Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, has refuted speculation surrounding the imminent announcement of a new search engine on Monday, May 13. While recent agreements have fueled anticipation, particularly regarding the integration of live content from English, Spanish, and French publications into ChatGPT, accompanied by direct links to the primary sources, Altman clarified that no such reveal is on the horizon.
Additionally, there are conjectures suggesting that OpenAI might introduce an AI Assistant. Such a development could provide contextual support for the partnerships with publishers, facilitating the display of their content alongside direct links to the original sources.
OpenAI Search Is Not Happening
Numerous attempts by competing search engines to dethrone Google, the reigning search giant, have fallen short over the years. Despite the emergence of a new generation of hybrid generative AI search engines, none have managed to significantly challenge Google’s dominance.
Sam Altman has consistently maintained that directly competing with Google through the creation of another search engine is not a viable strategy. Instead, he advocates for technological disruption as the key to surpassing Google, suggesting a need for a paradigm shift in the search landscape. Given Altman’s history of dismissing the idea of creating a rival search engine, speculations about such an announcement on Monday seemed unfounded.
Altman recently put an end to the speculation by explicitly stating that no search engine would be announced on Monday. In a tweet, he clarified:
“Not GPT-5, not a search engine, but we’ve been hard at work on some new stuff we think people will love! Feels like magic to me.”
“New Stuff” May Be Iterative Improvement
It’s highly probable that the upcoming announcement will focus on iterative improvements to ChatGPT rather than a complete overhaul. This aligns with Altman’s recent statements about his approach to enhancing ChatGPT.
He stated:
“While it’s not ideal to release a product that you’re not entirely satisfied with, it’s still preferable to the alternative. Especially in this context, where I believe it’s our responsibility to gradually introduce improvements to society.
There may come a time when we reconsider the effectiveness of iterative deployment, but for now, it seems to be the most effective strategy we have. We’ve already seen significant benefits from this approach, and hopefully, the broader community has as well.”
Sam Altman’s inclination towards improving ChatGPT incrementally is evident, and recent hints suggest what these enhancements might entail.
Recent Deals Contain Clues
Since December 2023, OpenAI has been striking agreements with news outlets and platforms featuring user-generated content. While mainstream media has portrayed these deals primarily as content licensing arrangements for training expansive language models, they’ve missed a crucial aspect we highlighted last month. These agreements grant OpenAI access to live data, enabling them to attribute real-time information via links.
Consequently, users of ChatGPT can anticipate the integration of real-time news access, empowering them to employ current information creatively within the ChatGPT interface.
Dotdash Meredith Deal
The recent deal involving Dotdash Meredith (DDM) marks a significant departure from simply utilizing their content for training purposes. Instead, it explicitly entails the integration of Dotdash Meredith’s content directly within ChatGPT.
The official announcement highlighted:
“As part of this agreement, OpenAI will prominently feature content and accompanying links attributed to DDM within relevant ChatGPT responses. …This partnership underscores OpenAI’s commitment to collaborating with content creators and publishers to foster a healthy online environment for the future.
With over 200 million Americans relying on our publications each month for guidance, inspiration, and enrichment, this collaboration ensures that ChatGPT users have access to the most pertinent and high-quality content available.”
OpenAI’s statement further reinforces the speculation that the organization indeed plans to incorporate licensed third-party content directly into ChatGPT responses.
OpenAI elaborated:
“We’re excited about our collaboration with Dotdash Meredith, which allows us to integrate their esteemed brands into ChatGPT and to pioneer innovative strategies for advancing the publishing and marketing sectors.”
In addition to this, DDM stands to benefit from enhanced in-house ad targeting by OpenAI. This enhancement aims to facilitate the display of more precise contextual advertisements, providing DDM with a valuable outcome from the partnership.
Le Monde And Prisa Media Deals
In March 2024, OpenAI unveiled agreements with two prominent global media entities: Le Monde and Prisa Media. Le Monde, renowned for its French-language news coverage, and Prisa Media, a Spanish multimedia powerhouse, have opened up a fascinating opportunity for OpenAI by granting access to real-time data in French and Spanish.
Prisa Media, headquartered in Madrid, Spain, operates as a comprehensive Spanish language media conglomerate encompassing magazines, newspapers, podcasts, radio stations, and television networks. Its expansive reach spans from Spain to the Americas, including the United States, Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Mexico, and Panama. This broad spectrum of real-time information caters to a vast audience numbering in the millions.
OpenAI explicitly stated that the objective of these partnerships is to directly deliver this rich content to ChatGPT users. The announcement elucidated:
“We are continuously enhancing ChatGPT and recognizing the pivotal role of the news industry in disseminating real-time, credible information to users. …Through our collaborations, ChatGPT users will have access to Le Monde and Prisa Media’s top-notch content on recent events, enriching their experience. Moreover, the content will significantly contribute to refining our model through continuous training.”
The deal extends beyond just training data; it’s about integrating current events data directly into the ChatGPT experience for users. The announcement provided further insight:
“Our aim is to offer ChatGPT users worldwide a novel, interactive, and insightful way to engage with the news.”
As highlighted in our April 30th article introducing OpenAI’s plan to display links in ChatGPT, the intention is to incorporate third-party content alongside relevant links.
OpenAI emphasized the objective behind partnering with Le Monde and Prisa Media:
“In the coming months, ChatGPT users will have the opportunity to interact with pertinent news content from these publishers. This will include select summaries accompanied by attribution and enriched with links to the original articles, empowering users to delve deeper into the news or explore related articles on their respective news platforms.”
Additional agreements with entities such as The Financial Times underscore the development of a new ChatGPT feature facilitating user interaction with real-time news and current events.
AI Assistant
The Information recently reported that OpenAI has demonstrated a new AI assistant technology capable of speaking and expanding the capabilities of existing AI voice assistants. This report aligns with a similar claim made in Bloomberg, suggesting that OpenAI and Apple are nearing an agreement to integrate OpenAI technology within the Siri framework.
OpenAI’s Monday May 13 Announcement
There are numerous hints indicating that Monday’s announcement will likely unveil a feature enabling ChatGPT users to engage with content related to current events. This aligns with the terms of recent agreements with news media organizations. While there may be other features revealed as well, the emphasis on this particular aspect is supported by multiple clues.
Original news from SearchEngineJournal