Search is just a tool for LLMs. Ask Bing Chat about tomorrow’s expected Starship launch and it will do a decent job.
Likewise with 3rd party extensions; a good LLM will make the best choice based on criteria.
In a way the LLM becomes the end user from a search/advertising perspective. The actual end user just expects an answer, not a list of 5 ads and 10 possible places to go look for the answer.
So yeah, search as an activity still exists, it’s just much less monetizable because the value prop of LLMs is distilling all that noise to a useful answer.
‘A decent job’ is really subjective here. You don’t get to see the pictures from the article it’s summarizing, which may be ok for something as routine as a Starlink launch, but doesn’t help for a hurricane forecast where you want to see its path on a map etc.
I rarely just want an answer when I am doing a search. But when I do I generally care more about accuracy than I am willing to trust a LLM.
This whole product category is barely a year old and you’re pointing out its (real) limitations?
If we’re talking about the viability of the search ads business in the next few months, sure, those are good reasons people will stay with traditional search and therefore be monetizable.
But as an industry trend, I think search will be 100% LLM intermediated pretty quickly. Pics of a subject, projections of hurricane routes… I’d be very surprised if both aren’t provided by LLMs within 12 months.
But won’t LLMs be monetized in the exact same ways search has been? If you’re asking Bing Chat instead of searching Google for the best hotels in a city, you bet people are gonna wanna pay to make sure their name comes up.
If anything, I can see this poses more of a risk to websites than to Google. You’re still querying a knowledge graph representation of the internet, it’s only really the last step (clicking a link to a third party website from the SERP) that disappears.
AI can clearly move past these limitations, but it won’t be an LLM it will be some other technique.
If anything in the next 12 months I expect LLM’s to get worse in many areas as people start doing the equivalent of SEO to get LLM’s to say whatever they want. It’s GPT 5.0+ vs companies trying to sell stuff etc.
LLM kind of suck doing web searches, asking for SpaceX launch date is faster with google. Asking it for a stock market summary, it will suck hard comparing to just loading the first page of wsj. Most real time news tasks will suck vs Google, where it excel is remassaging info that it has been trained on like coding and how tos
I am not sure about stock market summary and similar stuffs. I created a stock earnings report summariser [1] using the recently announced GPT from OpenAI. It is pretty handy and cool. This is not something Google can replicate for everybody’s niche needs.
Here, I just went to chatgpt and asked it two questions -- it now just automatically searches bing:
> can you explain what's currently going on with the israel palestine situation?
ChatGPT
The current situation in the Israel-Palestine conflict, as of November 2023, is characterized by ongoing hostilities and a deepening humanitarian crisis. Key aspects include:
Human Impact and Fighting: As of November 13, 2023, the death toll in Gaza has reached 11,100, including more than 8,000 children and women. The collapse of medical centres and communication services in Gaza has made it difficult to update casualty figures. Israeli air raids have continued, and there have been fatalities on both sides, including Israeli soldiers and Palestinian fighters .
Gaza’s Hospitals in Crisis: Gaza’s medical infrastructure is under severe strain. The second largest hospital in Gaza, al-Quds, ceased operations due to a fuel shortage. Al-Shifa Hospital, another major hospital, is struggling with numerous challenges, including handling the bodies of those killed in the bombardment and having to close its doors to new patients. There are ongoing international concerns about firefights in hospitals endangering innocent patients and staff .
Diplomatic Efforts and International Response: Diplomatic efforts are ongoing to address the crisis. The UN has been involved in memorials for colleagues killed in Gaza. U.S. President Joe Biden has engaged in discussions with Qatar's Emir regarding the protection of civilians and the need for humanitarian aid in Gaza. There has been a call for an immediate ceasefire, and Hamas has suspended hostage negotiations in response to how Israel handled the situation at al-Shifa Hospital .
West Bank Developments: There have been reports of fatal incidents in the West Bank, including the shooting of a Palestinian man by Israeli forces. The Palestinian Health Ministry has reported the deaths of at least 186 Palestinians in the West Bank since October 7. Clashes and explosions have been reported in areas like Nablus and Qalqilya .
This situation is complex and continues to evolve, with significant human suffering and widespread international concern. The ongoing conflict, coupled with the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the West Bank, remains a focal point of international diplomatic efforts and media attention.
User
> what started the current fighting
ChatGPT
The current Israel-Hamas conflict, which escalated into a war in October 2023, began on October 7, 2023. This escalation was initiated by Hamas, the Palestinian Sunni Islamist group, which is designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the United States. Hamas launched an unprecedented and multifaceted assault on Israel from the Gaza Strip, involving attacks by land, sea, and air. This offensive included a massive barrage of rockets fired into southern Israel in the early morning hours of October 7, with the impacts of these attacks being felt as far as Tel Aviv and Beersheba .
These actions marked a significant escalation in the longstanding conflict between Israel and Hamas and led to a severe humanitarian crisis and a high number of casualties. As of mid-November 2023, the conflict had resulted in the deaths of over 12,000 people, including civilians and journalists from various nations .
The complexity and intensity of this conflict highlight the deeply rooted tensions and the ongoing struggle in the region, with each new incident contributing to a cycle of violence and retaliation.
I'm just pointing out that it can talk about current events perfectly well with an integration, it's not a fundamental issue if you're building a product around an LLM.
Saying it can do something based on evidence of it failing to do that very thing isn’t convincing. Summarizing the first search result isn’t the same as actually giving the information someone is looking for.
Further the assumption that search engines would allow OpenAI to leverage their work while running them out of business is extremely suspect. So if the argument LLM’s will replace search engines while leveraging them is poorly thought out.
I almost never go to google search first if i want to know something anymore. ChatGPT is often my first last and only resort (along with some trips to wikipedia or documentation or whatever to verify)
I agree but I think it's more complicated than that. Advertisers have become very prudish about what content their ads are shown next to and LLMs have been getting a lot of media flak about bias and hallucinations and copyright infringement which might scare off advertisers. They might be having a really hard time selling this to advertisers which could be holding things up. Also, ChatGPT is ad free so if Gemini isn't clearly better then a lot of people won't switch.
ChatGPT 3.5 is free, but GPT4 is not. I can see a lot of people using something as good or better than GPT4 that is supported by ads and no monthly fee.
