Microsoft Corp. is expanding public access to its generative AI programs, making the new Bing available to everyone.
Since the launch of the new Bing, customers have engaged in more than half a billion chats and created more than 200 million images with Bing Image Creator, with downloads of the Bing mobile app quadrupling.
The new Bing, it said, is now in “open preview” and now no longer has a waitlist – combining large language models like OpenAI’s GPT-4 with its search index.
“This means that it will now be easier than ever for everyone to try the new Bing and Edge by simply signing into Bing with your Microsoft Account,” Yusuf Mehdi, corporate vice president, said in a blog post.
The tech giant unveiled the new artificial intelligence-powered Bing and redesigned Microsoft Edge three months ago to “reinvent the future of search.”
Moving to the next generation of the tools, the company said it is moving from text-only search and chat to more visual answers – think charts and graphics, as well as the integration and expansion of Bing Image Creator – and multimodal support.
Furthermore, it is shifting from single-use chat and search session to “multi-session productivity experiences with chat history and persistent chats within Edge.”
Users will be able to share and export chat histories, as well as return to previous chats. To explore something deeper, the chat will move to the Edge sidebar.
Chat in Edge will also have improved summarization capabilities for long documents and Edge mobile will include page context.
Edge will be getting an enhanced user interface and a streamlined look.
Microsoft is also opening up platform capabilities, in order for developers and third parties to build on top of Bing.
“We are working with our partners at OpenAI to make it easier and as consistent as possible for developers to take advantage of this opportunity. We believe these types of skills are a game-changer in the reinvention of search and to advance opportunities for developers in search,” he said, teasing that more details would be shared later this month.
Mehdi finally noted that teams are continuing to work to address issues related to AI advancements like misinformation and disinformation, content blocking, data safety and preventing the promotion of harmful or discriminatory content.
