What is ChatGPT and why does it matter? Here's what you need to know | blogosm

This AI chatbot's advanced conversational capabilities have generated quite a buzz. We answer your questions.

umesh verma-635a912414f6f umesh verma-635a912414f6f
May 20, 2023 - 13:22 Updated: May 20, 2023 - 13:28

What is ChatGPT?

With the help of ChatGPT, an AI-powered natural language processing tool, you can communicate with the chatbot in a variety of ways that are human-like. The language model can help you with tasks like writing emails, essays, and code as well as provide answers to your questions.

OpenAI, an AI and research company, developed ChatGPT. ChatGPT was introduced on November 30, 2022, by the company. 

OpenAI is also responsible for creating DALL-E-2, a popular AI art generator, and Whisper, an automatic speech recognition system. 

Just how significant is ChatGPT?

"ChatGPT is frighteningly good. Elon Musk, who was a founding member of OpenAI before leaving, stated that we are not far from dangerously powerful AI. OpenAI's CEO, Sam Altman, claimed on Twitter that ChatGPT attracted over a million users in the first five days of its launch. 

The analysis by the Swiss bank UBS indicates that ChatGPT is the app with the greatest rate of growth. Only two months after its launch, the analysis predicts that ChatGPT had 100 million active users in January. Comparatively, TikTok reached 100 million users in nine months.

Visit chat.openai.com and register for an OpenAI account to access ChatGPT. 

Additionally, you can still access the chatbot using its previous URL, chat.openai.com/chat. For the benefit of the user, OpenAI condensed the original URL. 

With ChatGPT, you can start chatting right away after logging in. Ask a question to start the conversation. You can use ChatGPT for free and as many times as you'd like because it's still in the research stage.

Check out ZDNET's tutorial on how to start using ChatGPT for detailed instructions. 

How much does ChatGPT cost?

No matter what you use ChatGPT for, including writing, coding, and other activities, it is free to use. 

Users have access to a subscription option that costs $20 per month. Users who choose the paid subscription option receive additional benefits like general access even when there is a wait list and quicker response times. 

With the exception of access to the most recent AI version, known as GPT-4, which the subscription model ensures, the free version is still a good choice because it largely has the same technical capabilities. 

When I attempted to use ChatGPT, it indicated that it was full. Why does that matter?

The use of ChatGPT is still free. Many people are rushing to use it as a result of the buzz its advanced capabilities have created. The website runs on a server, and when too many users load the server, it becomes overloaded and unable to handle your request. This does not imply that you will never have access to it. Simply put, it suggests that you try visiting the website later, when fewer people are attempting to access the server. You could also leave the tab open and simply refresh it every so often. 

The model does more than just provide answers to straightforward queries. ChatGPT can write essays, give in-depth descriptions of art, generate AI art prompts, engage in philosophical discussions, and even write code for you. 

To make my daily life more productive, my personal favorite use of the chatbot is to ask for assistance in creating simple lists like packing, grocery, and to-do lists. There are countless options. 

A language model called ChatGPT was developed to communicate with the user. To assist users in finding the information they are looking for, search engines index web pages on the internet. The ability to conduct an internet search is not available in ChatGPT. It generates a response using the knowledge it acquired from training data, leaving room for error. 

Another significant distinction is that ChatGPT only has access to data through 2021, whereas Google or other conventional search engines have access to the most recent data. As a result, ChatGPT would be unable to respond to your query about the 2022 World Cup winner, but Google would.

Although ChatGPT appears to be very impressive, it still has limitations. These restrictions include the inability to respond to questions that are phrased in a particular way because it necessitates rephrasing in order to comprehend the input question. A more significant drawback is the poor quality of the responses it provides, which occasionally sound plausible but are excessively vague or verbose. 

Unintentional responses to questions can result when the model simply assumes what your ambiguous question means instead of seeking clarification. The developer question-and-answer website StackOverflow has already temporarily banned ChatGPT-generated answers due to this limitation.

The main issue, according to Stack Overflow moderators, is that while ChatGPT's answers frequently produce incorrect ones, they frequently have a good appearance and are simple to generate. Critics claim that these tools are simply very good at arranging words in a way that makes sense statistically, but they are unable to comprehend the meaning or determine whether the statements they make are true.

