mike would you please introduce yourself uh yeah
sue um i am mike tedasco i'm a visiting fellow
at the ai center at san diego state university
um my background i used to run the innovation
team at paypal um before that i was like an accountant
way back in the day and i uh i don't know i'm
just very fascinated about the world of ai and
helping to kind of see where that goes and how
that's going to change change everything for
us it's very exciting time it really is it's
a huge can of worms isn't it it is it is yes
um yeah unlike any kind of worms we've ever seen
in our society before so it's going to be it's
a very different can for sure all right by visiting
fellow so are would this be like in the business
business department or like because the background
would be businessy Yeah, so AI centers are various
different places at different universities. At
San Diego State, it's in the Fowler School of
Business. So yes, it's actually in the business
center there. The AI center was started about
seven years ago. And we do a lot of things, just
like various aspects of research, you know, work
with different, you know. government and non
-governmental organizations in the research that
we do. We play around with robots. We build models.
We do all this other kind of stuff as part of
that. Yeah. That's really cool. All right. Well,
I want to hear about your vision for the people
that you're serving. So I know you're dealing
with a lot of students. Are you also inventing,
like, what does this look like? How are you serving?
Yeah. I mean, first, maybe describe who I serve.
I'm here to... Like students and those who want
to learn is who I am here to serve, ultimately.
Started writing about AI in 2022 because nobody
was really writing about it and writing about
it in very common terms. And it was kind of bothering
me. This was before ChatGPT or anything like
that. And I'm like, my gosh, like there was a
lot of very technical stuff out there, but there
wasn't any stuff really for normies. And I consider
myself to be a normie. I'm kind of an accountant
to, you know, learn about technology and all
this. But like at my age, I'm not. I can't code.
I'm not an engineer. All this other kind of stuff
is part of that. So I've been building that out.
So the vision I have is to basically explain
what is probably going to be the most impactful
technology we will ever see in our lifetimes.
Explain that in real terms to people. And make
it so that people aren't afraid of it and are
willing to just kind of get their hands dirty
and try and play with these things. Because the
only way you're really going to learn how to
use these AI tools is to just get in there and
try it out yourself. For sure. And, you know,
it is you see these ads constantly on YouTube
going, you know, most people are using it like
Google. You ask a question, you copy paste, whatever.
There's so much more to this. I don't think that
anybody has really you know, there's people freaking
out. There's people who like, oh, yeah, I use
it every day. But I don't think anybody has really
comprehended the full extent of where this could
go. And that's that's absolutely true. And that's
also true for the people who made this technology.
I mean, this is really the first technology that
has infinite capabilities. So there are ways
that people are using it day in and day out that
were never the intention or never the vision
of anybody who created this. And that's the really
exciting thing about this. By building a community,
by sharing it with others, by learning from other
people, it becomes this amazing tool to better
our own lives. And I could talk through at some
point all the ways it's changed both personally
and professionally, how I do things, how I operate.
That's worked really well for me. And it's going
to be a little bit different for every other
person out there. And that's kind of the exciting
thing about this. What's been the most impactful
thing so far for you of those things that you
refer to? i'd say health is probably the number
one thing uh i at some points made a personal
decision that i'm just going to put all of my
health data into an ai and just have that where
i can speak to it and i could ask you questions
and it could give me very nuanced uh personalized
thoughts and so and you know sometimes It's hard
to get access to a doctor. Sometimes it's not
the right time. Sometimes, I don't know, I'm
too embarrassed to ask a doctor about this, whatever
it might be. Or sometimes I'm like, I'm going
to go see a doctor and I need better guidance.
I want to go in more educated and ask better
questions and have a more nuanced discussion.
Like it just led to so many different things
with that. I mean, just, you know, how I live
my life and how I kind of just operate and so
forth. so much insight into that. So like that's
for me has been the one way that has really been
clear. That's cool. And then how do you, what
would your dream come true? Yeah. You have the
influence, the impact that you want to have,
you know, writing, speaking, whatever else that
you can do. Like, what would you like to accomplish?
