In one of the fireside chats on SXSW2024, theOpenAIOpenAI will always offer a free version of ChatGPT, a decision made in line with OpenAI's mission to help humanity, said Peter Deng, vice president and head of consumer and enterprise products.
The free version of ChatGPT will be funded by selling the service to businesses and will be enhanced over time, Deng said. This approach is similar to that of tech giants such as Google and Meta, which offer their products for free to the world and open them up to the general public, such as Google Search, Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.By offering a free version of generative AI, OpenAI aims to expand its use by providing those who can't afford the paid version with access to expand usage.
Deng believes that getting people to try out ChatGPT will make them realize how powerful AI can be. He said:Â "I have never seen a technology in my life that is so powerful and has such great potential. I see it as a powerful tool that unlocks our ability to delve deeper into something that interests us."
Rather than taking over society, AI will "fundamentally humanize us" by enabling people to pursue what makes them unique, Deng explained, adding that ChatGPT is designed to be a helpful assistant and perhaps even a partner. He mentioned some real-world examples, such as in a courtroom where the AI listens to testimony in real time and simultaneously cross-checks past cases and other resources to advise lawyers on good cross-examination.
In the healthcare space, Deng cited the case of a mother who was unable to cure her son's ailment after seeing 17 doctors in three years. When she turned to ChatGPT, she got the right answer and her son was able to undergo surgery and recover.
Deng also mentioned a study conducted by BCG in the Harvard Business Review, where employees' use of ChatGPT resulted in a 171 TP3T increase in productivity and quality for high performers and a 431 TP3T improvement for low performers.
He noted that one of the benefits of AI is that it can create cognitive space for often busy people. By tackling more monotonous and mechanical tasks, AI unleashes the ability of humans to think about higher-level problems. In terms of where AI is headed, Deng sees it going to the edge, learning from users and data to generate answers that are applicable to specific scenarios.
When discussing customization, he said that the system will learn the user's values over time because every culture has its own beliefs and OpenAI should not impose norms.
Deng sees a day when people will no longer care if artwork is created or enhanced by AI, just as people use Adobe Photoshop to edit images or Grammarly to correct writing today. However, in the short term, the ability to authenticate AI-generated content will remain an important one, especially in the election year of 2024. To that end, OpenAI has announced that it will add metadata tags to ChatGPT-generated images using the DALL-3 image generation model.
In response to the debate over accelerating or decelerating AI development, Deng said he stands in the middle:Unleashing technology "in a way that ensures the right safeguards are in place," adding that he supports an incremental approach to improvement, "which is what we're advancing in technologyoptimalway."