Enrico Schaefer argues that today's AI tools already work. Voice dictation with Whisper lets you speak faster than type. AI can draft emails from prior threads and spoken notes, or summarize documents. Skip the AGI hype and restructure your workflow around what exists now.
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I saw a video the other day from a commentator on AI, and he was pointing out something that I think is true, which is that there's still a lot of hype in the space. There's still a lot of predictive hype, meaning like what's going to happen next. So I wanted to focus this morning on like what's happening right now. What are the real-world examples of where AI is helping me in in ways that are dramatic in my day. So the simple things, the ones that are the most repetitive, which are the fact that I dictate almost everything now using the Whisper technology of AI. And you can speak way faster than you can type, and you're much more inclined to provide a lot more context to the AI than you would if you were having to type everything out. So being able to speak at your systems and have it able to perfectly interpret what you're saying is huge. And so your productivity gain is significant. And then what are the use cases that I'm seeing pop up in my day the most? Well, certainly email. Having an AI that I can dictate with draft emails is incredible because you take the prior thread, you put it in there, and then you dictate what it is you want to say, the points that you want to address, what those points are. And it spits out a very comprehensive email. You might upload a prior piece of work product and have it be summarized much more substantive. So it is the simple things that make the big difference in AI today. Leaving the hype aside, forgetting whether AGI is coming or how advanced the analytical models are doing or how they're doing their magic, we are seeing a slowdown. in the leaps forward between the different models, and that is true. But it is also true that the value and the productivity and the quality, the amplification you can get out of AI today if you use it properly, if you train up on it and you understand all the different features and you really change your workflow around the capabilities of the currently existing ready-for-prime-time AI tools right now, you're going to level up big time. And it's a nuanced thing, but it is real, and it is dramatic, and it makes a huge difference in how good you are at what you do at your job. My name's Enrico. We'll see you next time.