The data cap for ChatGPT is a significant additional restriction. It lasts until 2021. Events or news that have happened since then are not known to the chatbot. For example, the prompt "Who won the World Cup in 2022?" will not produce any results.

Finally, ChatGPT doesn't cite any sources in its answers. But there is a workaround. You can force it to cite its sources by following these steps.  

ChatGPT can be used for less elaborate tasks like friendly conversation, despite some users using it for more complex tasks like writing malware or code. 

"I'm hungry; what should I get?" is a straightforward conversation starter. or even something more complex like, "What do you think happens in the afterlife?" In either case, ChatGPT is certain to have the solution for you. 

Concerns have been raised about AI chatbots eclipsing or degrading human intelligence. For instance, the chatbot could potentially replace the need for a human writer by writing an article on any subject quickly and effectively (though perhaps not accurately). 

Additionally, the chatbot can quickly and completely write an entire essay, making it simpler for students to cheat or skip learning how to write properly. Some school districts have blocked access to it as a result of this. 

The potential spread of false information is yet another issue with the AI chatbot. The bot might share inaccurate information because it is not connected to the internet. 

"My responses are not intended to be taken as fact," the bot declares, "and I always encourage people to verify any information they receive from me or any other source." Additionally, according to OpenAI, ChatGPT occasionally provides "plausible-sounding but incorrect or nonsensical answers."   

Exists a tool that can identify ChatGPT text?

The requirement for a ChatGPT text detector is growing as worries about students using ChatGPT to cheat grow. The AI research firm behind ChatGPT, OpenAI, has released a faulty, no-cost tool to address this issue. Only 26% of text marked as "likely AI-written" by OpenAI's "classifier" tool can be correctly identified as having been written by AI. Furthermore, it delivers false positives 9% of the time, mistaking human-written content for AI-written content. 

The GPT-2 Output Detector, Writer AI Content Detector, and Content at Scale AI Content Detection are a few additional AI detectors available on the market. ZDNET tested all three of these tools, but the outcomes weren't particularly impressive. All three of the tools were discovered to be inaccurate predictors of AI, frequently returning false negatives. Here are the complete test results from ZDNET. 

A study suggests that humans may be able to identify ChatGPT-generated writing by scanning the text for politeness, even though tools are insufficient to do so. The study's findings show that ChatGPT's writing is exceptionally polite. And unlike people, it is unable to respond with metaphors, irony, or sarcasm.

A sophisticated chatbot named ChatGPT has the potential to both improve people's lives and help with tedious daily tasks like writing emails or searching the internet for solutions. Before it is widely used, however, some technical details must be worked out in order to avoid unfavourable effects like the spread of false information. To perform at their best, AI and ML models typically require extensive training and fine-tuning.

Does this imply that AI will eventually rule the world? Perhaps not yet, but OpenAI's Altman is convinced that human-like intelligence in AI is not so far off. Altman tweeted in response to Musk's statement about artificial intelligence that is "dangerously strong": "I agree on being close to dangerously strong AI in the sense of an AI that poses, for example, a huge cybersecurity risk. We must take the risk of real AGI very seriously as well, as I believe we could reach it within the next ten years.

He added that it was "interesting to watch people start to debate whether powerful AI systems should behave in a way that users want or that their creators intended. One of the most significant discussions society has ever had will centre on the question of whose values we align these systems.

The most recent version of OpenAI's language model systems, GPT-4, is much more sophisticated than GPT-3.5, on which ChatGPT is based. 

GPT-4 is a multimodal model that generates text from both text and image input. For uploading worksheets, graphs, and charts to be examined, this can be helpful. 

The only ones accessible to the general public right now are the text input capabilities of GPT-4. By purchasing a $20 monthly subscription to ChatGPT Plus or by using Bing Chat, users can access them.

Microsoft announced that its chatbot, Bing Chat, had been using GPT-4 since its launch on the day that OpenAI unveiled GPT-4. Although access to this chatbot is free, users must sign up for a waitlist. 

In a series of simulated benchmark exams, GPT-4 outperformed GPT-3.5 due to its more sophisticated cognitive abilities. Additionally, the chatbot's production of hallucinations has decreased. 

