Artificial Unintelligence: Cutting Through the AI Hype

Hey everyone, it's Alan Shimel and welcome back here to Text on tv. You know, I got some three of my favorite people in the world on this one to talk to and talk about. Something I think is really you're gonna find interesting.

Let me introduce you to, to, uh, who's joining us today. First of all, one of my good friends, he's, he's helped me with our RSA DevSecOps event for 10 plus years, and I know him at least that long, all around. Good guy, my friend Mark Miller.

Hey, mark. How are you? You know, I'm doing good, Alan.

Trying to get through this heat wave. I don't know how you guys are doing down there. Well, you know, it's not, it's about, I mean, it, it is going on July and Florida, so, you know, it's, it's not cool.

But I did go up to New York this weekend and I heard all about this a hundred degree heat wave. Of course I got there, the heat wave broke and it was 60 something degrees. I didn't bring a jacket, I was freezing.

But That was the Shimel effect. Yeah. Yeah, the shimel effect.

I was in your neck of the woods walking around the West Village there. 11. I don't understand why people stand on line for pizza that long, but that's another story.

Mark, tell folks, what have you been up to lately? I've been working on the Artificial Unintelligence conference project. I don't know if you've heard of it, Alan, but it's about the idea that practitioners are doing things that are not getting picked up by the hype cycle.

The idea that we want practitioners talking to other practitioners about what they're doing. So Chip and I had this idea to put this conference together. I'm gonna let him talk about that a little bit too.

But we wanna get beyond the hype cycle. We wanna actually deal with practical solutions in ai. Sounds good.

I can't wait to hear more about it. Next up though, before I chip, I'm saving you for last. Next up is Our, Our correspondent on the street, John Boyle.

John, how are you? How are you doing? I'm doing great.

It's always good to see Shimmy, uh, and, uh, the gang here, so it's great to be here. Fantastic. And thanks for joining us.

Chip. You know, mark threw, threw the gauntlet down at you. Put it on your head.

Chip Stewart is, mark and Chip are partners and, uh, is it Miller and Stewart, or Stewart and Miller, whatever it is. But Chip, tell us a little bit about what you're up to with this conference. Hi, Alan.

Um, thanks Dave. Thank you for taking the time to talk to us today. Um, really appreciate it.

Uh, the artificial intelligence conference is about finding the real stories behind people who are using AI today and how they're using MO most effectively, or where it's really failing them. You know, where it isn't get a job done, we need to return back to other, you know, human, uh, unintelligent solutions to their workflow. Look, if we're gonna talk about this conference, let's get out of the way right now.

When is it, how do people register, join, attend, interact. Part of it, It is September 16 through 17. Because it is a 24 hour conference, we're running five simultaneous tracks for 24 hours.

So they can just follow the sun, uh, around the globe. The, uh, the sessions are gonna be 25 minutes each with a little five minute buffer in between. And that way we get to go a hundred plus sessions in a 24 hour period.

Well, if you, let's say two sessions an hour for 24 hours, that's 48 sessions. So it's not all five tracks going all 24 hours at a time. We're trying to fill it up that way.

You know, in the past for events like this, we've been coming pretty close. We're easily gonna have over a hundred sessions. Yeah, Well, five times 48, 5 times 60, about 250 sessions.

So with that, that would be max capacity, but that's also a lot to take in. And, you know, through the magic Mark, you and I have been doing virtual events for years and years through the magic of virtual events. If you miss one, will you be able to, 'cause you know, you're in track one, but there's really something in track three you'd like to see, but you'd like to see track one a little bit more.

Are you gonna be able to go on demand and, and miss what you, or see what you missed over at that time? Or is that too deep in the woods at this stage? Jim, Go ahead.

You can handle that one. We got that covered. Yes, you will.

It'll be more polished. You won't miss Stef of a live day of event. Um, but certainly, you know, a month after we've gone live, you'll be able to access all of the sessions, so you weren't able to take part of day of.

Fantastic. And To answer your earlier question on intelligence AI is where you can register today to Attend Unin Unintelligence ai. Correct.

