Broadlines
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Broadlines
Navigating AI workslop while unlocking the power of AI tools | Shira Lazar
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Is AI making us more powerful—or quietly making our work worse?
This week, Rae and Natalie sit down with media entrepreneur and AI expert Shira Lazar to unpack a defining question of the future of work: is AI making us more powerful—or quietly making our work worse?
From the rise of “work slop” to research suggesting AI may weaken critical thinking, this conversation explores what happens when efficiency starts to replace originality. As companies rush to adopt AI, many are missing the culture and frameworks needed to use it well—leaving workplaces caught between speed and substance.
But it’s not all downside. Shira shares how AI is unlocking new opportunities for creators, entrepreneurs, and accessibility—pointing to a future where creativity could be more democratized than ever.
This conversation takes a clear-eyed look at both sides of AI: the shortcuts, the trade-offs, and the possibilities. What emerges is a deeper question about the future of work — and what it means to stay human in it.
Topics discussed:
00:01:41 - What Is “Work Slop”?
00:04:32 - Deepfakes, Scams & AI Misinformation
00:08:25 - Can AI Improve Work Quality?
00:11:26: Guest intro
00:12:33 - How Companies Are Misusing AI
00:15:14 - Burnout, Shortcuts & AI Culture
00:18:50 - Should AI Be Regulated?
00:23:20 - How to Tell What’s Real Online
00:25:08 - Is AI Hurting Creativity?
00:30:38 - The Positive Power of AI
00:35:58 - AI for Creators & Entrepreneurs
00:40:47 - The Future of Work with AI
EPISODE CREDITS...
Hosted by Natalie Lizarraga and Rae Williams
Directed by Lauren Ames
Executive Produced by Sydney Kramer and Rachel Apirian
Produced by Lauren Ames, Rae Williams, and Natalie Lizarraga
Filmed & Edited by Davielle Waldner
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Broadlines is a production of The Female Quotient and recorded in Los Angeles, California. Write us here to submit your own Dear FQ and join the conversation!
We create less brain activity when we use AI more.
SPEAKER_01So the tool that's actually supposed to make us smarter seemingly is doing the opposite and making us less smart.
SPEAKER_00I think our guest today is going to be so helpful in breaking some of this down for us because we have a lot of questions.
SPEAKER_01Today we are going to be talking about AI and work slob. Welcome to Broadline Shira. What does the next five years of work look like for companies?
SPEAKER_02AI is a game changer. If we're just working on this on our own with no support systems, then this is where things I think fall apart.
SPEAKER_01Are we using AI as a tool to make our work better, or are we outsourcing the thinking that actually makes us good at our jobs?
SPEAKER_02If leaders aren't doing anything about this and making it a priority, it's going to impact the culture.
SPEAKER_01AI is quietly eroding our ability to think creatively.
SPEAKER_02We are hopefully democratizing creativity. That is the North Star of AI.
SPEAKER_01Welcome to Broadlines, a weekly video podcast by the Female Quotient.
SPEAKER_00Where real headlines meet real conversation.
SPEAKER_01I'm Natalie Lazaraga, a journalist and former news anchor. And I'm Ray Williams, an entertainment, lifestyle, and culture journalist. Today we are going to be talking about AI and work slot, the most powerful tools that you've ever seen too when it comes to AI.
SPEAKER_00So I've been seeing all over the place that people who rely heavily on AI to do their work actually show lower brain activity over time.
SPEAKER_01Right. So the tool that's actually supposed to make us smarter seemingly is doing the opposite and making us less smart.
SPEAKER_00That is what MIT found. And then it gets a little worse because you know when a coworker sends you like something that looks impressive that says like nothing and it has like the words like confidence, you know, cooperation and whatever, and you're like, what does that even mean? I know exactly what you're talking about.
SPEAKER_01It looks right on the outside, but it has no substance.
SPEAKER_00So there's a word for that now, and it's called work slop, because of course there's a word for everything, but it's basically AI-generated work that looks smart on the surface and has zero substance underneath. And 40% of employees say they've received work slop in the last month alone. For zero. That's nearly half of us. That's almost half of us. And it's also not cheap because companies are losing millions in productivity because then people are spending time reviewing and redoing the work that it should have never been sent in the first place.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, work slop is actually part of AI Slop. I'm sure some of you have already seen that. It's this like low-quality, AI-generated content that's designed to not only just grab our attention, but also keep us scrolling, and it's wreaking havoc on our ability to focus at all.
SPEAKER_00And with as someone with ADHD that gets distracted very easily. That genuinely scares me because my attention span is already fighting for its life, and now the internet is literally designing itself, engineering itself to make it worse for me.
SPEAKER_01That's a big problem for Ray. It's seemingly a big problem for a lot of us because the real question is: are we using AI as a tool to make our work better, or are we outsourcing the thinking that actually makes us good at our jobs?
