The ChatGPT chatbot by OpenAI is taking the world by storm. Here’s how to use it and everything you need to know about AI text generation with GPT.
ChatGPT has continued to dazzle the internet with AI-generated content, morphing from a novel chatbot into a piece of technology that is driving the next era of innovation. No tech product in recent memory has sparked as much interest, controversy, fear, and excitement.
If you’re just now catching on, it’d be fair to wonder what the fuss is all about. You can try it out for yourself for free (or use the official free iOS app), but here’s the detailed guide you’ve been looking for — whether you’re worried about an AI apocalypse or are just looking for an intro guide to the app.How people are using ChatGPT
ChatGPT is a natural language AI chatbot. At its most basic level, that means you can ask it any question, and it will generate an answer.
Using the ChatGPT chatbot itself is fairly simple, as all you have to do is type in your text and receive information. The key here is to be creative and see how your ChatGPT responds to different prompts. If you don’t get the intended result, try tweaking your prompt or giving ChatGPT further instructions. ChatGPT knows the context of previous questions you ask, so you can refine from there rather than starting over fresh every time.
For example, starting with “Explain how the solar system was made” will give a more detailed result with more paragraphs than “How was the solar system made,” even though both inquiries will give fairly detailed results. Take it a step further by giving ChatGPT more guidance about style or tone, saying “Explain how the solar system was made as a middle school teacher.”
You also have the option for more specific inputting requests for an essay with a specific number of paragraphs or a Wikipedia page. We got an extremely detailed result with the request “write a four-paragraph essay explaining Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.” And remember, ChatGPT is great at making tweaks to previous answers, so you can always ask for more detail, ask it to rewrite something, or ask it further questions.
To see what it can do, try using ChatGPT in daily life or work activities to see how it can help. Ask it to write emails, craft business proposals, fun date night ideas, or even a best man’s speech. So long as it doesn’t break some of the explicit or illegal content rules, the generator will do its best to fulfill the commands. It’s certainly is potential for ChatGPT to begin filling in gaps with incorrect data. As OpenAI notes, these instances are rare, but AI “hallucinations” certainly do happen. The company also notes that ChatGPT, which uses the GPT-3.5 LLM (large language model), currently has “limited knowledge of world events after 2021.” For more recent knowledge of the world, consider using another tool like Bing Chat.
Even so, you have the option to input queries continuously until you close your browser or reset the thread to clear your previous requests. These chats are then saved in conversations in the sidebar, even automatically naming the chat. From there, you can manage these chats, renaming or deleting them as needed. You can even “hide” specific chats if needed.
You also have the option to use ChatGPT in dark mode or light mode.
Unlike Bing Chat, which can now generate images with Bing Image Creator and receive images as prompts for questions, ChatGPT only works with text in both directions. Google Bard also recently got this feature included.How does ChatGPT work?
As opposed to a simple voice assistant like Siri or Google Assistant, ChatGPT is built on what is called an LLM (Large Language Model). These neural networks are trained on huge quantities of information from the internet for deep learning — meaning they generate altogether new responses, rather than just regurgitating specific canned responses. They’re not built for a specific purpose like chatbots of the past — and they’re a whole lot smarter.
This is implied in the name of ChatGPT, which stands for Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer. In the case of the current version of ChatGPT, it’s based on the GPT-3.5 LLM. The model behind ChatGPT was trained on all sorts of web content including websites, books, social media, news articles, and more — all fine-tuned in the language model by both supervised learning and RLHF (Reinforcement Learning From Human Feedback). OpenAI says this use of human AI trainers is really what makes ChatGPT stand out.How to use ChatGPT
First, go to chat.openai.com. If it’s your first time, you’ll need to set up a free account with OpenAI before getting started. You have the option of choosing an easy login with a Google or Microsoft account, or just entering your email address. You’ll be asked next to enter a phone number; however, keep in mind that you cannot use a virtual phone number (VoIP) to register for OpenAI. You will then receive a confirmation number, which you will enter on the registration page to complete the setup.
