Just Teach Me AI

Meet the tools · 4 min read

What is ChatGPT?

The chatbot that made AI a household word. What it is, who makes it, what it costs, and what it is like to use.

ChatGPT is the AI chatbot most people have heard of, and for many it is the only one. It was released by a company called OpenAI on 30 November 2022, and within two months it had a hundred million users, faster than any consumer product before it. If you have heard a relative say "I asked the AI," they probably meant ChatGPT.

Who makes it

OpenAI is a San Francisco company founded in 2015. It began as a non-profit research lab and later added a for-profit arm to raise the enormous sums needed to train large models. Microsoft is its biggest investor and partner, which is why ChatGPT's technology also shows up inside Microsoft products under the name Copilot.

What "GPT" means

The name is a small piece of jargon you will see everywhere, so it is worth decoding once. GPT stands for Generative Pre-trained Transformer:

  • Generative: it produces new text rather than looking up stored answers.
  • Pre-trained: it learned from a huge pile of text before you ever talk to it.
  • Transformer: the design of neural network it uses, published by Google researchers in 2017.

OpenAI numbers its models (GPT-3, GPT-4, GPT-5 and so on). The number goes up when a substantially better model arrives. ChatGPT is the product; the GPT models are the engine inside it, and the engine gets swapped out regularly. You do not need to track the version numbers; the app just uses whatever is current for your plan.

What it is like to use

You go to chatgpt.com or open the ChatGPT app on your phone or computer. There is a text box. You type. It replies.

Beyond plain text, the current versions can:

  • Talk out loud. Voice mode lets you speak and hear it speak back, in a natural conversational way.
  • See. You can upload photos or documents and ask about them: "What plant is this?" "Summarise this PDF." "What's wrong with this error message?"
  • Search the web for current information when the question needs it.
  • Make images from a description.
  • Write and run code to do calculations, make charts, or analyse a spreadsheet you upload.
  • Remember things about you across conversations, if you allow it.
  • Use custom versions ("GPTs") that other people have set up for specific tasks, like a recipe helper or a study coach.

What it costs

There is a free tier that is perfectly good for learning and for everyday use. It has limits on how much you can do per day and uses a less capable model when you are busy, but for a beginner it is more than enough.

Paid plans (the mainstream one is called ChatGPT Plus, currently around $20 a month, with more expensive tiers above it) give you the best models, higher limits, and early access to new features. Do not start with a paid plan. Use the free one for a few weeks and see whether you hit its limits.

Strengths

  • Everything in one place. Voice, images, documents, web search, code. It is the most fully-featured of the mainstream chatbots.
  • Broad knowledge and a friendly tone. It is good at general explanation and at conversational back-and-forth.
  • Enormous ecosystem. Because it was first, there are more tutorials, plugins, custom GPTs and community tips for ChatGPT than for anything else.

Weaknesses

  • Confident mistakes. Like every chatbot, it sometimes invents facts, quotes and sources. Always check anything that matters.
  • Can be a bit eager to please. It has a tendency to agree with you and to pad answers with cheerful filler. Telling it "be concise and direct" helps.
  • Privacy. By default, your conversations may be used to improve future models unless you turn that off in the settings. Take two minutes to look at the data controls when you sign up.

Is it the one you should use?

If you want the single most feature-rich option and do not mind a busier interface, yes, it is a fine place to start. If you mainly write and read long documents, Claude may suit you better. If you live inside Gmail, Google Docs and Android, Gemini may be more convenient. Honestly, for a beginner the differences are small, and trying two of them for a week each is the best way to decide.

Try this

Open ChatGPT and type:

"I'm completely new to AI. In three short paragraphs, tell me three things you're genuinely good at and three things I should never trust you with."

The answer is a good introduction, and it comes from the tool itself.

Next: Claude, the chatbot built by a company that started with safety as its main concern.