notacomputergeek

The other day, I heard someone say the phrase “technology at the speed of chaos” when talking about Artificial Intelligence (AI). I thought, that’s such an appropriate description of the current state of AI.

The current chaos is being fueled by the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO), how much marketing of AI is done, advantages, and concerns. As long as there has been a stock market, FOMO spreads quickly for certain stocks. “Buy now or you’ll miss you chance to get rich.” In the case of AI, there are so many companies touting their app as a perfect solution. “If you don’t implement now, you’ll go out of business.” The hard sell. Don’t get me wrong, I think AI will be part of our culture for a long time, but we get bombarded with marketing at every turn and the decision to implement AI becomes chaotic. Eventually, most apps will include AI features, change forever how we interact with our devices, and become normalized.

The Law of Accelerating Returns, popularized by Ray Kurzweil, states that technology advancements increase exponentially. AI is our current example. Technological advancements can be good, but it can be difficult to know what technology to implement and or how to implement it. The Greek philosopher Heraclitus, is attributed with saying, “the only thing constant is change”. Sounds about right.

According to Everett Rogers’ Diffusion of Innovation theory, 16% will be leaders and 16% will be laggards. That leaves 68% in the middle and AI is still a new technology. For some of you early adopters, these are exciting times, but for many small businesses with limited time or resources, this just causes technology anxiety. My advice – slow down, take a breath, implement technology at your pace, hire someone to assist if you must, and remember there should be a good business case to implement something, not because everyone else is doing it. Well thought out AI use policies should be in place and potential apps vetted to make sure they provide appropriate, verifiable results and don’t jeopardize your data.