Is Google chattering on the rise of GPT and how AI chatbots could hurt its search and ad business? Well, that might explain why the company is holding a surprise livestream event on Wednesday, February 8, which Google says will showcase how it can harness the power of AI. is conceptualizing how people search for, discover, and interact with information.
Alerts to Live stream event were sent to several media outlets late Thursday. For some reason, the event will begin at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time (5:30 p.m. Pacific Time) in Paris, France. A YouTube link to the live stream video shows artwork that includes previous AI products, such as using Google Translate on text in images and using Google Lens to identify objects.
The incident comes at a time when Google is currently struggling financially, at least on paper. It showed little growth in its revenue in the fourth quarter of 2022. It also laid off 12,000 employees a few weeks ago. On top of that, Google is tackling the massive development of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. It was officially launched in late November 2022, and a report claims that 100 million users have accessed the service since launch. Rival Microsoft Chat seems to be joining GPT, with a new multi-year partnership between it and OpenAI. There are also rumors that Microsoft’s Bing search engine will soon add an updated and faster version of ChatGPT.
There are rumors that Google Chat is working on its own answer to GPT called Apprentice Bard (via CNBC), which will reportedly offer natural-sounding answers to user queries. It is rumored to use Google’s Language Model for Dialog Applications (LaMDA) technology. Google is also working on an AI program that can produce music. It’s possible we’ll see these events, and more, in Wednesday’s live stream event.
