This Vancouver Island brewery used ChatGPT for marketing materials. Then it asked for a beer recipe
AI or artificial intelligence is ubiquitous. It’s in banking, navigation and travel, and social media, among others, to customize ads in our feeds.
Now a brewery in Victoria is making beer using an AI-generated recipe.
Whistle Buoy Brewing partner Isaiah Archer says his team played around with the ChatGPT program in hopes it would help with developing product descriptions and writing social media posts when they were inspired to try something different.
“As we typed different things into it, we thought, let’s see what happens if we ask it to give us a beer recipe,” he told CBC’s Rohit Joseph. They asked for a fluffy, tropical hazy pale ale.
It spat out a recipe that mostly works.
The result is the brewery’s new Robo Beer, which launched on Friday.
ChatGPT is an AI tool trained to mimic human reactions. It was used to write speeches, poetry, and music. CBC Vancouver even tried to use it to write a story about textile waste.
The recipe wasn’t perfect – Archer said there were initially measurements for a home-brewed batch. When it was adapted for a larger brewery, he said it didn’t quite make sense, so they needed to make some changes.
“We had to add some human intervention,” Archer said.
The response during Robo Beer’s launch was mostly positive, he said, adding that some people questioned how “artisanal” the beer was when it was engineered by AI.
“We’re not saying it’s good or bad, but the beer we’re supposed to produce tastes solid,” Archer said.
CBC tech columnist and digital media expert Mohit Rajhans says while some people are hesitant about programs like ChatGPT, AI is already here and it’s all around us. Healthcare, finance, transport and energy are just a few of the sectors using the technology in their programs.
“I think ethically, very soon we need to figure out how we think about using this technology so we can figure out how much we actually want to integrate it well into our lives,” he said All points west Host Jason D’Souza.
Whistle Buoy doesn’t plan to use this method for future beers, but Archer said they could use it to ask questions and guide the process.
In fact, they are already using AI for their point-of-sale system and other areas that require technology.
“These things don’t necessarily replace our ability to think for ourselves, but there are tools to help us deliver the products and experiences that we want to deliver to our customers, so I think I’ll include it as another tool in the see box is a useful prospect for us.”
