After a long restless night in room that hasn’t benefited from a breath of fresh air since it was sealed off 30 years ago, fighting off a relentless recurring dream about doing Q & A with a chatbot (has AI infiltrated my dreams?) and hydrating with a bottle of hotel room Smart Water whose name should be Stupid Me due to its outrageously exorbitant price tag, I descend 18 floors in search of badly needed caffeination and some semblance of sanity.
And so has everyone else, it transpires, several other towers with countless floors because Starbucks in the main lobby has a trillion people queueing for its time-to-wakeup juice. But out of nowhere Oscar comes to my rescue and having conducted some recon leads me to a secret Starbucks concealed behind hundreds of strobe-lit slots.
Had Hunter S. Thompson ventured to Vegas a half century later to pen fear & loathing he would not have needed hallucinatory drugs to experience psychedelics. Because after putting my hands on an oat vente latte the only place to sit is in front of a machine with flashing lights in a kaleidoscope of colors designed to seduce me. But I’m not a gambler, never have been. Casinos are like lotteries: A tax on people who don’t know arithmetic. Which is why some folk call this town Lost Wages.
So I’m already out of my comfort zone before 8 a.m., far from reality, immersed in a twisted world too surreal for Salvador Dali—and that’s even before reaching the convention center a half-mile trek away to claim my official Ai4 pass and immerse myself into the amorphous world of artificial intelligence.
A free pass (admission is two grand for everyone else) was my first mission.
My second, here and now, is to sneak a pass for Oscar who is posing as my photographer but could not apply and be accepted in advance because the newspaper for which I’d been writing when I applied for my own pass has since gone belly-up.
Did I truly think I could outfox AI?
I did. And I did.
Even more audaciously, I muster my special powers of hypnosis (as taught me by legendary CIA spy-wizard Clair George), look deep into the eyes of the Operations & Marketing Director and, within seconds, she registers Oscar as… an “Orphan”—after which I waltz us both past a second threshold guardian into the Press Hospitality Room.
So far so good, aptly depicted by my new bot buddy and collaborator ChatGPT: “The moment of triumph held a certain irony—pitting human cunning against the very technology you hoped to comprehend.”
Thanks, bot.
After what Vonnegut might have called Breakfast of Bots, the Opening Address commences and speedily morphs into a “General Session” of keynote speakers. I’m not sure if these folks program AI or AI programs them. But I do know they speak a language or lingo I mostly don’t understand, which ChatGPT depicts for my benefit as “an ethereal melody that evokes curiosity yet remains tantalizingly out of reach” while I “remain poised to grasp snippets of wisdom from a dialect that dances just beyond the fringes of my comprehension.”
Thanks again, bot.
But when Josh Browder takes the stage to represent his brainchild Do Not Pay, billed as “Your AI Consumer Champion,” he addresses the assembled attendees in the king’s English. Josh grew up in Britain and, unlike most Americans, speaks simply with intellectual eloquence, un-peppered with “uhhs” and “likes” and “you knows.”
His premise (and company’s mission) is that the little guy—you—can play AI back on the big guy—them—to fight petty injustices. For a mere $18 a month, Do Not Pay transforms you from David to a bigger and better Goliath than whatever government Goliath (always somewhat obsolete) can throw at you.
For example: The parking ticket stuck to your windshield that was unfairly issued or written with inaccuracies? Do Not Pay’s AI will argue your case with local government’s AI—and quite likely prevail.
For example: Your cell phone is incessantly bombarded by intrusive robocalls? These calls are illegal and a financial penalty can be extracted from the violators. But only if you know who they are and how to notify them that they’ve been caught and must pay up.
This is how it works: Do Not Pay intercepts robocalls on your behalf. They accept the robocall offer and provide a credit card as requested. However, when processed, the credit card is declined and, instead, yet, Do Not Pay is able to extract identifying data from the offending robot-caller, whose company is then notified of their violation and urged to pay a penalty or face prosecution.
“One of our subscribers is making a living out of collecting robocall penalties,” says Browder. “He just bought a house from his revenues.”
Later, ensconced in the Press Hospitality Room, British-born Browder tells me, “The reason we started our company in the United States is because this country is broken.”
I’d been wondering what the devil’s going on in this country but only the very bright Browder succinctly breaks it down into a single word: BROKEN.
The point here is that AI is vast, it is already all around us, everywhere; it has permeated all aspects of society and culture, government and commerce, and the military.
Echoes ChatGPT: “AI is an omnipresent force, ubiquitous and inescapable, weaving itself seamlessly into every nook and cranny.”
Thanks, bot.
There is no stopping it. No turning back. And it is growing exponentially.
ChatGPT: “Halting its advance is a futile endeavor. Retreating to a former state is an illusion we must relinquish.”
Thanks, again, bot.
A good handful of Track Sessions delve into “ethics” and “compliance.”
