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What is Microsoft's new Bing with ChatGPT? Here's everything we know
What is Microsoft's new Bing?
In early February, Microsoft unveiled a new Bing whose standout feature is its integration with ChatGPT.
The new Bing has a chat feature powered by a next-generation version of OpenAI's large language model, making it "more powerful than ChatGPT," according to Microsoft.
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With the new Bing, you can ask the AI chatbot questions and get detailed, human-like responses with footnotes that link back to the original sources. The chatbot can also help you with creative needs such as writing a poem, story, song, or more.
When was Microsoft's new Bing announced?
On February 7, 2023, Microsoft announced the new Bing, which has been available to limited users since the launch date. This announcement came a day after Google announced their AI chatbot, Google Bard.
What language model does Microsoft's new Bing use?
When Microsoft announced the Bing chatbot in February, it said that the chatbot would run on a next-generation OpenAI large language model customized specifically for search.
Microsoft said the next-gen large language model (LLM) powering the new Bing is faster, more accurate, and "more capable" than ChatGPT or GPT-3.5, the LLM behind ChatGPT. The biggest difference is that Bing's AI chatbot has access to the internet and ChatGPT does not.
Who has access to Microsoft's new Bing?
Bing's chatbot is currently in a limited preview mode while Microsoft tests it with the public, but there is a waitlist you can join for early access. Some tips to move off the waitlist quicker include installing Edge, making it the default browser, and making Bing the default search engine. You can also install the Bing Mobile app.
Also: The new Bing waitlist is long. Here's how to get earlier access
Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft corporate vice president and consumer chief marketing officer, says "multiple millions" have already joined the waitlist -- up from just over a million two days after launch.
"We are prioritizing those with Bing and Edge as their default search engine & browser as well as the Bing Mobile app installed to optimize the initial experience. Over time we intend to bring it to all browsers," wrote Mehdi.
What is Microsoft's involvement with ChatGPT?
Microsoft has been involved with ChatGPT before incorporating it into its Bing browser. The tech-giant has been an early investor in OpenAI, the AI research company behind ChatGPT, even before ChatGPT was released to the public.
Microsoft's first involvement with OpenAI was in 2019, when Microsoft invested $1 billion, and then $2 billion in the years after. In January, Microsoft extended its partnership with OpenAI through a multi-year, multi-billion dollar investment.
Also: Microsoft just made a huge investment in ChatGPT maker OpenAI. Here's why
Neither company disclosed the investment value, but unnamed sources told Bloomberg it will total $10 billion over multiple years. In return, Microsoft's Azure service will be OpenAI's exclusive cloud computing provider, powering all OpenAI workloads across research, products, and API services.
What has been the controversy around Microsoft's new Bing?
Select users were given early access to the chatbot, and they have not been shy about sharing their experiences. Many of these users have made it their mission to test the chatbot's capabilities and expose its flaws, which were many.
From revealing its confidential codename used internally by developers, to declaring its love to a New York Times writer and asking him to leave his wife, to wishing it was alive, the chatbot was acting out of hand.
Also: Microsoft's ChatGPT-powered Bing argues with users, reveals confidential information
Consequently, Microsoft decided to reel in the chatbot with a new chat limit, changing chat sessions from an unlimited session to a five-question limit, and a 50-chat turn limit per day. That limit was then expanded to six chat turns per session and 60 total chats per day, still less than the original experience users got.
Microsoft notes that convoluted, long chat sessions were not something they were necessarily testing for internally, so the public's use and feedback has actually been useful in learning more about the chatbot.
"In fact, the very reason we are testing the new Bing in the open with a limited set of preview testers is precisely to find these atypical use cases from which we can learn and improve the product," says Microsoft.
Is Microsoft's AI chatbot better than ChatGPT?
ZDNET has tested both Microsoft Bing's chatbot and Open AI's ChatGPT chatbot. The findings from testing Bing's version was that it solved major problems with ChatGPT, including knowledge of current events via internet access and footnotes with links to sources from the information was pulled.
How will releasing the new Bing affect Microsoft?
Microsoft's search engine is undergoing an unprecedented run in the spotlight after being overshadowed by Google Search for the past 14 years.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said ChatGPT will "fundamentally change" all software, starting with what he said was the "largest category of all -- search." Microsoft claims the addition to Bing of its next-generation version of OpenAI's GPT will lead to the "largest jump in relevance in two decades." For this task, it developed the "Microsoft Prometheus," a proprietary model that meshes with OpenAI's models to generate more relevant results.
Also: Microsoft: This is how we integrated ChatGPT-style tech into Bing search
If the buzz around ChatGPT does rub off on Bing as a search engine, Microsoft could see its user numbers meaningfully increase. ChatGPT gained 100 million users within just two months to become the fastest-growing 'app' of all time.
According to Statista, Bing has 1.2 billion users. But Bing also only has about 4% of the world's search market, compared to Google's 92%, according to Statcounter GlobalStats.