Google suffers $140 billion loss as AI chatbot, Bard gives inaccurate information

Google’s AI chatbox tool, Bard‘s incorrect response in its demo, made the company’s shares suffer a loss last week. In the demo, which Google posted on Twitter, Bard got this question from a user: “What are the new discoveries from the James Webb Space Telescope that I can tell my 9-year-old child about?” In its response which included a series of bullet points, Bard said: “JWST took the first pictures of a planet outside of our solar system.”

However, according to NASA, the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope took the first image of a planet outside our solar system in 2004.

Last Wednesday, Alphabet experienced a significant financial setback when its artificial intelligence response caused shares to plunge by eight percent – resulting in an estimated loss of $140 billion.

Google had announced Bard to join the wave of generative AI as many people are now leaning towards conversational AI in their online search. Bard’s embarrassing error underlines Google’s struggle to incorporate the same AI technology that powers Microsoft-backed ChatGPT into its main search engine.

Bard leverages a large language model trained on enormous amounts of web data to create engaging responses to users. Experts have long cautioned against the potential inaccuracies the innovative technology may propagate in conversations.

Google had stated that Bard would be initially made available to “trusted testers” this week, with plans to make it accessible to the general public in the coming weeks.

According to a Google representative, the factual error highlights the need for a comprehensive testing process, and it’s why the company is starting this week with its “Trusted Tester program.”

“We’ll combine external feedback with our internal testing to ensure Bard’s responses meet a high bar for quality, safety, and groundedness in real-world information.”

Google, in response to Bard’s inaccurate result

Bard: Google want to win AI war

Bard is an experimental conversational AI service, powered by LaMDA. Built using our large language models and drawing on information from the web, it’s a launchpad for curiosity and can help simplify complex topics → https://t.co/fSp531xKy3 pic.twitter.com/JecHXVmt8l

— Google (@Google) February 6, 2023

After Open AI’s ChatGPT burst onto the scene in 2023, threatening to dethrone Google’s search engine and take over as internet users’ go-to source for questions large and small, Google has taken action. Last week, the tech giant launched Bard into battle against its newest rival. 

Google presented its plans to use artificial intelligence (AI) technology to fundamentally alter how people conduct online information searches on Wednesday during an event in its Paris location. This happened a day after Microsoft revealed its ambitious AI-based overhaul of Bing search engine services with the ChatGPT algorithm.

In a first-of-its-kind presentation, a Google executive unveiled their plans to utilize cutting-edge technology for unprecedented levels of conversational intelligence. With Bard powers, Google aims to help users with practical questions such as calculating pros and cons when making big purchases like an electric vehicle or navigating constellations in the night sky.