Google has announced the opening of its experimental conversational AI service, Bard, to trusted testers. Bard is powered by Google’s Language Model for Dialogue Applications (LaMDA) and seeks to combine the breadth of the world’s knowledge with the power and intelligence of Google’s large language models.

Google is releasing Bard initially with a lightweight model version of LaMDA, which requires significantly less computing power and will allow the company to scale to more users. With this approach, Google will gather more feedback and combine it with its own internal testing to ensure that Bard’s responses meet a high bar for quality, safety, and accuracy in real-world information.

According to Google, Bard draws on information from the web to provide fresh and high-quality responses. It can be used as a creative outlet and a launchpad for curiosity, assisting users in learning about new discoveries or exploring a range of topics, from the latest findings from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to the best football strikers.

Google is excited about this phase of testing as it will allow the company to continue to learn and improve Bard’s quality and speed. The release of Bard marks another step forward in Google’s journey to translate deep research and breakthroughs into products that can help people.

In the coming weeks, Google plans to make Bard more widely available to the public, following the testing phase. The company hopes that Bard will be a valuable tool for users looking to expand their knowledge and understanding of the world.