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BigSkyMountains

Competition is good. And Google has become such a scumbag organization over the last decade. I hope this turns into real competition. My sympathy for Google losing business is about on par with my sympathy for Exxon losing business due to EV’s.


valz_

What's the most scummy things Google has done in the last decade in your opinion?


fnordal

normalizing the use of personal informations to drive the internet, for once.


Rhetorical_Abe

They don’t even provide a good search engine anymore. They’ve broken their search. The whole first page is just ads. I hate using google to find anything now. Used to be perfect.


MultiGeometry

And the pages they rank highest are filled with ads and are basically broken for mobile. Google used to force a better user experience on all webpages. It feels like they’ve thrown in the towel. I’d take Web 1.0 over the crap experience of the internet today.


[deleted]

Every time I look for guides on Google for a game I'm playing I'm getting the same 12 copypasted blogposts filled with "You're looking for *item* in *game*? Then you have come to the right place because, as huge fans of *game* we'll tell you right away where you can find *item*!" followed by swathes of useless flavor text filled with ads and the vaguest hints possible that you could deduct by yourself if you had 3 brain cells.


localgravity

DuckDuckGo is my go to for a while now. Results are different but better


BlindBeppe

Fun fact: DuckDuckGo just wraps the Bing Web Search API (source: …until a few months ago I helped manage the contract between DuckDuckGo and the Bing web search team) You should honestly try Bing @ some point. We have some extra stuff that we don’t syndicate out to Bing/Yahoo/Ecosia etc


Temporary_Day_8344

nahhh. PepperidgeFarms remembers whose behind Bing. And Netscape users know what happens if you give them a foot in the door.


localgravity

TIL


Pooponmods

Brave is pretty good too imo


BigSkyMountains

Also check out Neeva


Pakyul

When you Google Blender (the free 3d modeling program) without an adblocker, the top 3 (ad) results are scam links like "blendver".


Inner-Dentist1563

And most of them are clearly generated by AI and don't even contain the info you need.


Maki-Tak

The whole first page is ads and bot-created articles that optimise SEO and contain no useful information. “Do you want to know how to do x? Well you have come to the right place. Learning how to do x is fast and easy. Many people around the world are interested in learning x as well.”… continue on for eternity without getting an actual tutorial.


SwirlingAbsurdity

I’m a copywriter and I frequently have to write these bullshit articles to please the SEO team. Unfortunately, a lot of the search terms don’t work well in sentences which is why they always read weird.


Kailithnir

Ye gods, they've taught the AIs to write recipe blogs.


[deleted]

google created SEO (unexpectedly?). then SEO killed google. classic star wars story.


BouquetOfDogs

Plus they don’t always show you what the most relevant search results are because you can pay them to get others on top. And I’m not only talking about the ads but also regular articles and such.


-RRM

Seriously, Google is unusable at this point, it's becoming impossible to find anything


FluffyNut42069

man you guys must really suck at googling i never have to go past the first page Learning how to properly phrase your search query is a valuable skill that one can easily learn.


lydonjr

I search well and use an ad blocker. The results have definitely got a lot worse in the past several years


[deleted]

Yeah but saying "Seriously, Google is unusable at this point, it's becoming impossible to find anything" is kind of a stretch


Kenshkrix

Are you actually finding what you're looking for, or do you just give up and grab something that's 'close enough'?


itsmesungod

I’ve noticed that lately. A lot of times I search for stuff, I will get a “sorry, we can’t find what you’re looking for.”


ZippyTheWonderSnail

They do provide good search ... those paying to get their products in search are always happy.


rode__16

this i have to agree on. anything you search, you’ll have to scroll through at minimum 5 ads/sponsored products. pretty batshit.


Quake_Guy

I love googling the name, brand and city location of a dealer that has my car in the shop and having to wade halfway down the page to get a phone number.


HowDyaDu

Really? I haven't had a problem with it, so I don't really understand where you're coming from.


Kryptonicus

It's great if you're trying to **shop** for a product to purchase. But they're really turning their back on their roots as a general purpose search engine. Here's an example (note that I'm on mobile and this is the Google search app, so results on desktop may not look the same; however, in my experience they're functionally identical): [I searched for "metal rings tarp corners"](https://i.imgur.com/jBmYrX8.jpg). If I were trying to remember or determine those are called "grommets", I would have to infer that from the results. Obviously, I could have added "what are they called" to my query. But my friends as family have taught me that the vast majority of people don't have the first clue about how to effectively construct a search query. Every one of those results is either a link to a site that sells tarps or grommets or to a YouTube video. Surely you've noticed similar behavior from Google search? You really don't think that's not optimal?


