Google Search will reportedly have a dedicated ‘AI Mode’ soon

[Cpvr]

The new option will open an interface similar to Google’s Gemini chatbot, The Information reports.​

Google is planning to add a new “AI Mode” to its search engine, according to a report from The Information. The company will reportedly display an option to switch to AI Mode from the top of the results page, allowing you to access an interface similar to its Gemini AI chatbot.
The new AI Mode tab would live on the left side of the “All,” “Images,” “Videos,” and “Shopping” tabs, The Information reports. When you receive a response in AI Mode, The Information says Google will display links to related webpages and “a search bar below the conversational answer that prompts users to ‘Ask a follow-up...’”

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This tracks with Android Authority’s report from earlier this month, which spotted an AI Mode in a beta version of the Google app. 9to5Googlealso dug up codesuggesting you can use AI Mode to ask questions using your voice. The Verge reached out to Google with a request for comment but didn’t immediately hear back.
With OpenAI rolling out search in ChatGPT for all users, Google is likely under increased pressure to consolidate search and AI. The company already displays AI search summaries for some queries and recently expanded the feature to dozens of more countries in October.

Source: https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/20/24325776/google-search-dedicated-ai-mode-gemini

 

[fdk]

What is really frustrating to me is the amount of times AI just makes stuff up. The reliability of the information AI provides needs to be significantly improved before I'd ever consider using this mode. AI is great for some things - ChatGPT has helped me find a lot of solutions when I've had problems remembering PHP syntax for example - but I wouldn't trust it to write something factual for me.

 

[Arantor]

What is really frustrating to me is the amount of times AI just makes stuff up.

That is literally every occasion. AI doesn't know anything, it just assembles things that look statistically appropriate, and it so happens that there's enough statistically significant material to chain together things to make something look right.

e.g. PHP syntax - there's no shortage of examples to train on, so it'll statistically get it right (because there's vastly more correct syntax than invalid syntax posted online), but it will also entirely synthesise methods etc because it knows what they should statistically look like but it has zero comprehension of whether it's correct.

 

[Bawse]

I hope this doesn't affect the traffic I get to my forums from Google.