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OpenAI’s ‘code red’ reveals the new reality of the AI arms race
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The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, has sent an internal company memo announcing that ChatGPT is now in “code red” mode in an effort to refocus efforts on improving ChatGPT’s basic functions instead of adding new, innovative features.
The memo arrives just as ChatGPT is under renewed threat from competitors like Google, which has just released the well-received Gemini 3 Pro and Nano Banana Pro, and Meta, which is investing billions into AI research. Not to mention the Chinese startup DeepSeek, which has casually lobbed two new enormous open source AI models into an already fractious market.
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What is a “code red”?
According to the WSJ, the memo had Altman saying that more work was necessary to improve the day-to-day experience of using the chatbot, and that it required more personalization features for users, along with better speed and reliability.
Altman indicated that to achieve this, the company would be pausing work on other initiatives, such as advertising, AI shopping agents, and the Pulse personal assistant, to refocus staff on improving the overall ChatGPT experience.
On Monday, VP and head of ChatGPT Nick Turley confirmed the new direction, tweeting: “Our focus now is to keep making ChatGPT more capable, continue growing, and expand access around the world – while making it feel even more intuitive and personal.”
How OpenAI's focus is changing
Earlier this year, Sam Altman was talking a lot about the imminent arrival of AGI, the artificial general intelligence that was set to revolutionize everything from medicine to space travel.
Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inboxContact me with news and offers from other Future brandsReceive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsorsBy submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over.In fact, he wrote two blogs about how we were on the cusp of a major societal transformation.
In one blog, he framed the purpose of OpenAI as developing AGI: “Our mission is to ensure that AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) benefits all of humanity.” In another, he described how close we are to achieving it: “We are past the event horizon; the takeoff has started.
"Humanity is close to building digital superintelligence, and at least so far it’s much less weird than it seems like it should be.”
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Now, with no realistic likelihood of AGI arriving in 2025 as some expected, talk of it seems to have vanished altogether. OpenAI famously isn’t profitable and depends on external funds plus large investments in compute infrastructure.
While the promise of AGI clearly excited investors this year, putting monetization options on the back burner will surely cause some friction going forward.
Yesterday’s leak that OpenAI was planning to start putting ads in ChatGPT seemed to point to the chatbot weakening its consumer offering in favor of generating income. However, the renewed push by Altman for a better user experience first indicates that OpenAI is worried about the competition and does not feel it is in a strong enough position yet to begin that monetization process.
On 18 November, Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced that the Gemini app has surpassed 650 million users per month, gaining significant ground on OpenAI. Altman can clearly feel Gemini breathing down his neck.
There have also been rising user frustrations with OpenAI. The recent launch of ChatGPT 5 did not go well, as users complained the new LLM – which replaced the popular ChatGPT-4o – felt flat and robotic compared to the older version.
The newer, “warmer” ChatGPT-5.1 has addressed some of these issues, but many users still prefer ChatGPT-4o.
What it means to you
A renewed emphasis on reliability and speed for ChatGPT means there could be fewer “fun” new features on the horizon.
While Pulse and the newly announced Shopping Research do not seem to have captured people’s interest, they are exactly the kind of innovative tools you would expect from a market leader like ChatGPT, and I am glad it is experimenting with them.
It is certainly not all bad news for you and me, though. A slowdown in monetization and shopping features should mean a ChatGPT that is nicer to use and more secure.
Nobody wants ads intruding into their user experience or being prompted to buy things as part of a normal ChatGPT conversation. And of course, keeping your credit card out of the app altogether means it is more secure by default.
One area where ChatGPT has struggled in the past is user safety, and it has made significant efforts to identify when users might be in distress and to address their needs. It has also introduced parental controls for the first time. The biggest concern I have is that Altman pushing for faster improvements to the ChatGPT experience could compromise its internal safety culture and lead to hasty releases that have not been tested rigorously enough, putting users at risk.
The end of an era
You could argue that the very existence of ChatGPT put the rest of the technology industry into a code-red moment and wrong-footed it completely. Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, and Google have been trying to catch up ever since.
Now that Google is finally closing the gap, Altman is panicking and focusing more on perfecting his existing product, ChatGPT, than on the loftier goal of helping humanity by reaching AGI.
In the end, OpenAI’s “code red” is not about AGI or even Google. It is about something more fundamental: the realization that the AI race will not be won by whoever promises the wildest future, but by whoever builds the most dependable tool in the present.
If OpenAI delivers on this renewed focus, ChatGPT could emerge stronger. If it stumbles, the door is wide open for rivals like Google, which are already accelerating. Either way, the era of AI companies coasting on hype is over.
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Graham BarlowSocial Links NavigationSenior Editor, AIGraham is the Senior Editor for AI at TechRadar. With over 25 years of experience in both online and print journalism, Graham has worked for various market-leading tech brands including Computeractive, PC Pro, iMore, MacFormat, Mac|Life, Maximum PC, and more. He specializes in reporting on everything to do with AI and has appeared on BBC TV shows like BBC One Breakfast and on Radio 4 commenting on the latest trends in tech. Graham has an honors degree in Computer Science and spends his spare time podcasting and blogging.
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