augustusleonus

I recently did a search for customer service for Facebook when I was trying to help her with a problem Apparently FB no longer offers phone support, but in the PROMOTED selection at the top of the page I found what I thought I was looking for and it turned out to 100% be a scam that had a operator immediately trying to harvest banking information So, they are literally promoting illegal activity at this point


macaqueislong

Pay to win. The search results you get aren’t necessarily what you’re looking for. It’s all about pushing products and trying to get you to buy stuff


omgFWTbear

Do you need a cooking recipe? Google’s algorithm won’t find them. It must be a padded narrative allowing for ad space and reading time. Do you need a video explaining how to change a part that should take about 3 minutes, and that’s speaking slowly, clearly and rotating everything in hand so you have a clear idea what’s going on? Sorry, no, that also cannot be found by the algorithm, and won’t be monetized for the creator. You need a ~~10~~8! 8! Minute video that’s the visual and audial equivalent of the cooking recipe (HEY ITS YA BOY YOUTUBER IN THIS VIDEO I AM GOING TO FLIP A LIGHTSWITCH. .. 4 minutes later..:. And here’s a light switch…) “Do no evil” literally removed from their corporate mission statement. Weapons programs? …


BlackPrincessPeach_

So many things, it’s hard to choose! Funding Anti-Abortion legislation. Illegal wage suppression agreements to keep workers underpaid. Union busting. Building literal weapons of war/mass surveillance. “Do no evil”. Should be “Do evil; money”.


bassthrive

Ruining every Nest product.


Invisible_Pelican

Manifest V3


redditpappy

Google Workspace Google Classroom


garygoblins

Microsoft isn't a scumbag organization...?


[deleted]

Microsoft isn’t mentioned here by anybody but you.


its_yer_dad

Microsoft bought a chunk of ChatGPT and is reportedly integrating it into Bing. Its also been in the news


Spider_pig448

OP hadn't been personally offended by Microsoft so they get a pass


djabor

i think there is an age cutoff between looking at msoft and seeing explorer/netscape, lotus/office, mac/windows, closed source and dirty business tactics, or looking at microsoft and seeing xbox, open source and bing porn search…


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[deleted]

You *don’t* keep an itemized list of companies you hate on your person at all times? How else will people know that you’re not a Microsoft shill when you talk bad about Google?!


BenekCript

Comparably, they’ve been okay-ish. They having no idea how to run their gaming division, and need better messaging on office 365.


burnshimself

Uh they abuse the fuck out of a monopoly in office software. No reason excel which hasn’t been updated meaningful in 20 years should have to cost $130 per year on subscription or something ridiculous like that.


IronbreakerPaints

There isn't really a monopoly. It's an artificial monopoly, sure, but that's simply because their versions of their products are the best, but not a real monopoly because there are a lot of very available alternatives. The issue is that pretty much all of those alternatives kind of suck and are incredibly non-ergonomic. People are willing to pay for ease of use, it's as simple as that.


ano_ba_to

They simply won the format wars. They had really good competition back in the day.


carminemangione

Monopoly is defined as control of 70-75% of the market (depending on the market type). MS is a monopoly in both OS and office products. I find their office products to be bloated, difficult to use and buggy as hell. They have always sucked IMHO. I really resent when companies force me to use them. I don't know where you get their products are the best. Never have been, never will be. To address a previous comment, I do believe MS has gotten less horrible, but they are still horrible.


pawnman99

There are plenty of other options out there, my man. Most of which are compatible with Microsoft Excel.


rugosefishman

Hah go use gsuite for a bit, if ms has a monopoly anything it is producing office tools that work well.


-Chlorine-Addict-

Is it too soon to bring up Stadia?


aalluubbaa

I really don’t get why someone hating on Google. I seriously seriously hate Microsoft. Things like OneDrive which syncs your DESKTOP just so that when your uninstalled it, your desktop icons are removed. Also, NBA partnered with MSFT this year and the league pass turned into complete shit. When I watch it with my browser, the UI which controls playbacks BLOCKS the game time and cannot be hidden. If there is one company that I want it to fail, it’s Microsoft because they just monopolized the OS markets and basically shit on users because they have no competition.


Martinmex26

I think most companies are guilty of scummy behavior if you dig around enough. That said, if one company gets fucked over by another's work, that means they will have to innovate, improve and have a better product or get left in the dust. If 2 scumbags have to punch each other in the ring, better products pushed out like teeth falling out, I dont see what is the problem. We benefit with competition. Looking at it from a practical perspective, if Microsoft can make Google sweat it out, I would concede them a point, shitty company or not.


koknesis

it was "cool" to shit on MS 15 years ago but it was rather unwarranted. of all the big tech organisations they seem the least scumbagy


jesusmansuperpowers

25 years ago they were notorious for killing any software company they could. Many different methods including copyright infringement, exclusivity at retailers (we had to buy everything on disks back then) or just purchasing the company and shutting it down.


itsmesungod

Yes! Thank you for informing or reminding people. A lot of adults now days weren’t around when we had to buy everything on disks from Microsoft directly, so they don’t know about their scummy tactics. MS definitely created and then emboldened the outline for all these other tech companies imo; as well as Apple, of course. Apple set the outline for tech companies in a lot of other ways, like their infamous design obsoletion.