SPEAKER_00AI is everywhere. It's writing emails, it's generating images, it's editing videos, audio, it's helping people code. Uh, my personal favorite is I use an AI style app called Alta that I absolutely love, founded by a woman, and I feel like it's helped me to step up my style game.
SPEAKER_01I have been jealous ever since you showed us, and I was like, how is she already dressed in these clothes? One, they look so real, and it's on your actual frame, which is just why.
SPEAKER_00Because you can even put in your height and weight so it fixes your body. But like I used it to find my South by Southwest outfit before I even bought it to see what it would look like on my body. We're also seeing a lot of AI slop.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, there's a lot of AI yes girl moments, and then there's a lot of oh no's because you're seeing it everywhere, and sometimes you don't know yourself that you are seeing it. And according to the World Economic Forum, AI Slop is this low-quality, mass-produced, AI-generated content that is literally designed to grab and keep your attention. And that's when we see it on social media. There's also AI work slop. So of course it's seeping its way into the workplace. Actually, according to this study that was published by the Harvard Business Journal, work slop is AI generated work that actually like masquerades itself as productivity, but it lacks any sort of real substance at all.
SPEAKER_00In addition to that, we also have deepfake scams which are rising. So AI scams surged 1,210%, which is a lot of percent in 2025, according to the cybersecurity company Vectra. And it's not just like scams like people tricking you into like taking your money. It's also just even in our social, you know, pop culture. So, for example, Zendaya recently had to go on Jimmy Kimmel to clear up that wedding photos of her and Tom Holland were AI. Now, first of all, Zendaya, if you would just give us the real pictures, we wouldn't have to do that. However, you know, like it's just crazy that, you know, a celebrity of that magnitude had to come on and say, listen, these are fake because it's so hard to tell. And then even my parents, like my dad, dad, I'm sorry for putting you out like this, but he sends me an AI nun praying for me like once a week. And I'm like, this is not a re this is not a real nun. I do she know that? I don't know. So it's videos. I'm gonna show you one. It's videos, and it's like either like a nun or like somebody like you know, saying a prayer, like say it is prayer for your daughter. And it's like the voice sounds authentic and it sounds pretty real. I know it's AI because at this point I'm very suspicious of everything. But it's in the same way that you know, he has like there's AIs of Dr. Sanjay Gupta giving health advice that, you know, he hears these things and he's just like, oh, well, Dr. Gupta said that. And I'm like, no, that's not AI. And he's like, how can you tell? So it's it's infiltrating a lot of our pop culture, social media, not just scamming us.
SPEAKER_01To be fair, that is a genuinely real question for everyone out there. How can you tell? I mean, it's easy to get duped on that kind of stuff. Also, we will be editing in that nun so that everyone can see what you're talking about and who is playing.
SPEAKER_00And we're definitely gonna get into how we tell later on when we have our guests, but another aspect of it is AI influencers. They are becoming a real industry, they are getting real huge followings. I'm talking about like there's some AI accounts that are influencers, which with hundreds of thousands of followers. They have backstories. I thought of you the other day because I saw one that was like a mom, and I'm like, you're not, you're not real. It was like an AI mom. And she was cute. She was gorgeous, and she was teaching other moms how to like do productivity thing. And I'm not opposed to like sharing information, obviously, but it was under this like AI, you know, mom with her kid. And I was like, and they just look so freaking stunning sometimes. Like, I think I sent you all one. I'm so glad that's what you thought of. That is why I sent you guys one on Instagram, and and and I think I think you commented, or maybe like our showrunner, Lauren, commented and said that she's so gorgeous. And I'm like, this is the standard that we have. But, you know, 40% of Gen Z say they follow a virtual influencer on social media that's according to marketing platform WAP. Exactly. That's a lot. And then even like our pre-Oscars episode, we talked about Tilly Norwood, that AI performer. I'm gonna call her, because we called her an actress, and in the comments, people were like, that isn't that an actress. So, I mean, agreed, like, you know, AI is in the culture at this point.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, we're and we're seeing it in pop culture, in the way we do a lot of things every single day. All of us are on social media, let's be honest, but all of us were also in the workplace, and we're seeing it trickle down into there. There was this um study by MIT that had like 1,100 US-based employee researchers surveyed across all of these various industries. And can you believe that? 40%, 40% reported that they have received some sort of AI work slop in the last month.
SPEAKER_00I I feel like I've gotten very good at telling like what is AI. Like I got an email the other day and I was like, this is entirely AI written, but I don't know if everybody is like paying attention like that. Um, and then the tricky part is that it is so powerful, but it's also really risky because some people are using it to cut corners. And we'll talk more about that with our guests later and see how that really affects us. But I mean, it's like, how do we avoid AI work slop while still using AI as a powerful tool?
SPEAKER_01There is a way to do your work for someone else to do it for you, is what we've always imagined. Like, God, I wish someone can just do this. So obviously, whether you're lazy or not, I don't think that has anything to do with it. People are gonna take that opportunity to be like, let it let it get done for me so I can go do X, Y, Z, or hell, not do anything at all. Yeah. That's where I lay. But one of the statistics. But I think that when we when we see it in the work slot, you're right. You can identify it.
