Where Will AI Go Next?

Posted 3 May By Hanju Lee—Technology—No Comments

Where Will AI Go Next?

I started a TikTok and Youtube Shorts channel for 2 things. First, I wanted a creative outlet for my obsession – golf. And second, I was interested in doing an educational experiment. I wanted to dive deeper into how TikTok and Youtube Shorts works.

It seems so different from my current social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn). These engagements are mostly based on my current connections/friends/followers. But with TikTok and Youtube Shorts, I’m having to rely on the algorithm that it assigns for my posts. Starting out with 0 followers or following, I put my content out there (2 times a day for 2 weeks) and watched what would happen.

Interestingly, my posts became pretty popular right away. I got a couple of posts with around 20,000+ views and a couple of 35,000+ views and even 135,000+ views…the rest were less than 1000. Mind you, these were perfect strangers and I have no idea where and how my posts got shown in their feed. Doing some more digging, it seems that the built-in AI would intelligently analyze my audience, their demographics, their retention rate, their likes, their comments, their shares, their saves, and determine if they should continue to show my content to more people or slow it down. The bottom line, they used AI to do all the work.

Last week, I received a couple of copyright violations from the PGA Tour. They didn’t like some of the b-roll videos I captured from their youtube. They shut down those posts right away and sent me an option to appeal their decision. I used a “Fair Use” copyright Act of 1976 disclaimer letting them know that I was using their media for teaching, researching, commenting, or news reporting purposes to appeal. They still rejected my appeal and removed my videos.

So, who are they? AI. Who found the violation on my content? AI.

The biggest takeaway from my simple experiment is: AI is at work. Doing exactly what it is programmed to do. So, what’s next? Where do we go from here?

In 1997, the chess computer Deep Blue (created by IBM) beat the reigning world champion Garry Kasparov. AI uses its raw processing power to analyze a number of possible positions far beyond the capabilities of human beings. It was able to look at 200 million positions per second.

Last year, AlphaZero, an AI developed by Google, took it to the next level. Instead of learning derived from human experience, it played itself over and over, reinventing the history of chess through millions of self-played games and learning the behavior and patterns that led to a win. It no longer plays like a typical AI doing what it’s programmed to do – it started to play more like a human. It’s learning very analogously to how humans learn, and it’s able to do it much quicker and much better. The AI approach to the game is starting to border on creativity and intuition.

So, what’s next for AI? No one really knows for sure. The technology is moving forward, but hopefully, we are also moving with caution. When Kasparov lost his second chess match against the IBM Deep Blue, he described the computer as playing “like a god for one moment.” Afterward, he said, “I’m a human being. When I see something that is well beyond my understanding, I am afraid.”

For me, I embrace the challenge. I am excited about the future and the opportunities that it will bring. I am excited about the technology and the solutions that it will provide. I am excited to learn more and grow in the education and experimentation of it all.

But most of all, I am excited to see how it can help me get more views and engagement on my golf TikTok and Youtube Shorts channel.