ChatGPT Has Stolen Google’s Thunder… for the Moment

Within days of OpenAI launching ChatGPT, a version of GPT3 redesigned for a conversational interface, it was clear to Google that this kind of Large Language Model (LLM) posed a serious threat to its position as the world’s leading search engine. Comparisons about the user experience were being made, and a Google extension for ChatGPT was developed that allows users to view both ChatGPT’s response to a search query and the results provided by Google.

It’s worth remembering that a few months before the launch of ChatGPT, Google had hit the headlines with its conversational algorithm, LaMDA, which one of its engineers claimed was self-aware. Why Google did not did not follow up with more research and allowed itself be overtaken by the launch of OpenAI remains a mystery. One reason could be that Google was afraid of damaging its reputation with the LaMDA results, preferring to put the project on hold. After all, the stakes are not the same for a relative newcomer like OpenAI as they are for the hegemon of search engines.

At the same time, Microsoft began making noises that it could capitalize on its initial support for OpenAI to gain a competitive advantage by incorporating ChatGPT into many of its products, including its Bing search engine.

Finally, Google could wait no longer: it declared a code red corporate emergency, asked founders Larry and Sergey to join meetings on the subject, and it has been leaked that it plans to launch a version of its search engine with conversational machine learning features, and launch 20 related products.

For the moment, Google’s official response is: “we continue to test our AI technology internally to make sure it’s useful and safe, and we expect to share more experiences externally soon.” But Google is undoubtedly nervous about ChatGPT’s popularity, as millions of people around the world test its ability to write novels and short stories, its efficiency as programming assistant, to answer questions, to gather information, and for thousands of other uses, even if others have pointed out ChatGPT’s unreliability.

There are three main types of Google search: navigational (to find a particular page), transactional (to make a purchase decision), or informational (to learn about something or answer a question). Despite its many current limitations, ChatGPT certainly has potential regarding the third category, and may even be poised for an assault on the second, as users ask ChatGPT to compare products or provide feedback on their performance.

Are we at the beginning of a fundamental shift in search interfaces? What happens when you’ve been using ChatGPT for a while and, despite its limitations, you wish Siri, Google Assistant or Alexa would answer you the way ChatGPT does? And what about those who, like those who take the first result on a Google page as the absolute truth, interpret a ChatGPT answer as if it were completely reliable, despite its mistakes (for some of which it even apologizes when you cross-examine it)?

Over the last two decades, Google has become a global byword for a search engine. Could that be about to change, and if so, will it be for the better or the worse? In a Google’s search results’ page, we at least get a few links with some details on the source, etc. In a paragraph written by ChatGPT, we just get information, with no idea on the source, the trustworthiness, etc. Nowadays, we have some people that blindly trust the first result on a Google result without the minimum amount of critical thinking: what’s going to happen when this people just get a couple of paragraphs with their answer, and nothing else? How’s that for the development of critical thinking? How about the potential for manipulation? Aren’t we making things just too easy?

(En español, aquí)

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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.

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