Swansenreport

AI. #FAIL
There doesn’t seem to be any middle ground on the subject of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Either AI is the greatest thing to come along in social evolution since sliced bread, or it is the eve of Armageddon.

There are those who have and are promoting their own parochial interests on both sides of the issue.
What I’m not seeing or hearing is the practical application of the technology, for personal or business use.

I had a firsthand exchange with what I would call a beta version of a robo call “AI voice agent,” which was embarrassing. The voice was mechanically smooth and measured. The tip-off that this wasn’t a real person calling was the extended pauses in the caller’s conversation. It was apparent that the AI agent had to “think” and search its LLM for an extended period before responding to me, then continued the conversation. All in all, a very disjointed and unnatural exchange.

Another indicator was the timing of the call. This “business” call came in at nearly 6 pm local time, and the AI agent was looking for the business’s owners. Clearly, another indication that the calling party had not done their due diligence prior to the call. Then, to compound the overall issue, the calling party called again 90 minutes later with the same pitch.

What is interesting is that the calling phone number doesn’t appear in any online phone number search.