The real problem with ChatGPT plugins

… is UX: they interfere with the basic experience of using ChatGPT.

In an interview with Raza Habib of Humanloop archived here, Sam Altman says (paraphrased): “The usage of plugins, other than browsing, suggests that they don’t have product-market-fit yet”

But I think there could be PMF. The blockage is UX – ironically for a product which is otherwise super simple to use.

Here’s the bigger list of issues with plugins:

• Most of them don’t work as advertised – or just don’t work at all
• Most of them take too long to return results
• Many of them require you to do many things outside of the ChatGPT UI, which is annoying
• Many of them duplicate what ChatGPT can do natively – and do so in a worse way
• But the big problem: they disrupt the ChatGPT UX

To be clear, I think the concept is great and there are several plugins I like. For example:

• ChatWithGit
• ChatWithWebsite
• daigr.am
• Scraper
• AskYourPDF
• Metaphor (<– this is one is great, BTW)

But even these disrupt the iterative flow of conversation.

It’s like when you’re in an enjoyable, animated conversation and the other person says: “hang on, I have to look that up on my phone”.

Then two minutes of silence later: “shit I can’t find it”.

Prompting is part priming the model but it’s also priming your own mind – the current plugin UX cuts both short.