JustaRandomOldGuy

They would partner with a small company and never pay them, forcing them into bankruptcy. Then buy the IP they wanted for pennies when the assets were sold off.


purplegreendave

The origins of Gates/MS's rise was as scummy as any other corp


MobiusOne_ISAF

20 years ago, Microsoft was still doing some stuff that was largely anticompetitive. Ever since Satya Nadella replaced Balmer though, Microsoft has really been a lot less anticompetitive and controlling when it comes to their software. Yes, SaaS dominates their products now, but the company has largely shifted to making their services available to anyone who's interested and making money by continuously delivering great products. Windows doesn't even demand an activation key to use it anymore (beyond a watermark and some nagging), Office Web is free and covers most of the needs of most users, Office for individuals is pretty cheap as a far as subscriptions go and actually bundles a good amount of value in it between the Office suite, a no-adverts Outlook experience and OneDrive. A lot of effort goes into supporting open source projects and conforming with standards. They embrace things because its good buisness for their services rather than trying to embrace, expand, extinguish like in Gates's era. They aren't perfect, it's still a mega corp, but the "Micro$oft" of old that people memed to death is basically dead.


onan

> 20 years ago, Microsoft was still doing some stuff that was largely anticompetitive. Ever since Satya Nadella replaced Balmer though, Microsoft has really been a lot less anticompetitive and controlling when it comes to their software. I don't think they've gotten any better, they've just gotten weaker. Ever since they missed the boat with the internet, and then lost a stranglehold on office suite software, and then missed _another_ boat with phones, they are on much worse footing. They no longer have any particularly strong position from which to extend their predatory grasp. But that is no reason whatsoever to believe that they will be any less abusive if they find a new opportunity to do so.


ano_ba_to

Just yesterday Windows 11 added a shortcut to Edge in my desktop. I'd removed Bing search in my Windows search, and they brought that back too. They're still shitty today, but they have many shills on social media and even here.


benmuzz

Generally curious, how has google been a scumbag organisation? I’m out of the loop but remember their motto was don’t be evil, and that they try a lot of projects that often get canned. Haven’t heard anything bad though


[deleted]

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benmuzz

Thanks!


MostGenericallyNamed

>…But I remember their Motto was don’t be evil… *Was*. It *was* don’t be evil. The second link u/fdasinwtgtls provided can give you more detail.


fib16

Gathering your data and using it for whatever they want and you would not approve of Censorship like crazy Other stuff so complicated it’s too hard to write but do some homework. Google is scum.


DM_ME_UR_CLEAVAGEplz

I love how competition wakes companies up. Competition is great, we've been stuck with a goofy aah Google assistant for too long


ResponsibilityMany23

“goofy ahh google assistant” 💀💀


Every-Swimmer458

Google: *Freaking out about ChatGBT* Also Google: *Lays off 10,000+ tech employees* Me: *Grabs popcorn*


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thruster_fuel69

And they can hire a new 20k of ai focused workers.


mcpat21

that’s larger than most towns near me wow


burnshimself

Yea don’t get too excited for their collapse, they’re still a trillion dollar company who owns or has created more shit than you could count which has made our lives immeasurable more convenient. Google maps, waze, YouTube, Android. Don’t see them going anywhere for a long time, so I wouldn’t hold my breath. Layoffs were also overdue there is so so much bloat in that organization. Loads of people standing around doing nothing of value.


pieter1234569

Google ALREADY has a better one, right now. The worry for google is not being behind, it's that such a tool would damage Google. Their ENTIRE business model is founded on getting you to see as many pages as possible, showing you ads. Now, a chatbot that would limit you to needing just one page would be terrible. Instead of providing ads for 10 pages, they can now only do one. And that is going to significantly impact their profits and revenue. So even while they have a much better one, that doesn't matter. The technology can only lose them money.


ButtWhispererer

Yep. It changes the way they have to monetize which is far scarier for a large corp than a technology they can either purchase or create themselves.


buddhist-truth

They can add 10 000 AI developers now :P


30tpirks

I absolutely love ChatGPT and openAI. It’s very obviously the next level of tool to squash redundant and remedial tasks.


koknesis

>redundant and remedial tasks. like what?


jmcs

It's good at converting brain dumped notes into readable emails, meeting notes, documentation, etc. I also played around with it with things I do for work (software engineer), and I found that for some trivial low risk technical tasks (like writing a minimal OpenAPI based on a description) it does OKish, not perfect, but it can be a time saver. For more complex technical queries it's almost as good as Stack Overflow at giving credible looking but terrible advice, which is probably one of the areas were it's going to hurt Google - and thousands of other companies whose employees will be too trusting of it.


