文章來源：《經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)人》Feb 9th 2023 期 Business 欄目

The battle for internet search

互聯(lián)網(wǎng)搜索引擎之戰(zhàn)

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For more than 25 years, search engines have been the internet’s front door.

25年來，搜索引擎一直充當(dāng)互聯(lián)網(wǎng)的門戶角色。

AltaVista, the first site to allow searches of the full text of the web, was swiftly?dethroned?by Google, which has dominated the field in most of the world ever since.

AltaVista是第一個(gè)實(shí)現(xiàn)網(wǎng)頁全文檢索的公司，但很快被谷歌取代。從此谷歌在世界大部分地區(qū)占據(jù)了主導(dǎo)地位。

Google’s search engine, still the heart of its business, has made its parent, Alphabet, one of the world’s most valuable companies, with revenues of $283bn in 2022 and a market capitalisation of $1.3trn.

搜索引擎仍然是谷歌的核心業(yè)務(wù)，它的母公司Alphabet已成為世界上最具價(jià)值的公司之一，2022年?duì)I收2830億美元，市值13萬億美元。

Google is not merely a household name; it is a verb.

谷歌不僅是一個(gè)家喻戶曉的名稱，也是一個(gè)動(dòng)詞--谷歌即搜索，搜索即谷歌。

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But nothing lasts for ever, particularly in technology.

萬物皆無常，技術(shù)領(lǐng)域尤是如此。

Just ask IBM, which once ruled business computing, or Nokia, once the leader in mobile phones. Both were dethroned because they?fumbled?big technological transitions.

問問曾主導(dǎo)商業(yè)計(jì)算的IBM和手機(jī)領(lǐng)域的昔日霸主諾基亞就知道了，如今這兩家公司都因錯(cuò)過技術(shù)變革而日薄西山。

Now tech firms are?salivating?over an innovation that might?herald?a similar shift—and a similar opportunity.

如今，科技公司對一項(xiàng)可能帶來同等變革和機(jī)遇的技術(shù)創(chuàng)新垂涎三尺。

Chatbots powered by artificial intelligence (AI) let users gather information via typed conversations. Leading the field is ChatGPT, made by OpenAI, a startup.

人工智能聊天機(jī)器人讓用戶通過打字的方式，與之進(jìn)行對話并收集信息。目前這一領(lǐng)域的領(lǐng)頭羊是創(chuàng)業(yè)公司OpenAI開發(fā)的ChatGPT。

By the end of January, two months after its launch, ChatGPT was being used by more than 100m people, making it the “fastest-growing consumer application in history”, according to UBS, a bank.

截至1月底，也就是ChatGPT發(fā)布兩個(gè)月后，用戶已超過1億人。瑞銀集團(tuán)稱其為“歷史上增速最快的消費(fèi)應(yīng)用程序”。

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AI is already used behind the scenes in many products, but ChatGPT has put it centre stage, by letting people chat with an AI directly.

實(shí)際上，AI 已是許多產(chǎn)品的幕后功臣，是ChatGPT將AI推到C位，人們可以直接與之對話。

ChatGPT can write essays in various styles, explain complex concepts, summarise text and answer?trivia?questions. It can even (narrowly) pass legal and medical exams.

ChatGPT可以撰寫不同風(fēng)格的文章，解釋復(fù)雜的概念，總結(jié)文本的要點(diǎn)，回答瑣碎的問題。它甚至可以（勉強(qiáng)）通過法律和醫(yī)學(xué)考試。

And it can?synthesise?knowledge from the web: for example, listing holiday spots that match certain criteria, or suggesting menus or?itineraries. If asked, it can explain its reasoning and provide detail.

它還可以綜合匯總線上信息：例如，列出符合特定標(biāo)準(zhǔn)的度假地點(diǎn)，或推薦的菜單或行程。如果刨根究底，它還會解釋原因且有理有據(jù)。

Many things that people use search engines for today, in short, can be done better with chatbots.

簡言之，搜索引擎能做的，聊天機(jī)器人也能，而且做得更好。

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Hence the?flurry of?announcements, as rival firms try to?seize the initiative.

競爭對手公司想搶占先機(jī)，因此發(fā)布了一系列聲明。

On February 7th Microsoft, which has invested more than $11bn in OpenAI, revealed a new version of Bing, its search engine, which incorporates ChatGPT. Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s boss, sees this as his chance to challenge Google.

2月7日，已向OpenAI投資逾110億美元的微軟發(fā)布了新版“必應(yīng)”，其中就包含了ChatGPT。微軟CEO薩蒂亞·納德拉認(rèn)為這是必應(yīng)挑戰(zhàn)谷歌的機(jī)會。

For its part, Google has announced Bard, its own chatbot, as a “companion” to its search engine.

谷歌也發(fā)布了自己的聊天機(jī)器人Bard，作為其搜索引擎的“搭檔”。

It has also taken a $300m stake in Anthropic, a startup founded by ex-OpenAI employees, which has built a chatbot called Claude.

谷歌還斥資3億美元入股了Anthropic，這是一家由OpenAI前員工創(chuàng)辦的初創(chuàng)公司，該公司已經(jīng)開發(fā)了聊天機(jī)器人Claude。

The share price of Baidu, known as the Google of China, jumped when it said it would release its chatbot, called Ernie, in March.

有“中國的谷歌“之稱的百度公布，公司將于3月發(fā)布聊天機(jī)器人Ernie，股價(jià)隨后飆升大漲。

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But can chatbots be trusted, and what do they mean for search and its lucrative advertising business?

但聊天機(jī)器人是否值得信任，它們對搜索及其背后利潤豐厚的廣告業(yè)務(wù)意味著什么？

Do they herald a Schumpeterian moment in which AI?topples?incumbent firms and elevates upstarts?

它們是否會遵循熊彼特的創(chuàng)新理論，預(yù)示著人工智能會在革故鼎新過程中起重要作用？

The answers depend on three things: moral choices, monetisation and monopoly economics.

答案取決于3個(gè)方面：道德選擇、變現(xiàn)方式和壟斷經(jīng)濟(jì)。