AI
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The News Business
Seventh in the News Commons series. How does the news business see itself? Easy: ask an AI. Or a lot of them.* That’s what I’ve been doing. Unless otherwise noted, all the following respond to the same three-word prompt: the news business. Here goes… Microsoft Bing (Full name: Microsoft Bing Image Creator from Designer), which Continue reading
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Getting Us Wrong
Several thousand years ago, when I was on leave from journalism and working as a marketing dweeb, my small North Carolina firm learned about PRIZM (Potential Rating Index for Zip Markets), a techy new service that told me that my rural zip code was “Hardscrabble,” while the next one over was a suburb PRIZM called Continue reading
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A Moment of Applied Holiday Robotics
I asked ChatGPT and Bard to “List all Christmas holiday tunes in chronological order, by the year they were written, running from oldest at the top to the newest at the bottom.” ChatGPT gave me a lame list. Bard gave me a much better one, improved by my follow-ups. Here ya go: While creating a Continue reading
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Feeling is Human
“Honesty is the best policy,” George Burns said. “If you can fake that you’ve got it made.” The same applies to feeling in composition and musical expression. Long ago I went with a friend who was a pianist and composer, to a concert by a somewhat famous pianist. While I was enjoying the concert, she Continue reading
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How is the world’s biggest boycott doing?
Eight years ago, I called ad blocking The Biggest Boycott in World History, because hundreds of millions of people were blocking ads online. (The headline came from my wife Joyce.) Then, a few days ago, Cory Doctorow kindly pointed to that post in one of his typically trenchant Pluralistic newsletters. So I thought I’d check Continue reading
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Some possible verities
Just sharing some stuff I said on social media recently.: It’s easy to make an ad hominem argument against anything humans do. If we had to avoid every enterprise with owners we don’t like, we might as well graze on berries or something. Capitalism is way too broad a brush with which to paint all Continue reading
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Building Better AI
What shall we make of AI? Marina Zannoli has something to say about that, and she’ll say it this coming Tuesday, October 17, at Indiana University—and online too, at 12pm Eastern time. The title of her talk is Mastering AI: What I Learned as the Chief of Staff of Fundamental AI Research at Meta. Though Continue reading
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Microsoft Bing Chat 0, Perplexity.ai 1.
So I thought I’d give Bing a try at using ChatGPT to answer a question for which I knew the answer. The question was, “What group sings the theme song to the podcast ‘A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs’?” Bing search took me to a page of search results about the podcast itself, Continue reading
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An exercise in perspective
I wrote this today for a list that’s mostly populated by folks in overlapping music, broadcasting, legal, tech, and other businesses who share a common interest in what’s happening to the arts and artists they care about in a world now turning almost completely digital.—Doc Here is a question I hope can get us out Continue reading
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Toward customer boats fishing on a sea of goods and services
I’ll be talking shortly to some readers of The Intention Economy who are looking for ways to connect that economy with advertising. (Or so I gather. I’ll know more soon.) What follows is the gist of what I wrote to them in prep for the call. First, take a look at People vs. Adtech, and/or Continue reading
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A Santa Barbara itinerary from ChatGPT
I asked ChatGPT for a three-day itinerary to give visitors to Santa Barbara. Here ya go: Day 1: Start the day with breakfast at the Shoreline Beach Cafe, which has a beautiful view of the ocean. After breakfast, head to Knapp’s Castle for a scenic hike and exploration of the ruins of a 20th century Continue reading