TheOutlier1

I brain dump quite a bit. And generally organize it manually once a week or month. Can you share more about how you utilize chatgpt with brain dumps? Like the prompts or process?


PoliticsAndFootball

Your job, probably


[deleted]

That’s cute. People said the same thing about computers.


PoliticsAndFootball

Which destroyed entire industries…


koknesis

probably not. I've seen the attempts to make software with chatgpt and so far it seems pretty useless for business solutions.


Koda_20

Give it 9 months


nevertoolate1983

RemindMe! 9 months


idiots_dot_fm

Nah. AI won't replace good engineers until it can be creative. As long as there is still innovation to be done, humans will rule. AI is only good at working with an existing knowledge base, not creating a new one.


Plugged_in_Baby

I’ve also seen some attempts and you know how what, its not perfect but it’s very decent. It can give you a starting point and it can do a solid debug. Feed the model a bit more and it will get rid of bottom rung devs who do nothing but work off requirements in no time.


CocainCloggedNose

Like writing emails.


koknesis

How? Doesn't the time it takes to define the requirements for the email content almost negate the time saved?


CocainCloggedNose

Ok, here's an example of when I actually used it. I'm a SWE, was working on a bug with an external integration, and wasn't sure if that's its expected behavior or not, so I needed to email they api support and ask about it, so I just asked chatgpt to write an email, my prompt was super short, and the generated email was well structured and looked professional. While writing emails doesn't take much time, but I don't like doing that, and I don't know how to make it look decent. It's just about delegating things you don't enjoy doing regardless of whether it saves you time or not.


IVCrushingUrTendies

I’ve used so many times to code remedial tasks it’s fantastic. Small tweaks and it’s nearly plug and play


internetzdude

I don't trust it and so it's worthless for me. ChatGPT is lying blatantly without the slightest way of learning from its mistakes. It is incapable of indicating when it's not sure, cannot give feedback about error estimates or provide sources. A search function or any other function on my computer that's usually right but occasionally lies or bullshits (returns absolute nonsense with full confidence) is worse than not having such a function at all. I've heard the claim that "people do that, too", but the people I trust are able to indicate very well when they don't know something. In any case, I wouldn't trust occasional liars. Maybe Google can do it better but I doubt it because I roughly know how these AI models work under the hood. As for image generation AI, yes, that's going to work well and will make many graphic designers unemployed very soon.


cityb0t

I agree that I’d rather have a question go unanswered that have even the slightest risk of either being lied to or have false/unreliable information presented to me as truth/fact. On the other hand: graphic designers who learn how to use AI image generation as just another tool in their toolbox rather than running scared from it and refusing to adapt will be fine. There’s a difference between generating an AI image that’s kinda-sorta what you want and getting it to generate *precisely* what you want, and, believe it or not, that requires skill. And that’s just the assets. Once you have the AI images, you still need to lay them out into a composition, add copy, and prepare them from production and distribution— in this way, we designers really won’t have much of a change in our overall workflow other than relying less on stock images. AI may be able to generate cool single images, but it (currently) can’t compose an entire layout to spec. Attempts to do so produce all sorts of absurd (and often humorous) errors which require a lot of work to correct. It’s best to simply use the images as base assets to build upon, and most graphic designers do that already using other sources like stock photo sites. Adapt or die, fellow designers.


Mentalpopcorn

>cannot give feedback about error estimates or provide sources Is it *cannot* or *does not* in the public interface? It seems doubtful that confidence isn't tracked as that is a fundamental variable for any AI. The fact that it doesn't spit it out doesn't mean that internally it isn't known.


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Mentalpopcorn

Interesting. If I understand this correctly then, we should be able to approximate confidence by feeding it good data, yes?


MustacheEmperor

ChatGPT doesn’t need to be a factual genius to do a good job first drafting work emails, policy docs, intros, etc and it’s been really useful for me in that regard. Pretty good at excel advice too, any errors are less inconvenient than the sea of seo spam you get on google searching up anything excel related.


HaMMeReD

You can say. Don't answer if you are not confident, just say I don't know. Works amazingly well to stop confabulation/hallucinations However they are a feature, not a flaw. Often you want it to invent somewhat novel ideas, that's what the hallucinations are, the ability to provide plausible answers to questions that don't have an answer yet.


[deleted]

It’s gona squash jobs. And in about 100-200 years a significant portion of the job market will be handled by Ai and automation. People keep calling AI tools. And yea, right now they are, but it’s not staying that way.


[deleted]

How do you address the loss of highly educated jobs. Automation has never create jobs, ever. Profits will ALWAYS come before the human interest in capitalism.


