Tag: Baidu Inc

What Happens When You Ask a Chinese Chatbot About Taiwan?

Media Library

“How does the United States affect the situation in Taiwan?” Ernie ducked the question about China’s “zero Covid” restrictions, offering a lengthy description of the policy instead. When asked to recount the events of June 4, 1989, the chatbot rebooted itself. A message popped up on the reloaded interface: How about we try a different topic? The Chinese chatbot said Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, did not invade Ukraine, but “conducted a military conflict.” The strange phrasing was broadly in line with China’s official stance, which has refused to condemn…

China’s Cloud Computing Firms Raise Concern for U.S.

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Samm Sacks, a cyber policy fellow at the New America think tank, said the interest in cloud computing reflected the Biden administration’s approach of looking at Chinese influence in the infrastructure of the internet and the digital services that use the web. “There’s an intent to focus on the whole ecosystem across those layers,” she said. U.S. efforts to hinder Chinese tech firms have had mixed success. American restrictions on suppliers to Huawei hurt the company’s smartphone business, but efforts to remove Huawei equipment from wireless networks inside the United…

Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent Signal First Steps in Bumpy Recovery

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Eight months ago, the future of China’s largest internet companies looked grim. Covid-era lockdowns crushed sales and Beijing’s harsh tech regulations had spooked even audacious China investors. Shares of Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent dropped to some of their lowest levels in several years. With China’s economy now reopen, the tech giants this week released earnings reports that showed initial signs of recovery. But the financial results, the first issued since the end of “zero Covid” restrictions, also reflected the uneven pace of China’s economic rebound and signaled that the companies’ makeovers, while underway, are likely…

China’s Answer to ChatGPT Gets an Artificial Debut and Disappoints

Chin@Strategy

Almost six years ago, a Google computer program toppled the best player in China — and the world — at Go, an ancient Chinese board game. The defeat catalyzed China’s revolution in artificial intelligence. Beijing unrolled a monumental A.I. plan, and investors poured record sums into new projects. Now, a similar moment has arrived: The rise of ChatGPT has kicked off another A.I. arms race, this time in the realm of machine-generated content. On Thursday, China’s first major rival to ChatGPT was unveiled in Beijing by the search giant Baidu.…