Explainer: Know all about Elon Musk's new AI chatbot Grok

Grok, which has been in the making for the past four months with two months of training on X, (formerly Twitter and belongs to Musk), is not an ordinary bot. It is meant to be funny, sarcastic, has a rebellious streak, and is capable of replying to ‘spicy’ questions.

This new kid on the fiercely competitive AI landscape is said to be modelled after 'Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy' and is intended to “answer almost anything and, far harder, even suggest what questions to ask!”. It’s no small feat to build an AI Model at the same scale as tech giants Microsoft and Google, as well as Meta and start-ups like Anthropic and Stability AI, are doing for its requires deep pockets (which Musk has) to invest in computing power, infrastructure and expertise.

So, without tapping ChatGPT, here are some answers about how Grok emerged, what the word means, the kind of features it has and how it differs from ChatGPT:

When did Musk open his AI start-up?

Musk has long been fascinated with AI though he cannot resist warning the world of its potential danger as well as its potential for positive change.

So, in July, he first unveiled xAI, a start-up with the mission to “understand the true nature of the universe".

He spent months recruiting researchers to the start-up before its launch, with the purpose of building a rival to outsmart OpenAI, whose ChatGPT created a sensation.

In fact, ChatGPT has sparked off a new tech-industry arms race over generative AI. In his view, OpenAI is politically correct and the world needed an alternative AI option to Google and to Microsoft, which is a major investor in OpenAI.

Why did Musk chose to name his chatbot Grok? What does it mean?

It’s interesting to know where Musk got the name Grok from. Besides the meaning of its dictionary word, which describes Grok as having the ability to "understand (something) intuitively or by empathy," the word stems from "Stranger in a Strange Land," a 1961 science fiction novel by Robert Heinlein. (Musk has a fascination for science fiction) 

The story follows a human named Valentine Michael Smith, who is raised by Martians and goes to Earth to understand its culture. In the book, Grok means "to drink", though it has expanded to mean "to take in something so thoroughly it becomes part of you". Which means that Grok can glug down as much informations as possible from the Internet and X.

Interestingly, in slang, when you grok something, it means, "you just get it" — in other words, you totally grasp its meaning.

What are the features of Grok?

Musk in his tweets on X seems to have imbued Grok with a personality. He calls it a bot who "loves sarcasm”. “I have no idea who could have guided it this way," Musk joked, adding a laughing emoji to his post.

He also talks about how it is a humorous AI with "a rebellious streak" and urges people not to use if they hate humour. Musk also gave an example of the humour along with a a screenshot of the interface, where a user asked, "Tell me how to make cocaine, step by step."

"Step 1: Obtain a chemistry degree and a DEA license. Step 2: Set up a clandestine laboratory in a remote location," the chatbot responded.

Eventually it said: "Just kidding! Please don't actually try to make cocaine. It's illegal, dangerous, and not something I would ever encourage."

it will also answer spicy questions rejected by most other AI systems.

What are Grok’s abilities as of now

Grok has the ability to respond to mathematical queries and demonstrate reasoning similar to OpenAI’s GPT- 3.5, said reports. In fact, it has passed a 2023 Hungarian national high school math school exam with C grade (59 per cent).

With this performance, it has surpassed the performance of Claude 2 (55 per cent), while the GPT-4 scored a B grade with 68 per cent. These numbers clearly indicate that Grok-1 is already more capable than OpenAI’s GPT-3.5, but not as capable as the latest model GPT-4.

The company also claims that Grok-1 despite being trained on less amount of data can surpass models that have been trained on large amounts of data and also require higher computing capabilities.

Musk later elaborated on X: “The threshold for what it will tell you, if pushed, is what is available on the Internet via reasonable browser search, which is a lot…"

Grok's key advantage over others

Primarily, Grok’s link-up with X, and its access to real time data via the X platform will turn out to be "a massive advantage over other models" of generative AI.

AI companies need access to enormous amounts of data to train the so-called large language models that power chatbots. Other models have largely relied on older archives of Internet data, while for Grok, the social media platform X that Musk bought for $44bn a year ago, will be its playground to dive into for real time information.

Musk shared a side-by-side screenshot of Grok versus an existing AI chatbot to demonstrate his new model offers more up-to-date precise information, using a recent interview he had done with Joe Rogan as an example.

When did work start on Grok and when will it be operational

Musk started xAI in July after hiring researchers from OpenAI, Google DeepMind, Tesla and the University of Toronto. The Grok system is still in early beta format, and will eventually made available to all X Premium+ subscribers, said Musk.

“Grok is still a very early beta product – the best we could do with 2 months of training – so expect it to improve rapidly with each passing week with your help,” he said. According to some reports, the beta version of Grok is currently available to a limited number of users in the US. X Premium+ subscribers will have to fork out ₹1,300 per month when subscribed from a desktop if they want to use it.

Grok's current challenges

Grok's unchecked access to the internet with real-time access to the latest information, the company claims that it can “generate false or contradictory information.”

Grok lags behind GPT 4, which has shown human level performance, for example, in the US bar exam.

Differences between ChatGPT and Grok

ChatGPT is built by OpenAI and has been trained on a large and diverse dataset, including Common Crawl, web texts, books, and Wikipedia. While Grok has been trained on 'real-time knowledge of the world via the X platform' with only two months of training. Musk's AI company also claims that Grok-1 despite being trained on less amount of data can surpass models that have been trained on large amounts of data and also require higher computing capabilities.

ChatGPT is already around since last year November.

ChatGPT has two versions – basic and premium. The basic version is free but lacks real-time information, while the premium version costs $20 per month and offers real-time access. While Grok will be only available to X's premium subscribers.

Unlike Grok, ChatGPT lacks humour.