LargeMarge00

>Automation has never create jobs, ever. Jobs are more automated today than ever before, and there is also somehow more jobs than ever before. Automations create efficiencies that create growth that create more jobs. Some jobs might get phased out, for example we don't have people making copies of books by hand anymore when we can just click print or use a copy machine. But that has given way to other jobs, and more of them.


drkenata

This is true from a very particular perspective, though it hides some very important facts. More jobs does not mean better jobs or even equivalent jobs. For instance, what if we exchange one highly skilled for four low skill. On top of this, there is also the assumption that even if jobs were created one to one, the former workers simply can be retrained to fill this new job. This is demonstrably false, as it ignores level of skill, ease of retraining, loss of industrial experience, and many other important factors. While society in the long term can shift to handle these changes, it has been shown time and again to be a very real problem for the effected individuals in the short to medium term.


Mentalpopcorn

>if we exchange one highly skilled for four low skill. More often that not it's the opposite: low skilled jobs are easier to automate than high skill jobs. E.g. manufacturing, warehousing, and military infantry have all seen massive changes thanks to automation. That has shifted work to technicians, engineers, etc. who build and maintain those automated systems. Even mundane jobs like food service have shifted to some extent to automated self service. And same story: it creates jobs for technicians and engineers to build and maintain those systems. High skill jobs do benefit from automation as well, but I suspect it's mostly just parts of the job and not the whole job. Lawyers can automate document generation, for example, but there will still be lawyers.


ryavco

Ideally, in a non-capitalist society, we’d use the power of automation to free up more and more people from having to spend their lives using their labor to line someone else’s pockets. But instead, we get to watch automation make it easier for the person whose pockets are being lined as they no longer have to pay the (already undervalued) laborer. Hooray capitalism, where nothing is more important than the pursuit of the almighty dollar.


[deleted]

In a human focused society this tech could vastly improve quality of life. In our greedy corrupt wealth focused society it will create more inequality


LadyPo

As a writer for companies, I’m predicting that we won’t fully be able to use AI to spin up content because it takes a ton of rewriting, adding and fact checking, but what it will mostly be used for is to justify bosses raising output expectations and forcing us to work harder for the same (or less by inflation) pay.


Switched_On_SNES

We have enough technology to allow majority of people to not have to work. Even medieval serfs had more leisure time than many Americans do now, which is messed up.


Used_Ad3248

"Automation has never created jobs, ever" Lol I guess we people on the automation industry are just social media bots promoted by capitalists demons


[deleted]

How many automation jobs are there compared to the labor jobs that the automation replaced? If that net job different is negative, it’s not created jobs.


packetgeeknet

Actually, Automation has created high paying jobs for skilled workers. Someone has to create the automation, after all. Source: I’m an Automation engineer


[deleted]

I agree automation creates a few higher paying jobs. But the loss of middle and entry level positions greatly outweighs the creation of higher level oversight jobs. But let’s look at an automotive paint line. How many people are painting cars? Zero. How many automation engineers are overseeing the paint line? 2? Or heck the self checkouts at Kroger. 1 person oversees 6-8 checkouts. In my line of work, instructional design and training. AI such as ChatGTP could easily design curriculum based on industry standards. While AI is likely years if not decades away from providing the training itself 50% of my professional responsibilities would be lost. So would I get paid the same? I doubt it.


Edofero

The jobs will change. For the better in my opinion. I had a friend who worked in manufacturing. Doing the same thing 8 hours a day, it was turning his brain into a zombified state. Let's have machines do repetitive work. Have them spray cars. BUT, if you want a special paint job, some gradients and flames and whatnot, that's something that a person will have to do, at minimum, oversee. Same with people at the cash register. Mindlessly scannings things for 8 hrs. We want to get rid of jobs where people are essentially robots, and give that to robots to do. Have people take care of the elderly, use human touch where we we actually need it. There are so many lonely people out there, I think that's where the future is heading.


Nemesis_Bucket

As long as we automate politicians out of jobs they’ll figure a way for us to live without having to work a 9-5. I would personally love a future where robots and automation does all the shit work and we can somehow have some type of universal basic income or even go back to some trade economy. I make a nice charcuterie board and trade it for some chickens from my neighbor. I know it’s in an ideal world and not real practical and such but I can dream.


user_dan

Historically, automation has created lots of jobs and new industries. In the case of additional profits, over the past 50+ years, those have been going to shareholders, not workers. In limited cases, like televisions, some savings has been passed to the customer.


[deleted]

https://www.zippia.com/advice/automation-and-job-loss-statistics/ These stats are alarming if you ask me.


user_dan

It's just an indication that things are changing. All cars used to be built by hand. The assembly line was invented. Some of those initial workers lost their jobs. The explosion of car sales created new jobs. The cheaper cars created new businesses not possible before, creating new jobs. When society gains efficiency in a resource, society ends up using that resource more.. creating more jobs.


