ChatGPT — The Good and The Bad

30 November 2022.

OpenAI launched ChatGPT. Since then, it took the internet by storm. By December 2022, it had over a million users. People are talking about it all over social media. There are even moments still where it's down because it’s at capacity.

The Good

I asked ChatGPT what were its uses (summarised). It said:

1. Customer service and support.
2. Content creation and generation of human-like text.
3. Language translation.
4. Personalized marketing.
5. Mental health support.
6. Educational assistance, including generating study materials, providing feedback, and answering questions.

Moreover, if used properly, ChatGPT can be a viable resource for Content Creators. It can give them ideas for YouTube videos/shorts, Instagram Reels, TikToks. It can also give ideas to writers even, I often find myself asking ChatGPT for article ideas. ChatGPT can sort of help with writer’s block.

ChatGPT can be useful to developers, it can find solutions to code that went wrong and fix it. It’s demonstrated on OpenAI’s website.

Also, ChatGPT can be a fun timepass. You can ask it questions like:

“What would happen if Columbus came to America in 2020?”

It’ll give you really creative answers. The sky is the limit for questions like this!

ChatGPT can even give therapy, you can ask it for advice of all sorts, it’ll give you some sort of solution.

Now, let’s move on to the controversy.

The Bad

It hurts to say, but I have to say it.

ChatGPT will potentially, eventually, at one point replace Wikipedia. The saviour of many people might fall. Don’t get me wrong, Wikipedia is one of the best things to exist, but just think, ChatGPT can get you whatever Wikipedia can and summarise it into exactly what you need. You don’t have to manually find what all is needed, ChatGPT does it for you, making projects a piece of cake.

This is the exact problem with ChatGPT. Students can easily exploit it. Many schools and colleges in the US and France have already banned ChatGPT. CBSE (India’s Education Board) has banned ChatGPT for entry in Board Exam (Phones are banned, how do you even take ChatGPT with you). Students are using it to write their essays. And you see, it’s extremely hard to differentiate between AI writing and human writing.

So, I asked ChatGPT its thoughts on students using ChatGPT to write their essays. Here’s what it said:

“As an AI language model, I do not have personal thoughts or opinions. However, I can provide some insights on the topic.

While ChatGPT can generate human-like text, using it to write essays for students may not be an ethical or productive approach to learning. It can hinder a student’s ability to develop critical thinking, research, and writing skills, which are essential in academic and professional settings. Additionally, using ChatGPT to complete assignments can be considered plagiarism, which is a serious academic offense that can result in severe consequences.

Instead, students should focus on developing their research and writing skills and utilize resources such as online databases, writing centers, and academic advisors to receive guidance and feedback on their work. They can also use ChatGPT as a tool to assist them in generating ideas, summarizing complex concepts, or proofreading their work. Ultimately, using ChatGPT to write essays for students may provide a shortcut, but it does not promote learning, growth, or academic integrity.”

I’ve emboldened the points I think are important.

It says that using its essays for academic purposes is considered plagiarism. That’s engrossing.

More over, it has explained the uses of ChatGPT for academic purposes, which are reasonable.

Personally, as a writer, I won’t use ChatGPT for writing essays. But, it can be exceptional for things like, as it said, summarising points and proofreading.

I also asked ChatGPT what its demerits were (summarised). Here’s what it said:

1. Bias based on training data.
2. Lack of emotional intelligence and sensitivity.
3. Limited contextual understanding leading to irrelevant or inappropriate responses.
4. Misinformation based on biased or inaccurate data.
5. Dependency leading to a lack of human interaction and communication abilities.
6. Security vulnerabilities leading to sensitive information disclosure.
7. Ethical concerns related to using ChatGPT to write essays for students, which can hinder learning and promote academic dishonesty.

Again, I’ve emboldened the notable points.

ChatGPT Plus

OpenAI has also rolled out a subscription plan for ChatGPT. Basically, it gives you access when demand is high, gives you faster response speed and early access to new features. It costs $20/Month.

Wrapping Up

ChatGPT is an excellent resource for many things for many people.

There are many videos and articles even mentioning the ways with which you can make money with ChatGPT. Some might work, actually.

My personal thoughts on students exploiting ChatGPT, it might get banned in some countries if it persists.

Potentially, AI could replace human jobs one day. We’ve got food delivery robots, receptionist robots, and even self-driving taxis. Now with ChatGPT, it might replace some more jobs.

PS: ChatGPT’s full form is Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer