ChatGPT is already the fifth biggest website in the world, but it has plenty of other plans than just being an AI assistant.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has spoken about how OpenAI can have a “Sign in with ChatGPT button that can being users’ contexts to other apps. This button could bring users’ context to other apps that can then build on it. This button will be similar to a Sign in with Google or Sign in with Facebook button, but could come with a lot more information than just the basic details that the other sign in options provide.
“We’re gonna do our thing, hopefully very well,” Altman said in a conversation with Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan. “We are gonna try to make the best super assistant out of ChatGPT that we can. We’re gonna add the things that we think we need to add to that. But that is like one small part of the opportunity in front of us,” he added.
“We would like to do more things like finally, now you can imagine that ChatGPT could drive a lot of traffic to new startups. And that there’s a new kind of App or Agent Store that we could do inside of chat GPT and drive traffic to new startups,” he added.
“You could imagine that we could do like a “Sign In with OpenAI” and people could bring their personalized model and easily connect it to a new startup. And that would probably help in a bunch of ways. So we want to be a platform for other people to build stuff,” he added.
OpenAI has tried some of these ideas before. OpenAI had launched an app store early on, but it didn’t get much traction. But the other parts seem to be working out — companies are beginning to report seeing traffic referred through ChatGPT on their websites and apps, and OpenAI could create something similar to SEO for its LLMs through which companies could get mentions in its answers. A “Sign In With OpenAI” button is even more interesting. Most people now have a ChatGPT account, and ChatGPT knows quite a bit about them through all the questions they’ve asked. OpenAI doesn’t only know what users are interested in, but what their levels are — for instance, it knows whether someone struggles with basic math problems or post-graduate level ones, and this context could help other startups build on this information. OpenAI is already investing in robotics, and a new hardware device, but it’s also looking to extend its core product into becoming a platform instead of just being a helpful personal assistant.