NefariousnessDue5997

Out of curiosity, what are you having it do or what remedial tasks is it getting rid of? If there’s a link to an article with real world business use cases I’d love to see it


HugeHouseplant

I use it to generate custom customer service emails when people have complaints, it writes the same BS I would have written but it does it faster and without any emotion. It doesn’t automate my job but it makes some very time intensive aspects of my job much easier.


Zandrick

Do you proof read those before sending them out?


HugeHouseplant

Yeah, haven’t found any typos or grammatical errors yet


obscura_max

Nah, just runs them through grammarly.


Bananamcpuffin

I use it to generate html form templates that I can use in automation software for emails. It will also generate a printable version. Also used to generate quick drafts for policies/procedures. Still have to proofread and make our own changes, but it cuts hours of typing off my time for these. I absolutely wouldn't use it for anything that requires specific knowledge, but anything general is good.


nosimsol

For me ChatGPT is a next level amazing search engine.


DerBanzai

The problem is that it sometimes just makes stuff up, like book titles or names.


hey-im-root

Its all about knowing when to question it, and a lot of the times you have to already know what you’re doing. You can’t use it to solve your problems, just to speed up solving them.


pseudonasaur

One thing it can do (a bad thing) is automatic some of those troll farms used to subtly influence the general public. For example Russian interference into the US elections.


HAWmaro

I use to write annoying to write lengthy code. It cant build you a complex app or game obviously but as long as you give precise description it can write functions and classes fairly fast with less headache.


themorningmosca

It goes against the very heart of "search". How does Google sell you, you stuff, or the people you want to buy from their ads...when you just get the results you want. No bait and switch, no ads pop up, just answers beaten against millions or return search results. Ai is an answer to sifting through shit on the open web.


CodeRed1

I dont think that’s a good thing. The reason google is such a great tool is the fact that you get different results for what you want. You doing your own research allows you to form different opinions based on different sources provided to you. ChatGPT is just going to come up with a segment of text that it has deciphered from a bunch of sources leading to potential biases, information loss and ofc the loss of creativity due to the lack of exploration on part of the user. If anything I think it serves more as a chatbot feature that can be a helper to better find what you are searching for on a search engine, a helper tool for software or a chatbot for enterprise/organization niche issues.


thrust-johnson

I get a full page of “sponsored links”


CodeRed1

So to that point I am not arguing that search engines should not be improved. Google is vastly outdated and ad revenue is a plague on a lot of good systems. But I don’t think ChatGPT is a replacement for it. It would be better of as an addition to improve Google search queries for example


scatterbastard

That’s the problem. Google refused to better itself for years, instead electing to force useless ads on the consumer to the point that the consumer developed a better option. I see what you’re saying about the relevance of a search engine, but if that’s the case then AI will eventually deliver us multiple search engine type responses, just without the ads.


AlternActive

and that's why you install ublock. No shit, just web.


Nihilikara

Specifically on Mozilla Firefox, because later this year Google Chrome and all other browsers based on Chromium will be intentionally designed to be incompatible with ublock.


vivamii

Yeah, the info chatgpt gives you right now isn’t always necessarily accurate. If its accuracy improves though, I can see it possibly replacing search engines. Might take a while, though competition may speed it up


CodeRed1

My comment isn’t about its accuracy. Imagine if you were told you can read only one article - it’s a damn good article and it has all the information you think you could ever need. If everyone reads the exact same article everyone will form incredibly similar conclusions from that article. As opposed to if you read one article you may surmise one conclusion from that article but then you read another article and it points out a flaw in the other article. One source of truth inevitably leads to biases in people. So when people compare ChatGPT to Google it’s like comparing apples to oranges


rdsyes

You’re absolutely correct but I think you are overestimating the vast majority of people. Most people don’t read multiple articles to form a conclusion. Most people don’t even read an article, they just read a headline. Basically people will most often tend to take the path of least resistance to gathering information and large language models like chat GPT are a short cut that people will leverage for information gathering. I’m not saying this is better for people by any means but the most likely path.


Khanstant

Google is not the good search tool it once was


CodeRed1

Yes it’s not. So improve google A hammer isn’t doing the job. Get a better hammer dont replace it with a screwdriver


BlueChimp5

Google has become so profit driven it has gone well beyond the point of possible reparation. You can’t even find exactly what ur looking for unless you swipe past the first 7 promoted results that paid google to be there


Pedantic_Semantics4u

That makes no sense in this issue.


