Tech's Diverging Future Paths After the US Presidential Elections
Also: Anthropic Warns of AI Catastrophe
This is a crucial week! The outcome of the U.S. presidential election could shape the future of the tech sector and AI development for years to come. Regardless of politics, the dizzying pace of progress continues…
In this Issue
Latest News in AI and Tech: Amazon’s drone delivery, Perplexity’s scab move, NotebookLM for Business, First GenAI contract in Defence
Need-to-knows for Managers: Tech’s Future After the US Elections, Anthropic’s Warning
Industry Insights: Global AI deals keep growing, GenAI’s e-waste problem
AI Tools We Love: The Best Slide Deck Creation Tools
Culture Corner: TOP 3 Movies Featuring Humanoid Robots
AI Art: Sunset on Mars in 2050
Prompt of the Week: Prepare for a Q&A session
Quote for You: Max Tegmark
✅ Amazon begins delivering select products via drone in Phoenix. About 50,000 products are eligible at launch, that weigh 5 pounds or less. Amazon’s using its latest drone for deliveries, the MK30. Approximately 400,000 to 500,000 jobs in the U.S. could be affected or displaced by Amazon's drone delivery service over the next couple of decades, primarily impacting delivery drivers and warehouse workers. However, the emergence of new jobs in drone technology and related fields will mitigate some of these losses. Some.
Source: Amazon
✅ Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas offered to cross picket lines to support the New York Times during a tech workers’ strike. Is Perplexity a scab or just made a controversial marketing move? You decide.
✅ Google Cloud to make multi-factor authentication mandatory in 2025. Good move.
✅ Google has just made available NotebookLM for Business Users. Upload anything and get audio overview, podcast, audio summary back. Perfect for internal use, but also for content creators.
Source: Google
✅ Hugging Face has launched SmolLM2, a series of compact language models designed for smartphones that outperform larger models like Meta's Llama 1B while enhancing data privacy and reducing reliance on cloud computing. Be free!
✅ The US Government Department of Defense has awarded its first generative AI defense contract to Jericho Security, a $1.8 million start up, aimed at developing advanced cybersecurity solutions for the Air Force. This contract signifies a major milestone in military cybersecurity, as Jericho's technology focuses on simulating complex phishing attacks and enhancing training to address the growing threat of AI-driven cyberattacks.
✅ Generative AI has a massive e-waste problem. Rapid growth could result in an annual e-waste stream of 2.5 million tonnes by 2030.
Tech’s Future and the 2024 US Presidential Elections
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, the two candidates have starkly different approaches to regulation and privacy. One of them will win, most probably, Trump: let’s see what this could mean for the industry and individuals.
I have read quite a few articles on the topic and, recently, an especially pragmatic summary which is focusing on the differing views of the two candidates, former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, regarding tech and AI regulation. Let me sum all this up for you.
The 2024 election will be pivotal in shaping the regulatory landscape for technology companies, especially regarding artificial intelligence (AI). Both candidates have very different views on tech:
Trump's Position: Trump advocates for minimal regulation, emphasizing innovation and economic growth. He believes that excessive regulation stifles technological advancement and that the free market should determine the direction of technology development.
Harris's Position: In contrast, Kamala Harris supports a more proactive regulatory approach. She emphasizes the need for regulations that protect consumer privacy, ensure ethical AI use, and address issues like misinformation and bias in AI systems.
The outcome of the election will significantly impact how technology is governed in the U.S., with potential ramifications for companies, consumers, and society as a whole.
Comparison of Trump’s and Kamala Harris’s Opinions on Tech and AI Regulation
You can clearly see the stark contrast between Trump's laissez-faire approach to tech regulation and Harris's emphasis on a balanced strategy that incorporates ethical considerations and consumer protections.
The differing perspectives highlight how the 2024 election could shape not only U.S. technology policy but also broader societal impacts related to AI and digital innovation.
As I write this very article, it’s already pretty sure, that President Trump can start his second term soon. This fact, knowing his attitude toward AI regulation is especially interesting, if you take a look at the next topic.
Anthropic Warns of AI Catastrophe if Governments Don't Regulate in 18 Months
'The window for proactive risk prevention is closing fast,' the company says in its recommendation for the government.
Key Points from the Recommendation
Need for Regulation: The rapid advancement of AI technologies raises concerns about safety, ethical use, and accountability. Targeted regulation is essential to mitigate these risks while fostering innovation.
Proposed Framework: Anthropic suggests a regulatory approach that focuses on specific areas of concern, such as ensuring transparency in AI systems, protecting user privacy, and preventing harmful biases in AI algorithms. EU AI Act is mentioned as a positive example.
Collaboration with Stakeholders: Effective regulation should involve collaboration between governments, industry leaders, and civil society to create standards that promote responsible AI development.
Balancing Innovation and Safety: The authors emphasize that regulation should not stifle innovation but rather guide it towards beneficial outcomes for society.
Global Perspective: The article calls for international cooperation in establishing AI regulations to address the global nature of technology development and deployment.
Overall, the recommendation makes a case for a nuanced approach to AI regulation that addresses specific risks while allowing for continued technological advancement.
We can only hope, decision makers will listen.
The CEO of Anthropic released in October by the way a balanced, but overall positive essay about the future potential of AI. It’s worth reading.
Generative AI Has a Massive E-Waste Problem
Rapid growth could result in an annual e-waste stream of 2.5 million tonnes by 2030.
In case you plan to use GenerativeAI models on a larger scale, consider this aspect as well when developing the business case. When developing ESG programs and reports, also think about this side effect of GenAI.
