Google's AI chatbot Bard is still being rushed
Happy hump day! We've made it to the middle of the week where Monday is well behind us and the weekend is coming closer into view.
I'm contemplating if I want to dive into one of my guilty pleasures over the weekend, reality TV. One of my favorite shows is Love is Blind, a Netflix show that rolled out its fourth season in March.
Insider has a juicy behind-the-scenes story that I enjoyed. It's about people on TikTok sleuthing for clues on the upcoming Love is Blind finale. You can read it here.
But the season came just six months after its third season aired. I'm not sure I have the bandwidth to handle another group of strangers deciding who they want to be engaged to after weeks of knowing each other, especially when the weather is so nice outside.
While I figure out my plans for the weekend, let's get into the 10 Things in Tech.
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1. Google contractors say they don't have enough time to verify correct answers from the company's AI chatbot, Bard. Google rushed to get Bard out the door after rival Microsoft invested $10 billion in OpenAI's ChatGPT. Contractors are revealing that it's still rushing Bard by not giving them enough time to vet the chatbot's answers, reports Thomas Maxwell.
- Bard got off to a less-than-ideal start when it gave an incorrect answer at Google's launch event earlier this year.
- Google hired a team of contractors to check Bard's answers, to make sure it didn't happen again.
- Some of the contractors told Insider that they just aren't given enough time to corroborate and check the most accurate answer.
In other news:
2. Jeff Bezos lost the most in net worth last year. Don't worry, he's still one of the richest men alive with $114 billion, according to Forbes. But the Amazon founder lost a hefty amount in the last 12 months.
3. Apple tells corporate retail employees to reapply to their jobs. Apple hasn't announced any mass layoffs yet. But correspondent Hugh Langley reported that some employees are being threatened with layoffs if they can't find a new role at the company.
4. Google CEO said he sticks to fun and creative questions with Google's Bard AI chatbot. Sundar Pichai, Google's CEO, told The New York Times that he learned through trial and error what type of questions to ask Google's AI chatbot.
5. Salesforce is trimming management. People familiar with the matter told Insider that Salesforce is being pressured by activist investors to eliminate a few layers of management.
6. Pausing AI might be a good idea, but companies won't do it. The number of companies who feel the need to keep up with any advancements in AI makes pausing it a pipe dream, writes reporter Emilia David.
7. TikTok is quietly rolling out affiliate commissions for US creators. It looks like creators can secure another bag by making commissions off product promotions in videos, live streams, and on their profiles.
8. Amazon handed out "small business" and "Black-owned business" badges to the wrong sellers. The badges — meant to help US companies with less than 100 employees and $50 million in revenue — are apparently being given to companies with billion-dollar market caps.
Odds and ends:
9. $30 Tesla beer, anyone? To commemorate the one-year anniversary of Tesla's German factory, the company is selling beers that are shaped like one of its unreleased vehicles, the cybertruck, for more than $30 each.
10. Russia's alternative to the iPhone is floundering. The AYYA T1 smartphone has sold less than 1,000 units since October 2021.
What we're watching today:
- ICYMI: A 106-year-old Indigenous tattoo artist is Vogue's oldest cover star. She's living proof that there's no age limit on cool.
Curated by Asia Martin. (Feedback or tips? Email amartin@insider.com). Edited by Hallam Bullock (tweet @hallam_bullock) in London.