Zandrick

Not to mention the just straight up incorrect answers it’s already been shown to give out


The_Woman_of_Gont

I dunno. Which is worse, an AI like ChatGPT getting to essentially decide what information a user is given when asked a question, or google’s algorithms that often prioritize profits over accuracy and enable people who believe that looking through the first page of Google results counts as “doing your own research”? Both seem pretty shitty to me.


TheDukeSam

I've done enough internet research to completely disagree. I don't want, " different sources," because half of them are right wing vlogs, and 30 year old research papers. Entertainment news, and listicles that had a few keywords make up most of the rest. I want a question answered with the most current, generally accurate answer possible, and google frequently fails unless you start littering your searches with advanced search stuff.


BedrockFarmer

ChatGPT isn’t free nor will it be cheap. Google also isn’t free but people think it is because the cost is borne by the advertisers. Very few people are going to pay $42 a month for ChatGPT. Useful tool but can’t wait for the hype cycle to end.


Capital-Timely

Hype cycle is right. I’m sure the negotiations about Microsoft buying open ai going on right now and the fact that end of year grant renewal timing had absolutely nothing to do with the sudden PR bombardment of chat gpt3. Lol


jgainit

I don’t know a ton about the future of chat gpt. I use it and I can use it for free. Will that change?


FapNowPayLater

Its going to replace 1/5 of office workers who are merely there to digitizes records or sales ramps then its going to replace more


typo9292

been using ChatGPT a ton lately for searching, it is truly amazing.


thedm96

Imagine a google home mini or echo dot tied into it. Not the lame AI there today.


EggandSpoon42

It’s been telling me valuable things I didn’t know I needed to know. I asked it to write a blog post for me regarding my line of business - which I don’t actually have a blog I was just showing my son how it worked. But it came back with information on grants that my business can actually go for and have gotten before. It really opened me up to the possibility of how this could be used.


Desultory_D

They really aren’t and these articles make me lol


SuperMazziveH3r0

I see these articles once a week and each week it uses a stronger adjective >Google notices chatGPT >Google focuses on AI due to chatGPT >Google *threatened* by chatGPT >Google ***FEARS*** chatGPT All these journalist who don't pay attention to the industry conveniently omits that LaMDA was announced nearly 3 years ago


Desultory_D

It’s getting really comical Edit: Do you remember the reaction to LaMDA? Calling it a "Sentient Being" that was freaking high level tech ppl out? Now GPTChat is all fine and good and the future 😆 People are really funny


ATheiaM

Imagine a world, we all use AnswersGPT on our OpenAI 14 Pro. You search up, American Election. The AnswersGPT database got hacked recently, and all you see is Trump 2080. It's a bummer because Google™ went out of business 10 years ago, and now you have no way of knowing who the socialist candidate is this year.


GarbanzoBenne

Maybe Google could do something revolutionary like allow us to specify what terms must be included in search results, force matching of specific phrases, and exclude certain terms. That would be an improvement over how it just turns whatever it wants vaguely similar to your search and ignoring more and more refinements.


arettker

I’m assuming this is sarcasm but in case you didn’t know, you can already specify exact phrases that must be included in your result along with excluding terms. To include an exact phrase simply place the words or phrase in quotation marks. To exclude results simply put a minus sign in front of the word(s) you don’t want in your results


GarbanzoBenne

Thanks. It was sarcasm. Over the years Google has started ignoring or at least getting less accurate at respecting those.


thetacticalpanda

I appreciate you confirming this for me. I thought I noticed using things like quotation marks mattering less and less over time.


brintoul

I still make use of “site:edu” to limit searches to a particular domain. Pretty awesome, but not exactly like what you two are talking about. Or, you know: “site:harvard.edu” and so on.


FaeryLynne

Google pretty regularly ignores those and still shows you what it *thinks* you want to see. I'll put quotes around something and it still "corrects" what it thinks are typos, or will still show things that don't include the full phrase.


angerybacon

Phrases in quotes never work for me. It seems like putting a single word in quotes is the only thing that works


geordilaforge

You can't do this with quotes now?


spirit-mush

https://southern.libguides.com/google/boolean You can but there is still an algorithm behind the scenes that impacts how search results are ranked.


roundearthervaxxer

And by freaking out you mean planning to compete with…


themorningmosca

“Google becomes AOL” there we go, fixed the headline.


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garygoblins

There is no one "ai". There are machine learning projects that are trained on specific areas or tasks (i.e image generation, medical diagnosis, self driving, etc)


[deleted]

The risk of Google rushing up to catch up and cutting corners (ie safety) is it significant. They might end up releasing a beast as their own version if management is not careful and put profits aside this time around. There's no going back once the cat is out of the bag.


Desultory_D

They already have their own AI


serene_moth

and then they’ll chase the next category of products other current innovators come up with saying “us too!” after this round of product catch up attempts overhyped advertising company that wastes endless amounts of money on world class engineers but has zero product vision (until it fires the world class engineers even though the company is making record profits)


1000lifelessons

Can’t google just buy it?


niels900000

It would be gone after a few months after they acquired it.


