AI has been a major part of our lives for over a year, ever since the
release of ChatGPT by OpenAI. The explosion of AI-related tools and
products, not to mention wild claims of future utopias (or death by
robot) are abundant in all forms of media today.
So, how are you feeling about it so far?
As a forward-thinking tech enthusiast, a creative, and a business
owner, I’ve thought about AI a lot. I’ve seen countless AI products
encroach in my skill space. Chances are you’ve felt this pressure
too—the power AI exerts over us when we consider our future.
To better understand that future, I spent the past few months
relentlessly digging into AI to learn everything I could. I explored
how it works, built and trained models, played around in every sandbox
I found, and used several AI-powered apps.
What I’ve discovered is that AI probably won’t be apocalyptic, and
neither will it save us. It’s more likely for AI to lead the charge
into the next evolution of technology and modern tools, and change
how we connect with the world as a result.
It’ll be a source of economic growth within capitalism. If we’re
lucky, it’ll empower everyday people to explore ideas and skills we
didn’t know we had, too.
Clarifying AI's
Existence
AI is a fascinating tool. It’s amazing at analyzing data, at
brainstorming, and at supporting human thought. It also makes a
surprisingly good companion in some cases, and can provide mentorship
and insight at an incredible pace.
On the other hand, AI is not human. It’s not a conscious entity with
its own needs. It’s a tool created by tech companies as another means
of innovation. It’s a product. A way to create new markets and provide
utility to the public at a cost.
This makes AI fascinating, but it also makes it dangerous to us as
consumers. We need to remember that AI is similar to the wave of SaaS
apps that came before it. We need to remember that AI is a technology
being created by businesses in the interest of profit and growth, not
a benevolent (or malicious) force with a mind of its own.
So when we look at AI and its effect on the world, let’s consider it
from that perspective. Set aside the Hollywood ideals of AI and its
possible sentience. Set aside the doomsday and utopian scenarios.
AI solves a great many problems, creates others, and acts as a bridge
between many professional and creative pursuits.
It threatens to change the definition of work and creativity.
It promises to change what it means to be human, and how we connect
with the technology around us. But even still, it’s a tool. An
innovation. So let’s consider it as such.
Business
Goals and AI
If there were ever a product designed to make businesses excited, it’s
AI. It makes operations more efficient. It’s cost-effective as hell.
It’s new, it’s shiny, and it promises to shrink your overhead while
improving productivity. What’s not to like?
When I see marketing for AI tools, it tends to be the same. “10x your
productivity,” they say. “Automate key segments of [this work] to save
yourself and your team time.”
It’s hyperbolic statements about how AI will single-handedly make your
business a success and give you free time back so you can go party on
the beach. It’s a solopreneur’s dream: convenient help with tedious
tasks without the burden of payroll.
In contrast, how many tools are coming out claiming to leverage AI
that actually improve the work we do? A lot of it feels like vaporware.
A lot of it is vaporware. But there are some incredible outliers.
ChatGPT, and other large language models (LLMs), are changing people’s
lives. Writing a report, doing research, drafting up a presentation,
and other tedious tasks have never been easier or more accessible.
It’s not a silver bullet. LLMs hallucinate. But it’s an amazing
improvement for anyone who needs to brainstorm work, generate drafts,
test ideas, or do quick research into a subject.
LLMs solve a real need.
It’s the same with
Notion’s AI summarization feature
when I’m otherwise stuck in a maze of notes I’ve left myself trying to
find a small piece of information.
AI has an incredible ability to summarize data.
So when we look at AI’s role in business, it’s easy to see where it
shines. We can process loads more data, which leads to better insights
and quicker decision-making when implementing features and pivoting
sales objectives.
This is how AI is marketed, and the major source of why companies are
receiving funding. VC firms want to support AI endeavors as the tool
of the future. CEOs and business leaders want AI to streamline their
business and make their payroll leaner.
AI is a great tool to empower decision-makers in business. It’s a huge
boon, and it has a lot of really interesting applications that
undoubtedly make business more efficient. But, those same applications
only have dubious success in making life fulfilling.
This is a limitation of AI. It makes us more productive and supports
decision-making, but do businesses really need to be more efficient at
this? Is maximum efficiency using AI even worth it?
Is chasing the legendary $1b valuation worth anything besides bragging
rights?
The truth is, to me, business doesn’t make us happy. Business is a
means to an end. At its best, it’s a fulfilling career and a great
point of pride, but it’s not inherently a part of what we need as
people to exist and thrive.
Business isn’t why we’re alive. I’m saying that as a business owner.
I know. It goes against what we hear in our peer groups, and what
we’re sold by presentations and marketing copy, but it’s true.
AI for the
People
When it comes to the fulfillment of ourselves as people, it’s more
complicated.
