Stop the world, I want to get off!
First Thing Monday, edition #105
Happy Monday all,
Don't know about you, but the pace of change in technology seems to accelerating week by week. It’s not just me, is it?
Fortunately, I had a (mostly) analog weekend. Breakfast at diners, walks with dog, bike rides, and visited waterslide park today. Listening to Sparklehorse. And meditation. Lord knows we all need to meditate to stay on top of it all.
The changing pace of music
Over just the last week, I've heard several snippets from the music world that have just blown my mind. Here are just two.
The news about about Noonoouri, an AI instagram influencer who has signed a record deal with Warner Music.
Or the news about Lalal.ai, a new AI tool that allows you to isolate tracks from a song. MMost of my life, I've wanted to be able to dissect a song into its core components. Remove the vocals. Single-out the vocals. Remix a bassline from one song with a drum-beat from another. Incredible!
Must admit, I haven't played with this tool yet (i only found out about it about 20 minutues ago!), but based on their demo, it looks very promising.
The changing pace of humanity
This week I learnt that Roblox are releasing a new feature that uses your camera to create 3d-animated immersive chat experiences. Sounds rather a lot like the metaverse, I know. But combine this with Generative AI and we'll soon be able to meet spin up new virtual worlds, to hang out with friends or collaborate at work.
I learnt (via my favourite new podcast) that we can start a relationship with an AI girlfriend. (To clarify - I am in no way suggesting that this is a good thing.)
And I learnt that we now have the technology that enables us to create AI replicas of their late grandmothers. Heck, we can even perform a "holographic conversational video experiences" at their funeral.
As my late grandmother-in-law Mavis used to say, "Stop the world, I want to get off!".
The changing pace of ux design
And of course, in my industry things are changing fast too.
For starters, AI is enable us to do our work much, much faster. We can now use tools like Framer AI to spin up a working website in moments. This used to take weeks or months, not even that long ago.
But it's so much more than just doing things faster. Generative AI will bring about a paradigm shift in the field of user experience.
I’m certainly feeling a sense of urgency , and a need to keep up with all this change in my field. “Either you’re the windshield, or you’re the bug”, so they say.
But I know how you feel, Mavis. I know how you feel.