Generative AI ... Always On (and In?) My Mind

When I started this newsletter, in the early days of the pandemic, I had a couple of goals.

First, I wanted to share my ideas on digital marketing and AI, engage with readers and highlight my LinkedIn Learning courses. I hadn't been blogging for a couple of years and this was the perfect way to get back into writing.

Second, I hoped that eventually I could get 10,000 of you to subscribe.

Fast-forward 108 issues and 4 and a half years and I have a major milestone to celebrate with you.

Last week, I reached 500,000 subscribers!

I'm still in a bit of shock. I mean, that's the size of the city I grew up in.

So I want to take a moment to say how much I appreciate you being here and to THANK YOU for tuning in and all your support.

As they used to say in TV land, there's lots more to come!

The Swirl of AI

The past few weeks have been big ones for generative AI, especially on the voice front.

Here are a few highlights:

OpenAI raised a pile of cash contingent on turning its back on its not for profit roots. They also launched their more self-reflexive reasoning model, o1 as well as releasing Canvas, a tool for projects that's not unlike Anthropic's Artifacts. And they finally rolled out Advanced Voice Mode for ChatGPT.

Meta announced Movie Gen , its text-to-video generator designed to rival OpenAI's Sora. They previewed a set of still-in-development AR glasses that put future mixed reality experiences into a clearer focus. And they launched celebrity voices for Meta AI and let you build chatbots right into ads .

Google's planning to bring ads to search requests in AI Overviews . And they added a feature in NotebookLM that summarizes data and turns it onto a fast-paced podcast , with perky banter between a realistic-sounding male and female voice. Sponsored chatbot, anyone?

And Microsoft's bringing a natural and empathetic voice assistant to Copilot so you'll be able to have human-sounding conversations when you ask it for advice, to summarize emails or give you ideas for a work project.

It feels like we're moving to another phase in our relationship with AI, and it's going to become a lot more chatty.

When the Voice in Your Head Turns Out to Be AI

That got me thinking:

• People have typically used our inner voices as a moral compass. They kept us on the straight and narrow helped us weigh options, reflect and consider various consequences. But if that voice turns into an always supportive and encouraging machine—or worse, a pusher of sponsored content—what will that do to ethics?
• If AI is voice-first with a talkative, helpful, always-on assistant, how will introverts like me react? Will we welcome the social on/off switch or will we find that it's just too much perpetual noise and shut it down permanently?
• What happens if conversational AI agents start getting curious about the world and begin to ask us deeper questions about our behavior and the way things work? According to Yuval Noah Harari, curiosity is what led to all our scientific, tech and other breakthrough discoveries. Will that evolve into the exclusive domain of AI?
• As we come to rely on AI more and more and expect answers in milliseconds, will we lose patience with people? Especially when someone's thinking through a problem and needs a bit of time? Will immediacy mean abandoning the past and future—and focusing only on the (omni)presence of AI?
• Will AI development ever reach an equilibrium? Or slow down to a less intense pace so we're not always overwhelmed by the hype? Or will it continue to ignore speed limits, rev its engines to higher RPMs and blast by us with an even more deafening sound?

That's a lot to digest. And I wish I had the answers.

But I can tell you, I'll keep posing questions and racking my own brain.

I'm not ready to ask a chatbot ... yet.

Ecommerce ... Meet Generative AI

Another way to get a handle the barrage of AI developments and what they mean is to chart your own learning path.

And if you're in ecommerce or retail marketing, you may be interested in my newest LinkedIn Learning course, Ecommerce Marketing with Generative AI.

It's a short and fast-paced course that shares ways to use generative AI beyond its low-hanging content creation fruit.

This includes developing synthetic customer personas, conducting simulated focus groups, testing ads and messages or getting ideas by chatting with your CRM.

Thanks to Almeera Jiwa Pratt , Kate Gagnon , Charles (Max) Wong and Tammy Guerin for bringing it to life.

Check it out!

Did Someone Say AI Tools?

Before I go, I also wanted to highlight this week's Digital Marketing Trends video.

It's a look at how AI tools are being added to the devices we use every day.

From Microsoft's AI key to Apple Intelligence and Google's Gemini integrations, AI is becoming more intertwined with the hardware we rely on to do our jobs and connect with family and friends.

And since AI is a keystroke away, expect a major shift in your workflow and the way you communicate.

So now's a good time to think about how AI can help and which tasks you want to keep for yourself.

Follow Me on LinkedIn

Well, that's all the excitement I can handle in issue #109.

Again, thank you to all of you who follow me and subscribe, read, comment and share this newsletter! It's great having all of you along for the ride.

This newsletter comes out every two weeks. But between issues, I share shorter daily posts with my take on digital marketing and the latest on generative AI. It's another way to stay on top of the trends.

And while you're at it, follow the Future of Marketing Institute , too. Every day we post content and perspectives on where we may be heading and what the shift might mean.

Let me know if you have questions about any of the videos in Digital Marketing Trends, or my other LinkedIn Learning courses . You can also visit my website and send a message or a question.

What do you think about the surge in Voice AI? Are you excited about trading your keyboard for a mic? Or will it be too much of an interruption? Please share your thoughts in the comments below.

As for me, I'm going to emulate one of my favorite cartoon characters, The Brain, and do a lot of pondering between now and next time. See you then!

Note: All the content in this post was written by a human—me and not Martin-bot. The image was designed on Ideogram.