This Week in Venture Capital and Artificial Intelligence

Every week I will share and summarize 3-5 ideas and insights with the LinkedIn community. Some of the summarizations I may have covered during the week, and other things may have just been passing thoughts.

1. THERE IS NO STUPID QUESTION, ONLY STUPID ANSWERS

I read so much online content now with the word “crucial” that I am beginning to wonder what isn’t important anymore. Everything is crucial these days!

One thing I do believe that is crucial, is that many people are missing the point of Generative AI

Generative Ais like Chat – GPT, are aides, not a replacement, and I think we all know this for the most part. However people still seem to operate that Generative AI can do no wrong, and lazy people who rely solely on these systems for answers are creating an ignorance factor times one-hundred in our culture. So why is this?

It is not the people who don’t know and ask Generative AI, it’s the people who ask Generative AI and think they know and then go around touting their answers like a religion. As a LinkedIn Expert Article Contributor myself, I see the common Chat-GPT words like crucial all the time in many people’s answers and it just makes me want to cringe and immediately disbelieve their writings, because

1.)??????? It’s not from the heart which makes me conclude automatically the lack of authenticity and truth in their writings. Because honestly I think many don’t even believe or know what they wrote, because they’re not deep thinking it, fact checking, or hypothesize testing it. And if you were to contest with them against what they wrote, they just may agree with you,

2.)??????? Chat – GPT is not always right,?? because it is based on the internet and believe it or not the internet does have wrong information, out – of – date information and conflicting information. Small disclaimer in footer of Chat-GPT site “ChatGPT can make mistakes. Check important info.”

3.)??????? Generally speaking the type of words used signal a writing is obviously a copy and paste from Chat – GPT, because if it wasn’t any industrious person would have taken time to form research and learnings into their own way of writing style and thinking merged with personal experiences and analogies instead of plagiarizing recapitulated words from the internet.

Sometimes the internet is wrong, which means sometimes Generative Ais are wrong, but we do love us some Chat-GPT don’t we, it just may be the wrong love connection. Let’s keep it friends with benefits; that is how we have to look at Generative AI right now. If loving you is wrong, I don’t wanna be right…

When you ask ChatGPT a question on a topic you're familiar with, you'll quickly realize it responds like someone who has eavesdropped too many “don’t need to know” conversations but hasn’t fully grasped them in theory or tactically. For those familiar with the topic, it might offer insightful points and alternative perspectives proving to be a valuable aide to your work and track of thinking, but for the unfamiliar it does not really keep you from looking stupid, as a matter of fact it will probably make you look more stupid.

For example, using the word Lugubrious in a simple sentence "Why does that lugubrious old man kept sighing deeply to himself “

See the word “lugubrious “ which means sad, unhappy or faint-hearted just makes you sound stupid, not smart especially if you don’t typically use 25-cent words like this.

1.)??????? Because it is an excessive word for that type of sentence

2.)??????? And because most people wouldn’t use such a word, they would just say “sad”

2. THE “I” OF THE STORM

When we think about hurricanes, those who are familiar with their behavior know that the most deceptive and potentially dangerous moment is during the eye of the storm. After the initial fury passes, there is a lull—a calm that can be misleading. The skies might clear, the winds may die down, and it can feel as if the worst is over. But this quiet is deceptive, a wolf in sheep’s clothing so to speak. The most sinister part usually comes next: the back end of the storm, where the winds and rain intensify, causing the most destruction.

In many ways, we are at a similar point with AI, but not in a sense of causing destruction, in a sense of causing advancement, what is real not hype, and once in a lifetime opportunities. We've weathered the initial storm, where AI's rapid rise dominated headlines and captured imaginations. Now, things seem to have calmed down. The AI hype that once seemed overwhelming has started to settle. This is our “eye of the storm”—a moment that feels quieter, where the frenzy appears to be behind us.

We've gone through the initial hype storm of AI’s rapid rise. Now, things seem to have calmed down, but the real impact and progress is yet to come.

But this calm could be deceptive. As I discussed in my August 7th, 2024 newsletter on the AI Bubble, what we’re experiencing now is not an end but a refocus. Companies are no longer adopting AI just for the sake of it. The market is no longer driven by hype alone; instead, leaders are being mandated to extract tangible value from AI. The shift is subtle but significant. Instead of allowing AI to dictate their goals, leaders are now tailoring AI to fit their specific objectives, which is what they should have been doing all along. This is a reversal from the past year, where the excitement around AI led many to reshape their strategies just to accommodate the latest slap-on Generative AI technologies, such as chat-bots.

The real test of AI’s impact is coming in this next phase—when the quiet will give way to the results and repercussions of these more deliberate, focused implementations. Just like the back end of a hurricane, this phase could bring about significant changes, both positive and disruptive, as companies strive to harness AI’s true potential. The question now is whether we are prepared for what’s coming next or if we’ll be caught off guard by the storm that’s still brewing.

So what is next?