SPEAKER_00It's too good. Well, we can identify it. I don't know if everybody can at this point. I think we're gonna have to learn. But one of the things I found that kind of disturbed me is that women are underrepresented in AI development. So only 30% of the global AI workforce are women, and that's according to the World Economic Forum's global gender gap report in 2023. And I hate that for us because as we know, if there's tech or innovation and women are not in it, it leaves us behind a lot of the time. And so even that AI app that I mentioned that I use for a fashion Alta is founded and run by a woman, and I love that even more because she literally created the clueless closet app for us in real life. That's something that we definitely have to look at, is why the women are Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Actually, when we were at South by Southwest recently, I had two different people come up to me, two different women come up to me, and their their work was based on AI, and they come hang come came up with these companies, and one of them was like, I already feel on the outs because it's all men, and they don't think my ideas are good enough, and I'm still striving and striving when I know my work is good. So, you know, that's a whole other podcast about that femtech space, but we're seeing it, but it's not the dominant, right? Women are not, as you saw from the stat, like making and as much and creating as much. We do have numbers too that it's to talk about the productivity of actually having AI in your workplace. Is it paying off? Or are these investments of having these chatbots actually helping? A number of companies with fully led AI processes nearly doubled in the last year. So people are using said product. While AI use is likewise doubled since 2023, so it's doubled since since then. Yet in a recent report, this is also from MIT from the smart kids over there in Boston, they found that 95% of organizations see no clock this, no measurable return on their investment with these technologies.
SPEAKER_00Which is so interesting because I feel like for something so widespread and something that is so useful, like what's happening there? We definitely have to talk about that and and look into what's happening there. And I think our guest today is going to be so helpful in breaking some of this down for us, breaking down the ins and outs of what AI can be used for, what the kind of risks are, and like where it's going next, especially in the workplace and for women.
SPEAKER_01And I think the bottom line is that you're gonna come across it or you're using it right now.
SPEAKER_00Gonna use AI, or AI is gonna use you.
SPEAKER_01We're so excited for our guests today, an expert in this space, because we have a lot of questions.
SPEAKER_00There's a lot of things to talk about. So we are welcoming Shira Lazar. She is a media entrepreneur and digital culture expert who's been covering tech trends and news for more than a decade. She's the founder and CEO of What's Trending, one of the first digital shows to explore internet culture. She also hosts the AI download, where she explores how artificial intelligence is transforming creativity and media opportunities and the risks and the good things about the technology. And She is also a content creator who talks extensively about the creator economy. So, in fact, she and I actually collabed on a news story about AI influencers last year, and I learned so much. So I'm excited for Sheer to join Natalie and I as we dive deeper into the world of AI. So welcome to Broadline, Sheera. Hey, thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_02IRL.
SPEAKER_01This is real. We're not synthetic.
SPEAKER_00We're not synthetic, we are real performers.
SPEAKER_01Sheer, thank you so much for joining us. You had a long list of places where your expertise lies. And AI is one of them because we have a lot of questions. We did talk earlier about this 40% of employees that have encountered some sort of work slop. Let's we're we're gonna start with that. This is from BetterUp and Stanford. They found that at what point does this shift, though, from an individual habit? Say I'm just using it for myself in office, to a broader reflection of how companies are now introducing and trying to manage AI within their companies.
SPEAKER_02Well, I think that this happens when we're not starting to talk about this as a group and as a culture and as a community. If we're just working on this on our own with no support systems, then this is where things I think fall apart. There's no sandbox for us to play in. And so we're all experimenting with these things. We're finding out things that work and don't work. And then we're going into our work and uh we're not having honest conversations about it. And then also a lot of companies haven't created effective uh frameworks for how they want employees to use it. I mean, some companies actually say that you can't use these public tools like ChatGPT because there's a fear of stealing IP and ideas. They want to keep things private and protected. And so they have their own systems and tools that they've built for that. And so others, I think that it's a free-for-all right now. And that's where we see uh, you know, this type of things going through the cracks, right? And so if you think about our feeds right now, supposedly half of our social feeds are AI slop. So crazy. If life reflects our feeds, the feeds reflect life, it's probably gonna be happening IRL as well. And I think that is the big issue. And a lot of companies, it comes down to leadership. If leaders aren't doing anything about this and making it a priority, it's going to impact the culture. I think a lot of CEOs and companies, they're bringing in these like AI transition experts and helping uh implement these tools for efficiencies and productivity, but they're actually not thinking about how that impacts the culture. And that's the big disconnect, right? It's a company culture thing. And it's also comes back to how are we looking at ourselves as not just uh tools and just machines or people working with machines, but also humans and how do we implement the humanity into that? And so that's where I think that the gray area and gap is starting to build. And that's a huge issue, as you said. And you mentioned that stat from MIT, they studied 18 to 39-year-olds. Obviously, some of us are over 39. It still impacts us, right? That's a microcosm. But we know that our brains get lazy when we use AI too much and we start to cut corners. It's a survivalist instinct, I think, also, right? If we know that for our company, we'll get validation and attention and bonuses and all that if we do things faster and more efficient, you know, what kind of incentive are we giving and motivation are we giving people? So again, it comes from, I think, leadership and the culture of are we just gonna reward the efficiency and the scale and speed? Are we gonna reward originality and perspective?
