ChatGPT and Bing Chat may be indistinguishable after today

With the Microsoft build, the tech giant announced that Bing search is coming to ChatGPT, further solidifying its partnership with OpenAI The new feature is reportedly rolling out to ChatGPT Plus subscribers starting today (May 23) and will be available "soon" to users of ChatGPT's free Research Preview

If this last part is true, it would indeed represent a seismic shift in the generative AI landscape At the moment, if you want up-to-date information, you use Bing Chat or Google Bard; GPT-4 is trained with more current information and is currently available to ChatGPT Plus users, but the paid version of the popular chatbot still cannot capture information in real time It was not

But that was expected to change this week when web browsing was announced as a beta feature of ChatGPT Plus Now it appears that this feature is actually a Bing search integrated into the AI chatbot

It will certainly shake up the generative AI landscape, but it is not a seismic shift The seismic shift is that this Bing integration is coming to the free research preview, which not only opens the door for a free version of ChatGPT to access real-time information, but also the possibility of plug-in integration in the future

We have been discussing the possibility of ChatGPT plug-ins for some time, and last week they were officially announced for ChatGPT Plus beta users These plug-ins will allow third-party partners to integrate their apps, sites, services, etc into ChatGPT

However, Microsoft announced that these plugins will also work with Bing Chat This is because both OpenAI and Microsoft have adopted an open plugin standard that ensures that plugins designed for both companies' generated AI will work with all products This means that these plug-ins should work with ChatGPT, Bing Chat, Microsoft 365 Copilot, and the newly announced Windows Copilot for Windows 11

Microsoft seems to be betting that plug-ins are essential for generative AI The company expects plugins for Expedia, Instacart, Kayak, Klarna, Redfin, TripAdvisor, and Zillow to appear in Bing Chat within weeks, and plugins for Bandsintown, Cloudflare, Shopify, Spotify, and many more plug-ins will be coming to Bing Chat in the near future These will work on Bing Chat desktop and mobile, but in theory, there is nothing stopping them from coming to ChatGPT as well

Now we have integrated Bing into ChatGPT, for desktop and mobile And now we have integrated Bing Chat - GPT-4 and have one for desktop and one for mobile And both use the same plugin So is there any difference anymore?

The answer is yes, but the differences are more subtle: ChatGPT, or at least ChatGPT Plus, remains the more cutting-edge product and has coding capabilities that are completely absent from the Bing Chat field Bing Chat, on the other hand, will be a more consumer-oriented version, integrated into everything and providing everyday users with answers to the most complex questions thanks to the power of generative AI

However, the relationship between OpenAI and Microsoft is now completely symbiotic If you use ChatGPT, that's great for Microsoft and the billions of dollars invested in OpenAI And if you use Bing Chat, that's great for OpenAI, which runs Bing chatbots on the GPT-4 model These seemingly competing products are now perfectly complementary and, in essence, part of Microsoft's AI product line But at this point, it's a win for everyone, because it offers something for everyone who wants to experience the AI revolution for themselves