Following the Search Generative Experience (SGE) in September, Google is rolling out Bard access for teens with safety guardrails in place.
This is coming to “most countries around the world” from Thursday onwards. It will specifically be available for those that “meet the minimum age requirement to manage their own Google Account” and have English set, while more languages are coming over time.
Bard has been trained to “recognize areas that are inappropriate to younger users.” Safety features are in place to “prevent unsafe content, such as illegal or age-gated substances, from appearing in its responses to teens.”
When teenagers ask a fact-based question for the first time, Google will run the double-check response feature that “helps evaluate whether there’s content across the web to substantiate Bard’s response.” Bard will actively and continuously recommend that they use double-check to “help them develop information literacy and critical thinking skills.”
This is intended to raise awareness of how large language models (LLMs) can hallucinate, and Google plans to bring this to all new Bard users.
There will also be a “tailored onboarding experience” for teens that links to Google’s AI Literacy Guide, a video with “tips on how to use generative AI responsibly,” and an “overview of how Bard Activity is used” with the option to turn on/off.
Google says it “consulted with child safety and development experts to help shape our content policies and an experience that prioritizes safety,” like the Family Online Safety Institute.
For this audience, Bard is being especially positioned as a way to “find inspiration, discover new hobbies, and solve everyday problems.”
For example, they could ask Bard for writing tips for a class president speech, suggestions for what universities to apply to, or ways to learn a new sport like pickleball.
One of the more interesting use cases is as a learning tool that can conversationally explain complex concepts. In terms of new features conceding with this launch, Bard will now let users type or upload a math equation to get step-by-step explanations (like Lens), as well as the answer.
Bard can also now generate charts from tables or data mentioned in a prompt.
“…like if a teen asks Bard to show in a bar chart how many hours they volunteered across a few months.”
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