The AI Round-up: Gradually and then suddenly.

The AI Round-up: Year 4, Issue 32

“How did you go bankrupt?”Bill asked.

“Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”

From The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway

I’ve heard this quote a lot over the last two weeks. Well, actually I heard ‘slowly then suddenly’. And I heard it attributed to Mark Twain. Both are incorrect when I looked it up.

But you get the point. Gradually and then suddenly can apply to a lot of things. Sure, the bankruptcy reference is the most common. But in this case – and why I’ve heard it so much – is in regard to AI.

Let’s pause for a minute – what, specifically about AI?

All of it. Everything you’ve read. We’ve talked about. Listened to. Learned on your own. Experienced. All…of…it.

Are we officially past the gradually stage? Are we now experiencing suddenly?

To me, that’s the question. I spent time at MAICON last week (wk. of 10.12) in Cleveland. And from the jump, with Paul’s keynote, to the end of the first day, with Andrew Yang – and everything in-between (Kevin Roose, Andy Crestodina, Wil Reynolds) – the message, to me, was clear:

Get your house in order. This is not a drill. We need to start focusing on who we are, how we exist with AI, our role in the human-based economy and what that means for how we live our life.

Sound heavy? It was. But it always has been. People have just decided they don’t want to listen, listen to bits and pieces of this or listen to all of it….while they wait out this ‘fad’.

In the movie Dead Poets Society, Robin Williams says one of my favorite quotes, from the Walt Whitman (my other favorite W.W.) poem ‘O me! O life!’—What will your verse be?

It’s time we start to really think about answering that, for ourselves.

Let’s get to it.

“This is the worst AI you will ever use.”

Oh no! What AI is that? I don’t want to use THAT AI.

The answer, of course, is whatever AI you’re using. Ethan Mollick said this in his first book, Co-Intelligence. And to mark the release of his second book, Co-Existence, he has looked back at what has happened in the 30 months in between books.

What he found is – shocker – mind-blowing. Especially the part about the charts used to measure AI output no longer apply because they can’t actually measure the work being done.

Side note: About that ‘worst AI’…

I’m going to stop updating you (for the most part) on new models being released because 1.) I can’t keep up and 2.) at this point, if you’re not using at least two LLMs, I’m not sure if it would mean anything to you? If you’d like a run-down of what’s out or if you want to talk about what you’re seeing, you know you can reach out directly!

(We’ve hit the point where there will be news of models sunsetting, too.)

The $10 trillion workplace crisis no one is measuring. (StrategicCHRO360)

At MAICON, Paul talked about a possible reality where (I’m paraphrasing) “jobs are created, then run their course in two or three years giving way to new jobs…and so on and so forth”.

One of the first things I read when studying AI’s impact on us was in the spring of 2023, where the point was raised that our brains couldn’t keep up with the pace of AI…because science. Machines learn at a much faster rate than we do and if AI kept exceling at the current pace (remember, this was in 2023) we would fall behind in about two years.

It seems this part is being ignored. What ‘part’? Us. We (our brains) are the $10 trillion crisis the headline is referencing.

Side note: everything MAICON-related is here.

What’s it all mean?!

Anthropic released two new studies recently. One is about the impact AI has had on them. The other is about the impact AI will have/is having on us. (You can access both through the headline link.)

The latter is where I’ve spent my time as I dig to see if my thoughts on how our time would be spent going forward, is right.

Turns out…I’m not that far off. Less time on the ‘output’…more time on the strategy. Greater connections. Deeper thinking required. Human in the loop? Nah. Human in the lead (for now).

As Paul and Mike said in the latest pod, (episode 247) put this one in your LLM of choice and talk to it.

Help is on the way! (Kinda)

Man, it sure seems like these billionaires, sometimes trillionaires, can’t wait to give us their money. (Fast Company)

What does that tell you? They care about us? They’re looking out for our future? Or…control?

I’m not sure what it means, exactly, but we can’t ignore the fact that:

Elon Musk is giving away SpaceX shares (around $10B value)

Anthropic has pledged 5% of its public valuation (right now that’s in the $40B range)

OpenAI has agreed to do the same (valued at “billions”)

So, if you’re worried about AI…don’t worry, money is on the way. Soon. Maybe.

Your AI apocalypse handbook (Shelly Palmer)

Guess what this blog is about!

People can’t tell the difference between AI ads and human ones. BUT…

According to HBR research, consumers like ‘ours’ better.

Take that, AI!

The EU is requiring AI be watermarked. OpenAI says ok!

Hugging Face, the movie.

Netflix has released an instadoc on the Hugging Face security breach?

Some Nopes.

1. Sam Altman was interviewed in Vanity Fair.
2. Unvetted AI agents are accessing bank accounts. (Axios)
3. American Express is cutting 5% of its workforce to ‘prepare for AI’. (CNBC)
4. The biggest Internet threat has been known for 22 years. AI exposed it and made it a reality in two days. (CNN)

Live life, love life,

Ben

As a reminder, this is a round-up of the biggest stories, often hitting multiple newsletters I receive/review. The sources are many … which I’m happy to read on your behalf. Let me know if there’s one you’d like me to track or have questions about a topic you’re not seeing here.