Embracing the Digital Overlords: Navigating the AI-Driven World
Thoughts on the Role of AI in Sales, Writing, and the Changing Dynamics of Human Skills
Disclaimer.
Fundraising Radio was created out of my frustration with how vague a lot of advice on the internet is. So I decided to create “actionable” content, meaning that my readers and listeners can actually use strategies that I and my guests share. That’s why our podcast’s motto is “No Bullshit Podcast”.
However, this post will contain many speculative thoughts on the future in light of the rapid development of AI, which may not be as actionable as our usual content. I’ll include a handful of use-cases of AI for sales so you’ll still find useful strategies and tools in this article but it will be filled with speculation on what lays ahead of us. You’ve been warned.
This Substack’s Future and Use-Case №1.
Before I start speculating on the future of humanity, I want to briefly touch onto the future of this Substack specifically.
Simply put - it’s questionable. AI is improving on a daily basis and can almost replicate my writing style. More importantly, it can replicate the writing style of writers who are far, FAR better than me. Once you “feed” chatGPT the writing style you’d like to replicate, simply add a request to write on any subject you wish while sticking with that style. As of the moment, the final results need to be edited by a human but depending on the subject these changes can be minuscule or sometimes not even required.
In fact, I frequently run MY drafts through chatGPT to ask for suggestions and wouldn’t you know it - it makes great suggestions. And this will be my №1 suggested use-case: treat chatGPT as your personal writer. Need to create a post for your company’s blog - ask chatGPT; need someone to read through your text and edit it - ask chatGPT.
I have almost 100% confidence that just like in art-work, chatGPT will soon start outperforming the writers. Having that in mind, I’m not sure that I’ll be investing much more time into developing my writing skills. This means that you’ll probably see even less content on this channel but I’ll do my best to keep up with the developments in AI and share ways that you can integrate it into your work.
Relevance of human skills and use-case №2.
I’ve worked in sales for over 7 years and building strong interpersonal connections is something that AI will never learn. This is what I used to think.
The story of Replika (an AI chatbot that serves as a virtual friend) proved me wrong real fast. When Replika was banned from “dating” its users and articles like this started popping up: “Replika users say they fell in love with their AI chatbots, until a software update made them seem less human.” You can read the full article here.
Most mundane tasks that can be done online will be gone by the end of the year - I used to hire contractors to source some detailed information on potential leads that I was planning to reach out to. Now, I don’t need to, because I have a chatGPT extension for google sheets. All I need to do is input a prompt like “10 trade schools located in California that train truck drivers and have more than 50 and less than 500 students, in column B include the number of students you think each of these schools have. And in column C, D and F include the names of key decision makers in those schools.” Within 10 seconds I get the following data:
Then simply download the data, plug it into Apollo, Seamless or any other email-finding software and search based on names in the tables. Just with these few lines you’ll have a customized automated outreach ready and yielding at least 60% open and 10% response rates. And this is the veryyyyy tip of the iceberg.
Our future as AI grows.
I’ve also spent a significant amount of my life studying economics and history and I know full well that with new technologies the top 0.1% is the class that captures the largest upside of most technological advancements.
So what we have on our hands is:
Top 0.1% of the world population already control the majority of the resources.
AI is becoming stronger every day in quite literally all capacities.
There is a high certainty that the wealthiest people will capture all of the upside of super-intelligent AI and many of the skills that people have been developing for decades will become obsolete.
Growing division within the US and abroad. I won’t elaborate on this subject in this post because it’s TOO big, too political and too upsetting. BUT I will share a number of books that describe the framework of the downfall of nations (which I believe is happening now).
The outcomes that I see based on my knowledge of history and economics are quite grim.
Building the frameworks through books.
There are thousands of great books that can help you better understand where we stand as an economy, nation and humanity in general, but here are my top 4 picks:
Principles for Dealing with The Changing World Order. It perfectly covers where the USA and other key countries stand in the wake of COVID-19. This book gives a very accurate framework for navigating rise and fall of nations.
The Coddling of the American Mind. This book explains the division that we see in the US from the social and socio-economic perspective.
Why Nations Fail. I disagree with A LOT of points made by the author but it covers the political side of things which I’m not well-versed into so I still found it useful for myself. If you understand politics and political history, completely disregard this book.
The Wealth of Nations. The original is hard to digest especially if you’re an ESL like me so I recommend sticking to one of the adaptations that include a lot of excerpts from the book but also make a lot of historical and economic references that help you better understand the text. This book is a classic and very frequently referred to by people who support billionaires and who don’t quite grasp the key idea of the book. Read it just for the sake of being amused how accurate many of Adam Smith’s predictions and fears were.
Wrapping up.
With all the above being said, bear in mind that I’m an Eastern European which means that cynicism and depression have been in my veins ever since I was born. So even though there is clear evidence of things going to hell, we live in a world where things seem to always be headed that way. So maybe I’m just overreacting in the wake of massive AI improvements and sprinkling my Eastern European cynicism on top.
Progress is imminent and whether I think that only the wealthy people will profit from it or not, there is nowhere to run from it. Taking that into consideration, I will be actively digging around new AI plugins and presenting the best ones to you as they come. Most of it will be centered around sales, however I will share anything that I find to be useful. And maybe, just maybe, we will salvage the situation and live to see a happy dystopian future where people don’t have to spend 60% of their lives doing work they hate passionately.
Speaking of salvaging the situation we’re currently in, my brother (the one that’s giving me a lot of updates on AI development) and I, are participating in a soccer tournament to fundraise for California Collaborative For Immigrant Justice. For those of you who know us on a personal level, know that we’re not much for running so this really goes to show how much we care about the cause.
If you’re still not convinced enough to donate, our team is called ACABadores.
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This article was written entirely by a human and edited by AI.
May the Digital Overlords be with us.