Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Welcome to Prompting Curiosity, a podcast for the AI curious. No coding background required. I'm your host, Dr. Shantae Cofield, also known as the Maestro, and I created this show to explore what these AI tools actually are. Really, though, are the files in the computer, how to use them, and what they might mean for how we think, work, create, and move through life. Whether you're skeptical, intrigued, or already experimenting, you're in the right place. All that I ask is that you stay curious. All right, let's get into it.
[00:00:38] Hello, hello, hello, my curious people, and welcome to episode 35 of Prompting Curiosity. We did it. New name. Who dis?
[00:00:47] The name change is complete. The migration has happened. Hopefully you're looking at new cover art. Fingers crossed. Sometimes it takes, like, a little bit of time for the things to switch, but I just moved the mic there. If you heard that, uh, but hopefully it went through. I would love it. Speaking of migration, I would love it if you went and checked out the rebranded website, particularly the homepage, because it's dope and I spent a ton of time on it and I'm stoked with how it came out. I spent a ton of time on it the first go round. And, uh, this is a completely. I don't say completely new direction. It's. It's my typical brand colors. I. I brought them over, brought my Maestro colors over. I was like, you know what? I love them. We're staying with it. Um, but the hero section, the top part of the. The website has been completely redone. We got a new favicon.
[00:01:32] Everything is different, and I'm really, really stoked about it. Uh, so I would love you to check it out. There's not. Not really a big overhaul of the rest of the site, mostly just changing the color scheme. Um, but if you never checked out the website before, perhaps maybe use this as an opportunity to do so, because it's got all the things on there. It's got. I have a blog and I spent. And I really enjoy that blog. It is just the podcast episodes in. In written format, but I'd make a little thumbnail. Uh, what is it called? What is it called? Featured. Featured image. I think that's what it's called. I think it's really cool. I really like making them. Uh, I use, uh, what is it at this point? Um, Google at this point. Uh, to make them. It just looks cool. I love it. I love the whole thing. And, uh, you, uh, can read the blog. It's easy. You can search for everything, which to me is like, always Just an important feature. Um, and there is that Curious Finds page, which, for those of you who are AI nerds, you might be super interested in. Um, because it lists out all the resources that I've encountered along the way that I have found to be helpful and interesting. But, folks, we did it. We made it. The change has been, uh, completed, and I'm grateful to be on the other side of it because it was a lift. To say the least.
[00:02:44] To say the least. But why the change?
[00:02:47] Why the lift? Why the switch? I'm glad you asked. That brings us to the main topic for today's episode, which is putting your money where your prompt is. How fun is that name? Really liked it. So, straight up, I switched the name of this podcast from ChatGPT curious to prompting curiosity for three reasons. One, it became literally impossible to ignore Open eyes, bad behavior. Like, what in the actual fuck. If you don't know, OpenAI, that is a parent company to ChatGPT, and they're just acting a fool. Number two, I honestly don't trust that company, OpenAI, to not go after any brands or businesses that are using the name chatgpt, which is totally fair. I'm like, that's your shit. Totally fair. CrossFit has always done this, and I could see OpenAI cracking down on this. So I was like, I should switch this, right? I want to future proof myself there and then. Number three, the new name just fits better with what I've been doing all along, which is talking about AI tools in general, not just ChatGPT. So went with Prompting curiosity. I want to get that word prompting in there kind of stuff, speak to AI without, uh, being super pigeonholed in one way or the other. And I wanted, Honestly, I love the word curious. I also wanted to keep it because it would. I knew it would make the migration just a little bit easier and be able to keep some of that branding, uh, the same. So here we are. All right. I originally named the podcast ChatGPT curious because ChatGPT was and still is the household name. It's what people know when it comes to these LLMs. I wanted to help people learn, and part of that was making a name and choosing a name that people would actually search when they went to go and learn about ChatGPT.
