Google’s AI Chatbot ‘Bard’ Mistake Wipes $100bn Off Shares

Google’s AI Chatbot: Alphabet Inc lost $100 billion in market value on Wednesday. Company shares slid as much as 9 percent during regular trading with volumes nearly three times the 50-day moving average.

Google’s live-streamed presentation on Wednesday morning did not include details about how and when it would integrate Bard into its core search function.

According to reports, Google’s AI new chatbot shared inaccurate information in a promotional video. Alphabet posted a short GIF video of Bard in action via Twitter, promising it would help simplify complex topics, but it instead delivered an inaccurate answer.

In the advertisement, Google’s AI Chatbot ‘Bard’ is given the prompt: “What new discoveries from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) can I tell my 9-year-old about?” Bard responds with a number of answers, including one suggesting the JWST was used to take the very first pictures of a planet outside the Earth’s solar system or exoplanets. The first pictures of exoplanets were, however, taken by the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) in 2004, as confirmed by NASA.

A Google spokesperson said the error highlighted “the importance of a rigorous testing process, something that we’re kicking off this week with our Trusted Tester programme”.

“We’ll combine external feedback with our own internal testing to make sure Bard’s responses meet a high bar for quality, safety, and roundedness in real-world information,” he added.

The search and advertising giant is moving quickly to keep pace with OpenAI and its rivals.

Also read: Google introduces Bard: An AI Chatbot Service