4 ms·

I think it's not just run cost - there's also a risk of ad revenue destruction, that has to be worrying.

iamleppert 4y ago
100% this -- a Google search requires multiple input queries, refinement, and scrolling a list of possible answers that are really just links to other web sites. The ChatGPT experience is far superior to this, for the average consumer and getting close for the power user. It's a better way to ask the Internet what it knows with a more natural interface that everyone already knows how to use -- real natural language. Less cognitive overhead, no busy search results that require clicking back and forth and (for now) no ads. That last part is key -- ChatGPT is doing Google's job right now, and not even having to run ads. Google doesn't even offer a premium no ads option for search and if they did I doubt enough people would buy it anyway to matter. If I was Google I'd be worried. Very worried indeed. They either need to dramatically change their entire company within 18 months, or accept they are going to loose substantial amount of market -- and once its gone, it's gone in a first mover, winner takes all environment like what we have right now. Just ask Google themselves what it felt like back in the early 2000's when they completely destroyed the other search engines.
- ModernMech 4y ago
  > The ChatGPT experience is far superior Now it is. Google used to be good too, until ads started looking like search results, and then the first page became entirely ads. In the future, when you ask ChatGPT to help you write your resume, it will try to upsell you a premium account in linked in. It will withhold its best resume advice only for LinkedIn premium users after all. You think Clips was bad? You’ve seen nothing yet.
  - brookst 4y ago
    How does that help Google?
  - satvikpendem 4y ago
    Yep, Bing already has ads now inside its chat answers.
alain94040 4y ago
I don't see ads as a big problem with ChatGPT. You could put a side-bar on the right and on the fly recommend products relevant to the on-going conversation. The cost of computing these ads would be a lot more than today's keyword-based approach, that's certainly a problem. But think of hyper-relevant ads, based on the chat itself. There's a lot of information there, that beats tracking people's behavior online all day.
- HyperSane 4y ago
  And you could even program the LLM to try to subtly manipulate people into using the advertised product.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - visarga 4y ago
    A LLM trying to trick and manipulate? That's how your multi-million dollar model quickly becomes worthless in the eyes of the public.
    - HyperSane 4y ago
      Not if it was REALLY good at everything else and really subtle.
    - bigDinosaur 4y ago
      People haven't been up in arms about the dishonesty around 'native' marketing.
    - Lio 4y ago
      I could see this happening. I’ve been infuriated with DuckDuckGo on occasion because it refused to exclude certain results. In fact when you add an exclusion clause it simply boosts those results further instead of removing them. I’ve been told this is because the underlying search providers refuse to exclude paying customer even when you explicitly don’t want to hear from them. I could definitely see this happening in LLM answers too and I don’t expect it to be particularly subtle.

100% this -- a Google search requires multiple input queries, refinement, and scrolling a list of possible answers that are really just links to other web sites. The ChatGPT experience is far superior to this, for the average consumer and getting close for the power user. It's a better way to ask the Internet what it knows with a more natural interface that everyone already knows how to use -- real natural language. Less cognitive overhead, no busy search results that require clicking back and forth and (for now) no ads. That last part is key -- ChatGPT is doing Google's job right now, and not even having to run ads. Google doesn't even offer a premium no ads option for search and if they did I doubt enough people would buy it anyway to matter. If I was Google I'd be worried. Very worried indeed. They either need to dramatically change their entire company within 18 months, or accept they are going to loose substantial amount of market -- and once its gone, it's gone in a first mover, winner takes all environment like what we have right now. Just ask Google themselves what it felt like back in the early 2000's when they completely destroyed the other search engines.

ModernMech 4y ago
> The ChatGPT experience is far superior Now it is. Google used to be good too, until ads started looking like search results, and then the first page became entirely ads. In the future, when you ask ChatGPT to help you write your resume, it will try to upsell you a premium account in linked in. It will withhold its best resume advice only for LinkedIn premium users after all. You think Clips was bad? You’ve seen nothing yet.
- brookst 4y ago
  How does that help Google?
- satvikpendem 4y ago
  Yep, Bing already has ads now inside its chat answers.

alain94040 4y ago

I don't see ads as a big problem with ChatGPT. You could put a side-bar on the right and on the fly recommend products relevant to the on-going conversation. The cost of computing these ads would be a lot more than today's keyword-based approach, that's certainly a problem. But think of hyper-relevant ads, based on the chat itself. There's a lot of information there, that beats tracking people's behavior online all day.

HyperSane 4y ago
And you could even program the LLM to try to subtly manipulate people into using the advertised product.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- visarga 4y ago
  A LLM trying to trick and manipulate? That's how your multi-million dollar model quickly becomes worthless in the eyes of the public.
  - HyperSane 4y ago
    Not if it was REALLY good at everything else and really subtle.
  - bigDinosaur 4y ago
    People haven't been up in arms about the dishonesty around 'native' marketing.
  - Lio 4y ago
    I could see this happening. I’ve been infuriated with DuckDuckGo on occasion because it refused to exclude certain results. In fact when you add an exclusion clause it simply boosts those results further instead of removing them. I’ve been told this is because the underlying search providers refuse to exclude paying customer even when you explicitly don’t want to hear from them. I could definitely see this happening in LLM answers too and I don’t expect it to be particularly subtle.