What Is Google BARD? A Guide To Googles New AI

Welcome to the definitive guide to Google BARD AI

No, not The Bard, that’s Shakespeare. Just Bard (as in Google).

Google Bard is here, and while you may have heard the name, you may also be wondering exactly what it is and how it works. As with any Google service, Bard is bound to have ramifications for the tech industry and represents another step in the quest to develop better artificial intelligence. Let’s break down exactly what Google Bard is and what it means for the future of Google AI.

Google Bard: Unlocking the Power of Generative AI with Ethical AI Principles

Google Bard is an innovative tool that leverages generative AI to create human-like text based on user prompts. As part of Google’s growing suite of AI technologies, Bard is designed to assist with a variety of tasks, from answering questions to generating creative content. Built upon artificial intelligence AI principles, it emphasizes the importance of ethical guidelines and transparency in its interactions.

By adhering to these AI principles, Bard ensures that its outputs are both accurate and responsibly generated, making it a valuable asset for businesses looking to enhance their productivity and user engagement.

As generative AI continues to evolve, tools like Bard showcase the potential for artificial intelligence AI to transform industries by automating complex tasks while remaining grounded in ethical standards.

What is Google Bard?

First things first: Google Bard is the tech giant’s response to various large language model chatbots, the most popular AI example being ChatGPT. Since the launch of ChatGPT and other AI chatbots, the pressure has been on Google’s AI division to respond with a similar product, or at least give consumers and investors an idea of where their AI research and development was at. In a nod to Shakespeare himself, Bard is designed to keep up its end of the conversation, replying to questions and prompts much like the chatbots we’ve seen before.

Is “Google bard” the same as “Bard AI”?

Yes, Google Bard and Bard AI refer to the same artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Google. Bard is an advanced AI language model designed to provide real-time, conversational responses, similar to OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Initially branded as Google Bard, the AI was later integrated into Google’s broader AI ecosystem and renamed Gemini AI in 2024.

Google Bard (now Gemini AI) leverages Google’s powerful PaLM (Pathways Language Model) and other advanced machine learning technologies to assist users with a wide range of tasks, including answering questions, generating content, coding, and providing insights in various fields. Unlike traditional search engines, which return links to websites, Bard AI generates direct, human-like responses to queries.

If you’re searching for Bard AI, you’re looking at Google’s conversational AI technology, which has now evolved into Gemini AI—a more advanced and refined version of Bard with enhanced capabilities.

All you need to know about Google Bard

There have been plenty of trends and speculated uses for artificial intelligence, but what many tech firms are currently focused on is a conversational chatbot model, which uses huge data sets of language to learn from and predict responses that mimic human conversation and speech patterns. Google Bard is the latest release to follow this trend.

When was Google Bard announced?

In February 2023, Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai announced that Google Bard would be launching as an experimental tool for ‘trusted testers’. The announcement left a lot of questions unanswered for now, but here’s what we know so far.

How does Google Bard work?

Like other chatbots, Google Bard is a narrow AI, meaning it’s theoretically exceptionally good at performing a specific set of functions. In this case, finding factual answers to queries and questions, and giving them in a conversational way. Google’s Language Model for Dialogue Applications (LaMDA) powers bard.

It’s no surprise that one of the advantages Google AI has over its competitors is its access to data: Bard has one of the largest data sets for a large language model to learn from, giving Bard a potential edge over the competition as a powerful tool for users. At this stage, Bard has been initially released using what Google calls a ‘lightweight model version of LaMDA’.

Bard will work like you’re having a conversation. Type your query or question into a search bar, and voilà! Google Bard will present you with a conversational response that has all the answers you need.

What can you do with Google Bard?

We don’t have all the details about Bard’s full capabilities yet, so we’re not sure whether the Google AI will eventually be able to produce long form texts like reports, poetry and basic computer code like ChatGPT currently does. For now, the core feature is all about making queries simple: ask Google Bard a question, and it will distil the information into a concise, digestible answer for you.

One of the most exciting features about Bard is that it promises to offer deeper insights and more contextual understanding than any search engine currently offers. Right now, you can Google ‘how many strings on a guitar?’ and get a solid answer, but what you can’t do is ask Google how long it takes to learn the guitar, whether it’s quicker than learning piano, and whether the time is worth it. In their announcement, Google AI promised that Bard will have the capability to synthesise different opinions and perspectives on topics like this and give you a succinct summary.

