One thing this article gets wrong is how OpenAI isn’t an application layer company, they built the original ChatGPT “app” with model innovation to power it. They’re good at UX and actually have the strongest shot at owning the most common apps (like codegen).
I don't disagree. But that's a pretty good reason to make sure you're making something other than the obvious common apps if you want a big chunk of acquisition money.
I think the UX of chatgpt works because it's familiar, not because it's good. Lowers friction for new users but doesn't scale well for more complex workflows. if you're building anything beyond Q&A or simple tasks, you run into limitations fast. There's still plenty of space for apps that treat the model as a backend and build real interaction layers on top — especially for use cases that aren’t served by a chat metaphor
I wouldn't call it familiar, it's a weird quasi-chat. They didn't even do the chat metaphor right, you can't type more as the AI is thinking. Nor can you really interrupt it when it's off over explaining something for the 20th time without just stopping it.
It's missing obvious settings, has a weird UX where every now and mysterious popups will appear like 'memory updated', or now it spews random text while it's "thinking", it'll every now and then ask you to choose between two answers but I'm working so no thanks, I'm just going to pick one at random so I can continue working.
People had copy pasta templates they dropped into every chat with no way of savings Ng thatz they they added a sort of ability to save that but it worked in a inscrutable and confusing manner, but then they released new models that didn't support that and so you're back to copy pasta, and blurgh.
It's a success despite the UI because they had a model streets ahead of everyone else.
