OpenAI has updated its advertising policy to restrict competitors from promoting their own products within ChatGPT across key categories of generative AI. According to a report by The Information, the company has notified its advertising partners that campaigns for standalone image or audio generation products will no longer be approved.

This change is seen as a measure by OpenAI to protect user engagement within its core ecosystem. The timing coincides with the release of ChatGPT Images 2.5 and the announcement of live voice features. Notably, advertisements for video generation tools remain permitted on the platform at this time.

In addition to restrictions on paid advertising, organic discovery mechanisms within the conversational interface are also being affected. ChatGPT has stopped displaying outbound citation links in response to action-oriented image queries, such as searches for photo editors or image generation tools. As a result, third-party developers may be impacted in terms of both organic traffic and paid user acquisition.

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