A Massachusetts brewery asked ChatGPT to come up with a beer recipe.
At Night Shift Brewing in Everett, Massachusetts, there is always something brewing.
The brewery, co-founded by three roommates in Somerville, prides itself on being hands-on.
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"You are playing with culinary ingredients, playing with recipes, playing with time and temperature as an element of science," said Robert Burns, co-founder of Night Shift.
The last few years haven't been easy, though. First came the pandemic, then a worldwide carbon dioxide shortage that left the industry gassed. Add in the normal hops that come with operating a brewery, and it can pour a lot out of you.
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Those issues, though, are now in the past.
"We get to be creative again, think outside the box, be innovative, be playful and fun," Burns said.
And that is exactly what Night Shift did for its latest beer, turning to artificial intelligence.
"I was worried we would get a lot of people being like, 'This is stupid,' or 'You are letting robots just replace people,'" Michael Oxton, another co-founder of Night Shift, said Wednesday.
Oxton turned to the controversial ChatGPT to come up with a new beer recipe. A few tweaks later, a new beer was born.
"I was blown away. How did it know to modernize it this way? That is actually what you do," Oxton said. "You have to prompt it, you have to stay very involved, but it does create some opportunities that I don't think existed before."
The Night Shift team also using AI to create a label and name for the new beer: It is fittingly called "AI-P-A."
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"We are not trying to pass the Harvard Business School exam or anything like that, we are just playing around with making some tasty beer that people enjoy," Burns said.
Night Shift did a limited run, not knowing what to expect, but it has turned into a huge hit. On Wednesday, customers stopped by the Everett tap room just to pick some up.
"It is crazy what computers can do," Richard Kelly said.
Burns and Oxton said they've assured employees they are not going anywhere, and that this draught is just a quick sip into the world of AI.
"I don't think we foresee the world where the robots are taking over," Burns said. "At least just yet."
