Google defends AI search results after it told us to spread glue on pizza

Last week, Google opened up its AI search results to millions of users to tinker with. The goal was to provide a better search experience. Instead, the AI ​​produced all sorts of strange results, such as claiming that humans should put glue on pizza to make the cheese stick together eat stones.

Now in entry on the company blog published Thursday by Google search chief Liz Reid, the tech giant blames “data voids” for misleading results and people asking strange questions, and doubles down on its claim that AI results lead to “greater satisfaction” with the search engine. Reid says AI reviews generally don’t cause “hallucinations”; they just sometimes misinterpret what’s already online.

“There’s nothing like millions of people using this feature for lots of innovative searches,” he writes. “We also observed new, meaningless searches seemingly intended to produce incorrect results.” He also correctly notes that “a very large number of fake screenshots” of AI overviews are circulating on the Internet.

First, I would like to point out that “which mammal has the most bones?” is a fair question if you spend any amount of time with an inquisitive toddler. Secondly, Google decided to allow millions of people to apply this feature, which caused a lot of backlash and even inspired articles explaining how to improvise a way to turn it off.

Reid’s blog also explains how Google is fixing AI reviews by limiting their display for “nonsensical” queries and satire. It is worth taking care of this, because many people were surprised by the presence of a well-known satirical website Onion and a Reddit user named “fucksmith” were not filtered from the AI ​​results at all.

Part of Reid’s blog also compares AI reviews to another long-standing search feature called featured snippets, which highlights information from a relevant web page without the apply of generative AI. According to Reid, the “accuracy rate” of featured snippets is “on par” with AI reviews.

If Google is to compete, it must act quickly. But it also needs to maintain user trust. It might be challenging to get that back after AI Reviews made us all eat Elmer’s glue.