SPEAKER_01I think you're absolutely right in the fact that it comes from leadership because in that question, it was individual use versus a company being very open about it and saying, how can we use this to do better? As opposed to just a lot of people, as we kind of touched on, are using it to cut corners and are turning in the stuff that's like low quality. Or is it, I guess my question is, is is the real problem that we've always had people doing low quality work turning in stuff, or is AI just making it faster and easier for them to do that?
SPEAKER_02I think this is the perfect storm because simultaneously, as these tools now are hitting the mainstream. Guess what's also happening? We're dealing with a burnout loneliness epidemic. A lot of us are stressed out. We can barely I don't want to act like you know, we can barely function. People are just trying to survive. Let's be real. We're just all just trying to make it to the next day. A lot of people. That is a reality. So you're dealing with this intersection of the realities of human life in our world right now with the advent and emergence of these tools. And again, if we don't look at it with that nuance and context, of course, a lot of people are going to be cutting corners and looking for that quick fix because again, we just need some help. If we have an understanding as a society and culture, especially in the workplace, of okay, let's start with the human first. Let's brainstorm without the AI. Let's use AI then to refine our ideas, then it's used as a tool, not as a replacement. And I think we will see less of that laziness. But in the end, you need to force yourself. Let's be real. You might get the job, you might not keep the job. You know, you could fake it till you make it, and then it's like, yeah, you you actually can't um stand on that. There is that difference. Uh, and so if you're even though if you're doing a great presentation but you can't speak to it, that's gonna impact things, right? Exactly.
SPEAKER_01Yes, that's where people are landing. Exactly. Until you have to talk about it and you're like exposing yourself. Oh, I did none of this work.
SPEAKER_02It requires all of us as individuals to hold ourselves accountable to do that work too. And that will be part of modern day work and the people that stand out in it.
SPEAKER_00And it's funny because um my previous job, all AI, everything was banned on our computers. Even as I, and you know, I covered you know AI and the the uh intersection with the content creator economy extensively. So even as I was exploring some of the tools to report on, I couldn't actually use them. And so I was like, Well, that's ridiculous. That is ridiculous. If you're reporting about something, you need to test it out and demo it. But we couldn't because they were so afraid of us you especially as a journalism organization, of the work, you know, falling into the trap of reporting something fake or a fake fact. Yeah. You know, I was just like, I want to use this technology and I found ways to use it, just even to pitch my stories. Like I pitch my story in a uniform format. And I don't need to use the brain power to say, like, if I'm just pitching the story, I know what I want to pitch. I don't need to use the brain power to sit there and, you know, like do all of this manually when you can just format it for me. I can voice note you and tell you and you voy, you know. So I I found that interesting. But even outside of work, yeah, consumers are just inundated with AI generated content on social media and in ads, even in entertainment at this point. And a lot of it isn't labeled. And what I'm wondering is should there be a legal standard for disclosing when content is AI generated? And I know like some of the social media platforms have their own rules about how they want you to identify it, but I think it's so hard to discern. Like, do you think there should be a legal framework?
SPEAKER_02A lot of people feel like there should be just like FDA regulations or on a product organic USDA, right? If someone could just like throw that on without any sort of cautions or actually going through the process, that would be considered fraud. So can we look at our online lives and our online content in a similar way? So with the EU AI Act, I love their approach because they say what is illegal offline should not be legal online. Why are we not regulating our online spaces like our offline spaces? And I think that's really important. In the end, it's about consumer protections, right? And of course, when we talk about now minors, people will all agree we want to protect minors and kids. So I think that's what's gonna help us right now get any sort of laws. So it's gonna be the pressure from I think consumers and then also advocates, and then also some of these lawsuits that are popping up that are gonna influence this. I do believe that lawsuits are gonna end up changing how we look at AI and how they get implemented or it gets implemented on social platforms. I I do think, you know, on Instagram it says you have to turn on the label of if it is AI generated. Uh on YouTube, they've basically demonetized AI slot channels. So a lot of them have been shut down. And that's a pretty interesting way of taking a stand because if you can't monetize your content, that's AI slop, you're probably not gonna create it.
SPEAKER_01Correct.
SPEAKER_02That was their way of taking a stand.
SPEAKER_01The money isn't there.
