ChatGPT can now browse the Internet: Here’s how it can help you

The plugins are available in Alpha to ChatGPT users and developers who are currently on the waitlist. As of now, OpenAI has said that it will give access to a small set of developers and subscribers with its premium ChatGPT Plus plan and will roll out large-scale and API access later. The company said that it will also roll out the ability for developers to create their own plugins for ChatGPT.

“Today, we’re beginning to gradually enable existing plugins from our early collaborators for ChatGPT users, beginning with ChatGPT Plus subscribers. We’re also beginning to roll out the ability for developers to create their own plugins for ChatGPT,” OpenAI stated in its official blog.

Among the set of plugins launched by the company, the most interesting and practical seems to be its web-browsing plugin. This plugin essentially means that ChatGPT will now be able to pull data from across the web to offer answers to prompts from users. The plugin uses the Bing Search API to retrieve content and it also throws up links to websites ChatGPT visited to create its responses and will also cite sources.

With the web-browsing plugin, ChatGPT will show users its search in real-time. For example, for a query on comparison between critically acclaimed Oscar winners in the last two years, ChatGPT will show that it is browsing the best sources and compiling the answer. The response will essentially be a summary of the content pulled from the best sources. The bot will also offer citations in terms of factual information.

ChatGPT browsing the internet: What does it mean?

Along with the web-browsing plugin, OpenAI seems to have been working on a host of plugins for ChatGPT that will let users book restaurants, book travel, buy groceries, and do complex maths problems. All this is possible owing to some of the early collaborator plugins such as FiscalNote, Instacart, Klarna, Milo, Kayak, OpenTable, Shopify, Slack, Zapier, etc. that have joined OpenAI.

Book restaurant: The OpenTable plugin lets ChatGPT browse restaurants for available bookings, and lets users find the most suitable restaurants.

Go shopping: The Instacart plugin will let users place orders from local stores using the AI chatbot.

Enhance productivity: With Slack and Zapier, users will be able to connect with applications such as Google Sheets, Gmail, and Trello.

Code interpreter: This is an experimental plugin that uses Python and can handle uploads and downloads. It is also useful in solving quantitative and qualitative mathematical problems. It can convert file formats and can come in handy with data analysis and visualisation.

Interestingly, this is not the first time the company has worked on a chatbot with access to the Internet. In 2021, OpenAI worked on a chatbot called WebGPT which was reported to have quoted information from unreliable sources.

Incidentally, Meta Inc. too had experimented with its now-defunct BlenderBot 3.0 which also was shelved after it gave incorrect responses. However, with web-enabled ChatGPT, OpenAI has claimed that it has implemented all the necessary safeguards to prevent the bot from indulging in ‘undesirable behaviours’.