ChatGPT turns one: A year of rapid growth and controversies

OpenAI launched ChatGPT, a chatbot powered by GPT-3.5 language model on November 30, 2022.

In the world of artificial intelligence, OpenAI’s ChatGPT emerged as a groundbreaking creation, capturing the imagination of millions around the globe.

The journey of ChatGPT over the past year was nothing short of a roller coaster, filled with technological advancements, unexpected challenges, and even a touch of boardroom drama which saw the sudden ouster and return of CEO and co-founder Sam Altman.

Here’s a timeline of all that has happened since the viral AI chatbot was launched on November 30, 2022:

OpenAI launched ChatGPT, a chatbot powered by GPT-3.5 language model. The chatbot became widely popular on social media as people shared examples of its capabilities.

The platform experienced rapid success, amassing over one million users within a week of its launch. (To put this in perspective, Twitter took two years to reach the same milestone.)

ChatGPT achieved the remarkable feat of reaching 100 million users at a significantly faster pace than TikTok, which took nine months to reach the same milestone, and Instagram, which took two and a half years.

After the overwhelming response to ChatGPT, OpenAI launched ChatGPT Plus, a new subscription plan aimed at monetising the technology, starting at $20 per month.

In a bid to catch up with OpenAI's ChatGPT, Google unveiled Bard, an experimental conversation AI service.

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai outlined the plan to roll out the service initially to "trusted testers" before making it widely accessible to the public in the coming weeks. The chatbot was, however, launched for the wider audience on March 21, 2023.

Microsoft,  OpenAI's largest investor, rolled out a revamped Bing search engine and Edge web browser, integrating ChatGPT to challenge Google's dominance.

"This technology is going to reshape pretty much every software category," Microsoft Chief Executive Satya Nadella said in a briefing at Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, Washington.

OpenAI made ChatGPT and Whisper AI models accessible to developers through the company's API, allowing developers to use the core language and speech-to-text capabilities of the AI for integration into their own projects.

The company also promised support for updates being available to developers, and said that API users, "will always get our recommended stable model, while still having the flexibility to opt for a specific model version."

OpenAI launched GPT-4, the successor to GPT-3.5. This advanced model is "multimodal," meaning it can generate content in response to both text and image prompts. The text-input feature is available for ChatGPT Plus subscribers and software developers (with a waitlist).

Also read: 5 things to know about GPT-4, OpenAI’s latest language model offering

In a simulation of the bar exam required of US law school graduates before professional practice, the new model scored around the top 10 percent of test takers, versus the older model ranking around the bottom 10 percent.

A glitch in ChatGPT exposed the payment information of a small fraction of ChatGPT Plus subscribers.

The issue stemmed from a bug in an open-source library utilised by the chatbot, which inadvertently allowed other users to view conversation titles associated with different accounts.

OpenAI promptly addressed the vulnerability and took ChatGPT offline to prevent further exposure of user data.

OpenAI introduced plugin support to ChatGPT that allows it to receive updates and expand its information beyond what it knows up to 2021, which was limited to news and events.

The company said that it was rolling out support to a small number of users at first and would gradually increase availability.

Elon Musk and a group of over 1,000 AI experts and industry leaders penned an open letter urging a six-month pause on the development of AI systems more powerful than OpenAI's GPT-4, citing concerns about potential societal and humanitarian risks.

"Powerful AI systems should be developed only once we are confident that their effects will be positive and their risks will be manageable," the letter said.

A tech ethics organisation filed a complaint with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC), requesting that the regulator intervene and prevent further commercial deployment of advanced AI technologies that underpin ChatGPT.

The complaint, submitted by the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Digital Policy, headed by veteran privacy advocate Marc Rotenberg, focuses on GPT-4.

The group urged the FTC to launch an investigation into OpenAI to assess whether the commercial release of the tool's fourth generation violates US and international regulations.

Italy's privacy regulatory body announced the blocking of ChatGPT, citing concerns over the chatbot's lack of adherence to user data privacy and inability to verify user ages.

The decision, effective immediately, entails a temporary restriction on the processing of Italian user data by OpenAI.  The Italian Data Protection Authority initiated an investigation into the matter.

The blocking of ChatGPT in Italy comes days after the European policing agency Europol warned that criminals were set to use the app to commit fraud and other cybercrimes, from phishing to malware.

OpenAI launched a bug bounty program in collaboration with Bugcrowd, a leading crowdsourcing cybersecurity platform.

The program offers cash rewards ranging from $200 to $20,000 for the discovery and reporting of security vulnerabilities in OpenAI's technology and services.

The European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) expressed concern about ChatGPT and other AI chatbots, calling on EU consumer protection agencies to investigate the technology and the potential harm it poses to individuals.

BEUC's concerns centered around the ability of chatbots to generate content that appears true and reliable but is often factually incorrect. This content, BEUC argued, can mislead consumers and result in deceptive advertising. The group also raised concerns about the vulnerability of younger consumers and children to such risks.