For some of us, a good life may be a comfortable one. In this case, AI
makes sense as the next step in human societal evolution. It does work
for us, after all, and it abstracts away all that unpleasant stuff to
get you back to reclining in the sun.
On the other hand, it makes me think of Wall-E. Not in an endearing,
“look at the little robot trying his best,” kind of way, either. It
makes me nervous for our future. I don’t want to be a guy in a chair
drifting around. It’s not what makes life worthwhile.
If you’ve read anything from me in the past, you already know how
important community, and human connection, is to me.
AI threatens this, I think. AI makes it easier not to talk to people,
going so far as to actively make it harder to reach another human. For
example, service interactions are getting automated at an alarming
rate. And as the surface area of human-to-human interaction shrinks,
we get lonelier.
AI makes it easier for businesses to downsize departments, and reduce
the amount of professionals they pay. It makes it easier to automate
art, music, and video generation. It removes entire fields of creative
work at the lowest level.
High-earning and well-respected artists will be fine. When you have a
following, people seek you out because it’s you. But as a newer
artist, or someone trying to learn a creative field in 2024, AI is
scary.
But AI has some really interesting applications, too. AI therapy is
fascinating to me, and so is the idea of having an AI companion. It’s
intimidating as a simulation of human life and as a replacement for
human comforts, but there's real appeal for these options especially
in extreme cases of isolation.
Even in interpersonal life, or exercises like journaling, AI’s ability
to process data gives us the opportunity to examine ourselves like
never before.
AI gives me insight into myself, my patterns, and the patterns of
what’s around me in a way I could never do on my own. No amount of
pen-and-paper journaling will give me the insights that AI can pull
out of a long block of my own writing.
It’s a mixed bag, and it comes down to individual preferences. I have
colleagues who are deep into AI, and are seeing huge gains in their
personal lives because of it. I have other colleagues who are dealing
with deep depression, have had their art stolen, or are profoundly
struggling to adjust to an uncertain future.
Neither side is easy. Adopting new technology is tough even at the
best of times. But what I come back to every time is the idea of our
future, and whether AI truly helps us arrive at the finish line we’re
creating for ourselves.
Evaluating the
Impact
of AI
It’s hard to say this early how AI will affect us. But some trends are
becoming clear.
There’s been a lot of talk recently about the “loneliness epidemic.”
I’ve seen it happening around me. It’s easier than ever to feel
isolated, to be unsure how to meet people. AI makes that worse.
Ai makes analyzing huge swaths of personal data using much easier,
which is worrying in the hands of large companies. It makes data
analysis all but a solved field, and gives power to those with enough
data for AI to make strong judgments.
These uses for AI lean into existing issues we've already been seeing.
I recently
wrote about my dislike for SEO,
which is made worse by LLMs' ability to generate SEO-friendly content,
lower the barrier to creating adequate content, and flood the
market with mediocre writing.
Alternatively, AI risks usurping SEO entirely by making search into an
answer engine instead. Google
announced the launch of AI-generated search results
at I/O 2024, creating a lot of concern about the future of SEO and
web searches in general.
Machine learning and its use in algorithms is also guilty of making
social media problematically addictive. It gets us better stuck in the
endless loop of scrolling by powering better-tuned algorithms.
AI consolidates power and perpetuates unhealthy cycles online.
On the other hand, it gives people opportunities. Being able to
practice for an interview with a pretend interviewer is amazing.
Getting to brainstorm with ChatGPT is inspiring. There are a great
many applications for AI that do genuinely make our lives better, or
at least easier.
It’s not a simple problem. We have to understand it better as
individuals and as a society to decide its worth to us.
Will
AI
be Good or Bad?
I wish I could pass a simple judgment. I wish it was that
simple—that I could wrap up this post with an optimistic take,
pat you on the back, and usher you out the door.
In reality, however, AI is anything but simple. It is a far-reaching
technology that promises to affect every aspect of our lives, from
calling into support to researching ideas to even the work we do each
day.
In the end, I think AI will be both good and bad.
AI will do bad things when given to bad people, and lead to changes
that hurt the rest of us. It will empower businesses to be ruthless,
to clear out entire teams in favor of lean efficiency. It will
automate the hiring process, separate us from our peers, and let
algorithms decide whole parts of our lives.
But it will also create innovation, expand science, and allow us to invent
things that used to be pure fantasy. It will give us the chance to
learn and grow in ways we couldn’t before—it will give us resources we
didn't have, and support we haven't before felt.
In the end, it’s up to us to decide whether that’s worth it. Whether
the good outweighs the bad. It’s our jobs as individual contributors,
business leaders, and artists, to police AI and the companies
producing it. It's our responsibility as people of this age.
Knowing our boundaries as a society will be huge in shaping how this
technology changes the world. Now more than ever we must consider the
future.