You’ll see some basic rules about ChatGPT, including potential errors in data, how OpenAI collects data, and how users can submit feedback — all of which have some wondering about whether or not ChatGPT is safe to use. Once you’re through that, you know you have successfully registered. You’re in!How to use the ChatGPT iPhone app
After many months of anticipation, OpenAI has finally launched an official iOS app that you can go and download today. The app quickly topped half a million downloads in less than a week and is becoming available in an increasing number of countries.
Instructions for using it aren’t dissimilar to the ChatGPT web application. You do get an extra option for signing in using your Apple ID account, but it otherwise functions nearly identically to the web app — just type in your question and let the conversation begin.
The clean interface shows your conversation with GPT in a straightforward manner, hiding the chat history and settings behind the menu in the top right.
For those who are paying for ChatGPT Plus, the app lets you toggle between GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 too. You can even use the microphone to chat with ChatGPT over voice.
As our mobile editor noted in his experience with the app, it still doesn’t provide a connection to the internet like chatbots like Bing Chat and Perplexity.
Please note, though, that there is no official Android, Mac, or Windows app just yet. If you’re using one of those platforms, we recommend sticking to the web app to avoid any possible scams or fakes.Is ChatGPT free to use?
Yes, the basic version of ChatGPT is completely free to use. There’s no limit to how much you can use ChatGPT in a day, though there is a word and character limit for responses.
It’s not free for OpenAI to continue running it, of course. Initial estimates are currently that OpenAI spends around $3 million per month to continue running ChatGPT, which is around $100,000 per day. A report from April indicated that the price of operation is closer to $700,000 per day.
Beyond the cost of the servers themselves, some egregious information has recently come out about what else has been done to train the language model against producing offensive content.
OpenAI also has a premium version of its chatbot, called ChatGPT Plus. It costs $20 a month but provides access even during peak times, faster responses, and first access to new features like GPT-4.Who created ChatGPT?
ChatGPT was created by an organization called OpenAI, a San Francisco-based AI research lab. The organization started as a non-profit meant for collaboration with other institutions and researchers, funded by high-profile figures like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk.
OpenAI later became a for-profit company in 2019 and is now led by its CEO, Sam Altman. It runs on Microsoft’s Azure system infrastructure and is powered by Nvidia’s GPUs, including the new supercomputers just announced this year. Microsoft has invested heavily in OpenAI too, starting in 2019.What does the ChatGPT errors mean?
Many people attempting to use ChatGPT have been getting an “at capacity” notice when trying to access the site. It’s likely behind the move to try and use unofficial paid apps, which have already flooded app stores and scammed thousands into paying for a free service.
Because of how much ChatGPT costs to run, it seems as if OpenAI has been limiting access when its servers are “at capacity.” It can take as long as a few hours to wait out, but if you’re patient, you’ll get through eventually. Of all the problems facing ChatGPT right now, this had been the biggest hurdle for keeping people from using it more. In some cases, demand has been so high that ChatGPT has gone down for several hours for maintenance multiple times over the past few months.
This seems to be less of a problem recently, though, as demand has normalized and OpenAI has learned to manage the traffic better, but in the middle of the day, it still makes an appearance from time to time.Latest ChatGPT controversies
Although ChatGPT is a very useful tool, it isn’t free of problems. It’s known for making mistakes or “hallucinations,” where it makes up an answer to something it doesn’t know. A simple example of how unreliable it can sometimes be involved misidentifying the prime minister of Japan.
Beyond just making mistakes, many people are concerned about what this human-like generative AI could mean for the future of the internet, so much so that thousands of tech leaders and prominent public figures have signed a petition to slow down the development. It was even banned in Italy due to privacy concerns, alongside complaints from the FTC — although that’s now been reversed. Since then, the FTC has reopened investigations against OpenAI on questions of personal consumer data is being handled.