As I have said in my LinkedIn rhetoric through multiple posts and newsletters before, I believe the next and immediate future and focus on AI is much less on front-facing technologies, but everything behind the curtains that makes AI run e.g. waste reduction, data quality, and hardware

The other thing to pay attention to is the regulation of AI and how that is going down. With so many people running for election along with the reputation and fortunes of so many Silicon Valley and Wall Street types at stake whilst in the middle of this AI storm, this is one of the best times to get insights into how AI is being proposed to regulation.

3. VOTE FOR AI

The future of AI is certainly in politics. I have long said I believed we would sooner than later have AIs or Robots as our political leaders. And in a small town of about 65,000 residents in the capital of the State of Wyoming, City of Cheyenne, that seed has been planted at the ground floor community level.

Victor Miller’s bold approach to integrating AI into local governance by proposing an AI bot named VIC (Virtual Integrated Citizen) as the mayor of Cheyenne, Wyoming, exemplifies the kind of disruptive thinking that I love and that I think can reshape traditional paradigms. It is the kind of thinking that can solve issues like the water problem in Flint where I was born, or the crime problem on the South and West sides of Chicago where my Mother was born.

Miller’s argument that AI could bring a level of efficiency and objectivity unattainable by human governance is spot on. The idea of an AI parsing through municipal data and making decisions based purely on logic and data-driven insights could revolutionize how cities are managed.

In my perspective, Miller’s brave venture pushes the boundaries of what AI can achieve, which is exactly the kind of risk-taking that drives AI innovation that can improve our lives and cities.

Miller’s campaign suffered a setback when OpenAI shut down VIC’s account. So although Miller conceded in the election after only receiving about 3 percent of the vote, he has enabled the thought of possibility in the minds of everyday citizens for the potential of AI.

His work is notable and has furthered already present discussions on AI’s role in governance. He announced the formation of the Rational Governance Alliance (RGA) to continually expand AI's involvement in public decision-making. Even though Miller's bid was unsuccessful, he emphasized the potential for AI to bring efficiency, transparency, and impartiality to governance.

The bottom up approach of community advocacy for AI is exactly how I believe AI should be

I think Mr. Miller was on the right track as I believe the community-driven, bottom-up approach to AI implementation that he was taking is the ideal way to ensure that AI is embraced with approval and support from the people. Voting systems are one avenue to achieve this.

Currently, however, we see a top-down approach where governments and large corporations impose AI on communities to commercialize and monetize it, only to later try to regulate it to control the monetization, such as is happening in the State of California with the SB1047 legislation. This method is flawed and create tremendous dissension and separation / indifference because it creates dependencies within communities before regulations are even in place and then it creates vulnerabilities when those regulations are put into place.

What should happen instead is that we first establish acceptable parameters at the government level, ensuring AI works effectively within those boundaries and decisioning. Then, we introduce it to communities in a way that aligns with their needs and values.

At the end of the day, the government is already utilizing AI in various areas, but its impact feels different and more significant at the local level, especially in small towns like Cheyenne. Cheyenne may be too small to effectively pilot such initiatives or for companies like Open AI to turn down ($$$) from much more powerful and larger cities, but I believe it could realistically take hold in larger cities like Chicago or New York City.

Click this link of existing and future governmental use cases for AI; pulled from the federal government's site, ai.gov

SUMMARY

In this piece, I explored the growing reliance on Generative AI, such as ChatGPT, and the dangers of accepting its output without question. While AI was recognized as a powerful tool, I emphasized that it should have been seen as an aide, not a replacement for critical thinking. The current lull in AI hype—what I referred to as the "eye of the storm"—was deceptive, as the real impact of AI had yet to unfold, particularly in more focused and value-driven applications. I also touched on the potential of AI in governance, using the example of Victor Miller's campaign in Cheyenne, Wyoming, to advocate for a community-driven approach to AI adoption. Ultimately, I argued that we needed to balance AI’s benefits with careful, informed usage to avoid being misled by its limitations.

I hope you enjoyed this week's newsletter stay tuned for next Saturday's edition.

1. ) Upcoming - Stay tuned for:

-- Show release with Serg Masís on my podcast titled Explainable AI

-- Show release with Rohan Hall on my podcast titled Explainable AI

2. ) Upcoming publication

-- On IdeaScale, a well-known global innovation platform I write for

You can find out more about these by tuning into my LinkedIn profile daily and peaking my CV that is listed below from time to time. Also if you would like to be a guest on my 2 podcasts, Capital Unscripted, or Explainable AI, or if you would like to be a contributor to any of the medias I write for or am partnered with, -- includes AI Accelerator Institute , Idea Scale, or AI news -- then please reach me by inboxing me.

I hope you enjoyed this week's newsletter stay tuned for next Saturday's edition.

How to contact me:

-- Other than LinkedIn, if you want to know more about me or hear more from me you can view my CV here: www.paulclaxton.io

-- You can also schedule a meeting with me here by going to the bottom of my business card and following the instructions.

#ai #artificialintelligence #vc #venturecapital #startups #entrepreneurship #innovation #genai #generativeai #aiblogs #vcblogs #venturecapitalist #investing #aipolitics #aibubble #realworldproblems #innovation #founders #californiatech #aiinpolitics