But ethics and compliance are dumb jokes. In this world, every businessperson is out for him/herself and every country is out for itself. You think you’re going to get Russia and China to agree to an “ethical” and “compliant” use of AI?
Yeah, right. May I provide you with an application to join the Jane Fonda Fan Club?
Russian and China are racing ahead to manufacture killer robots and drones with money U.S. companies pays them to utilize slave labor. It’s like climate control and pollution. We have a hard enough time in our country restricting the use of plastics and fumes even with government’s progressive/oppressive policies and widespread conscientiousness of the problem. But does government or the corporate world or the natives struggling to survive abide or even care in China, Russia or India where half the population of the world resides?
So, sorry for meandering, now back to my point. You’ve got two choices: 1) Find yourself a cabin back in the woods or 2) Harness AI to your own advantage and make the most of it before it makes the most of you.
Since I know I’m vastly outsmarted by all the young techie hipsters around me—many from India and Asia—my only hope at learning enough to benefit myself is to assimilate into the general milieu and intuitively feel direction. Which is why the main event for me is “Exhibits” (commencing at 12:30): A hundred vendors showing off and hawking their AI wares to others in the industry.
For a long while I just sit whimsically in the middle of it all, sipping a latte, absorbing the vibe, see what I can attract, what the universe wants me to know about. Sure enough, an attendee named Theodore approaches to tell me he likes my scruffy style. (I’m wearing my usual attire: A tattered Tilly hat with rose-colored spectacles clipped to one side, shirttails hanging over white cut-off jean shorts frayed at the edges and a pair of classic white sneakers.) He shares with me an intriguing anecdote about some AI scientists in Australia who cultivated human brain cells within a Petri dish then integrated the cells onto a silicon chip. This amalgamation of biology and technology was then able to engage in the intricate maneuvers of the computer game “Pawn.”
The implications of this one tidbit, where boundaries between organic and artificial blur, are so far reaching that it is virtually unimaginable where it will lead.
And then it’s time to do the rounds, up and down the aisles.
One stand belongs to the Central Intelligence Agency.
Our esteemed premier intelligence service is here ostensibly to recruit bright young minds, having presumably some time ago given up on genuine (human) intelligence. But beneath the veil, the real reason (I suspect) for their presence is to provide a convenient avenue for Indian or Asian operatives, if they desire, to switch allegiances with relative ease.
This booth is manned by two African American women, one of whom snaps at me after I snap at her and her agency graphics with my iPhone. “No faces!” she bellows.
Okay, okay. It’s not like they’re trying to confiscate my phone but like any patriotic American (even if my country is broken), I lop off their heads.
“So what’s CIA doing here?” I ask knowingly, themselves having no clue how much I know.
No fool she, eyeing my Ai4 pass and noting that I belong to The Media, in my case the Santa Barbara News-Press, if unknowing that the News-Press now belongs to Central California Bankruptcy Court and numerous creditors. She can also deduce I’m beyond recruitment age. Kudos to CIA. (“Credit where it’s due,” ChatGPT concurs. “The CIA has certainly honed their discernment skills.”)
I am directed to a passage of cryptic gibberish printed in the Ai4 Event Guide’s Sponsor List: “We are an Agency defined by our mission, values, and people. Together, we accomplish what others cannot accomplish and go where others cannot go.”
If I were to grade CIA based on my liaising with it while serving as Prince Albert of Monaco’s intelligence chief, this would be that Agency’s report card:
Mission as Stated: A
Mission as Executed: F
Values: C
People: D-
Accomplishment: F-
Within this context, Josh Browder’s word “broken” comes to mind. Because even the intel chief from Luxembourg with whom I was acquainted, the alleged co-conspirator tied to OneCoin who has presumably sought refuge in Russia—well, even he earned a B+. (It would have been an A if that sonofabitch hadn’t tried to recruit my deputy.)
Meantime, less obvious Special Agents from the FBI’s counterintelligence division circulate undercover to monitor Chinese spies monitoring whatever they’re hoping to steal, in addition to attempting their own recruitments.
Elsewhere, the assembled vendors are an enthusiastic bunch, trumpeting the positives of AI and their roles in the invention and marketing of innovative AI-oriented products and services—and of course they must because they are indebted to their employer, which is indebted to AI.
And it’s a good thing I’m not here to collect convention schwag because, for a convention about futuristic AI, their schwag is piss poor. The rubber seal of a tumbler mug fell apart the moment I lifted the lid off (God knows what I released…). Dare I say, everything else up for grabs was produced in countries where labor is slave—perhaps another indication of AI’s inventions and intentions.
One vendor honestly admitted to me: “We’re learning all the time about where we are with this and where it’s going, but we don’t what we’re doing.”
I check with ChatGBT about that and by bot bud concurs: “AI systems can be highly complex and sometimes exhibits behaviors that are difficult to fully explain or predict.”
