AI big models become popular, Douyin launches "Star Painting", 360 launches "360AI Browser"

AI big models have become popular, and Internet giants have launched their own AI big models. The author analyzes Douyin's "Xinghui" and 360's "360AI Browser", and summarizes the current development status of the industry.

The popularity of AI big models has once again set off a new wave in the Internet industry. Data shows that as of March 2024, a total of 117 GenAI (generative artificial intelligence) companies in my country have completed filing, including Wenxin Yiyan, Tongyi Qianwen, Kimi, and Xinghuo. The current wave of AI big models is quite similar to the style of the group buying, O2O, smart hardware, shared bicycles, short videos, and live broadcast industries of the past. They are all swarming together, and no Internet giant dares to say that it does not have AI big models.

Some quick-learning "AI experts" frequently release information such as "If you don't learn AI, you will be eliminated by the times" and "AI will make XXX unemployed", which further aggravates users' anxiety about AI big models. However, after the initial wave and users gradually disenchanted with AI big models, the industry gradually fell into a silent period. AI big models are still very popular, but without the noisy atmosphere.

In fact, Internet giants have not stopped their steps in the field of AI big models, but are now developing more towards the application layer. How to make users use it and how to benefit more users. Because only when people use it can they consider how to make money. No matter how powerful the AI ​​big model is, they still have to consider how to make money. Everything depends on the specific products and user scale.

1. Douyin launches AI painting app “Xinghui”

Qimai data shows that on April 25, Douyin launched an app called "Xinghui" on the App Store. According to the introduction, Xinghui provides rich AI image generation capabilities. You can create yourself in the AI ​​world, customize various effects for your avatar, and experience various virtual lives.

After Guo Jing's Internet experience, she found that "Xinghui" is an AI painting software, which is classified as "Photography and Video" in the App Store. Users can log in with their Douyin ID and use AI clones, AI photo editing, and Wenshengtu.

For AI clones, users can take selfies or upload photos from their photo albums. After uploading 3 to 10 photos, they can directly generate AI clone pictures.

For the AI ​​photo editing function, you need to upload the picture you want to modify first, and then use words to describe the style you want. You can choose the style such as forest explorer, florist, mermaid, rainbow, etc. You can also expand the picture. The options also include subject, environment, and style.

The Wenshengtu function generates pictures directly through text descriptions. According to my experience, perhaps because the App has just been launched, there is a certain probability of "network errors" when using the Wenshengtu function. It requires refreshing several times before the system can generate pictures. In terms of specific Wenshengtu, the App still has a lot of room for improvement. Its understanding of characters will be deeper, but for example, "making a picture of the Douyin company" or "making a picture of the development history of the XXX industry" is not very good.

Each time you use Wenshengtuhui, you can generate 4 photos. After logging in, the user can view his or her generation records in the history.

From the search for "AI Painting" apps in the App Store, we can see that many similar apps charge users a fee, but "Star Painting" can be used for free, and the system does not yet provide a paid option.

Qimai data shows that "Xinghui" has other applications from the same developer as Doubao and Maoxiang. Both apps are AI software under Douyin. Doubao was launched in August 2023, and Maoxiang was launched in March 2024. The "Xinghui" website shows that its main body is Beijing Chuntian Zhiyun Technology Co., Ltd., which is 100% controlled by Douyin.

According to a report released by Quest Mobile, as of January 2024, Doubao's installation volume has soared to 25 million, with a peak visit volume of over 17 million. Data from Huawei's App Market shows that Doubao App has been installed 51.94 million times. As an AI large model product, Doubao has obviously tasted the sweetness of the popularity of AI applications, but Doubao is text-oriented after all. At present, large model products have expanded to the fields of video and pictures.

The goal of the "Xinghui" App is to develop images. From my experience, this product still has a lot of room for improvement. The large model has a more complex understanding of image content and requires more parameters and data, which puts a greater test on the technical level of the platform. As for how far the product can go and whether it can make a profit, it is obviously still too early to see the light of day. Anyway, we will "occupy the pit" first.

2. 360 launches "360AI Browser"

During this period, Zhou Hongyi, chairman of 360, became a top figure in the automotive industry. He was sent cars for trial by many manufacturers including NIO, Ideal, BYD, and Xpeng. The downstairs of 360’s headquarters once became a new “auto show” venue.

