There's a lot more to AI than ChatGPT

When ChatGPT launched in late 2022, it was tough to go anywhere online without seeing something about it. But while it's a powerful (and obviously headline-grabbing) tool, it's far from the only way AI can be useful for everyone from startups to century-old businesses.

With that in mind, let's build on the overview of AI from the last edition and talk about some of the creative ways it's being used in the wild.

In this edition, we'll cover how:

• AI can be used in a lot of ways, based on a company's goals and needs.
• Some kinds of AI are pretty in-your-face (like ChatGPT), while others hang out in the background and might even go unnoticed.
• Businesses and nonprofits can decide how to implement AI in a way that's best for their own objectives.

Let's start with the kinds of AI that are likely the most familiar to you: those that are based off of prompts.

The explosion of prompt-based AI tools

Unless you've been on a very long vacation, you've probably heard about ChatGPT by now. ChatGPT and similar tools, like Gemini from Google and Anthropic's Claude, run off of something called a large language model. You enter a prompt in your natural language, just like you'd speak to another person, and it spits back an (often frighteningly good) response in plain language.

Text-to-image models like DALL-E and Midjourney work in a very similar way, but you'll receive an image back instead of an essay.

As you've also probably heard, these new class of tools raise challenging questions about copyright, education, privacy, and much more. Revolutionary technologies often have a gray area period where we figure out how to incorporate them into our lives –?but this particular revolution is happening faster than anything before it.

The model that runs ChatGPT can be used for much more than writing blog posts or brainstorming ideas. OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, allows developers to seamlessly use the tool in their own projects.

One example: I built the Express Lister for Sevents Calendar with OpenAI's tools, which allows event organizers to add details simply by entering a web address that has their event's details. Behind the scenes, Sevents summarizes what's on that page in a sentence or two, grabs dates and categories, and more.

We'll talk a bit more about how AI can be a powerful background assistant in a bit.

Interacting with other kinds of AI

There's a good chance you've probably interacted with AI tools today – perhaps even without realizing it.

Chatbots on websites have become a nearly ubiquitous way of getting help, answering questions, and more. Granted, some are better than others, but these tools can save time by letting customers find answers to some of the most common questions without having to wait for a human agent. (The best tools can send a bunch of information to a human if necessary to make the support team member's job much easier.)

We talked a bit about recommendations in our beginner's guide to algorithms. Guess what? Many of those systems use AI to learn how to make better suggestions for content people would want to see or items they'd want to buy.

And let's not forget the AI in your pocket and home! Apple's Siri, Google Assistant, and Amazon's Alexa all use AI to find the best answers possible for whatever you throw their way.

Going deeper: AI behind the scenes

From my view, the most exciting possibilities with AI have to do with how they can improve a user's experience (even if they don't realize AI is involved).

One great example is the Photos app in iOS devices. Photos now detects any objects in the photos in your library –?and if you search for, say, "flower", it'll show you all the photos you've taken of flowers over the years. Recent iOS releases (as well as some third-party apps) can even identify the flower in the photo automatically.

The same goes for text in documents and photos. When you add a PDF document, your device can extract the text in it so that you can search for a word without having to do any extra work.

The best part? These kinds of features are available to add to your own web and mobile apps, too, creating a richer experience without having your users have to do any extra work.

AI can also have powerful effects on user preferences and analytics. You can customize an entire experience based on someone's role, or you can extract valuable insights from data you've collected from your users. These kinds of tools open up a world of possibilities to create happy customers and run your company more efficiently.

Using AI to create happy customers

I want to underscore the part about happy customers.

I think conversations about tech often focus on the actual technology –?but that's not the most important part of what you create.

The difference between a site, app, or tool that converts leads, brings in customers, or lets your business or nonprofit run more smoothly is often the experience your users have with it. We all know apps on the web and mobile that are a chore or even a pain to use.

AI opens up new ways to create really memorable experiences for users that make their days easier and better.

It's not the tools themselves that make me excited about AI. It's about the experiences they could help enable.

Next week, we'll wrap up this three-part series on AI with a look at how much time companies should spend thinking about AI –?and how worried (or not) they should be.

I'd love to hear your thoughts! Leave a comment with your questions or with your perspectives about how you're using or would like to use AI for your company.