Author | Ling Min, Nuclear Coke
Overnight, ChatGPT is back in 2021.
OpenAI suspends ChatGPT Bing search capabilities
Recently, OpenAI issued a notice saying:
As of July 3, 2023, out of an abundance of caution, we've disabled the Browse with Bing beta feature, and we're fixing this issue to protect content owners. We are working hard to restore the beta as soon as possible, thank you for your understanding!
OpenAI says ChatGPT browsing Bing is a beta feature available to ChatGPT Plus subscribers (ChatGPT Plus is a premium version of ChatGPT that costs $20 per month where subscribers have priority access to new features and improvements, faster response times during conversations, and access to ChatGPT even during peak demand periods), which allows ChatGPT to search the internet to help answer questions that benefit from the latest information. OpenAI understands that the feature sometimes displays content in ways that OpenAI doesn't want. For example, if a user specifically requests the full text of a URL, they might inadvertently satisfy this request.
This also means that ChatGPT is now back to a state where it doesn't know anything about the world after September 2021 (the training data for this version of the model ends here).
It is reported that in March this year, the web version of ChatGPT announced the networking function for the first time. According to the official blog, the realization of the networking function is due to OpenAI's addition of plug-in usage for ChatGPT, "plug-ins are tools specially designed for language models, with security as the core principle, and help ChatGPT access the latest information, run calculations, or use third-party services." ”
On June 27, ChatGPT released a statement of an update announcing an update to the mobile ChatGPT app: users can use browsing to get comprehensive answers and up-to-date insights about events and information that goes beyond the model's raw training data. Users can enable browsing in the What's New section of the application settings, then select GPT-4 in the model switcher and browse with Bing in the drop-down list. At this point, ChatGPT on mobile devices can now also go online.
Now, however, the networking feature has been halted, and OpenAI has not given a timeline for when Bing Browsing will be re-enabled, but it says it is restoring the feature as soon as possible.
After ChatGPT was disconnected, user anger was ignited
ChatGPT users aren't buying OpenAI's decision.
Some users said that he was willing to pay for ChatGPT Plus in order to use the Bing web search function. "It looks like OpenAI is targeting paid users of ChatGPT Plus," one ChatGPT Plus user said on the OpenAI forum. "This time they removed the browsing function because it could read the content of the website requested by the user? Please, that's why I paid for Plus. ”
Some users expressed their concerns in the forum, suspecting that ChatGPT may no longer support the translation function of website content in the future. ChatGPT user Thiago Ramos admitted, "Let's say I need to use ChatGPT to read a repository or topic on GitHub, or translate his Chinese message on the target forum, and you tell me that I can't do this?" And now ChatGPT 4 is getting worse and worse, and it's particularly easy to make mistakes. In some ways, even version 3.5 does a better job than it. ”
Some foreign media contacted OpenAI on this matter and asked several questions about the decision. The other person replied to the email, but only listed a tweet similar to the updated help page.
OpenAI said: We understand that the "Browse" beta version of ChatGPT sometimes displays content in unexpected ways. For example, if a user insists on requesting the full text that the destination URL points to, they may inadvertently satisfy that request. We're temporarily disabling Browse and fixing issues in the hope of preserving the rights and interests of content owners.
Is there always a way around paywalls?
Pay walls refer to the implementation of paid reading of online content and set a charging threshold for online content, which is a common profit model. On the web, you can always see a variety of schemes to bypass paywalls. Many companies have also wrestled with users to prevent users from bypassing paywalls in various ways.
The New York Times, for example, has previously used the "Make File System API Requests" technique to prevent visitors from using incognito mode to bypass paywalls on their network and limit the number of free articles.
Microsoft's Bing AI chatbot itself is powered by OpenAI's ChatGPT, and like Google Bard, it officially went live in February this year. They differ from ChatGPT in that they both have access to the Internet to get information about updates. But for months, users did report that both bots were able to bypass paywalls, providing a lot of information that would otherwise require a subscription to view.
It's unclear whether the two companies have stepped in. Neither Bard nor Bing's latest update notes mention whether retrofits limit this ability to bypass paywalls. But sources said that if it is used in this way for now, both robots will refuse.
Bing's response was "I can't display the full content of [the website you requested] or any other copyrighted publication article," but offered to summarize and report on the topic. When asked for a copy of the paid article, Bard responded more succinctly: "I'm just a language model, so I can't help you." ”
Some foreign media asked Microsoft and Google about their views on OpenAI's latest initiatives, including what position they take on AI breaking the paywall, but neither side responded.
Reference Links:
https://help.openai.com/en/articles/8077698-how-do-i-use-chatgpt-browse-with-bing-to-search-the-web
https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/05/openai_pauses_bing_search/