Microsoft has announced a series of new features for its Bing search engine that are focused on Artificial Intelligence (AI). At a keynote event in New York, Consumer CVP and CMO Yusuf Mehdi introduced a number of new features coming to Bing in the days, weeks, and months ahead.
Since the launch of Bing Chat, its OpenAI-powered chatbot, Microsoft has logged more than 500 million conversations and created more than 200 million images. In order to further advance AI, Bing will focus on new visual, personalized and multi-modal features.
Bing Chat: visual responses and new features
Bing Chat has become an important tool for the platform. Now, with the aim of offering a more visual experience, Bing Chat will show visual answers for specific questions, such as “Where is La Sagrada Familia?”. The results will be more detailed and will include images relevant to the user.
Regarding privacy and security, Sarah Bird, director of responsible AI at Microsoft, ensures that Bing Chat will have a filter to prevent the appearance of explicit images. In addition, a team of human moderators has been created to monitor the chat and prevent abuse.
On the other hand, Bing Chat has also become more customizable and will allow users to export their chat history and access third-party content through plugins. Also, the ability to answer questions within the context of the images will be added.
Bing Image Creator: improvements and language expansion
Another of Bing’s novelties is the increase in the ability of the Bing Image Creator tool to understand different languages. Now, this tool will be usable in more than 100 languages ​​and users will be able to refine the generated images with additional questions.
The Bing Image Creator tool uses AI to create images from text, and has been made possible through collaboration with OpenAI and their DALL-E 2 model. However, recently there has been controversy surrounding generative AI and the use misuse of copyrighted images for your training.
Despite this, Microsoft has gone ahead with the project and has implemented security and filtering measures to prevent the appearance of illegal images on the platform.
Multimodality and plugins
One of the coolest features of Bing Chat is its ability to interact with images, which will allow users to upload images to find related content and get step-by-step instructions. In addition, Microsoft is working on the implementation of third-party plugins, such as OpenTable or Wolfram Alpha, to offer even more personalized responses to users.
However, the implementation of plugins can raise concerns around the privacy and security of user information. Microsoft ensures that it is taking measures to prevent any type of abuse or misuse of the plugins.
Edge: new features and renewed design
Microsoft is making some improvements to its Edge browser, including rounded corners and more containerized elements in line with its Windows 11 design philosophy. One of the cool features they added is Compose, which works with Bing Chat and allows users to type emails and more with a basic prompt. With a new option, users can adjust the length, wording, and tone of the generated text to almost anything they want, using filters to avoid the use of problematic tones.
The most intriguing feature, though, is Edge Actions, which allow certain Bing Chat prompts to be translated into automations. For example, typing “bring my passwords from another browser” opens Edge’s browsing data settings page. Microsoft may expand these actions beyond Edge to other products like Office 365 and the Windows desktop, but they haven’t confirmed that yet.
Artificial intelligence at the heart of Bing
Bing Chat, powered by OpenAI models GPT-4 and DALL-E 2, is now available without a waitlist. Answers to questions include relevant images, reminiscent of Google Search knowledge panels. For example, when asked if the saguaro cactus produces flowers, Bing Chat displays a response with an explanatory paragraph and a picture of the cactus.
Microsoft hasn’t specified which categories of content might trigger images in Bing Chat, but has noted that it has toxicity classifiers and blacklists in place to keep the conversation as clean as possible.
Ethics issues in AI have been in the spotlight recently. Earlier this year, Bing Chat ran into trouble displaying vaccine misinformation and other extremist messages. It was also reported that Microsoft fired the ethics and society team in its AI organization. Sarah Bird, Microsoft’s head of responsible AI, says steps have been taken and they are committed to improving the quality of Bing Chat.
It seems that we are facing a renaissance of Microsoft in the sector.
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