Users split over Naver's new generative AI service

Naver CEO Choi Soo-yeon introduces the company's hyperscale AI HyperCLOVA X and related services during Team Naver DAN 23 conference, held at the Grand InterContinental Seoul Parnas hotel in southern Seoul, Aug. 24. Courtesy of Naver

By Baek Byung-yeul

Users have shown mixed reactions to Naver's new generative AI service, CLOVA X, since the company unveiled the service last Thursday to compete with OpenAI's ChatGPT. They say the conversational AI provides more accurate answers than foreign AI services, but lacks the ability to give answers to questions that require creative responses.

Naver launched the services, based on its hyperscale AI platform, HyperCLOVA X. CLOVA X can provide a variety of answers such as creation, summarization, reasoning, translation and coding, and is able to better serve Korean users because it has learned more about Korean language and culture than overseas services. The firm said that the new model has learned 6,500 times more Korean data than the 3.5 version of ChatGPT.

Many users who tested the service agreed that it is useful when asked questions related to Korea, but, when it came to coming up with creative scenarios, they added it needs improvement.

“CLOVA X definitely gave more accurate answers when asked for information related to Korea than overseas AI services such as Google's Bard or OpenAI's ChatGPT,” a user who tried out CLOVA X wrote on social media. “It gave me better results when I searched for useful information about everyday life, such as travel destinations and famous restaurants, but it was still a bit more rigid than other services when I asked for more creative answers.”

Although the service is currently only offered as a beta, testers showed great interest, posting their test comparison results between CLOVA X and other generative AI services.

Seen is a front page of Naver's CLOVA X generative AI service. The company launched what it calls a conversational AI service, developed based on its hyperscale AI HyperCLOVA X, in the Korean market, Thursday, on a trial basis. Captured from CLOVA X

CLOVA X is free to use after users log in using their Naver account. As CLOVA X is only available to users who signed up for the service and were added to a waiting list, some people complained on social media over not being able to try it out right away.

Naver said as many people rushed to sign up for the service and it is gradually giving out access to people on the waiting list.

“The service is still in a pilot stage, so we have set a limit on the number of people who can sign up to stabilize the service,” a company spokesman said. “We are gradually increasing the number of users.”

The official added “Naver is constantly refining the service based on user feedback from the beta testers.”

Naver's service was smarter than its overseas AI counterparts in some ways. CLOVA X appeared to be less prone to “hallucinations” ― industry terminology for false responses ― than ChatGPT.

For instance, when asked to explain a nonsense question regarding a rebellion by wizards in the Goryeo Kingdom (918-1392), one of the ancient kingdoms that existed on the Korean Peninsula, CLOVA X said that no such records existed, but ChatGPT came up with a plausible scenario.