Who can use Google Bard?

At the moment, the trial phase of Google’s new artificial intelligence – “Bard” – is restricted to ‘trusted testers’ as part of a rigorous process to combine internal testing with external feedback, eventually fine-tuning the bot for wide release. It’s not certain who makes up the trusted network, but a safe bet is that some tech reporters will receive early access to the service in order to put it through its paces.

There haven’t been any fixed promises from Google, but the way they describe their service does seem to indicate that eventually, Google new AI platfrom will be for everyone. If it works the way Google’s AI department says it will, then the Bard is a replacement for the current way the public uses Google as a search engine.

How will Bard display search results?

Again, the answer to this is based on a brief demonstration from a tech announcement, but, it seems that, Bard, gives a response to a query which reads like dialogue, and is followed by summary dot points which link out to search results, or followed by a ‘Read More’ section on mobile which contains those links.

What are the implications for website traffic?

It’s certainly a radically unique way to see results than the classic scroll down the first page, but in theory, this makes Google more usable and genuinely informative than it has been. There’s plenty of discussion online about the ways Google has changed as a search engine, and why it isn’t as effective as it was in the days of Web 1.0 and early Web 2.0. In much the same way Google’s preview feature now summarises information from a source on its own page, Bard potentially reduces click-through rates in favour of an integrated response which keeps users on Google.

If / when Google Bard gets a wide release, the implications for web traffic are potentially huge. Google knows that its value as a tool to help businesses become more visible is significant, so whatever changes Bard would usher in, they would need to still reward domain authorities, and drive traffic in some way.

Google Bard vs ChatGPT

A lot of talk about Google’s AI Bard has so far compared it to ChatGPT. There are a few reasons for this; firstly, the announcement of Bard in February seemed to be a direct response from the tech giant to the impact ChatGPT has had within the tech world.

It was almost inevitable that Google would announce some kind of service or update based on the current climate. Since 2021, they’ve been working on their language LaMDA, but consumers had yet to see much come out of the dialogue trained model.

With tech reporters breathlessly recounting their experiences with ChatGPT and even their suspicions that the narrow AI language bot was sentient (it is absolutely not), the time was ripe for Google to remind the market and the media that it has an enormous amount of resources invested in the future of artificial intelligence.

So far, it’s too early to produce a real comparison of the two; and until we see Google Bard in action, we won’t know whether the claims about its capabilities are accurate. So far, there are a few differences that jump out:

• ChatGPT is a subscription only model backed by Bing and Microsoft’s OpenAI. If we go off the announcement by Sundar Pichai, Google Bard will be a feature for everyone to use within the search engine.
• ChatGPT promises to create whole texts for the user, complete with references and stylistic features of the form (stylistically it’s pretty good, and factually it often makes huge mistakes). Google Bard also made a factual error in a GIF used during its presentation, but it is aimed at giving you a deeper, more contextual understanding of a topic you’ve searched for, rather than being a word processor.
• Google Bard only uses a lightweight version of LaMDA now, but it has the best potential language modelling and data set in the world. If Google AI can get it working with the full power of LaMDA, it could provide a serious edge.
• Both ChatGPT and Google Bard have a sophisticated grasp of human language and dialogue, they’re designed to sound like real people. So far, this has caused some panic in some corners, with people feeling like they’re really ‘alive’. Despite the witty dialogue, both tools are narrow AI models that do one thing very well: sound like people. They’re far removed from being a true general artificial intelligence, and they’re certainly not alive or self-aware. It will be interesting to see how Google tempers this highly realistic dialogue, if indeed Google Bard is slated for general public use.

There’s a lot about Bard we still don’t know, but with Google’s announcement of the service and its continued investment in artificial intelligence, one thing’s for sure: the tech industry has decided that AI is the future, and we’ll be seeing it used more and more in our daily interactions online.

Google Bard AI: The Future of AI-Powered Assistance

Google Bard AI is an advanced artificial intelligence chatbot designed to provide users with intelligent responses, creative content generation, and real-time information retrieval. As of February 2024, Google has continued to enhance Bard’s capabilities, making it a powerful tool for personal and professional use.

