Just Keep Trying
I’ve been co-founder of Interact for 14 years. In the last 12 months the AI obsession has created our biggest challenge yet. But the cracks are starting to show with AI, and they are the same issues that have always been our competitive advantage. The issue is that your first attempt rarely works to get you to your goal. Neither does your second, or your third, and somewhere around attempt number 327, something clicks and it just starts to go.
No fanfare, no celebration, just a quiet acceptance that what you’ve put your lifeblood into is starting to actually move you towards where you want to go. AI, and social media before that, have promised to make that difficulty go away. Drop a prompt, or post one reel, and your life’s problems will vanish, you’ll reach instant prosperity, and everything will be wonderful.
Except it doesn’t work. AI produces slop, ruins your reputation, and makes you dumb. Social media kind of does the same. If your expectation of either one is that it will yield you instant results. Anytime you throw your brain out the window and let something take over to get you where you want to go, something is doomed.
It’s been nearly a year since the start of the SAASpocalpyse, the day when everyone decided they would “do everything themselves” since AI could handle all the hard work and thinking. What actually happened was people lazily threw in a prompt and posted whatever garbage came out the other side. Reputations were ruined, business growth stalled, thinking ceased to exist.
But humans are resilient, and version 2 of AI usage is beginning. The version where it’s just another tool in your arsenal. One that you use in some scenarios and not in others. Personally, I don’t use it to help with my writing anymore. I found that it was pointing me in a direction, with a certain opinion, that constantly repeated itself. Original ideas were going out the window in favor of towing the party line, and my writing became less and less interesting over time.
But in other areas, like planning, I use it a lot. Because sometimes I don’t think about all the edge cases, and AI does a great job of making sure every scenario is considered in the planning phase.
Overall, despite this being the longest and most difficult period of “We don’t need software or expert help anymore” it is coming to a close. And in that time, we just had to keep trying. Which has always been the case over the last 14 years. If you just keep trying, you will eventually win out, like a tire buried deep underground, you will work your way to the top. Just don’t give up because AI, or Social Media, or fearmongering, threaten to take you out.
