No Account? You Can Still Use ChatGPT
OpenAI now allows users with no account to use its conversational AI, but there’s a catch
What was that about there being no free lunches in the corporate world? Well, if Sam Altman is to be believed, there could be a few of those coming our way as OpenAI announced that its flagship ChatGPT can now be used by folks who haven’t made an account for using this conversational AI tool.
That the experience levels would be inferior shouldn’t matter to such users but what comes as no surprise is that OpenAI would use all such chats from non-account holders as fodder for its data modeling and data training efforts. Yes, there is an option to opt out but as always such options are hard to find and harder to implement in the tech world.
No sign-up, but there’s a catch
“Start using ChatGPT instantly”, is how OpenAI reaches out to prospective users via its blog post that suggests that the company is “making it easier for people to experience the benefits of AI without needing to sign up.” Which may be true enough. Just that the data it scrapes from our interactions is what OpenAI really cares about.
This was rolled out in select markets late yesterday and would soon expand to the rest of the world. So, if you care to visit chat.openai.com today, there would be no need to log in (of course, one still can if one has created an account earlier). Users would be taken straight into a conversation window with ChatGPT with the same look-and-feel as for logged-in users.
“It’s core to our mission to make tools like ChatGPT broadly available so that people can experience the benefits of AI. More than 100 million people across 185 countries use ChatGPT weekly to learn something new, find creative inspiration, and get answers to their questions,” says the post.
All for broadening the user-base
“Starting today, you can use ChatGPT instantly, without needing to sign-up. We’re rolling this out gradually, with the aim to make AI accessible to anyone curious about its capabilities,” it adds. To be gracious to OpenAI, one does admit that the blog post does clarify that “we may use what you provide to ChatGPT to improve our models for everyone.”
The blogpost also states that users who want to can turn this feature off via settings, irrespective of whether one has an account or not. OpenAI also directs users to its Help Center should they have doubts around how content gets used to train GPT models. Of course, without a sign-in, users won’t be able to save their chats or share them, or provide custom instructions.
The blog post also notes that this extra-free version of ChatGPT will come with “slightly more restrictive content policies” which seemed odd as there was no clarification. Upon going through the web, we found this explanation in an article on Techcrunch:
“The signed out experience will benefit from the existing safety mitigations that are already built into the model, such as refusing to generate harmful content. In addition to these existing mitigations, we are also implementing additional safeguards specifically designed to address other forms of content that may be inappropriate for a signed out experience. We considered the potential ways in which a logged out service could be used in inappropriate ways, informed by our understanding of the capabilities of GPT-3.5 and risk assessments that we’ve completed.”
In spite of reading through this drivel a couple of times, one couldn’t say for sure what it was indicating. However, rest assured we will get to know more about these restrictive policies once users get on board and start their unaccounted journey with ChatGPT.
Anything to get a deeper understanding of AI use cases
The blog post also indicated that additional content safeguards had been introduced that includes blocking prompts and generations across a wider range of categories. Presumably this means those who haven’t signed in have lesser chances of using the powers of AI for nefarious purposes. Not a bad precaution as it stands.
Suffice to say that OpenAI wants to capture more users across multiple geographies and with a broader set of requirements. By opening up its use without having to log-in, the company can hope to capture a wider user-base and through them get a deeper understanding of future use-cases.
Whoever it was that said there are no free lunches in the corporate world, did know what they were talking about. OpenAI isn’t offering us a free lunch, it’s just a taster. And in doing so, it hopes to find out what these “lesser mortals” would want from ChatGPT.
