The date of 30 November may be one of the most significant in recent human history – the day ChatGPT was made public. It amazed the world with its detailed responses and natural manner of conversation. People found many unimaginable ways to use it. Also, businesses, whether big or small, have seen the ground-shaking potential of this tool.
According to a UBS study, the market where ChatGPT operates (and apparently dominates) may be worth up to $1 trillion. The chatbot, publicly available for free, hit a threshold of 1 million users by the end of its first week. Later, the paid premium version was launched, costing a $20 monthly subscription fee.
The mind-boggling valuation of $1 trillion dollars comes from the flexibility of the product. While being available as a chatbot that uses Natural Language Processing (NLP), the tool is capable of supporting multiple goals and operations.
This text covers the following:
What is OpenAI’s ChatGPT?
ChatGPT is an internet service where anyone can have a conversation with an Artificial Intelligence (AI) powered text-generating agent. Any user with internet access can access the service – the basic version (GPT3.5) is free to use. Users of the premium version get access to the updated model, GPT4.
Apart from enabling one to interact with the model using a web browser, OpenAI also provides an Application Programming Interface (API) that can be used in various services and products.
How ChatGPT works
A service called ChatGPT leverages the power of a Large Language Model (LLM). LLMs are basically the products of machine learning techniques as applied to process, digest, and understand human language.
The model behind ChatGPT is a combination of techniques that together produce ChatGPT’s unique effect, including supervised learning, unsupervised learning, and reinforcement learning. The idea behind the model is to deliver predictions for the next word in a sentence based on the surrounding words. This approach was effective, yet bore a flaw – the mechanism was able to keep consistency and context only for several words around the processed one. With longer texts, it was lost, effectively producing a gibberish text consisting of decent-looking sentences.
This was the dominant approach before introducing the transformer architecture. This approach, introduced in 2017 by Google Brain, enabled the neural network to process the full input simultaneously by assigning weights to various parts of the text, like words or sentences, effectively transforming them into tokens with applied vectors representing their meaning in a way comprehensible for a digital neural network.
The system also consists of an encoder system that analyzes the full text to be processed (for example, a prompt or a question) and a decoder to generate the output (usually an answer).
What does GPT stand for in ChatGPT?
The architecture described above was named Generative Pre-training Transformer, later abbreviated as GPT.
When was ChatGPT released?
The first AI model, GPT-1, was released by OpenAI in 2018, later followed by GPT-2 in 2020 and GPT-3 in 2022.
One of the key aspects of model development was a massive increase in the computing power used to deliver the new models.
Why was ChatGPT created?
In 2022, OpenAI decided to incorporate human feedback in the training process. They launched ChatGPT, which used a fine-tuned GPT-3 model (later dubbed later GPT-3.5) and was a perfect way to engage users in training and evaluation sessions.
The experience gathered was later used to deliver GPT-4, the version available for premium ChatGPT users and via API.
What can ChatGPT do?
Surprisingly to researchers and everyday users, ChatGPT appears to be helpful not only in the tasks it was trained and designed to perform but also in a wide range of other use cases. The main interface for the system remains the natural language in the form of a chat dialogue. Yet there are multiple expected and unexpected ways to use ChatGPT in daily business operations.
Write
As a Natural Language Processing model, ChatGPT can write human-like texts, including social media posts, proposals, or ad copy. The system can also be used to deliver longer pieces of text like blog posts, articles, and press releases.
Depending on the needs and abilities of the user, the Chat can be used to generate texts or rewrite existing ones to make them more polite, formal, or well-suited to a target audience.
Last but not least, ChatGPT can extend an existing text into longer paragraphs delivering a more comprehensive and detailed piece of content from existing information.
Summarize long documents
On the other hand, ChatGPT can be used to scan through walls of text to spot the most significant parts of a document and later provide it in a shorter, more digestible format. The tool can be used to transform a lengthy document into bullet points or a pill of knowledge.
