GARDEN ROUTE NEWS - In November of 2022, Open AI released its highly anticipated AI bot Chat GPT to much fanfare. Since its launch, the bot has amassed more than a million subscribers and more than 100 million monthly active users.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the technology at the heart of Chat GPT. AI is a branch of computer science that focuses on creating machines and programmes that can think and act like humans.

In essence, it is about making machines "smart" and creating systems that can solve problems just as well or better than humans can.

Let's illustrate this with a practical example. If you were to do a Google search about the history of George in Western Cape, South Africa, you would have to go through each page and pick out the information you need. 

But if you were to ask the same question of Chat GPT, you would get a drafted paragraph in a matter of seconds. The AI bot has already scanned the web pages and selected the relevant information for you.

This is what it produced:

"The area now known as George was originally inhabited by the Khoisan people. The first European settlers arrived in the area around 1775, after being granted land by the Dutch East India Company.

The area was named after King George III of England. In 1811, a garrison was established in the area and the town of George was established in 1817. The town was initially used as a trading post and a military base. In 1821, the Dutch Reformed Church was founded and the town was laid out in 1822.

The first official school was established in 1827.

In 1843, the George Municipality was established and the town was officially proclaimed in 1847. During this time, the economy of the town was largely based on timber and fruit production."

The impressive capabilities of AI are not lost on the tech industry. Companies like Google, Microsoft and Meta have all invested heavily in the development of similar AI tools. Google has released its AI tool called Bard, Microsoft is attempting to revive Bing with AI integration, and Meta has announced plans to integrate AI into Facebook.

AI is here to stay and will undoubtedly change the way we do things. We can either be early adopters and embrace the power of AI, or wait until the last minute and miss out on the potential benefits. Let's be proactive and take advantage of this technology now.

Servaas de Kock is the Group Executive Digital at Caxton & CTP and Operations Director at Group Editors (Pty) Ltd.

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