• For resumes, assignments, emails, the intriguing ChatGPT chatbot has settled in a few months in our daily lives.
  • We asked 20 Minutes users to tell us about their experience with the bot.
  • Teasing challenges or convincing remedies, from exploits to disillusionments, the tool divides as much as it makes people talk.

In all humility and if asked for a little introspection, ChatGPT finds itself "efficient", "very versatile", of great "availability", even "great". But hey, we preferred more objective humans, the Internet users of 20 Minutes, to appreciate the benefits, or wanderings, of the conversational robot that feeds the planetary buzz by writing poems or even manga.

And among them, some have tried it and adopted it in their everyday lives. This is the case of Liâm, 19 years old, who uses it "on a daily basis", for code, like many, and help with homework. "Speed of responses, constant availability", for him ChatGPT "has almost replaced Google", to the point that he finds it profitable to pay the 20 dollars subscription of the formula of the heavy users. "Just ask him the sources of his knowledge and half the work is done," agrees Theo, a student who uses the bot to write his cover letters. He also recently obtained a 14 out of 20 by entrusting him with the entire writing of a biology assignment, which proved convincing despite "a lack of precision and adapted vocabulary".

Arguments that hit the nail on the head for an increase

Antoine, a professional developer, is convinced by "this superb tool" as long as it is used correctly. "To correct your code and optimize it, it's crazy to see how well it works!" enthuses the computer scientist who also appreciates the bot's pedagogy. As for Julian*, he finds the robot downright "incredible" and "very rewarding". In every sense of the word. Because this thirty-year-old disappointed with his last increase says that he had the idea to entrust ChatGPT with writing advice for a text intended to express his annoyance to his hierarchy. "I just changed the names of managers to match the context of my company and sent it in," he explains. As a result, he was summoned to an interview with his management. Meeting for which, confident now, he worked his argument using the bot. Bingo! He is better paid.



But behind this brilliant success story, it also hides users much more circumspect. A physics student challenged the bot on a thermostatic assignment. "And if I can give advice, it's to continue using your brain!" says this disappointed, annoyed, like others, by the too polite mea culpa of AI when contradicted by it, with its famous "You are right, I apologize for the confusion". Not to mention its versatility, since it generated different reasoning when this tester perfidously submitted the same problem to him three times.

Confusions, errors and mea culpa

Jean-Pierre, a teasing septuagenarian, admits to having been surprised when ChatGPT laid a fair answer to a small riddle that required context while he planted himself on a simple arithmetic question. "However, a computer is first and foremost a calculating machine," he says. Lionel, as an attentive father, tried to help his son answer a reading sheet on A Happy Man, by Arto Paasilinna. Taking stock of the operations, the AI confused a city and a protagonist, then alternately described the main character as "small and fat" and "tall and thin". "In the end, I read the book to unravel the true from the false and help my son," says the quadra.

Antoine, finally, who we guess a bit misanthropic, tried without illusion to have a conversation about everything and nothing with the bot, as he would have done with a person. He found it "boring" and "off-putting." "Always the same thing but said in different ways."

Existential questions

Whether they are satisfied with its services or not, ChatGPT does not spare its loyal or occasional users a certain vertigo. Theo, our biology student, admits to feeling "always a little guilty" for using it for his writing, at the idea, "that one day or another AIs of this kind could totally make us useless in this kind of task". For John, who was tempted to refresh his resume, "companies that hope to do without employees thanks to AI risk for many to fail miserably". Adrien, while acknowledging that ChatGPT can write, translate and code in many languages, reminds us fiercely that "business intelligence is not artificial".

* The first name has been changed

  • ChatGPT
  • Society
  • Artificial Intelligence (AI)
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