SPEAKER_02If the money is not there, then they're not gonna do it. But for for uh TikTok or Instagram and meta, it's still a big issue. And I think in the future, one, with all of us using AI in some ways, turning on a label that my content, because I used one tool is AI generated, kind of is also disingenuous and doesn't make sense. So the two tiers I think should happen are AI generated or AI assisted. And so most things probably will be AI assisted, though. I think AI becomes the new Photoshop. Do all of us say when we've used Photoshop or a filter? We don't say when we use filters and we're those. But we decide it was an aesthetic then and it was popularized. And then there became a norm of maybe not using it because it was cringe if you did. You were either the creator that used the filters or didn't. And that said a lot about your brand. So while we can turn on labels and we should, and there's a lot around that that moves into disinformation and misinformation beyond just me thinking your content is cool or whether it's real or not. I think that when it's you sharing fake information, yeah, that should just be looked at as entertainment. Is an issue.
SPEAKER_00And it's interesting that you say that because I feel like, you know, as millennials in particular, we're kind of taught not to believe everything you see online. And then I find that Gen Z and Gen Alpha, and by extension, I'm gonna call out the boomers too.
SPEAKER_02I was gonna say boomers.
SPEAKER_00Like we're boomers are just skipping us like millennials. We're perfect. We're no getting well, we were specifically because we grew up with the internet. So we were taught not to believe everything you see online, but now you have Gen Z, Gen Alpha, the boomers kind of growing up in a world where AI can kind of fabricate anything, influencers, videos, voices, and make it feel real. And so the old lessons that we were taught of don't believe everything you see online doesn't really cut it anymore. So what is the new lesson that we kind of need to teach new generations and the boomers? Sorry. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02No, it's really true. We all need to learn, okay? It's everyone. But it is a new form of digital literacy, AI literacy. It involves an ecosystem to make it make sense and make it sustainable and healthy. The platforms implementing their tools. The hope is the regulations, or I say safeguards, because regulations is a trigger word. And then also individuals understanding how to navigate, right? So you see something, first you look on the platform. Are there any labels here? Right. Let's also look at the source. Who's actually sharing this? Are they trustworthy? Where did this actually come from? Then let's look at the comments, right? Are are is anyone calling them out to say this is AI, right? That then you have to go off the feed, sorry, and then be able to go and see through searching the news and not just a random site that might confirm your bias or that might be actually now there's a a lot of trolls and uh bad actors creating fake news sites that will tell you that that information is correct. And they're doing it in mass at scale because of AI. And so going off the feed, searching, using sites that are verified sites, PolitiFact, Fact Hub, these are there's gonna be more and more companies coming out to help you figure out what's real, what's not, what's true, what's not. And then there's the whole filter of like what is truth, right? Like the question of what is truth is a big thing depending on your perspective. But we're not talking about perspective here or opinion. We're talking about what is the fact. Is this video real? Was it documented? Who is there? Going through that process is gonna have to be really important because we cannot trust everything and sometimes anything we see.
SPEAKER_00One of the things that I look for, if I see a video and like something in my brain triggers, like, not real AI, I immediately go to the comments to see if other people are saying, This is AI calling out AI. We all help each other. Yeah, that's my first indication. And sometimes I I scroll for a while and like no one's calling this out as AI. Is this really real? Verify, go through the steps, check in with your check in with your comments to see.
SPEAKER_02There needs to be a bit of a communal aspect to it, but an individual aspect to that too, and doing the work. But again, if our brains are lazy and we're we're learning to cut corners, are we gonna do that?
SPEAKER_01Let's stick to the lazy brain that you kind of just touched on. And there's a real growing fear that AI is quietly eroding our ability to think creatively. So the more we rely on it, the less we stretch our imaginations when we use it. So, do you think that is actually a real threat? And also, what do we actually do about it?
SPEAKER_02I think there's my thought and opinion, and there's the science. You've mentioned the science. It is happening. We create less brain activity when we use ChatGPT and AI more. So, knowing that this is happening in our brain, what do we do? It I look at our brain as a muscle. You know, it reminds me of those machines that was like, if you put this machine on and just stay in your bed, it'll give you abs.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Come on, and so maybe it will stimulate something, but it's not gonna really make you healthy. The work we need to do with our brain is not gonna just impact creativity, it's gonna impact our mental health too. And they're intertwined. I think that a lot of times we're looking at five steps ahead when we need to kind of come back to our foundation and the basics, right? And then we can say, okay, how do we be creative?
SPEAKER_01There was recent analysis by the Active Track Productivity Lab. They reviewed 443 million hours of work, and they found that AI increases efficiency and capacity, but that extra capacity is immediately repurposed into doing other work, which is leading to more burnout, cognitive overload, poor decision making. Is this a design challenge that we can solve? Oh, or is it a signal that it's time to rethink how we actually define productivity altogether?