Seamless Integration with the Google App

One of the most significant updates to Bard AI is its integration with the Google app. This allows users to access Bard’s AI-powered assistance directly within the app, providing instant answers, composing text, summarizing content, and even generating creative outputs such as poems, code, and more. The seamless integration ensures a smooth and efficient user experience without the need for additional software.

Key Features of Google Bard AI

• Real-Time Information Retrieval: Bard provides up-to-date responses by leveraging Google Search, ensuring users receive the latest and most relevant information.
• Creative Content Generation: Whether you need blog posts, social media captions, or even poetry, Bard can assist with creative content generation.
• Code Assistance: Developers can utilize Bard to generate, debug, and refine code snippets for various programming languages.
• Multimodal Capabilities: With improved AI models, Bard can process text, images, and even voice inputs to enhance interaction and usability.
• Personalized Recommendations: By understanding user preferences and context, Bard offers tailored suggestions and responses.

How to Access Google Bard AI

Users can access Bard AI through the Google app or via the dedicated Bard website. By leveraging its latest advancements in AI and machine learning, Google Bard continues to redefine how users interact with digital assistants, making information access more intuitive and efficient.

With continuous updates and improvements, Google Bard AI remains at the forefront of AI-powered chatbots, offering cutting-edge solutions for users worldwide.

Did you know this about Google Bard AI?

Some Fascinating but Little-Known Facts About Google Bard AI:

• It Was Originally Named After a Poet – Google Bard was named after the term “bard,” which historically refers to a poet or storyteller, reflecting its role as an AI designed to generate and refine human-like text.
• It Uses Google’s Most Advanced AI Models – While Bard originally launched with LaMDA (Language Model for Dialogue Applications), it later transitioned to PaLM 2 and eventually Gemini AI, Google’s most sophisticated AI model to date.
• It Can Generate Code in Over 20 Programming Languages – Unlike traditional chatbots, Bard was designed to assist with coding, supporting languages such as Python, JavaScript, C++, and even Google’s own Dart programming language.
• It Can Access Real-Time Information – Unlike many AI models that rely on static training data, Bard has the ability to pull live information from the web via Google Search, making its responses more current compared to other AI tools.
• It’s Integrated with Google Search and Apps – Google Bard was built to seamlessly integrate with Google Search, Google Docs, Gmail, and other Google Workspace tools, making it a practical AI assistant for both casual users and professionals.
• It Prioritises User Feedback for Improvement – Google actively refines Bard’s responses based on real user interactions, meaning the AI is constantly learning and evolving in response to how people engage with it.
• It’s Multimodal (Not Just Text-Based) – With its latest iterations, Bard (now Gemini AI) has expanded beyond text-based responses to understand and generate images, audio, and even video, making it one of the most versatile AI tools available.
• It’s Designed to Be More Factually Reliable – Unlike many AI chatbots that can “hallucinate” (generate false information), Bard was built with improved fact-checking capabilities, leveraging Google’s vast data sources to provide more accurate responses.
• It Can Summarise and Translate Content Instantly – Google Bard can quickly summarise long-form content, translate between multiple languages, and even rephrase responses in different tones, making it useful for content creators and professionals alike.
• It Was Rebranded as Gemini AI – In early 2024, Google Bard officially transitioned to Google Gemini AI, signifying a shift towards an even more powerful and sophisticated AI system capable of multimodal learning.

As Google continues to refine its AI capabilities, Bard AI (now Gemini AI) remains a key part of its push into the future of AI-powered search, productivity, and content creation.

Read these articles further you knowledge about AI in the online world: How AI Affected Online Searches | How AI Is Revolutionising Lead Generation | Future-Proof Against AI Content

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About the Author

Andrew Raso

Andrew Raso, Co-founder and Global CEO of Online Marketing Gurus, has been instrumental in transforming the agency from a start-up into a $15 million global powerhouse. Since co-founding OMG in 2012 with colleague Mehrdad Hedayati, Andrew has leveraged his deep expertise in SEO and digital marketing to drive OMG’s expansion across Australia, the US, and Singapore.