By enabling ChatGPT users to invoke GPT in any chat, OpenAI is driving the adoption of GPT, a third-party application powered by its artificial intelligence model. Starting today, paying users of ChatGPT, OpenAI’s AI chatbot front-end, can bring GPTs into conversations by typing “@” and selecting a GPT from the list.
The selected GPT will understand the content of the entire conversation, and different GPTs can be "tagged in" for different use cases and needs - jumping into the conversation based on the context of what was previously said. "This way you can add relevant GPTs with full conversation context," OpenAI said in a tweet.
Just weeks after launching GPTStore, a GPT marketplace accessible through the ChatGPT panel, we’re rolling out initiatives to make GPTs more discoverable. No programming experience is required to create a GPT, and developers can create as simple or complex a GPT as they like. Currently available GPTs include trail recommenders from AllTrails, code coaches from Khan Academy, and content designers from Canva.
OpenAI plans to eventually introduce a fee mechanism for developers who wish to sell access to their GPT. But the company may have to boost traffic first. According to data from network analytics company Similarweb, custom GPTs account for only 2.7% of ChatGPT’s global network traffic so far, and traffic to custom GPTs has been declining month by month since November.
Content moderation proved to be another challenge. In its first week of launch, the GPT store was flooded with "romantic" chatbot apps, some of which were sexually suggestive - a clear violation of OpenAI's terms. Developers are also churning out bots for political campaigns, such as a chatbot impersonating U.S. presidential candidate Dean Phillips, which is also a clear violation of the terms.
OpenAI claims that it uses a combination of human and automated review to flag GPT and has removed some offending apps. But if the number of GPTs continues to grow as the company hopes, we can imagine the problem will only get worse.