The problem isn't AI; it's just a tool. The problem is the people using it incorrectly because they don't understand it beyond the hype and surface details they hear about it.
Every week for the last few months, I get a recruiter for a healthcare startup note taking app with AI. It's just a rehash of all the existing products out there, but "with AI". It's the last place I want an overworked non-technical user relying on the computer to do the right thing, yet I've had at least four companies reach out with exactly that product. A few have been similar. All of them have been "with AI".
It's great that it is getting better, but at the end of the day, there's only so much it can be relied upon for, and I can't wait for something else to take away the spotlight.
Well put and you're correct: There IS a lot of hype/BS still sadly - as companies seek to jump on the hype train without effectively adapting. My karma took a serious hit for my last post - but yesterday I met with someone whose life has been profoundly impacted by AI:
- An extremely dedicated and high achieving professional, at the very top of her game with deep industry/sectoral knowledge: Successful and with outstanding connections. - Mother of a young child. - Tradition/requirement for success within the sector was/is working extremely long hours: 80-hour weeks are common.
She's implemented AI to automate many of her previous laborious tasks and literally cut down her required hours by 90%. She's now able to spend more time with her family, but also - able to now focus on growing/scaling in ways previously impossible.
Knowing how to use it, what to rely upon, what to verify and building in effective processes is the key. But today AI is at its worst and it already exceeds human performance in many areas.. it's only going in one direction.
Hopefully the spotlight becomes humanity being able to focus on what makes us human and our values, not mundane/routine tasks and allows us to better focus on higher-value/relationships.
> Knowing how to use it, what to rely upon, what to verify and building in effective processes is the key. But today AI is at its worst and it already exceeds human performance in many areas.. it's only going in one direction.
I suppose this is the difference between an optimist and a pessimist. No matter how much better the tool gets, I don't see people getting better, and so I don't see the addition of LLM chatbots as ever improving things on the whole.
Yes, expert users get expert results. There's a reason why I use a chainsaw to buck logs instead of a hand saw, and it's also much the same reason that my wife won't touch it.
90% is a big number. Assuming being an expert allows her to make better use of AI than most, that is still an astonishing number without knowing anything about the field in question. That makes me think that 80 hour work weeks are mostly unproductive. Again, assumption being an average person to be able to use AI less effectively, let's ballpark at half as effectively, I still get 40 hours per week of mostly non-sense work. How did we end up here as a society?!