OpenAI gave users the option to opt out of having their ChatGPT conversations used to train its AI models. This is a privacy safeguard for people who may share sensitive information with the chatbot.

Users can turn off their chat histories by clicking a toggle switch in their account settings. When this is done, their conversations will no longer be saved in ChatGPT's history sidebar and OpenAI will not use that data to improve its models.

OpenAI announced the reinstatement of ChatGPT in Italy after addressing concerns raised by regulators regarding data privacy.

OpenAI closed a share sale worth more than $300 million, propelling its valuation between $27billion and $29 billion. This significant funding round attracted prominent venture capital firms, including Tiger International, Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz (A16Z), Thrive, and K2 International, who acquired new shares in the company.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman testified before a US Senate subcommittee and urged Congress to impose new rules on big tech companies, including regulations on AI. He argued that while AI has the potential to benefit society in many ways, it also poses serious risks that need to be addressed through regulation.

"We think that regulatory intervention by governments will be critical to mitigate the risks of increasingly powerful models," Altman said.

OpenAI released a free ChatGPT app for Apple’s iOS that seamlessly syncs conversation history across all devices.

OpenAI made its ChatGPT iOS app available in over 30 countries, including India. Previously, the app was only available in the United States.

A group of over 350 AI industry leaders, including OpenAI's Altman and Google DeepMind's Demis Hassabis, warned that AI poses an existential threat to humanity and should be considered a societal risk on par with pandemics and nuclear wars.

The group called for AI risk mitigation to be a global priority.

Japan's privacy watchdog warned OpenAI not to collect sensitive data without individuals' permission. The watchdog said it was concerned about OpenAI's data collection practices and that it may take further action if it has more concerns.

Mercedes-Benz and Microsoft teamed up to integrate ChatGPT into its cars in the United States. This collaboration aims to enhance voice-command capabilities in Mercedes vehicles, making interactions with the car's system more fluid, natural, and human-like.

Two American authors, Paul Tremblay and Mona Awad, filed a class-action lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging that the company used their copyrighted works to train its chatbot ChatGPT. The lawsuit claims that OpenAI copied data from thousands of books without the authors' consent.

OpenAI disabled ChatGPT's Bing search feature because it allowed paid subscribers to jump paywalls on other sites.

"We have learned that the ChatGPT Browse beta can occasionally display content in ways we don't want. For example, if a user specifically asks for a URL's full text, it might inadvertently fulfill this request," the company said.

OpenAI introduced a new feature called "Custom instructions" for ChatGPT, enabling users to provide information that the chatbot should consider for each conversation. This feature eliminates the need to repeatedly define the context for every interaction, allowing the chatbot to maintain a consistent understanding throughout the conversation.

OpenAI launched the ChatGPT app for Android devices. The app is free to use and is available in the US, India, Bangladesh, and Brazil.

OpenAI allows websites to block GPTBot, its web crawler used for data collection. This decision is in response to lawsuits accusing OpenAI of illegally gathering data for AI training.

OpenAI acquired Global Illumination, a digital products company founded in 2021. The entire Global Illumination team will be joining OpenAI to work on its core products, including ChatGPT. The deal was the first known acquisition by OpenAI.

OpenAI released a new version of its ChatGPT chatbot called ChatGPT Enterprise. The new version is targeted at large businesses and offers more security, privacy and higher-speed access to OpenAI's technology.

OpenAI introduced a new feature to its ChatGPT app, enabling the chatbot to see, hear and speak. ChatGPT's voice functionality is restricted to iOS and Android, while the image capabilities will be accessible on all platforms.

OpenAI updated ChatGPT with new features that allows users to upload and analyse files, as well as switch between different models without having to do it manually. These new features are in beta testing and are available to ChatGPT Plus subscribers.

OpenAI unveiled a suite of products at its inaugural developer conference, OpenAI DevDay, including an upgraded version of its flagship GPT large language model (LLM), GPT-4 Turbo, and tools for building customised AI chatbots.

Altman was fired from the company. He was accused of not being "consistently candid in his communications with the board." Greg Brockman, the president of OpenAI, resigned in solidarity with Altman. The company announced that chief technology officer Mira Murati will will step in as interim CEO.

Efforts to reinstate Altman as OpenAI's CEO hit a roadblock, with negotiations stalling over disagreements regarding the board's composition and role. Altman is open to returning but wants to see governance changes, including the removal of existing board members and a statement absolving him of wrongdoing.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced that Altman, Brockman, and other OpenAI employees will be joining the company's new advanced AI research team. Nadella added that Altman will serve as the CEO of the new advanced AI research team. In a show of solidarity with their ousted CEO Altman, nearly 700 OpenAI employees threatened to resign from the company unless the remaining board members stepped down.

Also read: A timeline of Sam Altman's ouster and return to OpenAI

OpenAI announced that it has reached an agreement in principle for Altman to return as CEO. The company stated that a new initial board has been inducted, including Bret Taylor, former co-CEO of Salesforce, and Larry Summers, former Secretary of the Treasury.