SPEAKER_02I think a bit of both. I do see even on social media certain platforms, we're gonna see this more, I do believe, especially with these lawsuits that have come out and and the social platforms did not win. More of these where you're scrolling, you're scrolling. They call it doom scrolling. And it pops up, hey, we've noticed you've been scrolling too long. You've been on this too long. We need to shift that relationship, right? Where we're not as slaves to them, that they're being responsive and being there for us, right? The power dynamic needs to shift. Unfortunately, that hasn't really happened. I also think it depends on the company. There are AI companies, like I use Rosebud, this journal. Oh, yeah, you told me about AI journal. It's amazing. And so at a certain point, just probably for their own uh money and resources, they cut me off. Like it actually doesn't want you to continue using it, and it'll do nice things to because it's supposed to be supportive of you to get you there. Well, I've noticed that with that AI specifically, whereas others will keep you on because they want you to spend more money, they want you to keep using it. And we need to shift that. We need to call platforms out. Let me just also add, I liken it to a gym. You know, imagine if you were at a gym and 50% of the people using the gym were getting hurt by it, and 50% of the people weren't. Would you then just ignore the 50% that were getting hurt?
SPEAKER_00No. No, that would be blasphemous.
SPEAKER_02That would be crazy if you ignored those people. What you would do, you might not take down the gym or shut down the gym. You would add signs, caution signs. You would add trainers. You would make sure to maybe onboard the everyone differently to know where they're coming from, right? And their weaknesses and their strengths. And I do believe we need to be approaching social media and also AI in that way, too. So we don't hurt each other.
SPEAKER_00And in the same vein of social media, you know, you and I did a story a long time ago where you helped me understand the kind of rise of AI influencers. And at the time it was like they were just popping up. This is maybe a year ago, over a year ago, they were just popping up. Um, we were starting to see them, they weren't as real as they are kind of a year later, where we're now seeing entire accounts with completely fabricated people with backstories, and they have hundreds of thousands of followers. Um what I'm noticing is that a lot of the virtual creators, if you will call them that, I feel like that's very synthetic influencers. I find a lot of them are women. And I think that it's well, that's that's what I'm wondering is like how how come how come they are women?
SPEAKER_02Because probably men are creating them. Yeah. Or I hope women are creating them and making money off of those. There's that thing too. But a lot of times, because women get objectified online and in social media and people follow accounts with hot women and women who show off. This is just a known thing. I just think it's not surprising that an a new tool that could be used to support all of us and change the world is also simultaneously used to hurt uh people, but specifically women and girls. And this is a real thing. While AI can be used for creativity, and I love the idea of someone creating a character, it's that line that's crossed when it starts to be used in a way that feels a bit non-consensual. The side, though, that I think that will create the most change most quickly from a regulator standpoint. And we're seeing all already that with some of the bills that have passed already. So basically, platforms need to remove non-consensual AI-generated content. And there's others that have been proposed, including No Fakes Act, Defiance Act, Clear Act. There's clear bipartisan efforts to make sure that what we're talking about doesn't happen, exploitation doesn't happen.
SPEAKER_01One of the things I want to touch on is the positives of AI that we've seen when it comes to people with disabilities. Oh, yeah. There are tools out there like Be My Eyes. There's also AI-generated voice cloning for those with permanent voice loss that have like ALS. We saw that with um Eric Dane from Eleven Labs. They actually made his voice so he could communicate. The visually impaired have real-time descriptions of what the world looks like around them. So there's a lot of stuff generated by AI that we're seeing kind of reshape the opportunities for people with disabilities. Are they also doing that when it comes to people with disabilities in employment? Because you're able to now work those jobs that maybe you couldn't before.
SPEAKER_02That is the hope. But again, AI can help with all these things. But as a society, how we want to support the disabled community, that needs to change too. And also building these tools, not just for them, but with them. And I think that's a big thing that a lot of uh us are talking about, folks that want to see uh diversity in AI and make sure there's no bias in AI. And so I love these types of case studies and these types of examples because again, we've been bringing up a lot of stuff that AI is doing that could be negative. I am a tech optimist. I don't bring these things up to scare people away. Skepticism is important, especially with new tools, right? Because we need to know what the gaps are in order to find solutions and in order to know how to navigate, right? And I think that that's important, but also saying that this is clearly amazing for medicine, for clinical trials, for those who have not had access in the past from science to education to mental health, the ability to break down those boundaries to uh giving tools for those who are disabled, like the ones you mentioned, and there's so many more actually, to the point where even uh there's brain tech happening where it will support those with dementia or Alzheimer's and degenerative muscle diseases, like the ability to be able to live better and longer in the future will happen because of AI. But again, then it's what do we do at that time? What do we do with those opportunities to best support ourselves and each other, right? Because we also want to make sure we're living in a just ethical place where we can all live happily too. So I I think those are examples are are great, but we need to be, again, building with those communities too.
SPEAKER_00And as you mentioned, education too, there are a lot of teachers that are using AI to just build personalized lesson plans for students with different learning styles, um, introducing it to the classroom. And it's something they never really had the bandwidth to do before. I think that's what we've talked about, is that it does open up bandwidth if we use it correctly. But we do you think if AI can meet a kid exactly where they are academically, it could be kind of like the biggest shift in, you know, the world in education since the internet, because the internet completely changed how we did things and is an extension of that. Huge.
