GPT-5 Faces Criticism and Promises Improvements Following Initial Rollout, CEO Addresses Snafus and Chart Crime in Reddit AMA
In a Reddit ‘Ask Me Anything’ session on Friday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and members of the GPT-5 development team faced queries about the new model and requests for the reintroduction of its predecessor, GPT-4o. During the discussion, Altman was also questioned about an incident referred to as the “chart crime” during the presentation of GPT-5.
One of the novel features introduced with GPT-5 is a real-time router designed to select the optimal model for each user prompt, providing swift responses or taking additional time to deliberate answers. However, participants in the r/ChatGPT Reddit forum reported experiencing less effectiveness from GPT-5 compared to its predecessor.
Altman explained that the perceived diminished performance of GPT-5 was due to issues with the router during its initial launch on Thursday. He assured that improvements would be made to enhance the user experience, stating, “GPT-5 will appear smarter from today. Yesterday, we encountered a service incident, and the autoswitcher was temporarily out of order, resulting in GPT-5 appearing less intelligent. Additionally, we are implementing adjustments to the decision boundary that should help you access the appropriate model more frequently. We will also make it more transparent about which model is addressing a given query.”
Despite these issues, users persistently advocated for the reinstatement of GPT-4o for Plus subscribers, to which Altman responded, “We are investigating the possibility of allowing Plus users to continue using GPT-4o. We are gathering more data on the trade-offs.” Furthermore, he also promised, “We will double the rate limits for Plus users as we complete the rollout,” providing users ample time to familiarize themselves with the new model without worrying about exhausting their monthly prompts.
The session also addressed a widely mocked chart presented during the live launch of GPT-5 that led to numerous “chart crime” jokes. Despite not addressing questions about the chart during the AMA, Altman acknowledged the incident on Thursday as a “mega chart screwup.” It was noted that the charts in the subsequent blog post were accurate.
The humorously incorrect chart sparked a wave of jokes about using GPT for corporate presentations, and even reviewer Simon Willison, who had early access and generally appreciated the model’s performance, highlighted turning data into a table as an example of a GPT-5 failure.
In conclusion, Altman assured continued efforts to rectify issues that seemed to concern users the most, ending the session with a promise: “We will continue to work towards stability and will keep listening to feedback.”