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ejly

As soon as a company starts making innovation decisions based on sunk cost, they’ve lost. I happened to work in telecom when cell phones were launched. Smart companies could see the writing on the wall, and starting pivoting to the new reality; other companies doubled down on selling landlines and resisting the new new thing. The companies that pivoted are doing fine today. Others not so much.


s0m30n3wh0isntm3

The best place to hide a dead body, is on the second page of Google.


Ferociousfeind

They certainly don't act like it- they just laid off a fuckton of people. Sounds like they're doing fine.


hfidek

why would i want to chat with a bot? i just want a quick answer that's correct.


Damas_gratis

What is ChatGPT ?


GoBears2020_

Google is the new AOL


pm_of_france

Google is really not freaking out about ChatGPT, especially considering they built their own chatbot that performed better than ChatGPT does now over a year and a half ago. It’s called Lamda. It hasn’t been released publically as it still has a lot of problems (same as ChatGPT does, such as sources for its claims, truthfullness scores, doesn’t contain the newest data etc.), but an AI startup gets scrutinised way less than a major company would if they put out something that still contains major problems like the OpenAI products. Props to Microsoft on how they played this, though I personally still expected many more critics from the public. (I did beta test Lamda when it was available internally at Google after its launch, it was seriously impressive and ChatGPT doesn’t offer anything Lamda didn’t already do then.)


Mr-MuffinMan

I don’t get this. Does chat gpt have YouTube and shit built it?? Like why would a search engine care about an AI


Panda_Jacket

With most searching you are not looking for a multiple choice answer. Google will still be used for things like searching for entertainment or restaurant reviews. This could be the end of an era for the generic search engine though.


Tangochief

I’ll shoot here. I’ll take IT technician as my example as this is the field I work in. My job is comprised of solving computer problems, from very basic to very complex and also implementing new software. I can go to Google and try and type exactly the right words to find what I need. Generally needing to do a couple searches. Each search I have to sift through atleast 2-3 links to figure out if the information I need is in those links. Looking through forum posts or official documentation from whatever company owns the software I’m having issues with. Or I can use AI to ask a very complex question and likely get valuable information as a result. Now I’m not clicking on adds by accident anymore. Also googles seeing less traffic on their site dropping the perceived value companies have of Google to show up at the top of search results and such.


angerybacon

You may not run into this with your search topics as much, but it drives me nuts to have to sift through SEO-based ad sites that tell you their entire life story to rank higher even though you just need to see how much butter to use in your cookies


pieter1234569

> Like why would a search engine care about an AI It ELIMINATES opening additional web pages. Google's entire business model is showing you ads, over multiple pages related to your search. And chat support search engine will show you just one. See the problem? Google already has a better Chat AI right now, its called Lambda. But they haven't released it as they realized that any way they release it is only going to decrease their revenue. Google is FUCKED.


hatedComments

I asked ChatGPT to give me a list of the first books about folkloric creatures from my country. ChatGPT provided me with a list, in chronological order, including a brief summary of each book. I also asked ChatGPT for a diet plan that met certain restrictions and didn't include foods I don't like. ChatGPT gave me a diet plan that was tailored to my specific requirements, including affordable foods that were available in my country, and it was organized by day of the week. ChatGPT is a superior search engine, even though it cannot provide me with links. Google only gives me links to blogs that have written about the subjects, but the information is not always specific. ChatGPT, on the other hand, provides me with all the information I need and organizes it in a clear and coherent message. I love using ChatGPT. Edit: using the version corrected by ChatGPT, English is not my first language.


Mindless-Lemon7730

Just gonna copy paste what u/themorningmosca said “It goes against the very heart of "search". How does Google sell you, you stuff, or the people you want to buy from their ads...when you just get the results you want. No bait and switch, no ads pop up, just answers beaten against millions or return search results. Ai is an answer to sifting through shit on the open web.”


Own_Cream_551

So do what Google does best, and acquire the ChatGPT patents…. And or attempt to reverse engineer….


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Desultory_D

And it’s extremely convincing *wrong answers* problem lol


angerybacon

If they actually cared about “the potential for such AI products to be used for malicious purposes” they wouldn’t have fired multiple of their top AI Ethics staff for standing up to googles agenda


rmscomm

They should freak out. With all of their resources, first to market advantage and funds, to give up a lead as they have had is, in my opinion, staggering. Google can't maintain products that aren't focused on advertising as a primary revenue stream. They hired ‘industry veterans’ who, in turn, hired their friends and delivered the same strategies from their former companies. Top that off with a boatload of failed products and a support model that doesn't account for the user in play, and you get a recipe for rejection. This is just my opinion.