Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence startup xAI will debut its first highly anticipated AI model on Saturday, November 4.
The billionaire made the announcement on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter) stating that the technology will be released to a “select group” of people. In fact, he boasts that “in some important respects it is the best that currently exists.”
It’s been a while since we last heard from xAI. The startup Hit burst onto the scene in July, revealing that it’s run by a team of former engineers from Microsoft, Google and even OpenAI. Shortly after its debut on July 14 Musk held a 90-minute Twitter Spaces chat where he talked about his vision for the company. While chatting, Musk declared his startup will try to “create a good AGI with the overarching goal of trying to understand the universe.” He wants it to conflict with what he believes is problematic technology from the likes of Microsoft and Google.
Yet another chatbot
AGI stands for artificial general intelligence, and it is the concept of an AI with an “intelligence” comparable to or beyond that of a normal human. The problem is that it’s more of an idea of what AI could be than a literal piece of technology. Even Stuck in their coverage of AGIs states that “there is no concrete definition of the term.”
Does this mean that xAI will unveil some kind of super smart model that will help humanity and have conversations like a science fiction movie? No, but that could be the lofty end goal for Elon Musk and his team. We believe that all we will see on November 5th is a simple chatbot like ChatGPT. Let’s call it “ChatX” since the billionaire has an obsession with the letter “X”.
Does “ChatX” even stand a chance against Google Bard or ChatGPT? The latter has been around for almost a year now and has seen multiple updates becoming more refined each time. Maybe xAI has solved the hallucination problem. That will be great to see. Unfortunately, it’s possible that ChatX could simply be another vehicle for Musk to spread his ideas/beliefs.
Analysis: A Personal Truth Spinner
Musk has talked about wanting an alternative to ChatGPT that focuses on providing the “truth,” whatever that means. Musk has been an outspoken critic of how quickly companies have developed their own generative AI models with seemingly reckless abandon. He even called for a six-month pause on AI training in March. Obviously that didn’t happen, as technology has advanced by leaps and bounds since then.
It’s worth mentioning that Twitter, led by Musk, is known for this comply with censorship requests by governments around the world, so Musk’s definition of truth seems questionable at best. Either way, we’ll know what the team’s intentions are soon enough. Just hope not.
While we’ve got you, check out Ny Breaking’s list of the best AI writers for 2023.