The Google Gemini chatbot’s “woke” AI image generator still isn’t fixed greater than a month after its disastrous rollout – and a few critics claim it’s the newest sign that embattled CEO Sundar Pichai ought to be out of a job.
The search giant disabled Gemini’s ability to create pictures of humans in late February after it produced bizarre ahistorical photos corresponding to Black Vikings and “diverse” Nazi-era German soldiers.
On the time, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis said that the feature could be “back online very shortly in the following couple of weeks”.
As of Sunday, Google’s AI image generator was still offline, with users told that the corporate “expect(s) this feature to return soon.” Asked for a timetable on when it would be fully restored, a Google spokesman declined to comment.
It’s a rare, embarrassing retreat for the Silicon Valley juggernaut. In a possible sign of trouble for Pichai, Google’s reclusive co-founder Sergey Brin admitted the tech giant had “definitely tousled” and “upset numerous people” in rare public remarks after the Gemini fiasco.
The 51-year-old Pichai — who also blasted the chatbot’s behavior as “completely unacceptable” in a memo to employees — has enjoyed remarkable freedom during his eight-and-a-half years as CEO. He enjoys close ties with Brin and fellow co-founder Larry Page, who retain voting control over every facet of the business.
Nevertheless, one former senior Google worker told The Post that Pichai’s job “ought to be at incredible risk” given the mistakes which have occurred on his watch.
“It’s all classic signs of a badly run company, except that Larry and Sergey control it like a family business,” said the ex-employee, who left Google last 12 months. “Sundar can survive as CEO eternally so long as Larry and Sergey don’t care enough to make a change.”
The warmth is on Pichai as Google reportedly is seeking to integrate paid AI features into its cash-cow search engine despite rampant skepticism about Gemini’s quality. Any further issues could derail talks with Apple to integrate Gemini into iPhones, while archrivals like Microsoft-backed OpenAI and Meta are pushing full steam ahead with their very own plans.
A lukewarm assessment of Google’s AI performance has shown up in the corporate’s stock price. The stock’s 8% gain in the primary quarter lagged behind that of the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq composite.
Google declined to comment.
Pichai’s critics include influential “Stratechery” blogger Ben Thompson, who argued Gemini chatbot’s “absurd” responses – which included a refusal to say whether Elon Musk or Hitler is worse – showed Pichai had allowed rogue employees to upset company culture and threaten Google’s business.
Thompson said Google’s current turmoil is harking back to Microsoft’s slump within the latter days of Steve Ballmer’s run as CEO, when the corporate clung to its struggling Windows platform. Microsoft later returned to growth only after a leadership change, when Satya Nadella refocused the corporate as a services provider.
“The purpose of the corporate ought not be to inform users what to think, but to assist them make essential decisions, as Page once promised,” Thompson wrote after the AI image disaster. “Meaning, before everything, excising the corporate of employees interested in Google’s power and its potential to assist them execute their political program, and return decision-making to those that actually intend to make a very good product.”
“That, by extension, must mean removing those that let the previous run amok, as much as and including CEO Sundar Pichai,” Thompson added.
More broadly, Google – which also fumbled the launch of its first chatbot “Bard” at a widely mocked demo event in Paris last 12 months – has once more given fresh fodder to critics who consider the highly-paid Pichai would be the mistaken person to oversee the AI race, where the corporate already shows signs of lagging behind Microsoft and OpenAI.
Critics point to other signs of discord inside Google’s sprawling empire – including ongoing layoffs which have sparked an internal morale crisis, evasive answers on the corporate’s earnings calls and a scarcity of product innovation.
Bernstein analyst Mark Shmulik said Google’s most up-to-date failure “only further raises increasingly louder questions around whether that is the correct management team to guide Google into this next era.”
Shmulik expanded on his point in an email to The Post, noting that Google’s more pessimistic investors are watching closely for signs of weakness as the corporate scrambles to catch up within the AI race.
“Should you consider we’re in war time, then the recent string of public missteps likely won’t fill you with confidence you possibly can win this war,” Shmulik said.
