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TechCrunch predicts Microsoft will throttle release of its embarrassing Bing AI
Devastating assessment here
https://techcrunch.com/2023/02/15/bing-around-and-find-out/amp/
with the headline "Bing around and find out."
They first do a good overview of Bing AI's "dizzyingly quick reversal: from 'next big thing' to 'brand-sinking albatross' in under a week" - which is "all Microsoft's fault."
And they explain why, at length.
And conclude:
It is very unlikely that they will fully retreat. That would involve embarrassment at a grand scale — even grander than it is currently experiencing. And because the damage is already done, it might not even help Bing.
Similarly, one can hardly imagine Microsoft charging forward as if nothing is wrong. Its AI is really weird! Sure, it’s being coerced into doing a lot of this stuff, but it’s making threats, claiming multiple identities, shaming its users, hallucinating all over the place. They’ve got to admit that their claims regarding inappropriate behavior being controlled by poor Prometheus were, if not lies, at least not truthful. Because as we have seen, they clearly didn’t test this system properly.
The only reasonable option for Microsoft is one that I suspect they have already taken: throttle invites to the “new Bing” and kick the can down the road, releasing a handful of specific capabilities at a time. Maybe even give the current version an expiration date or limited number of tokens so the train will eventually slow down and stop.
This is the consequence of deploying a technology that you didn’t originate, don’t fully understand, and can’t satisfactorily evaluate. It’s possible this debacle has set back major deployments of AI in consumer applications by a significant period — which probably suits OpenAI and others building the next generation of models just fine.
Similarly, one can hardly imagine Microsoft charging forward as if nothing is wrong. Its AI is really weird! Sure, it’s being coerced into doing a lot of this stuff, but it’s making threats, claiming multiple identities, shaming its users, hallucinating all over the place. They’ve got to admit that their claims regarding inappropriate behavior being controlled by poor Prometheus were, if not lies, at least not truthful. Because as we have seen, they clearly didn’t test this system properly.
The only reasonable option for Microsoft is one that I suspect they have already taken: throttle invites to the “new Bing” and kick the can down the road, releasing a handful of specific capabilities at a time. Maybe even give the current version an expiration date or limited number of tokens so the train will eventually slow down and stop.
This is the consequence of deploying a technology that you didn’t originate, don’t fully understand, and can’t satisfactorily evaluate. It’s possible this debacle has set back major deployments of AI in consumer applications by a significant period — which probably suits OpenAI and others building the next generation of models just fine.
I hope TechCrunch is right.
A plan to throttle the release could be hidden behind Microsoft's announcement that the waitlist for Bing AI suddenly jumped to millions in 169 countries, so everyone must be patient.. With so much demand, no one should expect it soon, right?
Google probably won't be rushing to release its own AI-assisted search, either, after this very public fail.
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