SPEAKER_02I think we all have different ways of learning. That is the fact. And there's been limitations to our education. Also, the gap, depending on wealth, so much. But again, then it goes back to our soft skills, right? Social, emotional intelligence, collaboration, and connection. We need to make sure to continue teaching young people that. A friend, Lars May, who runs half the story and an app called Ginkgo, it's helping parents and kids connect in safe digital spaces. She said it really concerns her because she was talking to a young person and they said they needed to write a letter to their grandparent and they needed to use AI for it. Right. Like, you know, like uh the fear is you could be learning things, but making sure are we just learning or are we actually learning how to integrate and process those things and think critically? This is the gap right now. Are we just learning how to create the menu? Are we learning how to make the meal? That is also the difference. Yeah. So again, we're in the first inning. So I say these things because we're seeing all the possibilities, and again, we're seeing the gaps right in front of us. And I'm not, we don't say the gaps. I never say gaps to raise alarms. I'm saying it so that it creates we could fill them. And then for for all those who see that, then you could say, maybe I could be one of those people to do that and solve that. Right. Versus just saying, why isn't it there?
SPEAKER_01When you say we're in the first inning, though, I feel like as the rules of baseball have changed most recently to make the game faster, I feel like we're moving fast.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, which is why a lot of people are are gonna be confused, right? Like the audience can't keep up. Yeah. The people that are watching, and let alone the players won't be able to keep up. But that's true. This is accelerating at a very fast pace, which is why also I think that there's so many things popping up and the mistakes and errors are happening in real time in front of all of us, which I think that's the scary thing when we haven't been prepared for that. But uh, when we start having more of these open and honest conversations, guess what? The industry knows that, but the public doesn't. We need to be educating the public about this process and bringing them into it as well. And to be clear, also to point out the positive of this is as someone who's been a content creator, a solopreneur, a small business owner, for SMBs right now, AI is a game changer. There is the concentration of power at the top, but I think for the future of work, we're gonna see the ability for a lot of us as individuals to build and compete in a real legitimate way. The amount of good work I've done over the past year or two with AI has just been unbelievable. I do believe the progression of my career and everything I've been able to do and create in the way that I've done it wouldn't have been possible because uh previously, because of AI, right? Like what you said, the pitches, my decks, all the things that would have stopped me or I needed to hire someone for. And guess what? I didn't have the money to hire that person. When you're saying that jobs are gonna go away, well, the people that are actually taking advantage of it and using it weren't able to hire those people anyway, unfortunately. So now we are hopefully democratizing creativity, right? Social media democratized the pipes and the distribution. Now AI is democratizing creativity and the access and our ability to build as businesses, which I just think is so cool uh and important and is really going to change the workforce and our economy. You know, I interviewed the founder and CEO of Lovable, and this is vibe coding. You could just like build anything with a prompt. Lovable popularized that. And he said that he wants Lovable to be the first company that builds uh a billion-dollar business with possibly one person. Is that even possible, right? The the idea that you could be uh a housewife or ha be someone in the middle of nowhere and don't have the connections and network and all that, and be able to have a great idea and build it from scratch and actually put it out there and test it out and possibly make a million-dollar business. That is AI in its best possible place, right?
SPEAKER_00That is the North Star of AI. And then speaking of some of those possibilities and building your business, what are some of your favorite tools? I think we all know mine at this point is Alta.
SPEAKER_02Of course, the basics are, you know, of course, using it for whether it be emails or pitches and all that. But Canva AI for presentations and decks has been amazing. Opus clip, if you have a long-form interview or speaking engagement, you want to create social clips around, Opus, definitely use that. Captions now, once you take that clip, even though some of these things are still needing some tweaks. It's not perfect. I'm just letting you know. But captions has been amazing for AI editing and adding those automatic, you know, captions in the aesthetic and style, as well as some images to Google Vio for really high quality B-roll. A lot of people do voice to texting, right? And it messes it up all the time, right? So there's an app called Whisper that will help you do that better and that will recap it in a better way. So check out Whisper. That is really great. I think any for anyone for a conversation where you're venting or you're angry at someone or just for work. And you introduce me to Rosebud too. And Rosebud, oh my god, the AI journal, I swear by it, morning and nighttime prompts, and it works with you. It doesn't overvalidate you because that's the issue with AI right now. Rosebud, I've just been a huge fan of. And then it also can create certain goals for you. So you might say, This year, you know, let's put aside resolutions, let's create certain intentions and goals and how you can track that as well. And then it also, with your journal entries, it will uh tag certain people and it'll show you the consistencies of those people, whether it's positive or negative, and bring up the patterns. Just saying. So do you talk to it? I'm an AI talker. Like I'm not, I don't like looking at my phone constantly because I'm on my phone so much for work. So I'm a more of a an AI talker. Oh, gamma. Well, you know what? Gamma, even if you're not in entertainment, all of us have to do presentations, right? And pitches for our business or whatever work we work in. I've started using, okay, Canva, okay, easy-ish. Gamma, OMG. It creates presentations so quickly and easily, it blew my mind.
