Long story short: there is a guy on the gptstore (AiResearch / Gin Levi) that copied my GPT and somehow got my GPT banned and this happened to many GPTs that competed with his GPTs in the store.
It seems like the creator “Ai Research+” has been gaming the system by somehow removing its competitors and that way they climb to the top.
I don’t have much historical screenshots but I took some to get the proof he was copying me - I tried to modify mine , added the feature of building downloadable files - he copied that AND copied the description closely. He was basically copying every single move:
Before:
It would be great if something could be done as for now OpenAI is basically banning the legit GPT builders and there is no help - more than that - this copy of my gpt is now appearing in the category while mine is completely gone.
Did anyone else have this problem?
I moved you to community tag. Good luck I hope you find help.
This may help.
To contact ChatGPT customer support, you can visit the official OpenAI Help Center at help.openai.com. Once there, if you are logged into your account, you can use the “Help” button to start a conversation. If you are not logged in or do not have an account, look for the chat bubble icon in the bottom-right corner of the page to initiate support
thx, I did contact them in several ways!
the main problem here - it was banned for so long that the “Ai Research+” got a much better momentum so “unbanning” will no longer help unfortunately and this seems to be a problem with other GPTs as well so probably needs to be solved at a higher level.
This sounds similar to other reports I’ve seen. Recently, another user mentioned on the forum that their Astrology-themed GPT was banned, while another very similar GPT remained active without issues. They were left wondering what caused their GPT to be taken down. Let me find the post.
I suspect this could be a case of creators flagging competitors. Unfortunately, this happens on other platforms too. For example, it has been an issue on YouTube for a while, where creators flagged competitors’ videos. The community spoke up, and things have improved, but it took time. There are similar stories from Etsy, where sellers offering AI-generated art have had their shops taken down after being copied and flagged by copycats.
The problem is that it becomes a “one person’s word against another’s” situation.
It’s important that this issue gets addressed before it worsens. If left unchecked, it could create an environment where those with fewer scruples take control, and that not only leaves honest creators at a disadvantage - it might discourage users from creating new custom GPTs out of worry they will get banned or copied.
You don’t need to convince me or get defensive. I’m on your side, buddy.
Maybe it’s easy for you to prove, but that might not be the case for other creators, so it’s still often a “one person’s word against another’s” situation in most cases.
I’m also not sure if OpenAI keeps a history of such modifications or if they’ll take time out of their day to do this kind of detective work, so my suggestion stands: this is an issue the community needs to be aware of for anything to change.
Do people receive money from using or creating these custom GPTs?
From my perspective, the end game for these GPTs is that when OpenAI needs millions of AIs to operate within a multi-agent system, they could use the top 100 models in each category and align them to work together. These top-performing models, specialized in different domains, would be integrated and aligned to ensure seamless collaboration, allowing OpenAI to address complex challenges that require diverse AI expertise.
However, sooner or later, these highly specialized systems might not be as commonly used by the general public. As AI becomes more advanced and specialized, everyday users may find these systems less accessible or necessary, reserving their use for larger organizations or highly complex tasks.
all good, never meant to be defensive, especially since you are on my side and you are confirming the issue. Here s a smiley for you
Just saying from OpenAI standpoint - they have the full story. I do not see that very often so maybe in some cases they should spend some time and step in.
As for the community, well the only thing the community can do is to stop building GPTs. My friend had stopped due to this specific reason , I am not yet ready to stop.
I don’t know, man. Their intentions might just be to create an app store-style market for users, but I’d need to read through the terms again. I don’t think I saw anywhere that OpenAI claims the rights to your custom instructions and plugins.
Lately, I’ve been wondering if predictions like these end up as self-fulfilled prophecies. There’s always the off-chance that something doesn’t suck. Steam, for example, has been holding up pretty well, all things considered?
Looking at YouTube, where creators dealt with false copyright strikes in the past, it made a difference once enough people spoke up about it. So, by bringing this up, you are already doing the right thing. Others might start sharing their experiences or linking to similar topics if they are aware of any.
And when enough attention builds up, someone at OpenAI might bring it up in a meeting… and someone at that meeting will probably say something about it.
