Google's Gemini scandal has been linked to rushed product shipping and internal misalignment, days after co-founder Sergey Brin and CEO Sundar Pichai admitted the company made a mistake.
What Happened: Insiders at Alphabet Inc.'s
Interestingly, the Gemini app's photo generation feature isn't powered by the Gemini model but by an older text-to-photo model. This was a quick fix to speed up the feature's launch.
Moreover, there appears to be a misalignment between the research team led by Demis Hassabis and the search organization under Prabhakar Raghavan.
While the former is in charge of building the underlying models, the latter is responsible for integrating them into user-facing products. Pichai has hinted at "structural changes" in a recent employee memo, which could potentially address this issue.
Why It Matters: The Gemini scandal is not the first time Google's hasty approach to product launch has been scrutinized.
Google co-founder Brin publicly admitted to rushing the Gemini image generator without proper testing. This followed an admission by Pichai that the Gemini AI errors were "completely unacceptable."
The Gemini AI had been generating historically inaccurate images, leading to widespread criticism. This included misrepresentations of Google's own co-founders, among others.
Internal discord and lack of alignment within Google's teams have been a concern for quite some time now, with former employees criticizing Pichai's leadership and claiming low employee morale.
