Elon Musk announced his Grok AI bot to challenge ChatGPT, claiming the prototype is already superior to ChatGPT 3.5 across several benchmarks.
Dubbed Grok, it’s the first product of Musk’s xAI company and is now in testing with a limited group of US users. Grok is being designed with data from Musk’s X, formerly known as Twitter, and is thus better instructed on the latest developments than alternative bots with static datasets, the company’s website said. It’s also developed to answer “with a bit of wit and has a rebellious streak,” according to the announcement.
Musk, earlier this year, was among the signatories of a petition calling for a pause in advancing AI models to allow for the development of shared safety protocols.
The tech billionaire owner of X and Tesla Inc. chief executive officer posted on Sunday, “I signed that letter knowing it was futile. I just wanted to be on the record as recommending a pause.”
US President Joe Biden just signed an executive order for AI oversight, aimed at setting standards for security and privacy protections, while tech leaders and academics debated the technology’s risks at the UK’s AI Safety Summit last week.
Musk told British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak last week that he believed AI was “the most disruptive force in history.” The technology will be capable of “do everything” and make employment as we know it today a thing of the past, Musk speculated at the first global AI Safety Summit, in Bletchley Park, England.
Grok is the product of two months of development, the xAI announcement said and will be made available to all X Premium+ users after it exits the testing stage.
Musk has voiced of his purpose to build X beyond its base as a social platform into a do-everything app akin to Tencent Holding Ltd.’s WeChat in China. Grok would be an essential part of developing that — while xAI is a separate company, it says it intends to work closely with X, Tesla, and other businesses.
In 2015, Musk co-founded OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, which has created a frenzy for generative AI technology around the world but stepped down from the board in 2018.
