188: History speeds up

And happy May 27 to all who celebrate

Given all that’s transpired with AI and creative technology in the past two weeks, it’s worth considering what’s occurred in just one year. If you’re feeling overwhelmed there’s a reason. 12 months ago…

• LLMs were shifting from single-task (text only) to multi-modal (text-to-text/image/video in one UX). Now multi-modal is table stakes for an LLM.

• OpenAI was having their Scarlett Johansson moment; and they’d just launched their 4o voice chat model with real-time, multimodal text-vision-audio. Now they’ve got o3 (my go to), and are dating Jony Ive.

• Wharton Professor Ethan Mollick’s book Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI had just come out. It’s still the most useful AI tome.

• Adobe’s “Generative AI in Premiere Pro” and “Generative Remove” in Photoshop had just launched. Now their Firefly web app is redesigned to generate 2K images, video and editable vector artwork. In addition, Adobe has partnered with OpenAI, Google and Black Forest Labs to enable access to non-Adobe LLMs inside Firefly.

• Google had launched its 1.5 Pro model. Last week they announced 100 AI products/enhancements/stories.

• Apple had released its infamous iPad “Crush” ad. They still haven’t figured out AI, but the WWDC is coming up.

• Microsoft had just announced an ability to do this new thing called “agents,” and Copilot had become its brand for all things AI. At Build 2025 they announced the evolution of agents.

• Benedict Evans was asking, “Does authenticity or originality matter? It depends why you wanted it.”

• I had just wrapped up teaching the Persuasion and Marketing and AI for Artists and Entrepreneurs courses at MCAD.

• My oldest graduated from high school and made his way to Loyola New Orleans.

• 271 of you were subscribed to this newsletter.

Today…

🧮 There are now 404 of you subscribed to this newsletter, a 49% increase. Thank you!

🎓 My middle child is graduating from high school and is heading to Berklee in Boston.

🔔 This Fall I will return to the Minneapolis College of Art and Design to teach AI for Artists and Entrepreneurs but differently— it’ll be a 15 week, asynchronous online course that’s open to the public. It’s going to be intense, and worthwhile.

✏️ Seth Godin just wrote, “If you’re not using the latest AI models, you’re falling behind. I’m seeing very senior people who are ignoring what’s happening, and the gap is widening.”

🍰🥳 Is my natal day and I remain grateful for the inspiration and encouragement from family and friends. Let’s celebrate with perhaps the best interpretation of “Happy Birthday” ever performed—from Richard Tee’s 1984 piano instruction video. The boogie-woogie version is fantastic.

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