ChatGPT, Bard & the new internet search war

ChatGPT has taken the internet by storm since its launch in November 2022. Some say that it’s overhyped, while others say it is groundbreaking. Either way, this technology will change many things, from how we interact with customer service to writing blog articles like this one. It will also change the way we interact with search engines. For example, Bing is growing in popularity, challenging Google’s long-standing dominance. Who would have seen that coming? We get more into that and investment opportunities in this space at the end of the article, but first, we give you some background on what you need to know about the AI chatbots everyone’s talking about.

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is an AI (Artificial Intelligence) chatbot developed by OpenAI. It is an example of generative AI, a class of machine learning algorithms and models that can generate new, original content that resembles the input data. In other words, it uses AI to create something that didn't exist before. Some generative AI platforms can create new images, music or videos. ChatGPT, on the other hand, creates text in response to a prompt. You can ask ChatGPT to write anything, from a joke to code for programmers.

OpenAI first launched ChatGPT with its GPT-3 (Generative Pretrained Transformer 3) AI model. However, more recently, it launched GPT-4, the fourth iteration of the OpenAI software and an even more powerful tool than GPT-3. GPT-4 is said to be more accurate, creative and collaborative than previous versions, and it can even analyse the contents of images.

ChatGPT’s popularity has grown in leaps and bounds. In its first two months, it had already racked up over 100 million users, making it the fastest-growing consumer application in history, according to Reuters. For comparison, TikTok reached 100 million users nine months after its launch, and it took Instagram two and a half years to hit that mark.

How does ChatGPT work?

What better way to tell you how ChatGPT works then by asking ChatGPT itself? Here’s what it said when we asked the question:

“ChatGPT is a language model that uses a technique called deep learning to understand natural language and generate human-like responses to user inputs. The model has been trained on a large corpus of text data, which includes everything from books, articles and websites to social media posts and online conversations. Once trained, ChatGPT can generate text that is similar to what it has learned from the training data.

ChatGPT is constantly learning and evolving as it processes more data and interacts with more users, which enables it to generate more accurate and useful responses over time.”

What is Google’s Bard?

Simply put, Bard is Alphabet’s (Google’s parent company) version of ChatGPT. It has many of the same functionalities with a few differences. Bard is built on Alphabet’s learning model called Language Model for Dialogue Applications (LaMDA), which uses current research pulled from the internet for its responses. In contrast, ChatGPT is trained on sources up to 2021, so its responses could be outdated.

What does this have to do with search engines?

For the past two decades, Google has dominated the search engine industry. ‘Google it’ has even become a common phrase we use when asked a question. As of November 2022, Google commanded over 91% market share in the internet search category globally compared to 2.95% for Microsoft’s Bing. Hence why you never ask someone to ‘Bing it’.

The introduction of ChatGPT, however, has shaken things up. OpenAI is backed by Microsoft. And on February 7th, Microsoft unveiled a new version of Bing, powered by the same technology used in ChatGPT. This caused Bing to see its app downloads increase tenfold within 24 hours, and its newfound growth could be very profitable for Microsoft. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that Microsoft could make $2 billion more in advertising revenue for every 1% of the market share that Bing takes from Google.

The day after Microsoft released the new Bing, Alphabet came out swinging by holding an event demonstrating Bard, which it plans to integrate into Google. But it was a bit of a swing and a miss. People noticed an incorrect answer from the chatbot, which, in part, cost Alphabet about a hundred billion in market value by a drop in its share price.

Bing still has a long way to catch up to Google, but the landscape of search, as we know it, is changing. We are still in the early days of the new search war, and only time will tell who comes out on top.

How can I invest in ChatGPT and Bard?

ChatGPT’s owner OpenAI is currently privately held, so you can’t invest in it directly just yet. However, since Microsoft is a major investor in the company, by investing in it you could gain indirect exposure to OpenAI. At this time, it is not clear if OpenAI has plans to make a stock market debut. You can, however, invest in Bard via Alphabet. These aren’t the only two companies in this space, though. You can find plenty of other AI companies to invest in on our platform.

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Sources: Bloomberg, Digital Trends, Reuters, TechCrunch, Computerworld, The Verge, CNET, The Daily, Business Insider