OpenAI might soon show you ads on ChatGPT based on what you tell the AI

OpenAI has been reported to be mulling putting ads in ChatGPT for some time now, but we have a new report from The Information that goes into the details of how this plan may work.

​The company is now said to be considering showing ads to users based on ChatGPT’s memory, which is the information it remembers about the users. The memory feature helps personalize the chatbot for users, so users may have to take a harsh call between losing out on a more tailored experience or continuing to use the chatbot as it is, but with ads.

​Reportedly, focus groups revealed that some users believe that ChatGPT already has ads, which has led to some staff members to argue in favour of adding advertising.

​The OpenAI staff members who are pushing to bring ads to ChatGPT are said to be prominently former Meta employees. Notably, OpenAI has brought a large number of ex-Meta staffers and has even created a dedicated Slack channel for them. Six hundred thirty of the 3,000 employees are said to have previously worked at Meta, including Fidji Simo, the company’s CEO of Applications.

​Simo is said to have played a key role in bringing ads to the Facebook app during her decade-long stint at Meta. A previous report had stated that she is also on the hunt for a candidate to lead a new team which will be tasked with bringing ads to ChatGPT.

​In an interaction with the Financial Times, OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar had said last December that OpenAI had no active plans to pursue advertising, but the team was open to exploring new revenue streams.

​Notably, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman had previously rejected the idea of having ads in ChatGPT purely for aesthetic reasons. In a podcast with Lex Fridman, Altman said, “I kind of hate ads just as an aesthetic choice. I think ads needed to happen on the internet for a bunch of reasons, to get it going, but it’s a momentary industry. The world is richer now. I like that people pay for ChatGPT and know that the answers they’re getting are not influenced by advertisers.”

​However, Altman has also been a fan of how Instagram has implemented ads on its platform. In a podcast earlier in the year, he said, “I’m not totally against it. I can point to areas where I like ads. I think ads on Instagram, kinda cool. I bought a bunch of stuff from them. But I think it’d be very hard to—I mean, it’d take a lot of care to get right.”