The tool can also be used to support taking notes from a meeting or brainstorming session, delivering summaries, and extracting the most important elements of a text.
Support writing code
The internet, where the training data was gathered, is full of examples of using code and programming. Thus ChatGPT also appears to be skilled in delivering code in popular programming languages and can generate the code necessary to perform a task the user requests.
ChatGPT can also be used to spot bugs and optimize code that was delivered by a software developer (or an unskilled non-professional). Last but not least, the user can ask ChatGPT to explain how to work with and implement the delivered code.
Support brainstorming
ChatGPT can be asked endlessly for answers, every time delivering a fresh answer again and again and again. Generating new responses every time is an inherent feature of the neural network, and so there is a chance that the system will deliver something new or at least inspiring.
Also, ChatGPT is great for delivering the low-hanging fruit during a brainstorming session.
Last but not least, the GPT system’s ability to hallucinate (deliver plausible-sounding yet nonsensical responses to questions) can actually be an asset during brainstorming sessions, where even a stupid or impossible idea can become an interesting starting point.
Write Excel and Google Sheets formulas
Spreadsheets are extremely useful and popular business tools, with most of the basic automation done in companies of all sizes being applied using spreadsheets.
These tools come with extreme flexibility and adaptability to new circumstances. Yet knowing all possible applications and use cases can be tricky. Also, support sites are helpful, yet building your own formulas can prove difficult.
ChatGPT is skilled in writing new formulas and providing all support required in extending the abilities of a spreadsheet – for example, connecting it with other OfficeSuite tools.
Enriching workflows and procedures
With the API service, generative AI can be used to infuse and support existing workflows in companies. For example, it can be connected with project management tools to support the management and assigning of tasks and keep track of projects.
Multiple platforms offer integration with generative AI tools like ChatGPT to support daily operations or to enrich workflows. Multiple professional apps have included access to ChatGPT in their structures, including Slack, Todoist, Shopify, and Zapier.
Last but not least, the company can run either an internal or external AI-powered chatbot to serve a particular purpose, for example, to support customer service or solve payroll problems.
Translate
The model has been trained on a gargantuan database of texts in multiple languages, including less common ones. The tool can be used to translate text, sometimes with much more elegance than with other popular tools.
According to OpenAI research, the GPT-4 model has a high level of performance in multiple languages apart from English, including Italian, Afrikaans, Spanish, German, and French, among others. The system also speaks less popular languages, including Mongolian, Urdu, Thai, and Nepali.
On the other hand, ChatGPT was not directly designed to provide translations, so the outcomes need evaluation – a statement that is true for nearly all applications of ChatGPT.
Analyze data
Despite being a Large Language Model, ChatGPT is surprisingly effective in analyzing data, both structured and unstructured. One can feed the model either by using the chat interface or via the API, depending on the user’s skills and the amount of data to be processed.
Is ChatGPT safe?
With millions of people asking questions and getting answers every day, including engineers looking for solutions to their problems and people sharing details of their private lives, concerns regarding safety and security arise.
- Legal concerns – currently OpenAI does not deliver special protection to the data provided by users. Also, it doesn’t provide information about the place and the ways the input is processed. Thus giving the system access to more delicate information can be risky.
- Leaks – ChatGPT is constantly improving and learning from user input. As such, it can sometimes reuse information gathered from the users. This creates the risk of leaking classified or sensitive information as it may be exposed in other users’ answers.
- Inappropriate content – last but not least, ChatGPT can generate content that may be harmful or offensive when used inappropriately. OpenAI has put great effort into making the chat as safe as possible, but considering the millions of users, malfunctions can still occur. Also, the chat can be used to generate phishing emails or similarly abusive messages.
Summary
ChatGPT is a powerful tool that will be remembered as an early sign of the new AI era supporting people’s daily lives. With its versatility and ability to be adjusted to more sophisticated tasks, companies can build entirely new workflows and products and enrich existing ones.
If you wish to learn more information about applying ChatGPT or similar tech in your business, don’t hesitate to contact us now!
