I’m the guy who’s always trying to be at the cutting edge, not to be cool or strange, but just because I have years of experience that have told me that the cutting edge eventually makes its way down to the rest of the population quickly enough and when it does I’d like to be prepared. That’s my whole stance on AI. If you were to peer through Sarah and my iMessage history it’s mostly me demoing generative AI stuff to her and in response, Sarah wows and compliments me on sharing. I’m a tad over-excited about it but I truly do think that the current phase of computing that the media dubs “AI” is going to change everything.

The best way to understand computers forever is that they work on a GIGO system. Garbage in, garbage out. Whatever you put in gets computed and is spat back out at you. If it’s garbage in, you get garbage out.

So here are a few things you can try to get your hands dirty this week, some ways to put some garbage in and see what comes out.

Microsoft Bing Chat or Google Bard or ChatGPT

These systems are all different recipes for the same meal: you chat with a computer.

The secret to using these chats well is to prompt them well. There’s a new industry of prompt experts, or spell casters, who know how to ask the best questions and have the best conversations with chat robots.

Here’s an example of a chat I just had with ChatGPT to help build a marketing plan if I was moving to Dolphin Sands in Tasmania. That’s all really helpful, but ChatGPT doesn’t know a lot about local businesses yet, so let’s take that data to Microsoft Bing’s new AI chat. You have to be using Microsoft Edge as a web browser, then go to bing.com/new. I take the last answer from ChatGPT and feed it into Microsoft Bing Chat and I’ve got this big list of wedding vendors I should network with along with contact details! From there I wanted to get some SEO information from the horse’s mouth, so I went to Google. Google Bard. Here’s what Bard told me to do with my website.

Prompting with “Act as if” and then giving detailed instructions is a great way of using these chat robots/chatbots for the best results.

Too long, didn’t video

If you have ever gotten off a video call and thought ‘What did we even talk about?’ then this Generative AI tool is for you. You invite it to your Zoom call and it listens and emails you a summary of the call afterwards. Wild!

Chat with a PDF

Here’s a fun one to end out on. ChatPDF lets you upload a PDF and then have a conversation with the bot about that PDF. Here’s an example: there’s a new Steve Jobs book called Maker Something Wonderful. I uploaded that to ChatPDF and I can now chat with the book.

Some technical notes

Sometimes a generative AI model can sound confident when it’s wrong, sometimes it can hallucinate and just talk crazy, and sometimes it’s wrong. Use your better judgement. A good example of that is to ask any of these bots this question and watch them get it wrong: “What is the latest date someone can lodge a notice of intended marriage form with their Australian marriage celebrant if they would like to get legally married, according to Australian law, on the 31st of March 2024?” Here’s how ChatGPT answers, incorrectly.

If you don’t know the answer, that’s what Celebrant Institute membership is for, so you can ask questions of Sarah and me because human intelligence and help is still the most valuable form of intelligence.