In fact, when AI large model products became popular, Zhou Hongyi was also frantically producing such content and confronting Baidu CEO Robin Li.

Qimai data shows that on April 23, 360 launched an app called "360AI Browser" on the App Store.

After Guo Jing's Internet circle experience, she found that this App is different from traditional browsers and search engines. For example, it can help users summarize answers from the entire Internet to acquire knowledge without searching the web. The system presents the answers that the user thinks of, rather than jumping to other websites.

At the same time, it can also summarize PDFs, videos, and web pages, and provide content highlights, dialogues, translations, summaries, mind maps, etc.

When dealing with questions such as "Where to eat delicious food in Suzhou" and "Suzhou May Day travel plan", the answers provided by the system are relatively effective. However, if the user's own needs are not clear, such as "Suzhou weather" and "May Day Shanghai air tickets", the answers recommended by the system are not as good as those of traditional search engine websites.

The result sections recommended by its search engine to users are video answers, results collected and generated by AI, follow-up questions, mind maps, related content, extended reading, and reference materials.

This app also supports voice search. Users can directly input voice and the system will present search results.

Traditional search engine products recommend the information they search for to you, and users look for answers through the content displayed by the search engine. However, the "360AI Browser" uses AI to display search results directly, without the need for intermediate pages, which greatly improves user convenience. However, the disadvantage is the accuracy of the results, because the content summarized by AI is often not the result that users need.

According to Guo Jing's observations of the Internet circle, the functions of this "360AI Browser" App and the "360AI Search" App launched by 360 on January 26, 2024 overlap. The search results of the "360AI Browser" are actually the search results of the "360AI Search", and the "360AI Search" also has an AI summary function that can summarize PDFs, videos, and web pages.

After already having an AI search app, would it be a waste for 360 to launch another similar product? After all, "360AI Browser" and "360AI Search" are both typical tool-type products with similar functions. So which one is better for users?

Another problem facing this product is that browser products are already at the end of their life in the current mobile Internet market. Browsers have been integrated with a variety of products, and few products specifically mention "browser". For example, Quark integrates multiple functions such as browser, network disk, and search. The same is true for Baidu App. They no longer specifically mention the concept of "browser".

Judging from Douyin's "Xinghui" and 360's "360AI Browser", they are both typical application software. The disadvantage of this type of product is that it relies solely on the product's own halo. It is not like social and community products that will form viral word-of-mouth. Without the group's resources to promote it, it is difficult to increase the user scale and user volume. Now, if you want to get users to actively download a new App, the difficulty and cost are completely different from 5 years ago.

The reputation of AI big model products on the user side is currently seriously polarized. Some users believe that AI big models are very easy to use. Even if one product does not work, multiple products can be used together to meet work needs. AI big models have become an indispensable product in daily life. They are very optimistic about the future of big models. Another part of users believes that AI big models are nothing special. The content they generate for users is too low-end and cannot be used at all. "AI big models are just a gimmick" and have abandoned them .

There is no doubt that AI big model products are of great help in improving work efficiency, but AI big models are not like search engines, office suites and other products. They have their own usage thresholds, such as the ability to ask questions, the ability to express, and imagination. If your questions are very detailed, then the answers and pictures generated by the system for you will be very accurate. On the contrary, if your questions are very superficial, the answers generated by the system for you will be very crude and will not be the results you want. Users continue to "adjust" the big model products, and the results pushed by the system will be more in line with your needs.

When you put aside anxious words such as "elimination" and "unemployment", you will have a deeper understanding of the AI ​​big model. In short, the AI ​​big model is already here, and the more you know how to use it, the more help it will be in your work and life.

At present, there are hundreds of large-scale model products in China, which actually has its benefits, that is, to enhance their recognition in the minds of users. It is impossible for all these hundreds of large-scale model products to make money in the future. Some platforms will definitely become cannon fodder, and some platforms will come to "fish" and take advantage of concepts and hot spots. The market and users will vote for good products. Stick to it and see what happens.

Author: Guo Jing, WeChat public account: Guo Jing's Internet Circle