(CNN) Google is moving ahead with plans to bring AI chat capabilities to its core search engine, keeping pace with a wave of new artificial intelligence tools that could threaten the company’s dominance online for the first time in decades. .
The company announced Wednesday that it is introducing the next evolution of Google Search. It says it uses AI-powered chatbots to help users by answering questions they “didn’t know search could answer.” Get the information your users need faster than ever before.
Update changed the look of Google search results significantly different. automatically when a user enters a query into the main search bar A popup containing the AI-generated response in addition to the traditional results display.
Users can now waitlist for the new Google Search launching first in the US via the Google app or Chrome desktop browser. The company says it will be accessible to a limited number of users in the coming weeks.
The update was announced at I/O, the company’s annual developer event focused on combining AI and hardware products. At the event, Google also announced PaLM 2, the latest AI language model to rival ChatGPT creator OpenAI’s GPT-4. The move is a major step forward for the company’s technology powering his AI products, which are expected to improve logic, common sense reasoning and math abilities. You can also generate specialized code in various programming languages.
The move comes as Google’s rivals, including Microsoft, race to develop and deploy AI features in their search engines and productivity tools following ChatGPT’s viral success. Due to the high profile of ChatGPT, Google management reportedly declared a “code red” status for its search business.
In addition to the search changes, Google is expanding access to its existing chatbot Bard. Bard works outside of a search engine and can help users with tasks like writing a draft essay outline, planning a friend’s baby shower, or getting lunch ideas. What do you have in the refrigerator? The tool was previously only available to early users via a waitlist in the US, but will soon be available to all users in 120 countries and 40 languages.
Google will also release extensions for Bard from its own services such as Gmail, Sheets and Docs, allowing users to ask questions and collaborate with chatbots within the apps they use.
However, deploying AI chatbots comes with some risks. These tools have raised concerns about tone and accuracy, the latter being especially important for the online search engine that has long been the cornerstone of Google’s business.
Get hands-on with the new Google Search
A virtual demo of CNN’s tools Ahead of Wednesday’s announcement, an AI search tool revealed why bees are so important to our ecosystem, whether Portland, Oregon’s Sound Hotel has Peloton bikes (it does), and local I briefly answered questions like what a chess camp for kids is. seconds.
This tool scans your website, extracts relevant information and neatly packages it at the top of the results page, highlighting the source in a section set to the side.
But it’s not perfect. A search for “best pizzeria in New York City” yielded many San Francisco restaurants.
Kathy Edwards, Google’s vice president of search, told CNN. He said it’s still in the “early stages” and the company will continue to make changes over the coming weeks and months.
“We really want to learn and … and fix the kinks,” Edwards said. “I don’t want to give you this experience until I feel confident that I’ve succeeded.”
Unlike other chatbots such as ChatGPT, Snapchat’s My AI tool, and Bard, Google’s search tool intentionally has no “personas.”
“We made a deliberate decision to only reflect information on the web,” Edwards said. “It doesn’t respond with ‘I think’ or express an opinion on things. It’s not like many chatbots out there.”
But if you’ve been using other tools for months, the choice can be an unpleasant experience. When CNN asked Google’s tool for suggestions on how to balance work and life with kids at home, it offered nothing that could empathize or connect with the daily work-life balance, unlike other chatbots. did not.
The new Google Search also offers Perspectives, which shows you what other people are buying and thinking, and influences your results. Another tool called “About This Image” helps you understand facts about an image so the user can tell when he first saw the image on Google and if the image was posted on other his websites. You can ask about whether it is visible. The feature is intended to provide “a certain level of understanding rather than taking the image at face value,” Edwards said.
“Twenty-five Years of Exploring Journey”
These efforts highlight Google’s commitment to advancing AI despite the technology behind it raising concerns.
Google in March Called in because of an incorrect answer to a telescope question in Bard’s demo. Shares of Google parent company Alphabet fell 7.7% on the same day, wiping out its $100 billion market cap.
Microsoft’s AI chatbot was also called out for a mistake in the demo.
Like ChatGPT, the new Google Search and Bard are Built on a large language model. These tools are trained on vast amounts of online data to generate compelling responses to user prompts, but these tools often return wrong responses or are “hallucinating”. It is also known to give
Previously Google He told CNN that Bard will serve as a separate and complementary experience to Google Search and will later “thoughtfully” add a large language model for searching “in a deeper way.” .
“We have been on a journey of discovery for 25 years and it remains an open question.” Edwards said. “The next long arc will span decades, so we want to be bold, but we also want to be responsible and do it right.”
