Welcoming the dawn of a new era. The AI Revolution.

Read time: approximately 7mins-16secs-ish.

It’s New Year’s Eve. This post marks the month which saw the consumer launch of Chat GPT. Here’s an entrepreneur’s perspective.

I have been immersed in the innovation/entrepreneurial eco-system for more than two decades. Over that time we’ve seen global ups and downs in the world’s economy, some of which arguably the most severe in history. We’ve never seen so much change, transformation, and new technology.?

Literally all our established orthodoxies are being challenged.

I think people are hardwired to resist change. For many, sadly that resistance worsens with age - which is a problem in an ageing society. I saw a recent video interview in which Elon Musk observed that humans don’t simply resist change, sadly “humans tend to ossify, and then die”. To which I’d respond with my observations about entrepreneurs:

• Whether or not we like change, entrepreneurs have a demonstrable knack for translating change into opportunity.
• Entrepreneurial success is sometimes admired, occasionally celebrated, and often envied.
• Entrepreneurial talent is sometimes revered, but often mistrusted.
• Entrepreneurial competence is often regarded as mythical, unacacdemic, instinctive, eccentric, and exclusive - all of which I frustratingly believe to be completely untrue.?

It both saddens and maddens me that in an era of unprecedented opportunity for innovation and progress so little is understood about entrepreneurialism; how to cultivate it; how to teach it; and how to democratise the benefits of an entrepreneurial mindset so that everyone can leverage the opportunities available. Particularly the lack of entrepreneurialism, innovation, intuition, and financial literacy in the formal education and curriculum of our kids.

I think this is important:

• To help counteract and pacify the genuine and legitimate concerns and anxieties I hear from people contemplating their future careers, incomes, and livelihoods. By contrast, entrepreneurs have a talent of managing uncertainty positively.
• I am a passionate egalitarian. I am greatly concerned by the apparent disproportionate growth of socioeconomic inequality. I believe that an entrepreneurial mindset helps drive prosperity individually and collectively.
• To maximise the potential positive impact of new technology and accelerate the mass adoption of technological advances to help people, businesses, and the planet to flourish.

My belief is that the more that entrepreneurialism is demystified and codified; the more that entrepreneurialism is understood; the more that entrepreneurialism is democratised and made inclusively accessible - the more these issues of anxiety, inequality, and ecology can be tackled.

Global issues such as the environment and the economy are debatable. Whether or not you agree with the scientific evidence regarding global warming - and whether or not you care about the consequences of this issue. Whether or not you have concerns about your future financial health and stability. From the perspective of an entrepreneur what I see is a world in which:?

• There are potentially more jobs than there are people.
• There are jobs that the majority of people just don’t want to do. Justifiably so.
• The cost of living is a significant burden for many people, (below a threshold of indulgence).
• Average expectations fall significantly below average outcomes.
• Inefficiency and poor productivity holds us back.
• Human error accounts for significant loss of life and injury.
• We are perilously close to passing ecological milestones that are irrevocable.

For years corporate corridors have been dominated with angst conversation about “Disruption”. My point is, if all we talk about is disruption, then all we will see is disruption.?

What if instead all we thought about was: “Liberation” - then perhaps what we would be looking for is ways to enable ourselves to be more free to do what ever it is that we want to do.

At one point ( a while ago) there was a growing momentum in a conversation about “UBI” - Universal Basic Income. The notion that everyone could/should be paid c. $500 per month in order to live. Interestingly, my sense is to a large extent that conversation seems to have gone away (or certainly quietened). I understand the idea as a notion to provide stability; a sustainable alternative to displaced employment; a new mechanism for wealth distribution. But my whole premise is the opposite to this - my premise is not how best to distribute free cash and to remunerate idleness. My whole premise is, how best to pursue technological advancement in order to eliminate costs - for people to be free to do what they want to do.

Recent progress in nuclear fusion - the source of limitless [relatively] impact-less free energy, gives us a tantalising glimpse at a scientifically viable route to delivering such cost reduction, in terms of providing?

• Free energy to power our homes;?
• Free energy to heat our homes;
• Free energy to power our cars;
• Free energy to radically reduce the cost of food production.
• Easy to dismiss as fantasist and fiction. Scientific breakthroughs this month in nuclear fusion mean that the industrial application of fusion power is an inevitability within the lifetime of my daughters. My view though is that this is not the most significant technological development to have arrived this month.

