You may have heard how Google recently declared a “code red” internally after the launch and explosive success of ChatGPT. Can you blame them? Google has dominated the search business for years, and has littered search results with ads that generate billions of dollars in revenues for the company. And they’ve used their dominant position to squeeze out complimentary services such as travel options, movie times, etc.

Generative AI and chatbots change the game

Google’s search business is feeling the heat from generative AI and chatbots. As technology advances, these tools are becoming increasingly more sophisticated – and they’re giving Google a run for its money! Generative AI can create content that sounds just like it was written by humans, while chatbots can provide helpful answers to everyday questions in an instant. These advancements mean that users have more options at their fingertips when conducting searches, making it harder for Google to remain on top.

Think about it – why do a Google search and have to sift through ranked websites for an answer when you can get the answer from a chatbot that is produced through generative AI?

In the short term, accuracy is an issue, but we all know this problem will be solved quickly. Already, we’ve seen a tremendous leap in capability with the release of GPT-4, which performs much better than the already impressive GPT-3.

Innovator’s Dilemma

Google faces the ultimate innovator’s dilemma. They’ve had this AI capability, but they’ve naturally kept it under wraps, knowing that its release would pose a threat to their current business model.

Now, with the release of ChatGPT, Google doesn’t have a choice. They will soon be releasing its own AI chatbot called Bard, which is now being used by testers. The company is also starting to ad more AI capability into tools such as Gmail and Google Docs.

Microsoft sees an opportunity for Bing

Microsoft’s search business has been a dud for years, but now the company sees real opportunity with generative AI and chatbots. They released a new version of Bing which allows users to toggle between conventional search results and results generated by a chatbot, which comes with references for further investigation by the user.

Give it a try and you’ll see in real time why Google is facing a real threat. The days of relying primarily on traditional Google-style web searches are over. Of course those types of searches ill still be popular. People want to find website and tools that are useful, entertaining or informative. But sometimes they just want an answer, and the new chatbots will eat into Google’s market share and inevitably threaten revenues.

These technologies enable users to ask questions in plain language and receive accurate answers with minimal effort. This threatens Google’s market dominance as users become accustomed to more conversational means of searching for information online. Additionally, traditional web search relies on keywords, while NLP-based systems can understand the context behind a query and provide results that better match a user’s intent. This decreases the need for users to manually refine their searches by providing more relevant results faster. As these technologies become increasingly sophisticated, they could potentially reduce demand for Google’s services and erode its position as one of the world’s leading search providers.

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One of the most interesting use cases for generative AI is the ability to generate images simply with text prompts. The prompts can be very simple, or they can be quite detailed.

I gave it a try on a number of different platforms and immediately saw the potential. It’s fun, but it can also be a very powerful tool for content creators.

In this post you can see four generative AI images of Natalie Portman in the style of Andy Warhol. Remember Warhol’s iconic silkscreens of Marilyn Monroe, Jackie Kennedy and Debbie Harry? That’s the style I was after. I tried this on Lexixa.art with a simple prompt: “one flat image of natalie portman in silk screen style of andy warhol.” I picked the four best for this post. Some were quite bad, and sometimes the tool would spit out files with multiple images in the same file.

But these four are pretty good. If I spent more time on the prompt and then made iterative improvements, I would likely end up with an image I’d be happy to post on a wall.

What’s amazing is that these generative AI tools have only recently been released. Others have created far more impressive images using these tools. Midjourney in particular appears to be quite powerful for skilled graphic designers who can improve images by adding more prompts and adjusting details.

With my simple prompt, you can see the power of the program with only several reference points such as the celebrity and the artistic style of an old artist.

Most of these tools are free for limited use, so it’s easy to give them a try. Enjoy!

You can comment on the images here on Twitter.

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ChatGPT has generated an enormous amount of interest over the past several months, but now several more generative AI tools are being released (some in Beta) that will also grab attention.

Microsoft has made significant investments into generative AI with its investments in OpenAI, and it recently released it’s new Bing AI in Beta for journalists and other tech influencers.

The results have created quite a buzz.

Kevin Roose, a technology journalist for the New York Times and co-host with Casey Newton of the Hard Fork podcast, was one of the journalists invited out to Microsoft headquarters to test drive the new Bing AI. In many ways he was initially impressed as he describes in this Hard Fork episode with Newton. The Bing AI created a side-by-side display, with traditional Bing search results next to answers generated by the AI tool in a narrative format with some citations. Both Roose and Newton explained how this development could radically change the search landscape, with Google‘s domination of the business suddenly facing a serious threat. Bing AI was a potential game-changer.

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The image above was created using generative AI. More specifically, it was created using a tool called Dall-E from a company called OpenAI. It’s a text-to-image tool powered by generative AI. For this image I simply entered the following text – “castle on the edge of a cliff at sunset.” This is one of the four images the tool spit out. The implications for creative work going forward are obvious.

Image-to-text tools like Dall-E and Midjourney were already creating plenty of buzz in late 2022, but the release of ChatGPT on November 30, 2020 created a sensation. It was downloaded by millions within days and has sparked a frenzy around generative AI.

ChatGPT is a chatbot that can write essays, answer questions, write poetry and write code. It’s not always accurate, so it’s flawed, but the results can often be stunning. After playing around with the tool for a few minutes, it becomes clear how this will change the creative process forever.

What is Generative AI?

We’ve been hearing about artificial intelligence, or AI, for years. So why all the fuss now? This paper from Sequoia on generative AI summarizes it nicely in the first few paragraphs:

Humans are good at analyzing things. Machines are even better. Machines can analyze a set of data and find patterns in it for a multitude of use cases, whether it’s fraud or spam detection, forecasting the ETA of your delivery or predicting which TikTok video to show you next. They are getting smarter at these tasks. This is called “Analytical AI,” or traditional AI.

But humans are not only good at analyzing things—we are also good at creating. We write poetry, design products, make games and crank out code. Up until recently, machines had no chance of competing with humans at creative work—they were relegated to analysis and rote cognitive labor. But machines are just starting to get good at creating sensical and beautiful things. This new category is called “Generative AI,” meaning the machine is generating something new rather than analyzing something that already exists.

Generative AI tools are based on large language and large image models. The system learns what a cat looks like by processing millions of images tagged as a cat, and then is able to generate new images of a cat based on prompts. It also learns artistic styles based again on analyzing millions of images, so it can generate an image of a cat in the requested style of an artist or specific style such as impressionism. The same applies to text. You can ask ChatGPT to create a poem using the style of a particular poet, or a short story in the style of a particular writer. The possibilities are endless.

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The cryptocurrency revolution is in full swing, and the popularity of crypto and NFT trading is only increasing as valuations spike. As with stock trading, this can become all-consuming for many people as they monitor the 24/7 trading environment.

We’ve seen significant peaks and valleys with cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, and now we have NFTs dominating the news as well.

Putting aside the positives of crypto and NFTs, some people become too obsessed with trading, leading to an addiction crisis.

So as you dive into this world, keep in mind the pitfalls. Be careful and understand the risks, but also don’t let it consume your life.