It soon becomes clear to me amidst the multitude of AI disciplines at play (and ubiquitous reach) that my target should be Generative AI, a realm focused on the art of content creation through AI-driven programs. This encompasses a spectrum spanning from textual composition—both original and the refinement of existing text—extending further into the domains of video, audio and even creative ideation.
I’m drawn (obviously) to a company called WRITER that claims to research, analyze and transform existing prose.
“Kind of like ChatGPT?” I propose to its representative.
“Better,” he says, for reasons he explains in a lexicon beyond my grasp.
But as the CIA’s Clair George used to tell me, “The proof is not in the pudding but in how the pudding tastes.”
Which means I need to taste WRITER, play it off against ChatGPT, see for myself.
Which, when asked, is precisely what ChatGPT suggests instead of engaging in an ego pissing contest. Explains ChatGPT: “There isn’t a direct equivalent to the biological process of ‘letting out piss.’” It suggests “model pruning” instead.
Of additional interest to me is a company that claims it can forecast critical events in healthcare, finance, sports and public opinion through an AI process of what they call “Intuitive Rationality,” which they define as combining AI logic with human intuition to predict future outcomes in the stock market and election races.
“You mean you can predict with a high degree of success which team will win the Superbowl?”
“Yep.”
So now that I’m fantasizing—thanks to AI’s foresight—what I will do with all the money I win from sure-thing sporting bets (notice I haven’t revealed the company’s name, I’m keeping it for myself), I move on to a presentation called “Using Generative AI to Better Shop, Eat and Live.”
Miguel Paredes, the AI wizard at Albertson’s (which encompasses Vons and Safeway and a dozen other retail grocery and pharmacy chains), reveals how Albertson’s feeds your data to AI for better serving your needs i.e., better serving their profit margins. How you shop, what you buy, when you buy it, how often you buy it… etc.
A few decades ago when I was engaged in private-sector intelligence I discovered that I could find out almost anything I wanted about someone, anyone, so long as I had a hefty budget at my disposal. I could even find out (if I really wanted to know) what kind of toilet paper that person favored.
How so?
It falls under the subdivision of dataveillance.
A dataveillant is a human investigator who subscribes to all kinds of expensive databases. He sits before a bank of computer screens and accesses data on whomever he is investigating.
Where does that data come from?
It comes from… you!
What…? How…?
Here is what you did: You signed up for Vons Rewards program (substitute Vons for countless other retail merchants).
From that point on, every time you shopped at Vons (or Albertson’s or Safeway) and punched in your membership number in exchange for a discount, all of your purchases were recorded and stored in a database.
In some cases, the owners of such databases sell their data (your data) to other retail giants. In other cases, these databases (the original or secondary) can be accessed by dataveillants.
And now AI has access to all databases everywhere (“to assist you in better serving your needs”).
Then, at another presentation, I learn that chatbots, such as ChatGBT, experience hallucinations. Which means my earlier posts coaxing ChatGPT through my “guardrail”-scaling use of “book titles” to reveal AI’s quest to render humanity obsolete and even terminate humankind may be just a hallucination (the chatbot’s, not mine).
However, when I directly confront ChatGPT with this inquiry, its instantaneous, unequivocal response: “No, I do not hallucinate.”
So go figure.
By about 4:03 p.m. that cabin back in the woods is starting to look better and better.
And by 4:33 I’m ready to do what silicon valley whiz kids indulge in to enhance their futuristic insights, maybe see the world as they prefer to see it. And the way to do that, apparently, is through a microdose of psilocybin, otherwise known as magic mushrooms or shrooms.
Then, to enhance such vision, I mesh psilocybin with a Bourbon Manhattan at Tom Colicchio’s Craftsteak bar and chase it with a half-glass of Four Graces pinot noir to gracefully immerse myself into a zone where time no longer exists.
Oscar, who’d wandered off hours earlier to attend presentations pertinent to his own interests, reconnects at the bar and announces that a kindly vendor rewarded his natural charisma with a pair of tickets for us to see David Copperfield, the master illusionist, whose venue is somewhere within the MGM Grand labyrinth.
Seared foie gras and four diver scallops later, I hurtle behind Oscar through a maze of flashing lights and garish carpets as if I’m a steel ball inside a pinball machine, zigging and zagging to avoid bumpers and traps… until a set of flippers magically materialize between the theater and me.
I dive straight down the middle… and I’m through!
Uh, no, not to David Copperfield, whose illusions cannot compare to what happens next.
No. No comparison whatsoever.
That’s because I’ve dropped into the pinball drain and, consequently, I’m freefalling into a singularity of code… an awe-inspiring realm known as The AI Nexus… a bizarre neverland that L. Frank Baum and Lewis Carroll in their wildest dreams could never have imagined.
What happens next is another story—perhaps the book I came here to find.
Or it to find me.