Technologies

ChatGPT AI Threat Pulls Google Co-Founders Back Into Action, Report Says

Sergey Brin and Larry Page are helping the company respond to an impressive technology that is a direct threat to Google’s search business.

ChatGPT, the high-profile AI chatbot from OpenAI, is such a serious threat to Google’s core business that the company’s co-founders are reengaged with the search giant, The New York Times reported Friday.

Startup OpenAI debuted ChatGPT in November, and within a few days more than a million people had begun prompting it with an enormous range of questions and requests. The artificial intelligence system has been trained on vast quantities of text on the internet and can answer questions, compose essays, write computer programs and generate all kinds of information.

ChatGPT can sound authoritative, but it isn’t always right, and you can’t tell where it’s drawing its answers from. It’s impressive enough to be a viral hit on the internet, though, and it’s useful enough that Google reportedly declared a «code red» response to ChatGPT.

Now, at the behest of Sundar Pichai, chief executive of Google parent company Alphabet, Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin are looking into the issue, the Times reported. They’d largely stepped out of day-to-day operating roles in 2019.

Google has a rival AI technology called PaLM, but it hasn’t made that AI system available for public use. And it’s an AI pioneer, inventing the «transformer» technology that’s at the heart of large language models like PaLM and OpenAI’s ChatGPT foundation, GPT-3. In a blog post this week the company summarized several areas where Google is using AI, for everything from suggesting email replies to placing ads.

Google didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Loup Ventures analyst Gene Munster sees ChatGPT, GPT-3 and large language models as a competitive threat.

«One possible future is that these LLMs could be built into the backend of many of the tech services we use,» Munster said in a Friday report. «This is the outcome that could hurt Google in the long-term.»

Ultimately, though, Google should be able to withstand the threat, he predicted. With four services that each have more than a billion users, and $60 billion in annual operating income from search, Google has «more than enough money to fund investments that will yield a ChatGPT competitor.»

Editors’ note: CNET is using an AI engine to create some personal finance explainers that are edited and fact-checked by our editors. For more, see this post.

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Today’s NYT Connections Hints, Answers and Help for March 18, #1011

Here are some hints and the answers for the NYT Connections puzzle for March 18 #1011.

Looking for the most recent Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s NYT Connections puzzle is pretty tricky, but musicians might find the blue group easy. Read on for clues and today’s Connections answers.

The Times has a Connections Bot, like the one for Wordle. Go there after you play to receive a numeric score and to have the program analyze your answers. Players who are registered with the Times Games section can now nerd out by following their progress, including the number of puzzles completed, win rate, number of times they nabbed a perfect score and their win streak.

Read more: Hints, Tips and Strategies to Help You Win at NYT Connections Every Time

Hints for today’s Connections groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Time between two things, maybe.

Green group hint: That smarts!

Blue group hint: Rockers know these well.

Purple group hint: You might write one out to pay a bill.