Okay. So look, you can't walk more than three feet in the tech world today without tripping over some ai. Hmm.

Gentech ai, generative ai ML op or ML AI or, or what have you. Mark, you, you talked a little bit about practitioners, the untold chip, I think you said the untold stories of ai. Everybody is jumping on this, but what, uh, what do we see?

Like what, what makes this conference, what's gonna be so special? What, what is the the special sauce mark that you bring into this one? It's an interesting question, Alan, because Chip and I were just talking over the last hour about one of the dilemmas that in general the public is having with ai.

And that is the hype cycle is so strong that you cannot get away from the hype. What we're trying to do is isolate a 24 hour period, no hype, no sales pitches, no marketing practitioners talking to practitioners. John, you're a a third party that's been watching what we're doing here.

What's your perception of it? So, yeah, I think first of all, um, I kind of put the, the AI discussion in two camps. There's the Steve Jobs camp, and then there's the Wise NIAC camp.

And what'll be seen the past three years is, is the big two letter slides with AI on it. And it's almost kinda like that movie Idiocracy. It's like ai, it's got electrolytes, it's what plants crave, and nobody else can really go beyond that.

I think that this conference is, is the first one I've seen where you're gonna bring the doers, the innovators, the developers, the people that are forming the actual use cases that the enterprises, mid-size companies, governments, everybody is looking for, to have application of ai. I think it goes back to when Wozniak invented the personal computer and people were like, well, how is this gonna be applied in the home and in business and all that? And it's more than just like, Hey, here's our product.

So I'm very excited about it because I think that there's, there's ai, uh, shiny object syndrome, fatigue. And also the thing is, there's that debate raging about replacing humans with AI and some analysts that posted about that, like AI's coming for your job or augmenting human. And I think that this conference falls on the side of the augmentation and accelerating the skill sets and usefulness of humans regardless of their tenure, age, whatever, uh, in, in the, in business and in, in the personal lives and government, all that sort of thing.

I think it's gonna be a tremendous opportunity. And quite honestly, whoever's not there attending, speaking and sponsoring, and they count themselves as being AI relevant to me, you're not gonna be relevant because this is a real conversation to people from around the globe who can't fly in to San Francisco or Las Vegas for every conference that has vendors with eight a eight pieces of carpet and traditional non-AI marketing approaches. So I think this is really, it's a real conference to me and I'll be, I I submitted to speak.

Hopefully I'll get accepted, but, um, I'm excited about it and it's the real deal. It's gonna be the conversation of the year. I think.

Mark, I was talking to our friend Tracy Reagan this morning, uh, the show we taped with Open Text and she, last week was in Denver at the Open Source Summit and the CDF, that's the Continuous Delivery Foundation, uh, user conference. And she did a session there on security, AI and cd, and she said she was really disheartened to hear from the cd from the DevOps engineers that, like, they were, they were not bullish on ai, you know, they were almost digging their he heels in the sand and said, you know, this is let the developers worry about ai. They, they, they don't think AI is gonna have a huge effect today or in the near future on them, that it's more hype than reality.

And I, I dug into that with her and I think part of it guys is, John, you touched on it. There's a lot of people who view AI as a, as, as a threat, as, as something that could take their job away instead of making them better at their job. Right.

And, you know, a message of, of hope and good news is, Ken, is that really what we want? You know, that's not really the truth. I think it'll take your job away if you dig in your heels and say, I don't wanna learn about it or I'm gonna ignore it.

Right. So your choice is to embrace it and make yourself, uh, more valuable in, in, in the market, or you do risk the, you do run the risk of becoming obsolete. And I, well, you Gotta think too, Alan, that what you're talking about, the DevOps and the DevSecOps movement started in 2009, we're coming up on 20 years.

Have people dug in their heels now in that? Absolutely. Yes.

I think this is a transformational phase right now. And as Chip and I talk about it daily, there's so many things that people are doing now that are not visible. And so what we, what we talk about is what are the sessions that we're excited about seeing that nobody knows yet.

