From the internet and smartphones to 3D printing, recent decades have ushered in general-purpose technology that increases efficiency and collapses the cost of routine tasks. The latest general-purpose technology—you guessed it, generative AI (gen AI)—has the potential to also extend the frontiers of creative search and innovation.

The rise of gen AI tools doesn’t just accelerate innovation; it can democratize it. Our recent research examining the Mozilla Firefox add-on ecosystem found that new add-ons—think grammar checkers, photo editing tools, ad blockers—surged 34% following ChatGPT’s launch in November 2022. This boom wasn’t confined to experienced developers. Novice creators, riding on gen AI’s capability to synthesize domain knowledge, ideate, and generate code, piled into the market.

Our data show that add-ons introduced by new developers maintained comparable quality ratings to those by experienced developers, suggesting gen AI helps bridge not just knowledge gaps but execution gaps as well.

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