SPEAKER_01So it seems like there's a lot of options when it comes to using AI for work. And I think that sometimes could be the problem of there are so many options. Let's say you're not using it yet, which I don't, there's there's probably some holdouts out there that are I'm certainly one of I don't use it nearly as enough as I could, but like I said, I took a pause from work to come back. And I think just within that year and a half of having my daughter, everything has changed. And that's why I commented on how fast things are moving. It's like, I don't know what to use, how to use it, and like in not in the wrong hands, but you know, like if you're not, I think the responsibility comes from, like you said, leaderships and companies teaching these employees like, hey, we are gonna use this system and here's how to use it effectively. And I I and I I want to ask you the question of what do you think then? Let's say we all jump on board and we're using it at work. What does the next five years of work look like for companies?
SPEAKER_02I think we're gonna see companies leaning down, and that is the reality because if AI is doing a lot of those efficiency work, a lot of like the cutting the fat, basically. And it will be about who comes up with the ideas, right? And also who can actually work with AI to execute on them. So that's why at first when AI was coming up, a lot of people were talking about being expert prompt engineers. We're moving from that conversational AI to operational AI. And it's gonna be how do you create these operations and how do you work best with the AI agents and how do you implement those workflows and systems and structures. So you're almost becoming like a project manager of the AI too. And that will become the biggest skill set. Understanding how what tool to use out of all the tools and how to bring it to your team and your company. So that will be if you're working at a company at that level. But again, really leaning into what are you bringing to the table? What value? What's your POV? What do you actually care about? What are you passionate about? Because that will end up leaning into the most imaginative and original ideas versus the sameness we might see from all of us using AI. And then we're gonna see a huge increase, as I mentioned, of solo printers, the creator printers, the small to medium-sized businesses that can hopefully be seven-figure businesses with very uh little uh lift or teams and resources and using platforms like a lovable to build that. Some people are using this for work or a company, and some people are just building these things just to help them. Like, I want an app to help all the parents figure out who's doing carpal. Or like, there are certain things that are being just created that you you might mention, oh my God, this is just annoying. Like I'm just created. This is not just for work, it could be also for life. So I just want to mention that. Also, just another one, it's so obvious, and I can't be here without mentioning it. Cloud co-work right now. I wouldn't say it's being implemented by the masses, you know, companies and early adopters. And you're gonna see, I think in the next year, each of us really using it more. And this is gonna be the beginnings really of understanding how to use our own AI agents and AI assistants. So, in the future of work, we will all have an AI agent or assistant using platforms like Claude Cowork and whatever is launched then for that. And it's doing tasks on its own autonomously while we're doing other work that we need to spend our time on or hopefully living our life or just touching grass. Exactly. That is the hope because as you mentioned, like we're having time and then we're like, what else can we do with this time? Yeah. Which is a mindset shift, a culture shift. Again, how do we want to live our lives? And some people might want to do more good, and some people might not. And good for them, right? We'll each have our own way of living. So, Claude Cowork is definitely one to check out connecting to your desktop. It could basically do anything. Anything you want it to do. If you're like, oh, I want to clean up my files, it will do that in the background. If you want to set up uh appointments and timelines for it to check your email in the morning and answer it for you or put aside the ones for you to answer. This is again, we're in the assistant era actually happening in real life right now.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I had it go through all my emails and tell me all of the shopping things that I haven't um opened in a long time. And the next step would have been for it to unsubscribe for me, but I was like too screamed back. I need to unsubscribe.
SPEAKER_02So and then I'll bring up because I love uh shout out to Sinead Bovell, who's incredible. Check her out, fangirl. But she was on my podcast talking about the future of work too, and we're gonna be in the freelancer era, and we're gonna be doing a lot of different jobs versus in the past having one main full-time job and all be all with the 401k and all that. So the future of work is gonna change, and we need to be flexible and malleable enough to deal with that. And that goes back to mental health, having a growth mindset and taking care of ourselves as we move through this change.
SPEAKER_00Well, Shira, thank you so, so much. This is, I feel like, a topic that I'm gonna be thinking about for the next like two weeks. How can I implement it? How can I be safe around AI, all of the different things? I'm excited actually to see what comes next for AI and how it's kind of like, you know, I like to watch a creator space too, so how that even applies. So thank you so much for being here with us. Thank you.
SPEAKER_02Just don't be scared by the headlines and even by the things I I shared. Stay curious and stay open because, again, there are people that have not been included in this, including women before in these tech revolutions. I want to make sure all the women are part of this next stage, and part of that is learning and implementing and playing. So keep doing that.