Image credits: Microsoft / OpenAI
Microsoft’s Bing is enjoying the spotlight for the first time in a decade after it released a GPT-powered interface last month. But the tech giant has so far been cautious about the pace at which it makes its new Bing offering — powered by OpenAI’s GPT-4 technology — available to users. But Bing seems to be tearing down those walls.
Microsoft, the lead investor in OpenAI, appears to have lifted the queue from the new Bing, ostensibly allowing anyone immediate access to the new experience. Windows Central, who first spotted this change, said users don’t have to wait to try the new Bing anymore. TechCrunch tested this with some email IDs (both new and old) and had access right away. However, not all email IDs we tested were accessed immediately.
While the new Bing landing page still displays the typical “Join Queue” button, you can sign in and get access right away. We’ve asked Microsoft for comment and will update the story if we hear back.
Microsoft is holding an event called “Reinventing Productivity with AI” later Thursday at 11 a.m. ET. While today’s agenda is limited to introducing AI-powered tools for Microsoft 356 (Office) and Dynamic 365 — the company’s Salesforce competitor — it wouldn’t be surprising if there was a Bing-related announcement as well.
The Seattle-based company is racing to integrate an AI-powered chatbot into many of its services. Last month, Microsoft introduced a GPT-4-powered bot to the Windows 11 taskbar. Earlier this week, the stable version of the Edge browser got a Bing AI chatbot feature.
OpenAI technology has proven to be a huge hit for Bing, which recently reported its arrival 100 million daily active users. This is to be expected given the hype around AI-powered chatbots and how they have attracted tens of millions of users who want to give it a go. After people were able to “jailbreak” their chatbot to say problematic things, Microsoft started Test various restrictions on conversations. Earlier this week, it raised the limit to 15 cycles per conversation and 150 messages per day.