The tracking of someone’s speech is prohibited by one feature, which is Siroker’s excellent privacy policy. But he also understands that while his long-term perspective encompasses a serious, lifelong report, Limitless needs to fix a problem today to get its first customers. The boring conferences are the first thing Sirioker wants to do first. It is a real issue that technology is address, says Siroker.
Siroker sees AI as a way to enhance the endless parade of discussions, in-person or distant, set or ad hoc, that experts suffer through everyday. He faces a lot of opposition. Adding to our meetings, production companies like Microsoft, meeting applications like Zoom, and translation businesses like Otter are also layering AI on top of ours. We may watch what happens carefully, because the way AI changes this chunk of the working life is an indication of the future of work in an AI-powered earth.
The AI conference universe has started in a nice way, with transcription and summarizing taking on an almost innocent step. It is the technology of a job that was once frequently assigned to secretaries. Also that change gently alters the dynamic of discussions, because then all discussions have a paper trail, stripping deniability from every stupid remark that pulls from someone’s teeth. Or the AI-generated record will reveal which team members have n’t said a word during their three-month planning periods. However, it is certainly helpful when AI you quickly and accurately sum up a discussion and suggest what actions are required. Those features may pour online grout into splits that assignments earlier slipped through.
After just one year, people forget 90 % of what occurs, claims Siroker. You did at most recall six days if you attended a meeting for an hour a week ago. ” Limitless uses AI to prevent you from forgetting the essential parts, sending information drawn from your data via its application to actively training you for your next conference. For instance, it might inform you of a report back and that you had previously promised to do something.
These are only the first baby steps toward what seems destined to be a bigger revamp of meetings. It would be wrong to assume that the room’s algorithms will be merely observers. AI is more like a ardent virtual worker looking for a raise, or at least a more active role in the process. One day an AI-powered service might actually run the meeting for you. Why not, then? It will be able to predict the company’s operations, what its immediate objectives are, how its customers are doing, and the capabilities of other attendees.
Not everyone sees things this way. Professor at UNC Charlotte Steven Rogelberg has been studying meetings for years. Glad We Met: The Art and Science of 1:1 Meetings is his most recent book. While he views AI as a helpful enhancer, Rogelberg believes that meetings as we know them will always be a vital part of work. Humans have been gathering for thousands of years, he claims. AI wo n’t eliminate the need for people to unite. ” When he advises companies looking for AI to improve their meetings he cautions them that real improvements still rely on the human fundamentals. That implies that the leader develops agendas that are highly strategic and engaging, with the appropriate number of attendees at the right time, he claims. The tool does not take its place. ”
Tell those who use generative AI to create systems. I arranged a call with Otter’s CEO Sam Liang. ai, a company that started as a simple transcription service and now is focused on using AI to remake meetings. ( Otto kept track of our conversation, keeping a summary as we spoke. ) One of Otter’s meeting tools allows you to compare the meeting agenda to a real-time summary that lists the items that need to be addressed. It would make sense, I mentioned, if instead of having the leader check those summaries, the AI itself kept things moving, butting in when it realized that people spent too much time talking about one item when there were only a few minutes left for three remaining items. This feature is currently being worked on, Liang claims. I pondered whether it was only a matter of time before the AI actually moderated the meeting. Liang does n’t miss a beat. He claims that it could be a moderator.
He claims that it could also serve as a personal meeting coach, improving attendees ‘ performance in groups or one-on-one sessions. For instance, if a junior person in a sales call got a tough question, the AI might provide advice gleaned from the calls of experienced closers. Or it might simply instruct the salesperson to stop speaking so quickly. It’s always beneficial to get advice from a knowledgeable person. But the idea of everyone in a meeting connected to their own personal coach feels vaguely dystopian, as if the people in the room voluntarily made themselves into puppets whose strings are manipulated by a large language model.
I’m curious to know whether Liang’s concern about AI’s use in meetings might reduce its use. Knowing that a summary will be made available may discourage people from actually showing up. Liang himself says that he attends only a fraction of the meetings he’s invited to. I frequently receive double or triple-booking invitations to attend meetings as CEO of a startup, he says. I can examine my invitations and determine their value with Otter. I classify them based on the content, the urgency, importance, and whether my presence add any value or not. He may find it simpler to opt out because he is the CEO. On the other hand, the boss’s presence in a meeting increases its value to those who are looking for a quick yes on a proposal or insight into his thinking.
Of course, the premise behind meetings is that every person’s presence adds potential value. If everyone turns to the one person who can contribute to a problem at once only finds an empty seat, defeats the purpose. However, Liang can also provide an AI solution for that. “We’re building a system called Otter Avatar that will train a personal model for each employee for meetings where the employee does n’t want to go or is sick or on vacation. We will use your past meetings, Slack messages, or historical data to train the avatar. The avatar can respond to that employee’s question on their behalf. ”
This might spark an AI arms race, I warn. I explain,” I’m going to send my avatar to every meeting, and everyone else will do the same.” Meetings will be just a bunch of AI avatars talking to each other—afterward, people will check out the summary to see what the AIs said to each other.
