2023 Tech Trends: Is Our Doom Imminent?

Sometimes I wonder if the technological advancements we've seen in 2022 will make our lives better or whether we're slowly planning our doom. Either way, 2023 is going to be a wild ride because it's undeniable that everything 2022 has shown us will be rapidly amplified and even more accessible in 2023. From text-to-image generators to AI-powered chatbots, we'll see many new tech trends in 2023. It's exciting to think about but also scary. Here are some of the top tech trends in 2023 that we should pay close attention to.

1. AI-powered chatbots (Will FAANG fight back?)

In 2022, we've seen how ChatGPT, the OpenAI chatbot, has been able to hold human-like conversations, generate indistinguishable from human-written text and perform tasks that we would have thought impossible ten years ago. This is undoubtedly a huge advancement, but consider that this is coming from a relatively small company. What will happen when Google or even Facebook brings its alternative, and what if it's not only trained on publicly available data but also on your personal data and that of billions of users? This is a reality that we might face, and it is terrifying.

But it's also important to mention that there are good sides to AI systems like ChatGPT. I've used it to get answers to questions, summarise text, and debug code. Even though I've found myself correcting it too many times than I would have expected, it's still a great tool to have. What I'm most worried about is that it can be used for malicious purposes like spreading misinformation and disinformation, creating fake news and spamming the internet with subpar content. Fraudsters can also use it to scam people and create sophisticated phishing attacks and emails. Add to that the fact that it can be used for mass indoctrination by the people training it, and you have a recipe for disaster.

So as much as this is an incredible advancement in tech, I can't help but feel that the bad will outweigh the good. I hope I'm wrong, but I want to hear from you in the comments. What's your stance on this? I talked about ChatGPT and its capabilities in more detail here.

2. Text-to-image generators

Text-to-image generation is another scary and exciting advancement in tech. It was much more fun than scary when we could use AI to create hand-drawn images or 3d graphics. Now, generators like DALL-E, Stable Diffusion, Midjourney and Lexica can create ultra-realistic images of alive and dead people, and people who have never existed. This is something to be worried about. I've seen realistic-looking images of celebrities and politicians created by these generators, and some of these images are already being used to spread fake news and misinformation. My prediction is that tech like this will be much more accessible in 2023. The only good thing about ultra-realistic image generators that I've seen is that they can be used to create free stock images, but even so, that's taking jobs away from models. I think AI art is fun and creative, but the bad definitely outweighs the good when it comes to images of people. What do you think? My YouTube video explains how to use this AI to generate images. Watch here.

3. Text to human-like speech generators

It's difficult to see the good side of this one. AI can now create human-like speech, not the regular robotic voice you know. There's already a YouTube podcast of Joe Rogan and Steve Jobs having an interview. So, not only is AI creating human-like speech, it can also generate audio of anyone saying things they never said. With the kind of emotion-driven world we live in, there's a lot that can go wrong with audio disinformation, and I'm not excited to see the damage this will cause. One good side is that AI like this can be used to generate musical beats, and if we stopped at that, I'd be much happier, but this AI can also generate full music tracks with human-like voices and lyrics.

What will happen when people start generating songs with the voices of famous musicians for malicious purposes? This is an incredible advancement, but I'm not sure it's worth it. What do you think? Are there more advantages to this tech that I'm not seeing?

4. Full Self-driving cars

We've been talking about self-driving cars for a while, but I saw a demo of the Tesla FSD by MKBHD on YouTube, and I think we're 90% there. The car was able to drive him to his office with very little human intervention, and it was also very cautious while driving, which will make our roads much safer if it's widely adopted. But at the same time, we're now putting our lives into the hands of technologies and companies that are far from perfect. Even more concerning is the fact that governments and government officials can hijack these companies to restrict, monitor and control your movements. But none of the challenges raised so far compares with the possibility that your ai-automated car can be hacked. Imagine if your car is hacked while driving; the consequence is grave as it's a matter of life and death. Image, text or audio generation is one thing, but this is a whole new level of irreversible danger, and all we can do is hope that our AI-powered cars are highly secure and 100% resistant to hacking.

Before we talk about Elon Musk's plan to implant chips in our brains, I published a video on how I would learn to code if I were to start over, and you can watch it on YouTube. 10 minutes of this video will save you 10 years of time-wasting:

5. Neuralink: Chip in the brains

I have many questions and concerns about Neuralink, a company owned by Elon Musk. Neuralink is developing chips that will be implanted in a person's skull, with electrodes that spread out into the brain. This is one technology that can be very helpful but extremely damaging if it gets into the hands of bad actors. Neuralink's primary focus is on developing brain-machine interfaces (BMIs) for treating brain disorders and enhancing the human brain's capabilities. The company's long-term goal is to create a "symbiosis with artificial intelligence" (AI) by enabling direct communication between humans and machines and improving human cognitive abilities. They've already done a lot of successful and unsuccessful experiments on animals and are now prepared to start human trials. I can see the advantages for people with brain disorders, but there's too much at stake, and everything can go wrong. Everything.

I wouldn't want to try it on my brain, but I don't know about you. So tell me what you think. Also, if their human trials are successful, do you foresee a future (even if far away) where this is widely adopted, and everyone has a chip in their brains?

There are a lot of other technological advancements that we've seen in 2022 and will see more of in 2023, including speech-to-text AI in wearables like eyeglasses (helpful for people with hearing difficulties), user-friendly and realistic map navigation, internet-controlled devices and so on. Still, those I've talked about are the ones I'm most scared of and intrigued by. 2023 will be an interesting year for sure, and I'm definitely curious to see what happens next.?

What's your thought on all of this? Do you have any questions? What top tech trends in 2023 are you most excited about? What are those that you're scared of? And what should I talk about next time? Let me know in the comments.