Introduction:

In November 2022 OpenAI released ChatGPT.

2 months earlier I had started my new job as a Data Scientist.

This changed my career trajectory in ways that no one - especially myself - could have anticipated.

Being an early adopter of this technology allowed me to gain significant advantages that I would not have been able to otherwise.

It helped me deliver projects, learn new skills and be twice as productive as I otherwise could have been.

I now work with this technology daily as an AI Engineer and Technical Advisor.

But why am I telling you this?

Because the biggest development since November 2022 happened two weeks ago - the release of GPT-4o

We’re going to talk about what GPT-4o is, what it means for beginners, 5 steps to start exploring ChatGPT and 16 ways you can use ChatGPT

It’s time for you to take advantage of this technology if you haven’t already.

The Dawn of GPT-4o

On the 13th of May, OpenAI announced GPT-4o.

The most important part of this announcement for beginners to Generative AI (the sort of AI that creates things like text and images) was that it would be available to free users.

This brings the free user several useful features:

1. Web Browsing: The model can now browse the web to obtain up-to-date information.

2. Data Analysis: The model can analyze data and create charts.

3. Image and File Uploads: The model can understand images and files uploaded to assist with summarising, writing, or analyzing content.

4. Memory Feature: The model can remember information across sessions to build a more personalised experience.

5. GPT Store Access: The model allows users to discover custom GPTs from the GPT Store. (A store of various versions of ChatGPT customised for more specific tasks.)

6. Voice Conversations: The model can engage in natural, real-time voice conversations. (Some of the most advanced features of this are available only to Plus users for the time being.)

7. Multimodal Interactions: The model can process and generate text, images, audio simultaneously.

You can find out more about the specifics here: https://openai.com/index/hello-gpt-4o/

For a new user, I would really recommend focusing on the “Explorations of Capabilities” section.

It dives in to the different ways these features can be applied.

There are limits on how much you can use certain aspects of the model as a free user, but it will give you a real flavour of the possibilities.

These features are being quickly rolled out to users. So you may start with gpt-3.5 (the older model) then get access to gpt-4o.

I’m going to go through 5 steps to start exploring ChatGPT, that will apply to either model.