During a recent episode of the favored “All In” tech podcast, co-host and former Google executive David Friedberg noted many investors were left “deeply frustrated and indignant” as a result of fears the corporate is falling behind rivals on the AI front.
“A lot of the investors I spoke with aren’t indignant in regards to the ‘woke’ DEI search engine,” Friedberg said earlier this month. “They’re indignant in regards to the proven fact that such a blunder happened and that it indicates that Google may not have the ability to compete effectively and isn’t organized to compete effectively in AI – just from a consumer competitiveness perspective.”
A native of Chennai, India, Pichai first joined Google in 2004. He became Google’s CEO in 2015 after Brin and Page restructured the corporate under the name Alphabet.
Under Pichai’s leadership, Google has enjoyed massive growth, with shares surging greater than 300% since he took over the gig. The corporate’s recent results have been solid, with revenue and earnings growth accelerating in every quarter in 2023 and Google Cloud achieving profitability last 12 months.
Still, detractors argue the sheer size of Google’s entrenched empire – which incorporates a greater than 90% search of the web search market – has helped to insulate Pichai and other members of the corporate’s leadership team from criticism.
Despite its AI missteps and allegations that the quality of Google Search has plummeted as a result of spam, the corporate raked in greater than $300 billion in revenue in fiscal 2023 alone.
“The truth is that Google gets away with mediocrity in 1,000,000 under the radar ways because they’re a monopoly and don’t face serious competition,” one tech policy insider who requested anonymity to debate the matter. “This can be a rare moment where that mediocrity happened to blow up publicly.”
Other Google critics, corresponding to Jeff Hauser, executive director on the Revolving Door Project, argue the large company has simply change into too bloated for any individual to effectively manage — and ought to be broken up under antitrust law.
“The scope of just the political challenges that his company faces is immense and would require greater than 40-hour work week to maintain tabs on,” Hauer said. “I feel it might probably be higher if the one that is in command of Gmail and search promoting wasn’t also the person overseeing generative AI.”
The Google Gemini chatbot’s “woke” AI image generator still isn’t fixed greater than a month after its disastrous rollout – and a few critics claim it’s the newest sign that embattled CEO Sundar Pichai ought to be out of a job.
The search giant disabled Gemini’s ability to create pictures of humans in late February after it produced bizarre ahistorical photos corresponding to Black Vikings and “diverse” Nazi-era German soldiers.
On the time, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis said that the feature could be “back online very shortly in the following couple of weeks”.
As of Sunday, Google’s AI image generator was still offline, with users told that the corporate “expect(s) this feature to return soon.” Asked for a timetable on when it would be fully restored, a Google spokesman declined to comment.
It’s a rare, embarrassing retreat for the Silicon Valley juggernaut. In a possible sign of trouble for Pichai, Google’s reclusive co-founder Sergey Brin admitted the tech giant had “definitely tousled” and “upset numerous people” in rare public remarks after the Gemini fiasco.
The 51-year-old Pichai — who also blasted the chatbot’s behavior as “completely unacceptable” in a memo to employees — has enjoyed remarkable freedom during his eight-and-a-half years as CEO. He enjoys close ties with Brin and fellow co-founder Larry Page, who retain voting control over every facet of the business.
Nevertheless, one former senior Google worker told The Post that Pichai’s job “ought to be at incredible risk” given the mistakes which have occurred on his watch.
“It’s all classic signs of a badly run company, except that Larry and Sergey control it like a family business,” said the ex-employee, who left Google last 12 months. “Sundar can survive as CEO eternally so long as Larry and Sergey don’t care enough to make a change.”
The warmth is on Pichai as Google reportedly is seeking to integrate paid AI features into its cash-cow search engine despite rampant skepticism about Gemini’s quality. Any further issues could derail talks with Apple to integrate Gemini into iPhones, while archrivals like Microsoft-backed OpenAI and Meta are pushing full steam ahead with their very own plans.
A lukewarm assessment of Google’s AI performance has shown up in the corporate’s stock price. The stock’s 8% gain in the primary quarter lagged behind that of the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq composite.
