The AI wars are heating up. Microsoft has announced a new version of its search engine Bing, powered by an upgraded version of the same core AI technology that is behind chatbot ChatGPT. Joining the new and— hopefully— improved Bing are a set of AI-driven features designed specifically for the Edge browser. Microsoft is pitching these tools as an “AI copilot for the web”.
“AI will fundamentally change every software category, starting with the largest category of all – search,” Satya Nadella, Chairman and CEO, Microsoft said in a prepared statement, adding that “Today, we’re launching Bing and Edge powered by AI copilot and chat, to help people get more from search and the web.”
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Microsoft says these AI enhancements are based on a more powerful version of GPT 3.5, OpenAI’s large language model that powers ChatGPT, and built around the “Prometheus model” so it is “even faster, more accurate and more capable.” The bigger draw, though, seems to be the fact that it can give you more up-to-date information. The GPT 3.5-powered ChatGPT seems to have little knowledge of events that occurred after 2021.
The new Bing is available today in a “limited preview” on desktop, though it appears limited to certain pre-defined sample queries at this point of time and there’s a waitlist for full access. Microsoft plans to scale the preview to millions in the coming weeks and a mobile preview is also under the works.
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In addition to upgrading Bing, Microsoft is also adding two new AI features to its Edge browser— chat and compose. While chat will allow users to get a summary of content on a webpage and then ask questions about it (say for instance, compare financial results of two companies), compose can serve as a writing assistant on the fly, drafting LinkedIn and other social media posts or a quick email with a few prompts. These features will be embedded within the sidebar.
ChatGPT’s growing popularity has given AI a big shot in the arm lately and Microsoft has been quick to react. With OpenAI training its AI models on Azure, Microsoft is a big beneficiary and seeing the massive potential, it has “naturally” taken the call to invest in the company even as it works to integrate AI in more of its products including Office— in a bid to one-up rival Google. Google tried to pre-empt Microsoft’s announcement by announcing its own answer to ChatGPT, aka Bard, a day earlier. Bard is being billed as an “experimental conversational AI service” and will be available more broadly in the coming weeks.