Bing Users Claim a ChatGPT-assisted Bing Temporarily Appeared Friday

Several Bing users say a ChatGPT-assisted version of Bing "mysteriously appeared (and disappeared) earlier today," the Verge reported Friday:Student and designer Owen Yin reported seeing the "new Bing" on Twitter this morning. He told The Verge via Twitter DM that he has Bing set as his homepage on Microsoft's Edge browser and the new UI just loaded up. "Didn't do anything to find it," said Yin. "After a couple of minutes it stopped working ... Jaw dropped when I realized what I was looking at...!" Yin was able to briefly test the system and shared further details about the integration in a blog post on Medium. He noted that the chatbot could not only answer questions but ask them in a conversational manner. The new Bing can also apparently cite its sources. This is an important feature, as the inability of language models like ChatGPT to describe where their information is sourced from makes them less reliable. Yin isn't the only one who says they encountered a new Bing today either. At least two others reported receiving access to the updated search engine on Twitter before it disappeared. Screenshots of the AI-augmented Bing show a new "chat" option appearing in the menu bar next to "search." Select it and you're taken to a chat interface that says, "Welcome to the new Bing: Your AI-powered answer engine." The Verge adds that they were "unable to verify the authenticity of these screenshots and Microsoft declined to comment on the validity of these apparent leaks."

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