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In November, OpenAI – the San Francisco artificial intelligence lab founded in 2015 by a group of tech leaders, including Sam Altman, Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman, and Elon Musk – released ChatGPT, a new chatbot that relies on artificial intelligence to deliver seemingly human-written responses to questions in clear prose, in seconds. Only two months after its debut, more than 30 million people have used the chatbot to write poetry, explain a concept, compose a college essay, build apps, and conduct makeshift therapy sessions.

It instantly sparked passionate discussions in both the business world and the general public and opened a debates on how it could transform business, education, and more. This article will provide an overview of ChatGPT’s origins, how it has generated enormous interest among investors and set off a race with its competitors, what kind of changes this technology represents, and why it is causing growing concerns.

From the beginning, OpenAI has defined itself as a mission-driven organization that wants to ensure that advanced AI will be safe and aligned with human values. Originally started as a nonprofit research lab, OpenAI created a for-profit subsidiary in 2019 and struck a $1 billion deal with Microsoft. It has since grown to around 375 employees and leaned into its new commercial spirit – which some might argue is at the expense of its original aims.

One day in mid-November 2022, workers at OpenAI were suddenly tasked with releasing a chatbot that would be made available free to the public in two weeks. OpenAI initially had been targeting a release of GPT-4 in early 2023, so the sudden announcement confused OpenAI employees. The threat that its rivals might beat OpenAI to the market pushed top executives to roll out a more aggressive timeline. OpenAI ultimately decided to update an unreleased chatbot using an elaborate version of the company’s previous language model in order to upstage its competition and collect data and feedback to improve GPT-4.

ChatGPT’s quick success – it is now considered one of the fastest-growing software products in memory (by comparison, Instagram took nearly a year to get its first 10 million users) – has brought OpenAI into the ranks of Silicon Valley power players, and, unsurprisingly, an enormous interest among investors and competitors.

The company recently reached a $10 billion deal with Microsoft, which plans to incorporate OpenAI’s technology into its Bing search engine and other products. Additionally, it is said that Sam Altman, OpenAI’s CEO, has met with top executives at Apple and Google in the past few weeks. The company also signed a deal with BuzzFeed to use its technology to create AI-generated lists and quizzes.

While arousing interest, it has also set off a race with big tech giants who are now rushing out to catch up with ChatGPT and incorporate this kind of technology into a wide range of products, such as internet search engines, talking digital assistants, and email programs. Google recently announced that it would soon release an experimental chatbot called Bard and more than 20 AI products and features, including an AI search engine that would try to process complex information and multiple perspectives to give users a more conversational experience. Baidu, the Chinese tech giant, is also preparing to introduce Ernie, a chatbot similar to ChatGPT in March. Anthropic, an AI company started by former OpenAI employees, is in the process of raising $300 million in new funding. As for Meta, they are figuring out how to remind the world of its own prowess in generative AI, despite widespread criticism of products it had previously released. OpenAI is also plowing ahead with the release of GPT-4 scheduled for later this year.

Despite the excitement for this new technology, it has not come without issues. First of all, chatbots are more expensive to operate than any typical software. In a recent tweet, Sam Altman, OpenAI’s CEO, said the average conversation costs the company “single-digit cents” in processing power, which adds up to millions of dollars per week for OpenAI. To offset the costs, the company announced that it will soon offer a subscription version of the chatbot, ChatGPT Plus, for $20 a month.

More importantly, this global phenomenon has caused controversy. Because chatbots learn their skills by analyzing vast amounts of text posted to the internet, as of now, they cannot distinguish between fact and fiction and can generate text that is biased, or simply incorrect. Moreover, OpenAI has been accused of overstepping because of some responses that may sound like rave product reviews or politically opinionated, which is why Google had long been reluctant to release this type of technology to the public. The company’s reputation could take a hit if the AI creates toxic or false statements.

Generative AI technology is also threatening the creativity and individuality of human writing and forces us to re-evaluate our education system, and even the value of teaching kids how to write. School districts around the US have banned ChatGPT to try to prevent a flood of AI-generated homework. However, there is no doubt that students will look to leverage this technology anyways. Therefore, it is important to teach students how best to use it. New York City Public Schools, the largest district in the US, serving some 900,000 students, is now training computer science teachers to help students identify AI biases and the potential risks with the technology, and to encourage them to challenge problematic technologies.

In response to teachers’ concerns, a 22-year-old student from Princeton University created GPTZero, an app used to detect if a text has been written by the AI system. His app, which is hosted by a free platform, became so popular that it crashed.

To conclude, the arrival of ChatGPT and the growing presence of AI technology in our daily lives feels like the beginning of a revolution. AI software is both awesome and terrifying: while it is changing the way computer software is built, used, and operated to give users a more interactive experience, it is also raising new issues and alerting us to the necessity of implementing safeguards to adopt the technology responsibly.

How many jobs will this kill? Will this further corrupt our public discourse? How will this disrupt our education system? What is the point of learning to write essays at school when AI can do that for us? Now humanity faces the prospect of an even greater dependance on machines, which jeopardizes human creativity. ChatGPT is a language model without personal thoughts or emotions and is not yet able to fully replicate the authenticity and individuality of human writing. Several initiatives like “critical computing” trainings at school and GPTZero have been taken before ChatGPT changes writing forever. This technology is the future, but full creativity remains in the realm of the human. The best path forward may be a partnership between generative AI and the creativity, selectivity, and insight of a human creator.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/06/technology/chatgpt-schools-teachers-ai-ethics.html?