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Top of Mind Thursday Memo Archive
Top of Mind Thursday – March 30, 2023: An Intelligent Way to look at AI Bots
***No AI tools were used in the preparation of this message.***
With all the attention around AI tools like ChatGPT, will this disclaimer be required on content that was generated the old fashioned way–by regular ordinary humans?
The answer to that depends on how you define artificial intelligence. There are some who worry about machines taking over the world and displacing the human race. Others say whole classes of jobs may be eliminated by AI algorithms. Still others say these tools open up whole new horizons that weren’t available before.
Now, a group of industry luminaries is proposing that AI tool development be put on hold for six months to review the potential disastrous impact on the human race. It’s too late to try to put the genie back in the bottle, so why raise these issues now?
That brings us back to the question of what exactly is artificial intelligence. Thirty years ago, I worked with a startup that had an AI-based tool that wouldn’t even cause a second look today. I’ve also seen blockbuster AI technology come and go with merely a whimper. That’s because AI is nothing more than technology and algorithms that do things we haven’t seen before and therefore didn’t think were possible.
Not that long ago, Siri and Alexa and the algorithm on Netflix that recommends your next movie at one time would have all been considered advanced AI. Today, ChatGPT allows a bot to create fairly good content with little human interaction. What I’ve seen so far, though, is usually grammatically correct, somewhat sterile, and often more fiction than factual.
I have no doubt these tools could write a play in the style of Shakespeare or the next book in the Harry Potter series. That’s because they analyze existing content and use that to guide their output. But could an AI bot create the first work of Shakespeare or envision Hogwarts if JK Rowling hadn’t done it first? Highly unlikely.
Technology by itself is neither good nor evil. Every tool known to man can be used to help mankind or hurt it. Rather than focus on what these tools shouldn’t be allowed to do, a more effective approach is to consider how to use them effectively and ethically.
What guidelines do you have for adopting new technology? Don’t wait for a bot to write these for you.
Check out our marketing thought leadership podcasts and the video trailer for my book, Marketing Above the Noise: Achieve Strategic Advantage with Marketing that Matters.
.
Let us help your business rise to the top.
linda@popky.com
(650) 281-4854
www.leverage2market.com
Top of Mind Thursday – March 23, 2023: Can You Bank on That?
About two weeks ago, one of the largest private banks in the country, Silicon Valley Bank, was declared insolvent and taken over by the FDIC.
The last banking crisis, in 2008, was caused by consumer banks aggressively offering subprime mortgages to unqualified buyers, who couldn’t pay them back. There was fraud and intentional miscommunication to buyers, who were stuck with loans for which they were never truly qualified.
This was different. SVB, who has funded many of Silicon Valley’s brightest young companies over the last 40 years, made a series of poor investment decisions in light of current market conditions. This made depositors concerned enough to rapidly withdraw their money and cause a run on the bank. Federal guarantees are limited to $250K per account–not enough to cover the exposure of startups, who were keeping millions of dollars of funds raised at SVB.
Then two things happened. The federal government stepped in to ensure SBV depositors would receive their funds in time to run payroll and meet day-to-day requirements. And, amazingly, most of the biggest banks in the country agreed to bolster another local bank, First Republic, a well-managed bank caught up in the panic and chaos.
Why would they do that? Because too often people react emotionally. In an effort to take care of themselves, they cause a panic that affects not just the institution in question but can spread to the whole sector. The big banks realized that in this case, helping a competitor might be the best way to help themselves.
Are you prepared to do what’s needed to help support your industry or market–even if it means possibly helping a competitor? How confident are you other players would do the right thing for you?
As Mr. Spock said in Star Trek, “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
You can bank on that.
Check out our marketing thought leadership podcasts and the video trailer for my book, Marketing Above the Noise: Achieve Strategic Advantage with Marketing that Matters.
.
Let us help your business rise to the top.
linda@popky.com
(650) 281-4854
www.leverage2market.com
Top of Mind Thursday – March 16, 2023: Three Years Later
I’m writing this from Rancho La Puerta in Tecate, Mexico — one of the original wellness retreats and still one of the best.
I was supposed to be here three years ago this week — the week the world stopped for COVID. It took awhile to get back here, but it feels good to be in a nourishing, healthy environment like this.
The world has gone through quite a trauma since 2020. We’ve lost over 7 million people — more than a million in the US alone, and millions more who’ve been sickened by the virus.
Everyone on the planet has been impacted by COVID — if not by illness or death, by disruption. We’ve added social distancing, bivalent vaccines, and KN95 masks to our vocabulary.
The official pandemic may be over, but our lives will not ever return to 2019. Instead, we have to find a new path forward.
Deborah Szekely, the founder of Rancho la Puerta, is about to turn 101 in May. She is still active, vibrant, and incredibly sharp. When asked what her secret is, she said, “I search out the positive and whatever the siuation, I always do the right thing.”
For the Ranch, doing the right thing meant not only taking the steps needed to safeguard the health of guests and staff, but also paying the salary of each staff member while the ranch was closed for six months…”because they’re family,” Deborah told us, “and we need them to stay with us.”
As we move into a post-pandemic world, this attitude is one we can learn from in our personal lives and in our businesses.
Today, 3 years after the global lockdown began, how do we stay positive…and regardless of what the world throws our way, how do we do the right thing?
Check out our marketing thought leadership podcasts and the video trailer for my book, Marketing Above the Noise: Achieve Strategic Advantage with Marketing that Matters.
.
Let us help your business rise to the top.
linda@popky.com
(650) 281-4854
www.leverage2market.com
Top of Mind Thursday – March 9, 2023: What I Said Isn’t What I Believe
For decades, American television audiences would tune in to hear newscaster Walter Cronkite update them on the day’s events, ending with his catch phrase, “And that’s the way it was.”
Forty plus years later, the news media has morphed into a totally different animal. Not only do we have a near infinite number of options and delivery vehicles to choose for news, but just about anyone with an electronic device and an internet connection can choose to create and publish their own take on current events. Many of these “news creators” offer nothing more than their own opinions, based on speculation or preconceived biases.
Yet, when a major global media organization adds the word News to their name, we take them at their word that they’re actually airing stories that are their version of “the way it was.”
Now, as a result of a billion dollar lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox News, we’re learning that both on-air personalities and senior executives at Fox knew the 2020 election had not been stolen, and that Biden was duly elected president. In spite of this, they went on air hundreds and hundreds of times saying just the opposite–because it’s what they thought their viewers wanted to hear.
Rupert Murdoch is quoted as saying he didn’t see things as red or blue, but only green–the color of money.
Abe Lincoln wisely told us you can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but not all of the people all of the time–which may become a very expensive lesson for Fox.
While I don’t believe most organizations operate in as egregious a manner as Fox, there are times when just about everyone says something they don’t really believe–for one reason or another.
Stop and look at what’s being said by your people and your organization–to customers, suppliers, employees. How often are you saying things that no one really believes: whether it has to do with product delivery, service commitments, or operating a safe railroad (as in the case of Norfolk Southern and the toxic disaster in East Palestine, Ohio).
If you don’t believe what’s being said, then stop your team from saying it. The longer you keep going, the bigger the hole you’re digging. Don’t wait for a billion dollar lawsuit or a train derailment.
Ask yourself: Could I look Walter Cronkite in the eye and honestly say, “That’s the way it was”?
Check out our marketing thought leadership podcasts and the video trailer for my book, Marketing Above the Noise: Achieve Strategic Advantage with Marketing that Matters.
.
Let us help your business rise to the top.
linda@popky.com
(650) 281-4854
www.leverage2market.com