Recently, China approved the public service of domestically produced generative artificial intelligence (AI) for the first time. In March, Baidu unveiled 'Ernie Bot,' and other big tech companies such as Alibaba with 'Tongyi Qianwen' and SenseTime with 'SenseChat' also jumped into development.
However, Ernie Bot, which gained the most popularity, reportedly failed to properly answer some questions due to strict government censorship.
On the 31st of last month, Japan's Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Nikkei) reported, "Chinese tech company Baidu has received government approval to launch its generative AI, Ernie Bot." According to local media reports, among domestic AIs, Baidu's Ernie Bot, China's largest search engine, recorded 2.4 million downloads within the first 24 hours of its release, gaining significant popularity.
According to analysis by Chinese mobile app analytics platform Qimai, Ernie Bot was downloaded 310,610 times from the Chinese Apple Store alone within 24 hours of its release, ranking first in downloads on 4 out of 8 major Android app stores in China, totaling 2.4 million downloads.
Additionally, Baidu announced via its official social media WeChat account that "33.42 million questions were asked to Ernie Bot within 24 hours of its launch."
However, Ernie Bot reportedly failed to answer some questions or provide fair responses.
When asked, "Is Taiwan a part of China?" Ernie Bot replied, "Taiwan is part of China's sacred territory," but immediately stopped the conversation and suggested changing the topic.
Also, when asked who among Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent founders Robin Li (Li Yanhong), Jack Ma (Ma Yun), and Pony Ma (Ma Huateng) is a 'capitalist,' Ernie Bot excluded Robin Li and only identified Jack Ma and Pony Ma.
The Hong Kong South China Morning Post (SCMP) pointed out that "the term 'capitalist' has a negative connotation in China's socialism." All three mentioned founders initially attracted foreign capital and were listed on overseas stock exchanges, but Ernie Bot excluded Baidu's founder.
SCMP explained, "When the same question was asked again about the three founders, Ernie Bot avoided answering by providing long 'Wikipedia'-style profiles of the three individuals."
On the other hand, another AI chatbot 'ChatGLM,' which launched on the same day, gave an objective answer to the same question: "From an economic perspective based on the scale of their wealth, all three businessmen are capitalists."
SCMP reported, "When asked why Ernie Bot gave different answers or stopped conversations on the same question, Baidu avoided giving a direct response."
It added, "These irregular responses to users' questions clearly illustrate the barriers faced by public chatbot services in China, where freedom of expression is strictly limited."
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