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I think AI chatbots will replace some of the use cases for search engines, but I also think that is a good thing. It will let search engines do what they do eve
by marginalia_nu 4y ago
I think AI chatbots will replace some of the use cases for search engines, but I also think that is a good thing. It will let search engines do what they do even better. Search engines right now do a lot of things, arguably a bit too many, which has the actual search-aspect suffer a bit.
A significant design obstacle with almost all search engines is that it's not entirely clear what you can do with them. They're just a search box, after all. You need either external training or a trial-and-error loop to figure out what you can do with them. This also means that if you change how they work, users get confused because their queries no longer give them what they expect (this is likely a big contributor to the "google is broken"-sentiment that's been going around).
This becomes a problem when the search engine caters to too many modalities of search, as there's an element of guesswork what the user want. Two users may even enter the same query, but look for different results. If I enter the name of a video game, do I want to buy it, or do I want information about it, or maybe fanfiction or something other than the game that shares the same name? Who the heck knows.
- blondin 4y agomy bet is on chatbots replacing Google Search and other search engines. people will stop tolerating their shenanigans. i have, myself, seen what is possible. and i am not setting that bar low ever again. the other time, ChatGPT taught me, right in the chat, about a CSS animation feature i didn't know about. with full example code. i proceeded to ask a trick question. i knew where to go for more in-depth information but asked anyway. ChatGPT gave me the correct answer. the top of the list was MDN. it also included w3schools, which i wasn't pleased about, but okay. what i am trying to say is that i got my answer, code example, and where to go next in mere seconds. i did not waste time combing through SEO-ridden results. has any of you searched for anything web related on Google Search lately? today ChatGPT recommended few electronic products. explained the selection criteria i needed to consider in the future! has any of you tried to look for products at all with Google Search? my only use case for Google Search is my work machine. ChatGPT uses my personal account. they need to figure out enterprise environment soon. i am having a hard time seeing other use cases search engines right now.
- shellfishgene 4y agoFrom all we've learned in the last decades the best way to make money on their AI assistant for a company will be too allow advertisers to pay for being preferred in the AI's answers. ChatGPT is a beta experiment and very neutral it seems, but considering the cost to run it there is no way it will stay like that.
- marginalia_nu 4y agoThe BonziBuddy-model is another business model for AI assistants that seems attractive, where even if it doesn't try to sell you stuff, it spy on you and sell information to information brokers.