Shant Mesrobian
@shantmm
I'm really not sold on the idea that AI chatbots will replace search. The vast majority of things I use search for do not have definitive answers. They are things that lack clear consensus. Most of the time I am looking to gather various data points, perspectives, studies, and research papers so that I can form my own personal consensus. I have never found chatbots good for this purpose. A chatbot is essentially like talking to one person. And while that one person may provide me with various sources and perspectives, it isn't like consulting those original sources and perspectives directly. A certain amount of editorializing/consensus is still built into the experience. Occasionally there will be something that is more clear cut and a simple answer from a chatbot suffices. This is why the blended version that Google offers with its gemini-powered AI overview works so well and why I currently think Google's UX is currently winning this. Change my mind. https://x.com/gregisenberg/status/1924468459297009829
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Daniel Fernandes
@dfern.eth
Aren't "deep research" models supposed to do this? Actively scour new links, papers, primary sources and synthesize the results. Only problem is that they are expensive & time consuming to run and not really analogous to search.
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Shant Mesrobian
@shantmm
I obviously don't have personal experience with them but I haven't seen evidence yet that anything can replicate what my brain does when weighing all of the different variables and validity of sources, social dynamics, and also my personal preferences, circumstances, etc. Might get there, but I anticipate too many safety guardrails. Right now it feels like a heavy handed bureaucrat talking to me with phony authoritativeness. Would today's models have told us in 2020 that COVID came from a lab (pretty sure they don't say that even now)? Because my brain did do that.
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