Chat GPT has been in the news recently and is gaining legitimacy through the support of titans like Microsoft. But what is Chat GPT and how does it work? I went straight to the AI tool to tell me directly, as well as expert sources. Yes, this piece was written with the help of AI. Time to get used to it, perhaps.
What is Chat GPT?
Chat GPT is a new AI-backed chat bot tool released by Open AI. It simulates a human in providing answers to any question posed. You may ask, “what makes birds fly?” and will get an answer. You can ask it to write a love letter with Shakespearian undertones and be provided an outline in seconds. It’s a powerful tool to get curated information in seconds.
This is not the first time we’ve interacted with this kind of technology. Many e-commerce sites have this type of interactivity in floating chatboxes to answer your questions online. Open AI is one of many doing this – with Meta and Google also developing this type of AI. Though, because this is being offered for free (for now) and available to the public, OpenAI’s tool is gaining traction and attention. In fact, in the days after its release, there were 1 million users of Chat GPT. Users are having fun experimenting with all it can do – everything from writing term papers and text messages to authoring scientific research papers. The uses are infinite with criticism and caution to match. I’ll let Chat GPT help me explain more.
How Chat GPT explains itself:
What is OpenAI?
Chat GPT was created by OpenAI, a company that calls itself “an AI research and deployment company. Our mission is to ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity.” Elon Musk was an early backer of the company but has since departed. According to the website:
OpenAI LP is governed by the board of the OpenAI nonprofit, comprised of OpenAI LP employees Greg Brockman (Chairman & President), Ilya Sutskever (Chief Scientist), and Sam Altman (CEO), and non-employees Adam D’Angelo, Reid Hoffman, Will Hurd, Tasha McCauley, Helen Toner, and Shivon Zilis.
Our investors include Microsoft, Reid Hoffman’s charitable foundation, and Khosla Ventures.
Can Chat GPT become the new ‘Google it’?
We tech watchers are monitoring the evolution of Chat GPT and other AI technologies. As we harness AI in new ways, it is crucial to understand how it can help improve our daily lives – and the downsides. Some believe Chat GPT-esque AI could replace ‘Googling’ things given how smart, quick and broad the application is. Soon, we could be posing queries to AI-fueled chatboxes instead of turning to Google. Some are using it to do everything from organizing travel to text translation to book and recipe recommendations. I asked it to recommend its favorite recipe, and here is what it wrote:
Answer from Chat CPT
More AI Concerns
In my experimenting with Chat GPT, one glaring issue I see is a lack of understanding around the sources of its content. It could be plagiarizing an author or sourcing a fake news site, and you would not know. When you ask it to write a blog post, from where does it get the material? If you are asking it to write a term paper, does it provide the same result to every user who asks to do the same? Schools districts are expressing concerns about the implications of this technology in the classroom and banning it. Chat GPT acknowledges there are errors in the results, allowing users to correct them in real time – making Chat GPT a hybrid Wikipedia/Google experience. There are other unresolved issues and questions, which Chat GPT acknowledges:
Want to try Chat GPT?
Trying the AI tool is simple. Visit chat.opeai.com and sign up for an account.
The account is free, though you must provide an email and mobile number that can both be verified. Once you complete the verification, you can chat away and see a glimpse of what AI can do.
