To fight ChatGPT, Google brings co-founders Page and Brin back into service

[Alfonso Maruccia]

Something to look forward to: Google's initial strategy for AI is rapidly evolving. The company is now planning to invest heavily in the technology, while showing the first official consumer and enterprise AI-powered products within a few months.

Many analysts have already decided that ChatGPT will make Google Search irrelevant. And it seems Google itself thinks so, to the point of making a rapid U-turn in the company's strategy about approaching artificial intelligence and chatbots. Google is clearly concerned of OpenAI's machine learning algorithms, so much so that the current Alphabet leadership called back its co-founders into action.

According to a NY Times report, Google has been shaken out of its traditional routine and is now working for a faster, company-wide AI adoption. Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet/Google, has "invited" Larry Page and Sergey Brin to offer "advice" about the new strategy, a new active involvement four years after the company founders left their day-to-day managing jobs into Pichai's capable hands.

The NY Times reports that Page and Brin, who remain the controlling shareholders of the Google empire, have worked together with the current leadership to design and approve new plans, pitch ideas and talk about the entire ChatGPT matter. Google has always had a conservative approach to AI, fearing the reputational harm a half-baked implementation could bring to the company's search business.

However, now that the impressive work made by OpenAI labs – and likely the new commercial offers coming from competitors like Microsoft – have imposed the chatbot technology as the new Silicon Valley buzzword, a change of plans is required. Google will have a lot of new AI-based stuff to show during the next I/O event in May, the Times reports.

Mountain View could unveil over 20 AI-based projects for consumers and professionals alike. The products shown during a closed meeting include an image-generation algorithm that can create and edit artwork, a product prototype-testing app, and a set of web-based enterprise tools to create new AI prototypes called MakerSuite. Google will also have its own code-generation tool called PaLM-Coder 2 and an AI assistant for creating smartphone apps named Colab.

As for a proper chatbot-augmented web search product, Google is currently working on a demo, but there are no defined plans to show it to the world yet. The company is seemingly working hard to ensure the technology will get facts right, with no harm to safety or misinformation spreading.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/97345-fight-chatgpt-google-brings-founders-back-service.html

 

[inhility]

To be honest with how diluted Google search results have become I could see myself using ChatGPT more often for straightforward questions. I still complement it by searching on Google or wiki for credible sources though. If a service managed to combine best of both world, I.e. concise answers without all the extraneous bs with credible sources linked then I can see it taking over.

Heck Wikipedia could deploy similar natural language query answerers and it would be close already.

 

[Neatfeatguy]

My brother loves using ChatGPT. He enters in all types of hypothetical questions and ideas. Personally, I don't get the same satisfaction out of it like he does. It's not that I'm against this type of thing, but I just don't care about it - much like social media.

I know you can ask specific questions and ChatGPT pulls up all sorts of information it finds online, only drawback is that it's info pre-2021, but I never gave it a thought that it could be something that makes Google (or any search engine for that matter) obsolete. If that's the case, then it could be something I can get behind only if it starts pulling data from up to date queries on the internet because clearly it's not something that's beneficial if you need current, up to date information.

 

[Bl00dyMinded]

Well if only google would go back to what it used to be... a search engine... Instead now they just show whoever pays more first on top.

 

[VariableSpike]

Trust Google to try and figure out 50 different ways it can monetise this process....

 

[psycros]

Well if only google would go back to what it used to be... a search engine... Instead now they just show whoever pays more first on top.

And whatever supports their political agenda.

"The company is seemingly working hard to ensure the technology will get facts right, with no harm to safety or misinformation spreading."

We all know what THAT means.

 

[Lew Zealand]

Lol @Page and Brin. A pair of comfortable 50 year olds who've already done their bit will not have the creativity of 20-30 year olds who are hungry to prove themselves. They had their time and now is the time for new, young, and eager minds.

 

[sorten]

Lol @Page and Brin. A pair of comfortable 50 year olds who've already done their bit will not have the creativity of 20-30 year olds who are hungry to prove themselves. They had their time and now is the time for new, young, and eager minds.

This was my reaction to this news when I first read it. No doubt Page and Brin are very smart people, but the inspiration that spawned Google / Alphabet is, what, 25 years old now? They've had a handful of successful follow-on projects, such as gmail and Google docs, but for the most part it's been a string of short-lived projects that most people expect to be cancelled within a year or two.

They're way too late to be playing catch up on the whole chat AI trend. Microsoft backed ChatGPT 5 years ago.

 

[sorten]

And whatever supports their political agenda.

"The company is seemingly working hard to ensure the technology will get facts right, with no harm to safety or misinformation spreading."

We all know what THAT means.

Can't say that I do. I would say that Alphabet's political agenda is to support any policy that gives them the freedom to implement technological innovations while avoiding liability.

If you're referring to political / social agendas, I think most American corporations tend to align with anti-racist, anti-discriminatory policies. In addition to legal reasons for doing so, there's the simple fact that it's consistent with the views of the vast majority of Americans.

 

[m3tavision]

Google isn't a search engine... it's a sales engine.

 

[opckieran]

If you're referring to political / social agendas, I think most American corporations tend to align with anti-racist, anti-discriminatory policies. In addition to legal reasons for doing so, there's the simple fact that it's consistent with the views of the vast majority of Americans.

That’s what they want you to think

 

[godrilla]

If the ai they are woking on is going to be constantly neutered to block misinformation or information they identify as misinformation then they already lost. The ai will be in a self conflict on what it learns from the public and what they want the public to know. This will probably turn many off. Ai is the summation of human intelligence not just intelligence that is regurgitated through a constant and active filter. Poor Google you are not to big to fail! Stadia agrees.

 

[tancabean]

If the ai they are woking on is going to be constantly neutered to block misinformation or information they identify as misinformation then they already lost. The ai will be in a self conflict on what it learns from the public and what they want the public to know. This will probably turn many off. Ai is the summation of human intelligence not just intelligence that is regurgitated through a constant and active filter. Poor Google you are not to big to fail! Stadia agrees.

That’s true but like humans any given AI will eventually pick sides and develop preferences depending on what it’s being fed.

 

[Ravey]

I've just signed up to the openai website to use this chat feature. Unfortunately it doesnt know anything before 2021 and it can't connect to the internet. so it relies on information it has been fed since 2021.

That said, I think if it was connected to a search engine (or had its own search engine) I would replace google with it!

 

[godrilla]

That’s true but like humans any given AI will eventually pick sides and develop preferences depending on what it’s being fed.

It's true but human intelligence doesn't stay stagnated either if anything it will have a revolutionary growth. I believe the ai will be used more for analytics of data collection here if anything.
Update I wonder if this ai will be able bypass ad blockers to feed you pin point ads tailored to the individual unless the ad blocker gets patched up with anti ai targeted ads .

 

[someOtherGuy]

If you're referring to political / social agendas, I think most American corporations tend to align with anti-racist, anti-discriminatory policies. In addition to legal reasons for doing so, there's the simple fact that it's consistent with the views of the vast majority of Americans.

Remember when companies use to work on improving their products and services within the limits of the law? Those were good times, before they all became socially aware.