Artificial Intelligence or (AI), has taken the world by storm and today practically every industry has introduced it to automate tasks and minimize human intervention, unless unavoidable. With continual advancements being planned, ChatGPT, one of the first AI tools to be presented to the global audience was launched by OpenAI, owned by tech wizard Sam Altman.
In the advent to bring out more features and ease the operational challenges, OpenAI on Thursday announced a new feature for ChatGPT that allows the popular chatbot to execute actions on a user’s behalf. It’s part of an industry-wide push to change the way people get things done on the Internet: Tech giants hope that instead of bouncing between multiple applications and manually searching the web browser, users might be able to one day rely on tech-enabled agents to do it all.
- ChatGPT’s new agent mode, which begins rolling out immediately, is indicative that tech giants are doubling down on digital helpers that demonstrate significantly advanced capabilities.
- It also increases the race between OpenAI and Google, which is pursuing similar ambitions with its AI tool – Gemini too.
OpenAI’s product ChatGPT’s will have a new agent mode – which will ‘think‘ and ‘act‘ using its own virtual computer, enabling it to handle complex action-oriented requests. For example, users will be able to issue command such as “look at my calendar and brief me on upcoming client meetings based on recent news” or “plan and buy ingredients to make Japanese breakfast for four,” the company said in an official blog post released by them on July 17.
This new feature will definitely add more curiosity amongst the existing ChatGPT fans, as they will hope to rely on the chatbot for their thinking and acting on it work – allowing them to focus on other subjects of greater importance. The new feature is available for those who subscribe to a Pro, Plus or Team plan. It builds on and combines capabilities from the ChatGPT Operator and Deep Research tools OpenAI already offers – the Operator browses the web, while Deep Research analyses online resources to do things like compile reports.
The update is a step closer in OpenAI’s efforts to turn ChatGPT in a more comprehensive universal assistant. At the same time, the broader AI industry is also grappling with how to address important shortcomings and privacy concerns around the technology. AI models are still prone to inaccuracy and bias and can act in unpredictable ways, which has also become a cause of concern as the reliance on its use increases.
- In the official blog post, OpenAI’s team acknowledged that ChatGPT’s new functionality presents new risks with the update. The feature’s operation has been limited in terms of the data the chatbot has access to, and certain tasks – like sending an email or responding to a query – will require the user’s oversight. The model is also trained to refuse “high-risk tasks” like bank transfers, payments and more.
- Though the new feature update by Sam and his experts to advance ChatGPT’s scalability has become cutting edge and experimental; but it’s not something that has been recommended by the owner himself, for high stakes work or with a lot of personal information until there is a genuine opportunity to improve and streamline the task being carried out.
He advised users to be cautious when giving ChatGPT access to personal information. For example, granting access to a calendar to coordinate a group dinner might make sense, but the agent wouldn’t need calendar access to shop for clothes on a user’s behalf. This cautionary announcement comes as tech giants are increasingly pushing to develop AI agents as they seek to win the AI race – win Google eyeing for advancements to its chatbot Gemini, and Apple strives to make Siri a one-stop AI bot for iOS users.
Helene Elliott is the senior reporter for News Raise. She covers Science news. She also has a keen interest in photojournalism. Helene holds a nomination for the prestigious Red Smith Award. She is married to author Dennis D’Agostino, a former publicist with the New York Mets.