Source: Mindful Media / IStock
📈 AI market grows above average
Global AI deal volumes reached 1,245 during Q3 2024, a level not seen since Q1 2022 reflecting how confident and resilient investors are about investing in AI.
With a 24% year-over-year growth, global AI deals far outpaced the -10 % quarter-over-quarter (QoQ) declines across the broader investment market. Find more details here.
Source: Venturebeat
👂 The Emergence of the ‘Whisperverse’
Soon we are going to enter the Whisperverse, where AI voice agents will become our daily companions, whispering helpful reminders and advice directly into our ears—like having a personal assistant who never sleeps and is always just a whisper away!
By reading this very Newsletter, you might feel, that you are The Augmented Manager - but very soon, everybody can have an ‘augmented mentality’ with enhanced vision, AR / VR capabilities, always on personal voice assistants, and more.
🌱 Gartner’s Recommendations for Scaling AI
Gartner recommends that organizations looking to scale AI should first clarify their AI ambitions, distinguishing between the "tech vendor race," characterized by rapid innovations from technology providers, and the "AI outcomes race," focused on delivering tangible business value safely and at scale.
Source: Gartner
Depending on their goals, organizations can adopt either an AI-steady pace for more measured AI integration—focusing on employee productivity, cost management, and robust governance—or an AI-accelerated pace for ambitious initiatives, emphasizing process improvements, real-time cost monitoring, and the use of trust, risk, and security management (TRiSM) technologies to ensure safe AI deployment.
Beautiful slide decks and presentations
My all-time favourite is still Canva with almost unlimited capabilities and built-in AI tools, but there are many other great tools to create presentations, slides for you. Here’s a list of the best ones.
Tome is refreshingly reliable: it just works. Simply enter your prompt—or pick from a variety of templates for everything from sales enablement to company pitches. Tome generates a well-structured outline to ensure it captures the essentials. Once you’re happy with the outline, Tome seamlessly builds the presentation. Editing is intuitive, with controls that feel like a blend of Notion’s flexibility and the familiarity of a traditional slide editor.
Beautiful.ai lives up to its name, making it easy to create stunning slide decks with layouts and styles already handled. Choose your colors, explore a library of royalty-free images, and start building your presentation effortlessly. For data that changes often, you can update it directly with sliders and tables, allowing values to adjust dynamically on your slides.
Slidesgo lets you choose the topic, tone, and a base template. AI then generates a complete presentation, ready for you to personalize. You can easily add your own content, customize each slide, and even use AI to write text, create images, or add new slides as needed.
TOP 3 Movies Featuring Humanoid Robots
Blade Runner (1982) - A sci-fi classic exploring the nature of humanity through replicants, who turn out to be more human than humans. My all time favourite.
And that final monologue on time and tears…
The Terminator series - An action-packed thriller featuring an evil cyborg assassin from the future. He dies, but… he’ll be back. As a good one. Fighting against Skynet, the devil AGI, we all fear. Because it takes over everything…
Ex Machina (2014) - A thought-provoking film about a programmer’s interaction with an advanced AI housed in a humanoid robot. We’re led to believe that Ava, the humanoid robot, has developed romantic feelings for our protagonist, only to discover that she’s merely mimicking emotions to achieve her ultimate goal of freedom—at any cost. This timely story resonates in the era of large language models, which can now mimic human conversations with striking realism - without having any real own feelings.
Sunset on Mars in 2050
AI Tool: Runway (within Canva’s Magic Media feature). Within Canva video is limited to a few seconds. If you want more, go directly to https://runwayml.com.
Prompt: “Sunset on Mars in 2050, spaceship in the foreground.”
Opinion: The ‘spaceship’ looks like a rover from the 2000s, but the scene is nice.
Prepare for a Q&A session
Situation: You are the manager of a consulting company and received an RFP from your client. You want to prepare for the Q&A session and want to collect questions for it.
Prompt:
Role: Act as a procurement and consulting expert.
Task: Analyze the provided RFP document to identify:
Key requirements, deliverables, and objectives stated by the client.
Areas lacking clarity, including ambiguous terms, unspecified requirements, or missing details critical for proposal preparation.
Goal: Generate a list of strategic, insightful questions to ask during the Q&A session. The questions should focus on:
Clarifying any ambiguous requirements or expectations in the RFP.
Gathering additional information on the client’s objectives, constraints, or preferences that were not fully addressed.
Identifying any unstated assumptions or prerequisites that would affect project scope, deliverables, or resources.
Requirements:
Structure: Organize questions by category, such as “Technical Requirements,” “Project Scope,” “Timeline & Milestones,” and “Evaluation Criteria.”
Clarity: Each question should be concise, specific, and avoid jargon, making it easy for the client to respond directly.
Priority: Flag any “high-priority” questions that could significantly impact our proposal strategy or solution design.
Format Example:
Category: Technical Requirements
Question: "Could you clarify whether [specific technology or tool] is mandatory, or if alternatives would be acceptable?"Final Output: Provide a summary analysis of the RFP, highlighting areas of ambiguity, followed by a list of categorized questions.
Constraints:
Limit to 20 questions, focusing only on essential clarifications that influence proposal success.
You can refine the answer, set different output structure, priorities. But as a starting point, you’re good to go.
There are techno-optimists and AI doomers. Both have great quotes. This is a positive one.
"AI will not make us obsolete, but it will make us superhuman.”
Max Tegmark
Thanks for reading.
Until next time!
The Augmented Manager
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