[00:04:21] So for what it's worth, as well, when I started, and like, you know, when everything started, ChatGPT was also better, right? They had the lead, they had the advantage, they had the product, and then they also shit the bed. My episode 33, I spoke about my feelings about Claude after, um, exclusively using it for like the past, I don't know, like month at this point. And y', all, it's the same, if not better, right? It does all the same things. It works great. The only downside side is, in my opinion, that it doesn't have custom GPTs, right? So if you are thinking about switching, but you're worried about the lift or if it can do what you want, just switch. I promise you, yes, it can and will do what you want. And yes, my friends, you will be fine. So that brings us to the second big thing that I want to talk about in this episode, which is also reason number one that I changed the name of the podcast, which is open AI's bad behavior, right? Look, if you want to stay with Chat GPT, stick with it. I am not here to shame you or force anyone to do anything or tell anyone what they have to do, right? Live your life. That's. I didn't start the podcast, you know, to be like, this is what you have to do for me, right? To me, for me, open AI's values as interpreted from their actions became so unaligned with my own values that it really came down to me putting my money where my prompt was, right? Uh, and moving away from their service.
[00:05:44] So what did they do? Let's, let's get a little list here. Well, number one, OpenAI's president, Greg Brockman has donated $25 million to. Trump that. Trump that guy Greg.
[00:05:55] ICE, all that, this whole administration.
[00:05:59] ICE. Speaking of that, ICE uses GPT4 or a GPT4 GPT4 powered resume screening tool.
[00:06:09] Earlier this year, January 26th, I began using them for resume, uh, screening to like score the job applicants and speed up the hiring decision. Like them, the, UM tool misclassified the majority of new applicants by flagging anyone with the word officer on their resume as having law enforcement experience.
[00:06:31] This means compliance officers, loan offers officers, and people who just wanted to be ice, uh, officers and had written that the error wasn't caught for over a goddamn month, during which the affected recruits were rooted into a shortened four week online training instead of the full eight week in person academy, which is still too goddamn short. Fuck that whole fucking shit, all of it. Next up, OpenAI went and signed a Pentagon contract that Anthropic refused. I spoke about this last episode, I believe, right? Anthropic refused. They wound up refusing that Pentagon contract. They were like, no, you can't just do whatever the you want with, with this, right? The Department of War. I hate that Name Hexeth. All of them. They wanted to require AI companies to agree that their tools could be used for any lawful purposes, including mass domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons. What the.
[00:07:30] What the.
[00:07:31] Anthropic said no. And the White House designated Anthropic a supply chain risk. This is insanity.
[00:07:38] Insanity.
[00:07:40] Next up. Right, and this was, uh, anthropic. I know, I kind of focus on anthropic there. Anthropic said no. And OpenAI was like, you know what? We'll do it. While at the same time, right before that, Sam Altman was like, yes, I agree.
[00:07:54] I agree with the red lines, whatever the. That he said, and then went and signed it because why? Money, money, money, money.
[00:08:01] Next up, open AI lobbying against AI, uh, regulation. OpenAI has helped launch a 125 million dollar lobbying, lobbying operation specifically to stop states from regulating AI. What the. Like, we need rules around this thing. We need regulations around this technology.
[00:08:23] Lastly, Sam Altman. I said this so many times. He's fucking weird, right? Sam Alton, he's the CEO of Open Eye. He is a weird dude.
[00:08:31] His public statements largely, if I was going to summarize it, they paint a picture of someone who is genuinely more excited about what comes after humans than about humans themselves. Right? Nothing good coming out of that, man.
[00:08:43] I don't trust him. He lies.
[00:08:46] He, uh, besides just being a weird dude, you do not want someone like that having so much power.
[00:08:54] And, uh, in running this company, he is at the helm for making decisions that will impact the world.
[00:09:02] Immediately, no. Immediately, no. Right. So why, you know, why did OpenAI get, um, put as the front, the front runner for, for boycotting? I spoke about this in the previous episode and it's because they're the most, um, at risk, I will say the most, uh, vulnerable. Right? A lot of them, they're not making any money, but the money they are making is coming from folks who are paying. Right? Whereas anthropic, a lot of their money comes from enterprise, from other businesses. And so they are ripe. OpenAI for feeling the impact of a boycott and from, you know, for feeling the impact of consumers pulling their dollars. And they felt it. After, uh, OpenAI went and signed that contract, there was a mass exodus from OpenAI. And Sam Altman did make a comment and responded and he was like, this was not received well. No, it's not. Weird guy. No, it's not. So as, uh, I said this whole time, right? I will also say here, I don't view Anthropic as some angel company. I know that I just went through and listed why I moved away from OpenAI.
