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Memory and new controls for ChatGPT

openai.com

11–20 of 270 posts

Re: Memory and new controls for ChatGPT

#11
post #7

So, so, so curious how they are implementing this.

My hunch is that they summarize the conversation periodically and inject that as additional system prompt constraints.

That was a common hack for the LLM context length problem, but now that context length is "solved" it could be more useful to align output a bit better.

Re: Memory and new controls for ChatGPT

#12
post #3
post #2

I love this idea and it leads me to a question for everyone here. I've done a bunch of user interviews of ChatGPT, Pi, Gemini, etc. users and find there are two common usage patterns: 1. "Transactional" where every chat is a separate question, sort of like a Google search... People don't expect memory or any continuity between chats. 2. "Relationship-driven" where people chat with the LLM as if it's a friend or colle…

Personally, I always expect every "conversation" to be starting from a blank slate, and I'm not sure I'd want it any other way unless I can self-host the whole thing. Starting clean also has the benefit of knowing the prompt/history is in a clean/"known-good" state, and that there's nothing in the memory that's going to cause the LLM to get weird on me.

> Starting clean also has the benefit of knowing the prompt/history is in a clean/"known-good" state, and that there's nothing in the memory that's going to cause the LLM to get weird on me.

This matters a lot for prompt injection/hijacking. Not that I'm clamoring to give OpenAI access to my personal files or APIs in the first place, but I'm definitely not interested in giving a version of GPT with more persistent memory access to those files or APIs. A clean slate is a mitigating feature that helps with a real security risk. It's not enough of a mitigating feature, but it helps a bit.

Re: Memory and new controls for ChatGPT

#15
This is a feature I've always wanted, but ChatGPT gets more painful the more instructions you stick into the context. That's a pity because I assume that's what this is doing: copying all memory items into a numbered list with some pre-prompt like "This is what you know about the user based on past chats" or something.

Anyway, it seems to be implemented quite well with a lot of user controls so that is nice. I think it's possible I will soon upgrade to a Team plan and get the family on that.

A habit I have is that if it gets something wrong I place the correction there in the text. The idea being that I could eventually scroll down and find it. Maybe in the future, they can record this stuff in some sort of RAGgable machine and it will have true memory.

Re: Memory and new controls for ChatGPT

#16

OpenAI's terminology and implementations have been becoming increasingly more nonstandard and black box such that it's making things more confusing than anything else even for people like myself who are proficient in the space. I can't imaging how the nontechnical users they are targeting with the ChatGPT webapp feel.

Non-technical users can at least still just sign up, see the text box to chat, and start typing. You'll know the real trouble's arrived when new sign-ups get hit with some sort of unskippable onboarding. "Select three or more categories that interest you."

Re: Memory and new controls for ChatGPT

#17

OpenAI's terminology and implementations have been becoming increasingly more nonstandard and black box such that it's making things more confusing than anything else even for people like myself who are proficient in the space. I can't imaging how the nontechnical users they are targeting with the ChatGPT webapp feel.

I would think it is intentional and brand strategy. OpenAI is such a force majeure that people will not know how to switch off of it if needed, makes their solutions more sticky. Other companies will probably adjust to their terminology just to keep up and make it easier for others to onboard.

Re: Memory and new controls for ChatGPT

#18
post #2

I love this idea and it leads me to a question for everyone here. I've done a bunch of user interviews of ChatGPT, Pi, Gemini, etc. users and find there are two common usage patterns: 1. "Transactional" where every chat is a separate question, sort of like a Google search... People don't expect memory or any continuity between chats. 2. "Relationship-driven" where people chat with the LLM as if it's a friend or colle…

Speaking of transactional, the textual version of ChatGPT4 never asks questions or is having a conversation, its predicting what it thinks you need to know. One response, nothing unprompted.

Oddly, the spoken version of ChatGPT4 does implore, listens and responds to tones, gives the same energy back and does ask questions. Sometimes it accidentally sounds sarcastic “is this one of your interests?”

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