Of course, the Chinese had to offer their answer to ChatGPT, so on August 31, they introduced their AI chatbot named Ernie bot. Just as ChatGPT leans to the left side of the political spectrum, wanting to write poems about, for example, Asians and other races while avoiding whites, Ernie bot has its own ‘beliefs’. Thus, Ernie states that the virus originated among American vape users in July 2019 and that it arrived in Wuhan via American lobsters. Regarding political issues, the chatbot is quite silent, and if asked about the shortcomings of socialism, it suggests changing the topic. With its limitations, we see that it is not far from OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
Ernie’s restraint will not be a shock to Chinese users who are familiar with a heavily censored internet, but the Chinese tech giant Baidu, which stands behind Ernie, has no major issues with this fact. Ten years ago, Baidu, which operates the largest Chinese search engine, was the center of the internet in the country. Combined with Alibaba and Tencent, the two most valuable internet companies in China, a triangle known as ‘BAT’ was formed.
One Million Users in 19 Hours
Baidu has never lost its dominance in its business and still enjoys over 90 percent of Chinese search traffic. However, changes in the technological landscape have left the company lagging behind. Most Chinese internet users now access the web through super apps like Tencent’s WeChat. Advertising funds have shifted to Douyin, the Chinese cousin of TikTok. Meituan, a delivery platform, and Pinduoduo, an e-commerce company, have surpassed Baidu’s valuation of $50 billion. In an effort to catch up, Baidu has tried to imitate and launched its own delivery and shopping solutions, but all these ventures have mostly failed, so the company’s market capitalization is now equal to one-eighth of Tencent’s, compared to one-fifth five years ago.