Liang claims that this can occur. There are always times when you want a personal relationship to happen directly. ”
I respond,” In that case.” I can go out with those people in a bar. ”
You can drink with your coworker while your avatars are meeting with each other, yes! Liang says. “Ultimately you don’t need a job, because the avatar did all the job! ”
We were riffing right now, but this speculating has a serious undercurrent. We are entering a period in AI development where businesses are embedding the technology in powerful products to be used in collaboration with humans, with the flesh-and-blood contingent firmly in charge. However, many people who are developing the technology are focused on creating artificial general intelligence that can outperform or replace humans. What would have started out as useful tools could take on more prominent roles in the workplace, replacing at first the pre-AI way of working—and later human workers as well.
At that point we can meet up in those bars, spending our universal basic income checks on drinks. In order to add Dan Siroker’s pendants to our expanding life archives, we might be wearing them to record our conversations. Can you help me remember what it was like when we used to hold those old-time meetings at what was once our jobs? ”
Time Travel
One of the constant indignities of the corporate life satirized in the long-running Dilbert comic strip is the boring, nonproductive meetings. In this 1996 Newsweek story, I wrote about the character exposed to maddening foibles of office culture, as drawn by a pre-politicized Scott Adams.
The Dilbert Principle serves as the foundation of this skeptic corporate vision. According to Adams, “management is the place where the most ineffective workers are systematically relocated to. ” Of course, this creates maximum damage, as their idiocy permeates corporate fife. It appears as though we have flipped nature’s laws, Adams writes. People with the least skills are consistently identified and promoted. ”
Reengineering, Total Quality Management, or paintball tournaments are some odd management fad that comes down from the “Dilbert ” workplace every month or so. They are tortures at best, and timewasters at worst. Hours are spent in meetings about deadlines, deadlines that get harder to make because of all the hours spent in meetings. Technology has failed in every way; The engineers are aware of how it operates, but the bosses, who ca n’t tell the difference between an Etch-A-Sketch and a PowerBook, do n’t understand it at all. Every so often, an order comes from above to devote massive amounts of time to make everything “IS09000 compliant”; no one is aware of IS09000. People are asked to memorize mission statements in order to avoid having goods shipped out the door. And in the background, burning ever closer, are the fires of Competition, triggering the dread drums of Downsizing. Knock knock, says the boss. Who is there, exactly? ” asks the employee. The CEO grinnes,” Not you anymore! ”
If this is n’t hell, it’s close. Even the creator of Dilbert admits that the two tufts of hair that protrude out of the boss’s typically bald pate are based on the Devil’s horns. Adams claims that as time goes on, his personality will become more disorderly, and his horns will become higher, giving him a more demonic appearance. ”
Ask Me One Question
Quentin asks,” Do you have any suggestions on how to separate real from fake advertising?” ”
Thank you, Quentin. This is a significant issue because some of the biggest advertising companies appear to have abandoned the idea that protecting customers from scams increases the value of their own company. Did you ever see an ad on Facebook selling discounted or discontinued Forever stamps? The United States Postal Service sends outdated commemoratives to a few websites, but here’s a news flash: it does n’t treat their stamps like used sports equipment. Someone like Quentin is probably aware that advertising can be fake. The question is, why does n’t Meta? I have seen those advertisements several times, and I ca n’t figure out why the company is n’t more aggressive about monitoring them. Similar to Amazon, it has been fighting a tsunami of fake goods, even fake authors! ( A Meta spokesperson said that fakes appear on all platforms and “We invest heavily in our trained enforcement and review teams and have specialized detection tools to identify compromised accounts and other fraudulent activity. The company’s help pages provide some pointers for avoiding shopping scams. )
Some basic common sense rules: Unless you have a relationship with a seller, anything that comes out of the blue packaged as a bargain is best ignored. Anything that seems too good to be true is typically false, especially on the internet. Avoid visiting the websites that some of those advertisements feature because some of them use a spelled or twisted translation of a brand you believe is selling. Go to the genuine website of a brand and see if you can find the offer there. And keep in mind that there are a lot of chances that you will be disappointed with the quality when you choose a low-priced item from an unknown brand on a website like Amazon. Take caution when reading the comments and reviews of an item, at least occasionally. Unhappy customers frequently share their dissatisfaction. ( Although reviews, too, can be fake. Often, you can look up an item on Google and see if someone has blown the whistle on it. However, you can still trust your guts and curbing your desire to snag one over on the seller. Or as W. C. Fields once said,” You ca n’t cheat an honest man. ”
End Times Chronicle
The coral reefs of the world are being shook by a “global bleaching event.” At least it will cure them of Covid.
Last but Not Least
Will AI actually make us quit our jobs? The CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco says it ’s up to us. Okay, but no. Tell that to GPT-10 now.
Revealed at last! The scientists who manipulated themselves to win World War II.
Google employees are challenging Israel’s contract terms. Who will tell Gemini?
