ChatGPT and Blogging: The Good & The Bad

OpenAI's latest creation follows in a list of impressive and groundbreaking AI models like DALL-E, which was able to generate digital images based on specific inputs provided by the user.

ChatGPT has been garnering the attention of the AI world for the variety of subjects and domains it is able to provide information about, as well as its ability to produce written works like essays or quotes. However, as we slowly explore what the revolutionary model is capable of doing, its impact on several fields of work becomes clearer. In this article, I aim to analyse the impact of ChatGPT on blogging and SEO (Search Engine Optimisation).

What is ChatGPT?

Before we can answer how it affects content creation, we must understand what ChatGPT is and the underlying mechanism on which it works.

ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence chatbot that is developed using OpenAI's previously developed GPT---3 language model. It is trained to converse in human language and to analyse human questions to generate accurate responses. The chatbot is seen as a revolution in human-computer interaction that can completely change the way we interact with computers and replace traditional search engine mechanisms. Any user can try out the model at chat.openai.com after creating an account or logging in.

The attention that ChatGPT has garnered since its release is a testament to the influence that AI simulated systems will have in the future. It also draws attention to the problems that are present in AI systems, like bias in responses and the need to make AI more racially and culturally equitable. But work has been done in ensuring that ChatGPT is less biased. (Case in point, this article released by OpenAI on their blog talking about addressing biases in AI and how AI systems should behave: openai.com/blog/how-should-ai-systems-behave/).

ChatGPT and Blogging

The Good

Ever since its release, one of the most surprising abilities of the model has been its content generation in the form of long paragraphs. This enables the bot to replace human writers by churning out human-like writings in a matter of minutes. It is a legitimate concern that jobs once done by bloggers and content writers will be replaced by ChatGPT. Some worry that AI will one day rid the industry of humans entirely and leave thousands jobless. But, that day is still far away and the model still needs to go through a lot of development before such fears start to move towards a new reality. In the near future, AI will help the blogging industry rather than threatening it, if integrated well enough into writing workflows.

Today, ChatGPT is capable of generating summaries and analysing data from webpages seamlessly, enabling writers to focus on the creative part of writing, and expressing their opinions properly. At the same time, it can generate title ideas, writing topics and help in optimising blog SEO to ensure maximum discovery. A major area that can be boosted with ChatGPT and the likes is keyword search to include within the post that guarantees that it will be seen by the maximum number of users possible.

The Bad

While it seems like AI can handle the blogging and content generation process on its own without human supervision, it still has a long way to go in doing that. The content generated by ChatGPT is often factually uneven, and should not be trusted without verification from reliable sources. This happens because the model, still being in its infancy stage, has not received enough training to generate the right output factually 100% of the time. That is the reason why stack overflow has banned ChatGPT in light of its low average of generating correct responses. It is often found to be generating facts with little to no actual factual basis. This phenomenon is known as "hallucinating facts". Plus, bad news to those of you out there looking to do your homework using ChatGPT, since its release, a number of methods have been developed to identify AI-generated content from human written content. Even OpenAI themselves have released one.

Another problem with the responses generated by the model is that its answers are too formal and verbose to pass as human answers. It struggles with using idioms and phrases that regular speakers use all the time in natural language. This makes it easily identifiable whether or not any written piece is authored by AI. Naturally, AI models like ChatGPT cannot express feelings as humans can, which reduces its responses to mere words, not expressions. The formality found in AI responses also gives it away. This also makes bloggers shy away from using ChatGPT to write articles because of their formal nature, clear and organised thought, and lack of verification of facts.

Conclusion

Today, ChatGPT represents the best AI has to offer. However, the problems outlined above leave a lot to be desired when it comes to AI replacing humans in an industry. Blogging is an industry that can be optimised, but it is also one where no AI will be able to do the work that bloggers do in expressing opinions, thoughts and facts.

Thanks for reading.