ChatGPT in the context of 2022

Natural language generation (NLG) is a software process that produces natural language output. A widely cited survey of NLG methods describes NLG as "the subfield of artificial intelligence and computational linguistics that is concerned with the construction of computer systems that can produce understandable texts in English or other human languages from some underlying non-linguistic representation of information".

While it is widely agreed that the output of any NLG process is text, there is some disagreement about whether the inputs of an NLG system need to be non-linguistic. Common applications of NLG methods include the production of various reports, for example weather and patient reports; image captions; and chatbots like ChatGPT.

Generative artificial intelligence (Generative AI, or GenAI) is a subfield of artificial intelligence that uses generative models to produce text, images, videos, audio, software code or other forms of data. These models learn the underlying patterns and structures of their training data and use them to produce new data based on the input, which often comes in the form of natural language prompts.

Generative AI tools have become more common since the AI boom in the 2020s. This boom was made possible by improvements in transformer-based deep neural networks, particularly large language models (LLMs). Major tools include chatbots such as ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Claude, Grok, and DeepSeek; text-to-image models such as Stable Diffusion, Midjourney, and DALL-E; and text-to-video models such as Veo and Sora. Technology companies developing generative AI include OpenAI, xAI, Anthropic, Meta AI, Microsoft, Google, Mistral AI, DeepSeek, Baidu and Yandex.

A chatbot (originally chatterbot) is a software application or web interface designed to have textual or spoken conversations. Modern chatbots are typically online and use generative artificial intelligence systems that are capable of maintaining a conversation with a user in natural language and simulating the way a human would behave as a conversational partner. Such chatbots often use deep learning and natural language processing, but simpler chatbots have existed for decades.

Chatbots have increased in popularity as part of the AI boom of the 2020s, and the popularity of ChatGPT, followed by competitors such as Gemini, Claude and later Grok. AI chatbots typically use a foundational large language model, such as GPT-4 or the Gemini language model, which is fine-tuned for specific uses.

An AI boom is a period of rapid growth in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). The current boom is an ongoing period that originally started from 2010 to 2016, but saw increased acceleration in the 2020s. Examples of this include generative AI technologies, such as large language models and AI image generators developed by companies like OpenAI, as well as scientific advances, such as protein folding prediction led by Google DeepMind. This period is sometimes referred to as an AI spring, a term used to differentiate it from previous AI winters. As of 2025, ChatGPT has emerged as the 4th most visited website globally, surpassed only by Google, YouTube, and Facebook.

Gemini (formerly known as Bard) is a generative artificial intelligence chatbot and virtual assistant developed by Google. Based on the large language model (LLM) of the same name, it was launched on March 21, 2023 in response to the rise of OpenAI's ChatGPT.

DeepSeek is a generative artificial intelligence chatbot by the Chinese company DeepSeek. Released on 20 January 2025, DeepSeek-R1 surpassed ChatGPT as the most downloaded freeware app on the iOS App Store in the United States by 27 January. DeepSeek's success against larger and more established rivals has been described as "upending AI" and initiating "a global AI space race". DeepSeek's compliance with Chinese government censorship policies and its data collection practices have also raised concerns over privacy and information control in the model, prompting regulatory scrutiny in multiple countries. However, it has also been praised for its open weights and infrastructure code, energy efficiency and contributions to open-source artificial intelligence.

DALL-E, DALL-E 2, and DALL-E 3 (stylised DALL·E) are text-to-image models developed by OpenAI using deep learning methodologies to generate digital images from natural language descriptions known as prompts.

The first version of DALL-E was announced in January 2021. In the following year, its successor DALL-E 2 was released. DALL-E 3 was released natively into ChatGPT for ChatGPT Plus and ChatGPT Enterprise customers in October 2023, with availability via OpenAI's API and "Labs" platform provided in early November. Microsoft implemented the model in Bing's Image Creator tool and plans to implement it into their Designer app. With Bing's Image Creator tool, Microsoft Copilot runs on DALL-E 3. In March 2025, DALL-E-3 was replaced in ChatGPT by GPT Image 1's native image-generation capabilities.

OpenAI is an American artificial intelligence (AI) organization headquartered in San Francisco, California. It aims to develop "safe and beneficial" artificial general intelligence (AGI), which it defines as "highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work". As a leading organization in the ongoing AI boom, OpenAI is known for the GPT family of large language models, the DALL-E series of text-to-image models, and a text-to-video model named Sora. Its release of ChatGPT in November 2022 has been credited with catalyzing widespread interest in generative AI.

The organization has a complex corporate structure. As of October 2025, it is led by the non-profit OpenAI Foundation, founded in 2015 and registered in Delaware, which holds a 26% equity stake in OpenAI Group PBC, a for-profit public benefit corporation which commercializes its products. Microsoft invested over $13 billion into OpenAI, and provides Azure cloud computing resources. In October 2025, OpenAI conducted a $6.6 billion share sale that valued the company at $500 billion. On 28 October 2025, OpenAI said it had converted its main business into a for-profit corporation, with Microsoft acquiring a 27% stake in the company and the remaining non-profit company (now known as the OpenAI Foundation) owning a 26% stake.

Threads is an American social media microblogging service operated by Meta Platforms. Threads requires an Instagram account to use the service and features integration between the two platforms. Upon its launch in 2023, Threads became the fastest-growing consumer software application in history, gaining over 100 million users in its first five days and surpassing the record previously set by ChatGPT.

After Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter in October 2022, Meta employees explored the concept of introducing text-based functionality to Instagram. This feature, known as Instagram Notes, was rolled out in December 2022. The company subsequently began developing a separate app focused on text-based posts. Development on Threads—internally known as "Project 92"—commenced in January 2023, with the platform officially launching on July 5, 2023. Threads immediately became available in 100 countries, but until December 14, 2023 had delayed its launch in the European Union as it waited for regulatory clarity from the European Commission regarding the service's data collection policies.

A generative pre-trained transformer (GPT) is a type of large language model (LLM) that is widely used in generative AI chatbots. GPTs are based on a deep learning architecture called the transformer. They are pre-trained on large datasets of unlabeled content, and able to generate novel content.

OpenAI was the first to apply generative pre-training to the transformer architecture, introducing the GPT-1 model in 2018. The company has since released many bigger GPT models. The popular chatbot ChatGPT, released in late 2022 (using GPT-3.5), was followed by many competitor chatbots using their own generative pre-trained transformers to generate text, such as Gemini, DeepSeek or Claude.