And I think that's gonna help because we're gonna be able to provide examples of things that are happening to say, oh man, I didn't know I could do that. Well, mark, you opened the Can of Worms. What are some of these sessions?

That stuff no one knows yet. There's one that I really like is, uh, Georgie and Australia is gonna be talking about AI failures, massive AI failures and why they failed. I think, remember when I did that book Epic Failures and Dev Sector?

I was thinking it just when you said that, The same, same thing. The other thing that I really love that we just booked last Friday, just three days ago, Damien has created a database of all of the court cases where bogus court filings have been handed to a judge that had bogus case numbers, bogus lawyers, bogus companies. And he is tracking that, and he is gonna talk about what's going on with that.

Uh, that, that one just blew me away. Um, chip, you got yours. You wanna, you wanna do that?

Yeah, there, there's, there's a lot of, I mean, we're 80 plus sessions now, so there's a lot of different great sessions for everybody. But one in particular if I'm excited for is about how you can use hallucinations in AI or when AI gets it wrong to supercharge your critical thinking, which I think is very interesting, you know, taking a happy accident and using it to make something more productive or better that you didn't have before. And, um, I I, I think that's really what sets us apart is there's just tons and tons and tons of conferences that you're not gonna get from a typical vendor pitch type conference.

I, I think one of the things I, I've spotted though, if I can just intercept, is that when you, one of the things I love that these guys have done, Alan, is that when you look on the speaker, uh, board, it's just so diverse as far as people's ages experience. That's what, that's really what there to do. In fact, I kind of coined the phrase, I, I don't think it's artificial intelligence.

I think it's augmented intelligence, right? It's meant to help the, uh, the speed of information and all kind of stuff so the human brain can accelerate innovation and that sort of thing. And there's no wrong answer, but, um, I think that what these guys have done is really got, gotten a global group and opened it up and given opportunity to people with these brilliant minds where it's not just under a corporate entity umbrella with, you know, this one, this one conference they're sponsoring.

Um, so I think that, um, the, the ones around augmentation of the human brain and condition to me are very exciting because how do you take a a it group that babysit systems 90% of the time and innovates 10% of the time? And what I hear is, help me flip that script, right? Augment my talent, augment my humans.

And so I think the things Chip and Mark, you guys have gotten in there that the augmentation versus the replacement discussions are gonna be great. I'm very excited for those. You guys have done a great job with that.

I, I'm excited about that too, John, because one of the things I hear daily when I'm discussing things with people is, am I going to lose my job? And I think that we've got this really covered very, very well in the conference. There's so many sessions.

I've got one guy in Europe that actually has saved 5,000 man hours a month without replacing a single person. That's a story I think everybody should hear. So they Called adding 5,000 man hours a month to your output, right?

Uh, Yeah. I mean we look at it without, Without replacing a person. And that that's huge.

Huge. The other thing that we have I think is fascinating 'cause I haven't seen anybody do it at this scale yet. We have 30 book authors who have books on AI as speakers.

I mean, these are the experts that are flying underneath the radar, but anybody that's anybody is reading their books, I, I think that's fascinating. Absolutely. Hey guys, I wanna do a little kind of setting the table in terms of the event.

This is a virtual event. It is. Follow the Sun, as Mark said, registration is free.

Yes, registration is open now. Yes, the registration is free. And what that does is it gets you access to all of the sessions after the conference too.

So if you can't attend the day of, I mean Chip and I are the founders here, there's no way that we can watch four sessions at once, you know, so everything is recorded. If you can't attend, please register anyway. ai and register and you will have access to on the unlimited content that we're gonna provide for free Speak.

Are there still speaking slots available? There are. We have a really good contingent already in Europe and in North America.

I'm actually focusing this month on apac. I really wanna get, you know, the Southeast Asia and the Australia contingent in there. And I've got some really nice speakers there already as a foundation.

And I'm expanding that foundation For potential speakers who maybe want to be considered. What, what's their best bet, chip? How do they, what do they do?

