ChatGPT launched three years ago today

On November 30, 2022, OpenAI innocently introduced a new product to the world describes it as “a model called ChatGPT that communicates with each other in a conversational way.”

It’s no exaggeration to suggest that ChatGPT went on to transform the world of business and technology, becoming immensely popular (it still ranks first on Apple’s free apps rankings today) while catalysing a flood of generative AI products.

It’s even made people suspicious of the em dashboard, which no chatbot will ever take away from me.

Karen Hao, author of “Empire of AI,” argued in a recent interview with TechCrunch that OpenAI has “already become more powerful than virtually every nation state in the world” and is now “rewiring our geopolitics, our very lives.”

Even more dramatic changes may be in store. Charlie Warzel wrote in The Atlantic that we now live in “the world that ChatGPT built,” which is “defined by a certain kind of uncertainty” and “constantly waiting for a shoe to drop.”

“Young generations are feeling this instability acutely as they prepare for careers where they are warned that there may be no predictable path to a career,” Warzel said. “Older generations are also being told that the future may be unrecognizable, that the marketable skills they have honed may not be relevant.”

Of course, others are more optimistic about an AI-centric future, and are indeed positioned to benefit greatly from it. But according to Warzel, the AI ​​boosters and investors are waiting along with everyone else – waiting to see if their bets pay off, but also waiting “because a defining characteristic of generative AI, according to the true believers, is that it is never in its final form.”

Meanwhile, Bloomberg took a more focused look how ChatGPT transformed the stock market. The most obvious winner so far is Nvidia, with its stock up 979% since the chatbot’s launch. But the AI ​​fever has also boosted other Big Tech companies, with the seven most valuable companies in the S&P 500 – Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Broadcom – all tied to technology, and with their combined growth accounting for nearly half of the benchmark’s 64% increase since ChatGPT’s launch.

This has created a more top-heavy market. The S&P 500 is weighted by market capitalization, and those same seven companies now account for 35% of the weighting, up from about 20% three years ago.

How long will this growth continue? With the notable exception of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, it has become increasingly common for AI executives to acknowledge that we may be in a bubble (or, if you prefer, a “mania”).

“Someone is going to lose a phenomenal amount of money on AI,” said the CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman said at a dinner with reporters in August.

Similarly, Bret Taylor, CEO of Sierra and OpenAI board chairman, agreed that we are “in a bubble,” comparing it to the dot-com boom of the late 1990s. While individual companies may go bankrupt, he predicted, “AI will transform the economy, and I think, like the internet, it will create enormous amounts of economic value in the future.”

In another three years – or less – we may know whether that optimism was justified.