[00:10:05] I don't want it to come off as like, well, then anthropic is the best and like, they've under done anything wrong. Right. Their pushback against the government did earn them some brownie points though, like, yes, but they are still in cahoots with Palantir and at the end of the day, they're still a big company that needs funding. And so when people need money, like, they're doing not good things, right? When these big companies, they be doing not good things. So if we just look at the two lists though objectively and approach this from, you know, do the least amount of harm perspective, OpenAI is the clear loser. Right. And it would be against my personal value system to continue paying them and supporting them by having a podcast and a website and, uh, you know, quote unquote brand with the name Chat GPT. So I moved away from it. You, my friend, do what you want, right? I am just here to present information and share my take on it with the overall goal of creating more informed consumers. Um, so all of that is why I stopped paying for and using ChatGPT. And that is one of the big reasons why I changed the name of this podcast. Um, you can, however, expect the exact same content you were getting before.
[00:11:11] You know, when I was rebranding and renaming and thinking about names, I did have a thought, uh, you know, that if I called it prompting curiosity, it would kind of pigeonhole m me into only talking about LLMs. But then I was like, actually, that's all I talk about anyway, so it's all good. If, you know, when you're using this word prompt, it's like you don't really use it. When we're speaking about any other kind of AI aside from LLMs and chatbots. And I was like, you know what? That is all I talk about.
[00:11:36] I did one episode that was called what is AI? Because it's a lot of stuff. But all I be talking about on this podcast are the various LLMs where I've used them. Uh, you know, how you can use them, how to train them, to program them, uh, to get the outputs that you want, things like that to make your life easier. But it's still all about LLM. So I enjoy the name. I think it's very fitting. Um, and hopefully my departure from ChatGPT solidifies the fact that I am, in fact, LLM m agnostic. Right. I'm just here to share the things that I'm finding helpful and that are also in alignment with my values. All right, so speaking of keeping, uh, things the same, when that uh, you're going to get the same content, let's use that as a segue to into hitting that final section of the episodes and then I'll wrap this thing up. So how I used AI this week. Each episode I share a quick example of how I used AI this week. This week. You already guessed it, folks. I used Claude to help me with all the zillion 11 billion pieces needed to make this name change and rebrand. All right? I asked it literally all the questions on the steps that were required. I had it map out a list of to do items because there were so many moving parts. I had it code up the animated sections on the website. I had it hold my hand big time with the super tech intensive portions that come with having a self hosted WordPress website and looking to change the domain is not an easy thing to do, folks. I literally could not do it without AI. Like, I'm, uh, guessing that that portion at least I could have maybe found some like, you know, tutorials online. But it's way easier with AI. Way, way, way, way easier with AI. So, yeah, the biggest of help from AI. And honestly I wouldn't. I know I said that I might have been able to like Google it and look somewhere else. I don't think I would have been able to do some of it without AI. Um, I'm gonna say I would not have been able to do some of it without AI. Definitely not any of the coding sections for um, the animations and stuff on the website. So, yeah, I continue to be big, big, big grateful that AI exists. Which is yet another reason why I went and rebranded this podcast for longevity. Because I am not going anywhere. All right, keeping it a little bit shorter today. That is all for today.
[00:13:57] Hopefully you enjoyed this episode. If you did maybe leave a little rating or review. We're at 25, I believe 26, y' all are listening. Hopefully you like the new cover art. Hopefully you just enjoy this, this show, right? I'm, I'm not going anywhere. Don't forget I also have that companion newsletter. The name stayed the same. Yes, it did. The Curious Companion. And it drops every Thursday. And it's basically the podcast in text format. It's the blog as well because this gets delivered to your inbox. So if you prefer to read or you just want a written record, join the newsletter fam. You can head to the new domain prompting curiosity.com forward/newsletter or check out the link in the show notes. As always, my friends, endlessly, endlessly, endlessly appreciative for every single one of you. Until we chat again next Thursday, stay curious.