They would go to our website, click become a speaker, and our time navigation, there's a form you can fill out and Mark and I review based off of a number of different factors. But most importantly, we're not looking for people who are just trying to, you know, chuck their product for 25 minutes. We want your actual practical lessons from how you try to deploy different AI tools or methodologies and your success in that area.

Chip, there was Unin intelligence, ai, Correct? Unin intelligence, ai. Just wanna make sure we, we reinforce that.

Sometimes you gotta say things two, three times right before people Remember UNT intelligence, do ai unin intelligence, do AI Tell you you weren't clicking your heels. Lawyer Bele Juice Kim For Bele juice. Um, what about sponsors?

Are there sponsors for this event? How are you got, you know, someone's gotta keep the lights on, You can become a sponsor. Um, it's a little bit different from other conferences and that, um, this doesn't guarantee necessarily that you're choosing the speakers, you're choosing the sessions, but it is a great way to expose your brand to, um, audiences that might be a little bit wary of, you know, traditional conferences and that vendor selling approach.

Um, I would say, you know, for my demand gen folks out there, this is an excellent way to address the dark funnel, um, in terms of engagement for your brand. The other thing too, Alan, that, uh, chip and I are doing differently on this thing is that when you're a sponsor, you get to help us define the personas that we target in our marketing. A majority of the sponsor money goes towards advertising and marketing and that advertising and marketing is a direct target for the audience we're going after.

That's a big deal. Shimmy. I think that's, that's when the call out be able to say, talk to these guys and say, here's my ICP, my ideal customer profile.

And uh, you know, instead of having the typical, here's a big list from, uh, you know, everybody gets from the, the traditional trade shows that are on site. I think it's what these guys are doing is very interesting. And the other thing is, is that, um, shoot with all the, you know, budgets going on these days and people looking at budgets, not having to bring people in, you know, flying in for travel and expense, uh, you're hitting all three regions.

I say three regions, but let's, let's be Americas is latam and North America, um, and all these, their own time zones. So everybody gets a little family time too. I think what they're doing is brilliant and I'm really looking forward to it.

I think it's gonna be something like, uh, I bet in 10 years we look back on this like we do with South by Southwest in its early years when it was really before Commerce gotten into it, you know, so I, I'm gonna put my name on this saying I'm excited about it. These guys are doing something real, which is why I covered them on, on the site for, uh, security Boulevard to get an idea of what's going on. Uh, so kudos to, to these two.

I'm, I'm excited and hopefully my presentation gets accepted too. Alan, We got you. We we heard that loud in clear John.

Um, subtle. That's John's subtle boy, right? Yeah.

Mr. Subliminal. Absolutely.

So I mean, guys, I guess I'd wrap things up with saying there's a lot of people, you know, the hype is, the hype is real, but the hype is beyond real, uh, around ai. People's time is valuable. Give me one sentence why this is the can't miss one.

That is one they must attend. Chip, I see your brain, Roland, you want to go first or you want a minute? I would say that if you are overwhelmed by all the marketing messaging around AI and want to get the nitty gritty on what's valuable and what's gonna help you, this is the right conference.

Excellent. Mark, anything you wanna add to that? Yeah, You talked about it already quickly and in the intro here is get beyond the hype cycle and the fear that the mass media is pushing about ai and see what real people are doing to create real solutions.

I love It. I got one for you, Allen. I'm gonna do my, my little article.

It's like, I call this the, uh, global AI rally for the builders, not the buzzwords. The world needs a reset, reboot, control, delete to clear the current AI marketing blue screen of death. And this is the conference for you Con did you submit a session?

Yeah, I did. Right? I think so.

I don't know. At least he admits it. All right.

Hey, I'm gonna leave you with just, you know, a little Dustin Hoffman for the graduate. ai. Go there, find out more.

Mark Chip, best of luck. It. Between now and September, we'll have you guys back on.

We'll get an update. Okay? All right.

Thank you, Alan. Thank you. All right, John, mark Chip.

Cheers guys. Thank you. Thank you for, we're gonna take a break.

We'll be right back here on Textron tv.