In preparing my book I have re-read the c. 175 posts I published over the last ten years. What’s clear, especially in the earlier posts, is the extent to which I was trying to capture the birth of the ‘digital economy’ - whatever that is, and whatever it means. Ten years later it could be debated whether the digital economy has now landed - or whether the ‘beginning’ is now over and we’re somewhere in the ‘midst’ of it. That is not important. What is important is, the public launch in December 2022 of ChatGPT - which delivers explosively the start of the ‘AI economy’.

It is a moment we should all note in our conscious memory: where and when we were when we first made aware of it - and fascinatingly, what we first nervously asked of it.

The difference between the ‘digital economy’ and the ‘AI economy’ is not semantic. Not only is the difference profound - but also, with each new economic-era the consequence, significance, and impact multiplies. In the case of AI I believe the impact will be exponentially more profound than any previous economic era.

When I first used ChatGPT it became immediately apparent to me that both conventional search (eg. Google) and established advertising models/revenue would be completely rewritten. I strongly suspect that is merely the tip of the iceberg. With CHATGPT, for the very first time, the general public gets a real-world practical AI tool that it can play with meaningfully that delivers tangible and interactive results.

The entrepreneurially minded among us will be beyond excited, motivated, and energised by the possibilities that AI now creates. Those that are more attached to an incumbent mindset will be deeply distrustful of this development and will choose instead to operate in either denial or combat (or both).

The hospitality sector. The agricultural sector. The care sector. The medical sector. All have profound shortages of labour. It seems overwhelmingly inevitable to me that the advances in technology, such as AI now need to be combined with the willing/available human capital in order to multiply the productivity and efficiency of those workers to enable them to meet the evident demand. AI can help make our existing workforce bionic. The distress in the health sector in the UK demonstrates that that need is beyond critically urgent. Whole regions of the UK today have announced ‘critical-emergency-cover only’.

I asked ChatGPT a question (as follows) - to which it replied with the six bullet points below, in less than four seconds:

Q. In using AI to deliver a conversational companion for elderly people with dementia, what safeguards need to be in place to protect vulnerable people? For example, in cold whether if an elderly person asked, should I turn-down my heating to save money - how can their safety and wellbeing be ensured and protected?

There are several safeguards that can be put in place to protect vulnerable people, such as elderly people with dementia, when using AI to deliver a conversational companion:

1. Clear and concise language: It is important to use clear and concise language when communicating with elderly people with dementia, as they may have difficulty understanding complex instructions or concepts.
2. Safety reminders: The conversational companion should be programmed to provide safety reminders, such as reminding the elderly person to stay hydrated, take their medications, and dress appropriately for the weather.
3. Emergency contact information: The conversational companion should be programmed to provide emergency contact information in the event that the elderly person is in need of assistance.
4. Limited decision-making capabilities: The conversational companion should not be programmed to make decisions on behalf of the elderly person, as this could potentially put their safety at risk. Instead, it should be programmed to provide information and recommendations for the elderly person to consider, but ultimately it is up to the person to make their own decisions.
5. Human supervision: It is important to have a human caregiver or family member available to provide supervision and assistance to the elderly person, as needed.
6. Regular review and updates: The conversational companion should be regularly reviewed and updated to ensure that it is functioning properly and providing accurate and appropriate information and recommendations.

My next question ought to be “please can you code this to work via Alexa?” - which I have no doubt it can do, but then like many of my entrepreneurial peers, I’m just trying to figure out what problem to fix first and where best to invest my limited time and capacity.

I am not eulogising that AI is the answer to all our problems and that the future is going to be amazing. I’m also not saying that entrepreneurs have all the answers and are exclusively placed to leverage this new technology.?

What I am saying is, is that the launch of ChatGPT and all the other flavours of AI that follow it, is a watershed moment. A before-and-after moment. More significant than when my parents replaced our black and white television for a colour TV.

From the perspective of business - I can’t think of a single industry that won’t be affected by AI technology. Whole industries will be (and are in need of being) completely rewritten as a consequence of the new capabilities that AI enables.

Like all changes of era throughout history before us - some of us will grasp the possibility that new technology represents as a positive opportunity. Others will fare less well. When we look back through history, so far, without exception the macro economic effect of each transition of era has been overall increased prosperity.

2023 is going to be epic!

Happy New Year.