Are there any viable substitutes for ChatGPT?

Despite the current buzz surrounding ChatGPT, there are other chatbots that are just as good and might even be better suited to your needs. 

Despite ChatGPT's broad range of capabilities, there are some significant drawbacks, such as the fact that the free version is frequently full. There are many other options to take into account if you want to try out the world of AI chatbots and writers, such as Bing Chat, YouChat, Jasper, and Chatsonic.  

Yes, ChatGPT has the ability to pass a number of benchmark tests. The results of a professor who used ChatGPT to take an MBA exam at Wharton, the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, were quite impressive. 

In addition to passing the test, ChatGPT earned a fantastic B to B-. Christian Terwiesch, the professor, was impressed by the questions and explanations in the basic operations management and process analysis sections.  

Yes, ChatGPT is a fantastic tool for aiding in job applications. ChatGPT can help you lessen the burden of conducting a job search, which can be time-consuming and challenging. Your cover letter and resume can both be created by ChatGPT. 

Use ChatGPT to help you write any essays or personal statements that your application requires you to submit in addition to your cover letter.

With its partnership with Snapchat, ChatGPT makes its debut on social media. On February 7, Snapchat unveiled a ChatGPT integration that will let users of its Snapchat+ service communicate with the bot inside the app. 

According to The Verge, the "My AI" feature will have some ChatGPT restrictions such as the inability to respond to questions about politics, violence, profanity, or even academic essay writing.

Before ChatGPT was made available to the general public, Microsoft was a pioneering investor in OpenAI, the AI research firm that created it. Microsoft's involvement with OpenAI began in 2019 with a $1 billion investment, followed by $2 billion in the years that followed. Microsoft expanded its collaboration with OpenAI in January by making a multi-year, multi-billion dollar investment. 

According to Bloomberg, neither company disclosed the investment value, but sources said it will total $10 billion over a number of years. In exchange, OpenAI will exclusively use Microsoft's Azure cloud computing service to power all of its workloads for research, products, and API services.

Microsoft has also updated its own Bing search engine and enhanced its browser thanks to its partnership with OpenAI. On February 7, Microsoft unveiled a brand-new version of Bing, a search-specific large language model powered by OpenAI's newest technology. 

Microsoft unveiled a new version of Bing at the beginning of February, and its integration with ChatGPT stands out as a key component. When it was first revealed, Microsoft stated that Bing Chat was "more powerful than ChatGPT" because it was run on a newer iteration of OpenAI's large language model. 

Microsoft acknowledged that Bing Chat had been using GPT-4, the most cutting-edge Open AI model, since its launch, five weeks after it had been made public. 

The biggest distinction between Bing's ChatGPT and ChatGPT is that Bing's version includes news and current events because it is connected to the internet. The fact that the new Bing provides links to the information sources it uses to generate its results reduces the potential for false information. 

Bing Chat is more effective and capable than ChatGPT's standard, free version because it uses OpenAI's most sophisticated large language model, GPT-4. 

Access to the internet is another benefit of Bing Chat over ChatGPT. Bing Chat has access to current information, whereas ChatGPT only has access to information from before 2021. 

Unlike ChatGPT, Bing Chat uses footnotes to link back to the websites from which it obtained its information. 

Google's AI chat platform, Bard, competes with ChatGPT. Google unveiled its beta AI chat service on February 6. After the announcement, Google started distributing access to Bard to people on a waitlist.

In stark contrast to ChatGPT, which lacks internet access, Bard uses a lightweight version of Google's Language Model for Dialogue Applications (LaMDA) and responds with all the data from the web. 

With a demo of Bard providing incorrect information about the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), Google's chat service had a difficult time getting off the ground. 

The company said in a statement to ZDNET reporter Stephanie Condon that "this highlights the importance of a rigorous testing process, something we're kicking off this week with our Trusted Tester programme." 

After Google started releasing the chatbot, ZDNET had the chance to test it, and the outcomes were unpleasantly surprising.

The sophisticated features of ChatGPT far surpass those of Google Bard. Even though Google Bard has internet access while ChatGPT does not, it consistently fails to answer questions.