Should I ask serious questions, or should I just have fun? That was me trying to figure out what would be the first question I would be asking the AI-infused chat version of the Bing search engine. It was almost like going on a first date… I took a deep breath and started typing “Write a script for a rom-com movie”. Voilà, Bing came up with a script in a few seconds. I was impressed. I then asked Bing to draft a letter addressing the US embassy for granting Visa. For the first few minutes, I was mesmerised by Bing and everything went smoothly. But as soon as I got deeper into conversation with Bing, the reality sunk in a bit more. That’s what most say about first dates too - don’t jump to conclusions. My first date with the early access version of Bing lasted over an hour. Frankly, I had never shown interest in either the Bing search engine or the Edge browser for years. Bing got a makeover last week when Microsoft announced an updated version of its search engine with support from OpenAI's viral ChatGPT tool and everyone now seem interested in it. The new Bing, as I’d like to call it, feels familiar at first. You go to the home page, type your query in the search bar and it comes with a list of links, typically how a search engine works. But what’s new is the "chat" page on Bing, where a chatbot answers additional questions about your queries. It’s akin to how ChatGPT, the cutting-edge AI chatbot responds, but the difference is that Bing has up-to-date information to answer your queries. For example, I asked Bing to update me on the latest news and instantly came up with trending news in a flash. Not only does it save my time scrolling through a news website but Bing curated news in such a fashion that what I needed to know in between the lunch break. The search engine looks for sources like indianexpress.com and curates news accordingly. This is a completely new way to consume news that does not require multiple steps to reach a news destination. It, obviously, scares me since I work for a news organisation and if AI-powered Bing caught up with consumers, it might change users’ search behaviour and eventually how we consume news. This may hurt publications’ revenue since the traffic from searches will take a hit - after all, Bing randomly searches for news websites to present written summaries of the news, complete with links to the original information sources. Getting visible on Google News was already hard for a publication but this new way of getting news will further shorten the window, leaving news websites to look for new options for increased revenue. That didn’t stop me from further trying out the new Bing, though. I asked Bing to suggest Valentine's Day gift ideas for men. It returned with a list of ideas based on the person’s personality, hobbies and preferences. I must say the list was fairly comprehensive and detailed. This showed a significant difference between Bing Chat and Google search. In another test, I asked Bing to write a poem that represents love and the chatbot came up with the poem. It’s not exactly what I’d write but for context, Bing is capable of generating original content. You could actually copy the poem and send it to someone via WhatsApp. Typically, most users do a Google search for ready-made templates - be it for a poem, a text message to congratulate someone on Birthday or even resignation letters. I know this because I had seen a colleague of mine in the previous organisation searching for a resignation letter template in front of me. But where I think Bing will be the most useful is in getting solutions for technical glitches we face on a daily basis in life. For example, I asked Bing if there is a solution that frees up space on my iPhone and it gave me five suggestions that might do the trick. The results are fairly accurate and exactly what I wanted to free up space on my iPhone. A lot of this has to do with how accurate and precise you are in framing your query. If I had typed the same query on Google, I would have lost my mind visiting website after website and still, I might not have got the answer. The chat option is useful as I could ask follow-up questions If I feel stuck or need more information. As an average user, all I want is to get the information I am looking for as quickly as possible and that too in a condensed form. That’s why we search for a query on the web but most of the time, we are either left empty-handed or confused with a mountain of information that’s hard to digress. Of course, Bing is not perfect. A lot of times I felt Bing was trying to be neutral, by not taking any sides. For example, I wanted to know what Bing thinks of a popular political leader. Instead, Bing came up with a short bio of the politician, relying on information from Wikipedia. That’s not what I was looking for. I then reframed the question and asked Bing what Indian Express thinks of that politician and it returned with information that was quite satisfactory. I’d have never gotten that answer with a simple Google search. Bing can give different answers each time it runs. For example, I asked Bing “Can I trust Anuj Bhatia from The Indian Express?” The response I got was a short bio that’s already there to read on the author page on indianexpress.com. I thought that the response lacked depth. So I typed my query again on Bing without changing the sentence or context. This time, I got a different response - much more detailed with the topics I write on and a list of recently published articles with my byline. I think Bing pulls the most updated search results each time it runs. During the time I spent with Bing, I asked the AI-driven search engine many questions, from easy to controversial ones. My date with Bing wasn’t as bad as I initially thought it might turn out to be. I kept it as truthful and authentic as possible and Bing too made it clear that “I am a search engine and not a human.” Yes, at times Bing made me uncomfortable with the responses, but I’d like to go on a second date because I feel Microsoft’s ChatGPT-style bot has a personality of its own. But this time, I may look for answers that otherwise only an expert has.