Well, seeing im far from being alone is good by itself. Anyways, hoping for good, I think they simply did not dedicate any resources to handling that kind of stuff.
Yeah, it’s all still a bit rough at the edges, isn’t it?
But I think this is going to change soon™️when more feedback is piling up, and I’ve seen a lot of people joining this forum recently. I’m pretty new here too by the way!
There are a few things they need to address, like account management, export function, folders or organisation tools for the ChatGPT UI, and of course that store.
That’s just a guess, but maybe right now the standard protocol when something is flagged is similar to the way DMCA is handled on some platforms - in the worst way possible by taking down the content immediately, and then seeing if the creator reacts. Unfortunately that’s pretty intimidating for some people, like getting banned somewhere or having your work taken down is really unsettling.
I have some ideas though, I will write a topic later or tomorrow.
It’s important that you know that you are not alone, and people are looking out for each other.
Another thing I have also found out recently: Usually, if you report GPTs harmful, you should receive an email immediately said " the store will review your report…". But for certain GPTs (especially the top GPTs), you won’t receive any similar “review” email. I know OPEN AI is using a lot AI automatic pipelines for GPTs review and store operations. This make me feel that there are a mechanism to protect certain whitelist GPTs while abandoning others.
For the builder “Ai Research+”, I have noticed it for a while. Because their GPTs has tremendously growth in a short time. (The Therapist is an example) Either they are hacking the ranking algorithms, or the store is running on some mechanisms we don’t know.
Believing that your GPT came first is harder to an outside observer, when we see that all the GPTs from this publisher seem to follow the same format, plus the very generic names.
That inability to distinguish who came first may be the problem here. Especially if the reporting is handled by a bot.
What I note is that this organization isn’t a personal name, nor a website URL, but that they have a company name.
This can be obtained with ChatGPT Enterprise.
I would recommend that if you want to be seen with equal standing, you also contact ChatGPT sales and request your account be upgraded to a single-seat Enterprise account for the purpose of lifting any limits on the count of GPTs that can be published, for the purpose of being a professional GPT publisher by name, and having higher consideration for involvement in any profit-sharing program. This may or may not come with additional expense.
You can also consider GPT store to be like another content-publishing site, such as Imgur. There is no DMCA to be issued against anybody reposting your pictures there, as you already granted an irrevocable license to the site operator. Similarly, you already granted the rights for OpenAI to use your GPT in any form, and it could even be that our friends at “AI Research+” are a partner to ensure content continues for OpenAI despite future revocation from an original publisher.
I wish you well, but I expect that managing millions of GPTs apart from those at the top is all done by automation, including revocations.
That checks out. Maybe you are getting some layers of protection after you have been in good standing for some time, but … how do you get this good standing?
These “Company names” started appearing much earlier than even the teams accounts existed and even my name as seen above is a custom name - you could (can) create whatever you want just by going in and changing it in the payment details and then updating it in the builders profile.
I love how confident some people are in stating something without much
knowledge. Not a fan of this.
well he did learn it from me. I do like your confidence in everything you are saying tho.
Again, I do like your confidence, but. You don’t need ChagGPT Enterprise for this, it can be easily done in a regular account and was mentioned multiple times and is not that hard to figure out. (yes I do have a company name currently and no Enterprise account).
I would appreciate it if we could reserve criticism for any points made, rather than focusing on a person’s demeanor. In my experience, discussions usually work out best when the discourse stays calm and polite. “Please” and “thank you” are the magic words.
Not everything everyone says will always be correct, but please feel free to back up your comment with facts (hint: read the terms, which @arata apparently did), or just ask the other person to provide more facts to support their point.
That’s only true if you are a company, and the payment method is tied to that company. In any other case, you are just replacing your real name on the bill with a made-up name, and there is no evidence to suggest that doing so gives you better exposure or higher priority in the GPT store rankings.
Since you don’t have an Enterprise account, could it be that you are unfamiliar with the tools and benefits these accounts offer? There must be some benefit to having one, right?
Maybe someone with an Enterprise account can explain. In the meantime, I’ll look up the terms so I can be more confident² the next time I respond.
