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5 things on AI
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Hi Reader, Welcome to Rev Up for the Week, where every Sunday, I give you an idea to kick-start Monday. Today I want to share a couple of thoughts about AI. As you may know, I've been experimenting with AI for a while now, and my free AI coach has definitely been a useful way to get 'under the hood' of AI a little bit, and figure out where this stuff may be heading. As ever, there are two factors at play: the first is how the tech develops, and the second is how we, as humans, habitually, societally, and politically, might react to it. So here are five thoughts I've been having recently, and I'd love to know how this chimes with (or differs from!) your own thinking... 1. Don't get stuck on novelty - you've probably seen everyone sharing their Barbie boxes and Simpson graphics over the last few weeks. Let's call this stuff what it is - a hideous waste of carbon. There are genuine concerns about the processing cost of AI, the electricity it uses, the water it takes to cool data centres and so on. Whilst it's a bit of fun, it does have a cost. We should call that out. 2. You are a prompt engineer now. If you don't know what I mean by this, then Google it. Or better still, ask an AI chatbot to explain it. If it's not yet an integral part of your job already, it will be soon. And there are courses you can take (and lots are free - there's a list here). 3. Writing with AI doesn't have to suck. My friend Jodie Cook uses a brilliant 'ban list' which you can give to Chatgpt or Claude, and ask it to remember a whole bunch of phrases that you want it to avoid using. If you've spent much time on LinkedIn recently, you'll probably already know half of them. Think of your AI list as an enthusiastic new assistant who is willing to learn - it becomes a better partnership if you teach it how you like to work and what to avoid. 4. It's a superfast way to biege. In a world where the race is for everything to become automated and look the same, adding colour to what you do has never been more important. Learn to take risks, do things with a combination of the human and the tech, and celebrate the wonky. What will catch people's attention in the future will be the stuff that's been created with love, by human attention. 5. The politics we're avoiding. This is the most important one. Should AI help us produce exponentially more output than ever before, then who benefits from that? It strikes me that there are two worlds on offer. The first is the one where the tech companies are forced to share the fruits of AI's labour - the world gets way more productive, but we all get to work a bit less. We could all use that extra time to write poetry, or learn philosophy, or create community. The other version is a dystopian nightmare where we all live in a tech version of feudalism to enrich a tiny proportion of humanity. Our enthusiasm for this technology may be very short-lived if it quickly becomes our overlord. I think this will be the battle of the next couple of decades, and the politician who grasps this at the right time may well be one of those historical figures that we're reading about (sorry, that our AI assistants are reading about) for generations to come. So those are a few thoughts on AI. I hope you find it helpful. Whatever your views on it, it's not going away any time soon, and it presents enormous opportunities for us all. I hope we grab them. And if you have a moment, hit reply and tell me your thoughts on it all... Have a great week, Graham PS - I've said this many times before but I'll say it again here as it's relevant - I write these the old-fashioned way, in the week they come out. My promise to myself is that I'll never 'phone it in' with Chatgpt or another AI tool. It would probably be easier if I did, but that's not the point. This mailing list gives me a deadline to write at least one thing of value each week. It keeps me in the practice of writing - and I think there'll always be a value to me in that. Thank you for reading this - if nothing else, it helps me to stay sharp! |
Rev Up for the Week with Graham Allcott
Join thousands of people starting their week on a positive note. Every Sunday afternoon, I send out an upbeat idea to set you up for the week ahead.
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