On Monday, 6th February, 2023, Google announced a brand-new chatbot tool called “Bard” in an apparent effort to counteract ChatGPT’s success in going viral.
Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai announced in a blog post that Bard will be made available to “trusted testers” starting on Monday with intentions to make it public “in the coming weeks.”
Bard is based on a sizable language model, just like ChatGPT, which the AI research firm OpenAI officially unveiled in late November. To produce engaging responses to user cues, these models are trained on enormous web data sets.
Pichai noted that “Bard seeks to integrate the depth of the knowledge of the world with the strength, intelligence, and creativity of our massive language models.” It uses data from the internet to deliver original, excellent responses.
The statement comes as online search, Google’s flagship product, is reportedly facing its worst risk in years. In the two months after it went public, ChatGPT has been used to answer some queries that people may have previously searched for on Google, as well as to generate essays, stories, and song lyrics.
According to reports, Google’s management has declared a “code red” situation for its search company as a result of the enormous attention being paid to ChatGPT. Paul Buchheit, a co-creator of Gmail, cautioned that the growth of AI could cause Google to be completely disrupted in a tweet from last year.
Microsoft has already stated that it will integrate the tool into some of its products. It is also claimed that Microsoft aims to integrate it into its search engine, Bing. Microsoft has announced plans to invest billions in OpenAI. The subject of Microsoft’s upcoming news event, which will take place on Tuesday at its Washington offices, has not yet been revealed. The event was publicly announced by Microsoft shortly after Monday’s AI bombshell from Google.
Although not readily accessible to the general public, the fundamental technology that underpins Bard has been there for some time. On Monday, Google announced that Bard will be powered by its Language Model for Dialogue Applications (or LaMDA) technology, which was first presented almost two years ago. When a former Google developer asserted that the chatbot was “sentient,” LaMDA grabbed news in the latter part of last year. The AI community harshly condemned his statements.
Google used the request from a user to Bard to describe recent discoveries made by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope in a way that a 9-year-old may find engaging as an example in the post on Monday. Bard answers in the form of talking points. In 2023, the JWST discovered many galaxies known as “green peas,” according to the first sentence. They were given this name because they resembled peas in size, shape, and greenness.
According to the Google post, Bard may be used to organize a friend’s baby shower, contrast two Oscar-nominated films, or find lunch options based on what’s in your refrigerator.
Pichai added on Monday that Google’s popular Search function will soon start to roll out AI-powered capabilities.
“Soon, you’ll see AI-powered features in Search that distill complex information and multiple perspectives into easy-to-digest formats,” Pichai wrote. “Whether that’s seeking out additional perspectives, like blogs from people who play both piano and guitar, or going deeper on a related topic, like steps to get started as a beginner, you can quickly understand the big picture and learn more from the web.”
There may be certain hazards if Google does move more in the direction of integrating an AI chatbot tool into search. Experts have emphasized that because these tools are trained using data from the internet, they have the ability to reinforce prejudices and disseminate false information. Pichai emphasized the importance of “bringing experiences founded in these principles to the world in a bold and responsible way” in his blog post.