What would you like to have be your legacy relative
to how people understand and use AI? Look, I'm
not going to do this myself, but I will kind
of I want to get to that question, though, because
it is really interesting. Like the end game for
this for me and like this world of AI is that
we have these amazing tools and they're there
to serve us. I mean, because and I say they I
don't want to even anthropomorphize that these
these are computer programs that are there to
serve us, make our lives easier, help us connect
and so forth. um but are not so integrated in
our lives that we can never turn them off um
that's the other thing i would say like i don't
want us to become over like it's been hugely
impactful but i don't want to be overly dependent
on this i don't you know i don't want a future
where our friends are ais because i don't believe
you can have a friend that is an ai but like
some people do like i I hope it's a human first
future where we have these amazing systems that
anybody with access to internet or a phone is
going to be able to have access to this brilliant
model that will be able to do anything that you
want from it. That's neat. And how are you working
toward that? I mean, one of the things I'm doing,
and this is like what I'm describing is like,
you know, a thousand on a scale and what i'm
doing is 0 .01 like on that because there's so
many things that because that would like truly
reshape humanity um one of the things that i'm
actually working on right now in my research
is i'm really curious about people's perception
of creative works in ai versus in humans and
i'm actually that's where i'm focusing my research
right now is just in that track because i do
believe it's going to and i see this with myself
that it will enable us to become more creative
to do more and so forth and it's going to be
able to make us more human but i think the perception
is that well you use an ai that's not really
being creative and to me it's just another tool
just like you know if you take a photo with a
photograph yeah that's different than making
a painting but it's an art form into itself and
i'm and i'm hope that we can get more in that
direction because you know I don't want to see
art go away I don't want to see artists go away
but I want to see it like become its own thing
and so a lot of the research I'm doing is at
that intersection okay and so that results in
you know academic publishing or Look, I hope,
oh yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's definitely some
studies I'm doing that will be published and
so forth that are around that area, 100%. I just
want us to live in a, I hope that this leads
to us working less. I mean, I've written about
this a lot. As a society, we are working less.
I know it doesn't feel like that to everybody,
but like if you actually look over the last 100,
150 years, like we work less overall over time.
I hope. You know, we've had everyone from Richard
Nixon to Bernie Sanders talk about the four hour
work week. And, you know, that's kind of both
ends of the political spectrum in many ways.
They're like, I want us to go there as a society.
And I want to have more room for all of us to
be more artistic, more creative, to be able to
do all of those kind of things that are really
human endeavors as part of that and to be able
to use these tools for more of that. That's great.
Will this also result in a consumer -facing book
or is it just going to be the academic or what
will happen? I hope not. Books are too much work
to write. I've actually been writing children's
books completely unrelated to AI. These books
are like 30 pages long and it took me like 12
months to write three of these things. It's amazing
how much... for anybody out there who doesn't
read books like read books like good god i try
and read 40 50 books a year personally um it
is the best bang for your buck and be able to
take information that somebody will spend years
on and within a few hours you're going to be
able to digest all of that information into your
own brain it's it's so efficient um books are
a lot of work so i have a newsletter people can
subscribe that's free go for that i'm not ambitious
enough anymore to to write a book. I don't think
so. Yeah. If somebody wants to take all those
and make it into a book, they could have at it.
Right, right. So what's your vision long -term
then? What are you aiming for? What's the hill?
What's the mountain? Honestly, I just want to
impact as many people I can. And this is the
next wave of... humanity that we're going to
have here i love working with startups i love
working with entrepreneurs who are just start
i mean that's most of my morning is just talking
with one entrepreneur after the next about what
they're doing is there any way that i can help
in their journeys or anything like that i'm 47
years old now i kind of feel like i'm in that
next phase where i got the gray hairs and been
through and seen a few things in my past where
i want to help people along with that so um My
vision is really to help the next set of builders
and inspire the next set of builders. This is
going to be a difficult time. I talk a lot about
solopreneurship, the thought that the only job
that I know that's going to exist in five or
10 years is a one -person company that is going
to have hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands
of AI agents working. I know that business will
exist. there will be other businesses there will
be other jobs out there but the direction that
we're going is like that is going to take on
a whole new era a whole new meaning that it didn't
have before um and i want to help you know prepare
more people for that entrepreneurial journey
as well that's interesting so will you be doing
that as like a consultant or like what How do
you like to work with people? I'm cheap. I'm
free. People just email me. I'm not like, no,
I'm good. I reach out usually through my network.
People just reach out to me directly. You can
find me on LinkedIn. I'm able to help you out.
I just kind of do that. Thank you for being here
today. I'm really happy that you tuned in to
Vision Pros Live. I'm looking forward to seeing
your reactions as these episodes continue to
move forward. This is going to get more and more
fun. We'll have more and more engagement as well.
We'll invite people to participate in the show.
And thank you for giving us your time and attention.
Have an excellent time building out your vision
and becoming a vision pro yourself.