The group wants to focus more on artificial intelligence.
(Photo: AP)
Shanghai After the release of several Chinese ChatGPT rivals, Alibaba’s language model is now apparently also receiving the green light from the government in Beijing. The chatbot Tongyi Qianwen will be made available to the public, the company announced on Wednesday.
In the near future, an open source version of the large language model will be available for free commercial use by “the entire society”. In an internal letter to Alibaba employees, CEO Eddie Wu said artificial intelligence (AI) would be at the heart of Alibaba Group’s future strategy.
“In the next decade, AI-driven disruption will be the single most important driver of change across all industries,” Wu wrote. “If we don’t keep up with the changes of the AI era, we will be pushed out.” Alibaba first introduced Tongyi Qianwen in April.
So far, only selected users have been allowed to test the programs. This was a competitive disadvantage because AI learns with every input. In the People’s Republic, providers of freely accessible AI must undergo security checks and submit their algorithms to the authorities.
According to experts, the government wants to prevent chatbots from influencing social opinion in a potentially subversive direction. The government emphasizes that AI content must correspond to the country’s core socialist values. By the end of August, eleven companies had already received approval for their AI, including TikTok parent ByteDance and video game provider Tencent.
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