You no doubt have heard about ChatGPT. It’s a terrible name – it stands for Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer – for an amazing artificial intelligence software application that can, among other things, produce essays on any topic in a matter of seconds. ChatGPT was released by the American research firm OpenAI last November. Since then, there have been heated debates around the world about the ethics, possibilities and potential dangers of such an “intelligent” computer program.

The Conversation published our first article on ChatGPT on Dec. 5. We’ve published dozens since then across our global network. And this week, The Conversation Weekly podcast offers a great episode on how AI programs like ChatGPT are changing the world – and how it’s happening so quickly.

For your weekend reading (and listening), I’ve assembled a collection of stories about ChatGPT that can help you better understand this emerging technology and allow you to come to your own conclusions: good, bad or a bit of both?

Have a great weekend and we’ll be back in your Inbox on Monday.

Scott White

CEO | Editor-in-Chief

Weekend Reads: Understanding ChatGPT

Three AI experts on how access to ChatGPT-style tech is about to change our world – podcast

Daniel Merino, The Conversation; Nehal El-Hadi, The Conversation

New technologies are often surrounded by hopeful messages that they will alleviate poverty and bring about positive social change. History shows these assumptions are often misplaced.

The ChatGPT chatbot is blowing people away with its writing skills. An expert explains why it’s so impressive

Marcel Scharth, University of Sydney

The newest OpenAI text-generator is a marked improvement over its predecessor – but it still has its pitfalls.

AI could make more work for us, instead of simplifying our lives

Barbara Ribeiro, University of Manchester

Automation may not reduce our workloads as much as we’d hoped.

A survey of over 17,000 people indicates only half of us are willing to trust AI at work

Nicole Gillespie, The University of Queensland; Caitlin Curtis, The University of Queensland; Javad Pool, The University of Queensland; Steven Lockey, The University of Queensland

AI is inevitably entering the workplace – some people are more OK with it than others. But do we trust this technology?

Unlike with academics and reporters, you can’t check when ChatGPT’s telling the truth

Blayne Haggart, Brock University

ChatGPT is a sophisticated AI program that generates text from vast databases. But it doesn’t understand the information it produces, which also can’t be verified through scientific means.

ChatGPT: how to prevent it becoming a nightmare for professional writers

Peter Bloom, University of Essex; Pasi Ahonen, University of Essex

Journalists, policymakers and academics are among those whose worlds could be turned upside down by AI chatbots.

ChatGPT and cheating: 5 ways to change how students are graded

Louis Volante, Brock University; Christopher DeLuca, Queen's University, Ontario; Don A. Klinger, University of Waikato

Educators need to carefully consider ChatGPT and issues of academic integrity to move toward an assessment system that leverages AI tools.

We pitted ChatGPT against tools for detecting AI-written text, and the results are troubling

Armin Alimardani, University of Wollongong; Emma A. Jane, UNSW Sydney

There won’t be an easy tech fix for the questions about authorship raised by ChatGPT and other text generators.