Microsoft has managed to seize the lead in Artificial Intelligence (AI) with ChatGPT, taking advantage of Google’s cautiousness. Last February, the Redmond-based company announced the integration of OpenAI’s AI language models into Bing search engine and Edge browser, while Google was treading carefully on a similar project. Google’s response came days after the rival’s move, introducing its own Chatbot, Bard, based on the Language Model for Dialogue Applications (LaMDA). This move has raised suspicion that Google was taking too much caution that gave an opportunity to Microsoft and Open AI to take the lead in this knowledge area.
The New York Times reported that two employees responsible for reviewing Google’s AI products attempted to prevent the launch of the chatbot as they believed it to be generating inaccurate statements. This lead to the director of Google’s Responsible Innovation group, Jen Gennai, modifying the final document to diminish the worry about the potential risks. It has also been previously known that the company suspended its engineer Blake Lemoine for expressing the idea that LaMDA was “aware” during an interview. These controversies have attracted the attention of European countries like Italy, Germany, and Canada.
Contrary to Google’s procedure, Microsoft has remained silent about the ethical and security issues related to ChatGPT. The company has kept an executive team with a minimum size and fired its employees who used to express their worries about these matters. Additionally, an email has been seen by The New York Times, delivered by Sam Schillace, a Microsoft technology executive, which exposed the company’s goals to lead the AI competition.
Google is an American multinational technology company specialized in Internet-related services and products. It’s headquartered in Mountain View, California, and has become the largest Internet-based company in the world. Google offers various online products ranging from advertising technologies, search engine, cloud computing, software, and hardware.
Jen Gennai is the manager of Responsible Innovation Group at Google. She holds the reputation for producing elaborate ethics rules for Google research. She has been taking ethical concerns into account for the company in her work, which enables the company to operate meeting the ethical standards. Last year, her team worked on creating a policy framework for Google Research, covering topics such as gender, fairness, and AI safety.
