatbots that could revolutionize web search. Mitigating these flaws and updating the software with new information is a major challenge for the industry.
Google’s AI Journey
Google’s AI journey began six years ago, with the company reorienting itself around AI. Since then, the company has made numerous investments in AI, including its AI research division and the acquisition of UK-based AI startup, DeepMind, in 2014. However, Google has chosen to proceed cautiously with adding the technology behind LaMDA to its products due to the limitations of AI models trained on text from the web, such as hallucinating incorrect information and exhibiting racial and gender biases. The advent of ChatGPT has inspired Google to accelerate its timeline for incorporating text-generation capabilities into its products.
Competition in the AI Industry
The growing popularity of ChatGPT has sparked excitement and speculation about a challenge to Google’s dominance in a web search for the first time in years. Microsoft, which recently invested $10 billion in OpenAI, is holding a media event related to its work with ChatGPT’s creator, believed to announce new features for its search engine, Bing. OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, recently tweeted a photo of himself with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella after Google’s announcement.
While ChatGPT’s ability to answer complex questions with apparent coherence and clarity has many users dreaming of a revolution in education, business, and daily life, some AI experts advise caution. ChatGPT does not understand the information it serves and is inherently prone to making things up. This may be particularly vexing for some of Google’s AI experts, who developed some of the technology behind ChatGPT.
Conclusion
Google’s launch of Bard in response to the growing popularity of ChatGPT marks a significant development in the AI industry. The two companies are building their chatbots on text generation software that, while sophisticated, is prone to fabrication and unsavory speech styles. The challenge mitigating these flaws and updating the software with new information is a major challenge for the industry. Despite these limitations, the potential for chatbots to revolutionize web search and other industries remains high, and Google’s cautious approach to incorporating the technology behind LaMDA into its products will likely continue to evolve over time.
Originally published at https://capitalfinanceworld.blogspot.com.