Google declined to comment.
Pichai’s critics include influential “Stratechery” blogger Ben Thompson, who argued Gemini chatbot’s “absurd” responses – which included a refusal to say whether Elon Musk or Hitler is worse – showed Pichai had allowed rogue employees to upset company culture and threaten Google’s business.
Thompson said Google’s current turmoil is harking back to Microsoft’s slump within the latter days of Steve Ballmer’s run as CEO, when the corporate clung to its struggling Windows platform. Microsoft later returned to growth only after a leadership change, when Satya Nadella refocused the corporate as a services provider.
“The purpose of the corporate ought not be to inform users what to think, but to assist them make essential decisions, as Page once promised,” Thompson wrote after the AI image disaster. “Meaning, before everything, excising the corporate of employees interested in Google’s power and its potential to assist them execute their political program, and return decision-making to those that actually intend to make a very good product.”
“That, by extension, must mean removing those that let the previous run amok, as much as and including CEO Sundar Pichai,” Thompson added.
More broadly, Google – which also fumbled the launch of its first chatbot “Bard” at a widely mocked demo event in Paris last 12 months – has once more given fresh fodder to critics who consider the highly-paid Pichai would be the mistaken person to oversee the AI race, where the corporate already shows signs of lagging behind Microsoft and OpenAI.
Critics point to other signs of discord inside Google’s sprawling empire – including ongoing layoffs which have sparked an internal morale crisis, evasive answers on the corporate’s earnings calls and a scarcity of product innovation.
Bernstein analyst Mark Shmulik said Google’s most up-to-date failure “only further raises increasingly louder questions around whether that is the correct management team to guide Google into this next era.”
Shmulik expanded on his point in an email to The Post, noting that Google’s more pessimistic investors are watching closely for signs of weakness as the corporate scrambles to catch up within the AI race.
“Should you consider we’re in war time, then the recent string of public missteps likely won’t fill you with confidence you possibly can win this war,” Shmulik said.
During a recent episode of the favored “All In” tech podcast, co-host and former Google executive David Friedberg noted many investors were left “deeply frustrated and indignant” as a result of fears the corporate is falling behind rivals on the AI front.
“A lot of the investors I spoke with aren’t indignant in regards to the ‘woke’ DEI search engine,” Friedberg said earlier this month. “They’re indignant in regards to the proven fact that such a blunder happened and that it indicates that Google may not have the ability to compete effectively and isn’t organized to compete effectively in AI – just from a consumer competitiveness perspective.”
A native of Chennai, India, Pichai first joined Google in 2004. He became Google’s CEO in 2015 after Brin and Page restructured the corporate under the name Alphabet.
Under Pichai’s leadership, Google has enjoyed massive growth, with shares surging greater than 300% since he took over the gig. The corporate’s recent results have been solid, with revenue and earnings growth accelerating in every quarter in 2023 and Google Cloud achieving profitability last 12 months.
Still, detractors argue the sheer size of Google’s entrenched empire – which incorporates a greater than 90% search of the web search market – has helped to insulate Pichai and other members of the corporate’s leadership team from criticism.
Despite its AI missteps and allegations that the quality of Google Search has plummeted as a result of spam, the corporate raked in greater than $300 billion in revenue in fiscal 2023 alone.
“The truth is that Google gets away with mediocrity in 1,000,000 under the radar ways because they’re a monopoly and don’t face serious competition,” one tech policy insider who requested anonymity to debate the matter. “This can be a rare moment where that mediocrity happened to blow up publicly.”
Other Google critics, corresponding to Jeff Hauser, executive director on the Revolving Door Project, argue the large company has simply change into too bloated for any individual to effectively manage — and ought to be broken up under antitrust law.
“The scope of just the political challenges that his company faces is immense and would require greater than 40-hour work week to maintain tabs on,” Hauer said. “I feel it might probably be higher if the one that is in command of Gmail and search promoting wasn’t also the person overseeing generative AI.”
