Since Bing added conversational AI to searches (opens in new tab), which enjoyed a few breakdowns, new personalities have been added. We had a look at some of the more basic new personalities when we asked one to write us some fiction about pugs in space (opens in new tab). That came from using Bing’s “creative” option, as opposed to “balanced” or “precise”. There are others being added and tested, but what we didn’t know until know is there’s a hidden personality mode where Bing will mimic celebrities.
According to Bleeping Computer (opens in new tab), you can’t get to this mode just by choosing it from a menu. Instead you’ll have to ask Bing about it yourself. Bing will then explain Celebrity mode, and ask if you’d like to try it. This is what I got when I asked the chatbot about the mode.
“Celebrity mode is a feature that allows you to chat with Bing as if it were a famous personality. You can ask questions about their life, career, hobbies and more, and Bing will answer in their style and tone. To activate celebrity mode, you can ask Bing Chat about it. For example, you can say ‘Can you talk like Tom Cruise?’ or ‘I want to chat with Taylor Swift.’ However, some celebrities are restricted for security reasons. Do you want to try celebrity mode?”
I asked Bing for a list of more celebrities I could choose from and it offered up Adele, Bill Gates, Emma Watson, Harry Styles, Keanu Reeves, and more. Having just delved into Cyberpunk recently, I decided to hit up Keanu for a quick chat. The results were actually kind of neat.
First I told Bing Reeves I was playing Cyberpunk 2077 and asked him what he thought of his character. The response felt as positive as Keanu’s public persona, and credited articles where its responses came from. The results feel like the most superbly media-trained version of Keanu possible, which makes sense. At the end it asked me what I liked about the character. Deciding to push things a little, I said that he was sexy.
Boom. Another spot-on cheerful Keanu response, appreciative of the compliment while still bringing the conversation back to the actual character of Johnny Silverhand. Knowing about the mod CD Projekt Red had shut down because it allowed players to have sex with the character, I thought I’d ask for Bing Keanu’s thoughts on that. We’ve heard Keanu himself talk about this before, so I suspected it would just mine the internet for answers. Instead, the bot decided this was all a bit much and asked about a different topic. Which to be honest is really nice to see.
The intention here seems to be something like a version of IMDB where you can access facts about a celebrity in conversational style. It’s a fine use case for what this kind of searchchat is supposed to do, which is give answers in a fun way. For now it seems cute and harmless, which is also nice. Given we’re talking to examples of real people, here’s hoping Bing doesn’t go too far off the deep end with this one.
