WEBVTT - The Most Hated Buzzwords in Tech 0:00:04.480 --> 0:00:12.440 Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:15.840 and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:15.880 --> 0:00:19.159 I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the 0:00:19.200 --> 0:00:23.320 tech are you? So? Old time Star Trek fans may 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:26.720 both love and kind of cringe at the use of 0:00:26.760 --> 0:00:29.640 some of the technobabble in scripts for that show. My 0:00:29.760 --> 0:00:33.280 go to Star Trek tech Nonsense always includes the phrase 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:37.920 reverse the polarity, which typically doesn't mean very much in 0:00:38.000 --> 0:00:40.240 most of the dialogue where it pops up, but it sounds, 0:00:40.240 --> 0:00:43.920 you know, science adjacent. So I suppose, you know, we 0:00:43.960 --> 0:00:46.800 should give writers some slack. They're trying to write stories 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:49.160 that are set in a far off future about technology 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:51.680 that really we can only dream about today. I still 0:00:51.680 --> 0:00:54.320 want a replicator, though. Just look at how far the 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:57.080 tech world has come, however, since the original Star Trek 0:00:57.160 --> 0:01:01.120 series first broadcast back in nineteen sixty. But you don't 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:02.960 have to go to the future to encounter plenty of 0:01:03.080 --> 0:01:07.240 jargon and buzzwords. They're all over the place, particularly in 0:01:07.280 --> 0:01:11.360 the tech sector, really throughout the business sector in general, 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:14.800 but tech in particular is incredibly guilty of this. It's 0:01:14.880 --> 0:01:17.520 one of the hallmarks of tech, and you get extra 0:01:17.600 --> 0:01:21.200 points if whatever term you're using is so vague or 0:01:21.280 --> 0:01:24.440 easy to misuse that it may as well be meaningless. 0:01:24.720 --> 0:01:27.559 So today we're going to talk about some tech buzzwords 0:01:27.600 --> 0:01:32.080 that have made various lists for most hated buzzwords in Tech, 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:36.440 or most hated jargon in Tech, or something along those lines. Now, 0:01:36.600 --> 0:01:40.280 I pulled these terms from a lot of different sources, 0:01:40.360 --> 0:01:44.759 all from articles that were about hated or misused tech buzzwords. 0:01:45.000 --> 0:01:48.200 Some of the buzzwords are used well beyond tech itself. 0:01:48.640 --> 0:01:51.320 Some of them don't even originate from tech, but just 0:01:51.360 --> 0:01:56.200 get reused. And I use sites like The American Genius 0:01:56.240 --> 0:02:00.360 and Smart Company and CMC Global and DNS Research, Vation 0:02:00.560 --> 0:02:04.279 and Forbes and trust Radius and net Suite to gather 0:02:04.360 --> 0:02:08.440 all of these different terms. And the terms span the 0:02:08.520 --> 0:02:11.679 last several years. Some of these buzzwords have faded a 0:02:11.720 --> 0:02:14.280 little bit from use. We're going to talk about some that, 0:02:14.600 --> 0:02:18.440 you know, just a couple of years ago were dominating 0:02:18.840 --> 0:02:23.400 the conversations in tech, and now they're almost forgotten. Now 0:02:23.400 --> 0:02:27.640 I'm going to start with one that I personally find exhausting, 0:02:27.760 --> 0:02:29.600 and I bet a lot of y'all out there feel 0:02:29.760 --> 0:02:33.320 much the same way, and that term is, of course 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:36.400 the biggest buzzword of the last couple of years in 0:02:36.440 --> 0:02:40.640 tech Artificial intelligence, or more frequently, just plain old AI. 0:02:41.240 --> 0:02:44.440 The explosion in AI development over the last couple of 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:48.120 years has really elevated the buzz terms use within the 0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:51.120 tech space. And don't get me wrong, AI has been 0:02:51.160 --> 0:02:54.520 a thing in tech for decades, like more than half 0:02:54.560 --> 0:02:58.120 a century. It's a common theme in science fiction stories, 0:02:58.160 --> 0:03:01.280 whether we're talking about comedic droi sidecakes, or you know, 0:03:01.360 --> 0:03:05.520 some omnim present malicious intelligence determined to wipe out humans. 0:03:05.720 --> 0:03:08.520 But in the last couple of years, AI has really 0:03:08.639 --> 0:03:12.120 ramped up in the public consciousness, largely thanks to a 0:03:12.160 --> 0:03:17.600 specific branch of the discipline, that of generative AI. Now 0:03:18.120 --> 0:03:21.040 I don't think anyone out there is unfamiliar with generative 0:03:21.040 --> 0:03:24.000 AI at this point, but just in case this term 0:03:24.080 --> 0:03:28.399 is new to you, Generative AI creates stuff. It generates 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:32.160 based upon user input. So you might ask a question 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:34.239 and then it gives you an answer, or you might 0:03:34.480 --> 0:03:37.680 create a suggestion that it makes some sort of content 0:03:37.840 --> 0:03:41.080 like I once tried to use generative AI to make 0:03:41.440 --> 0:03:45.120 I think it was a Shakespearean sonnet about artificial intelligence, 0:03:45.360 --> 0:03:48.000 and it did a decent job at making a very 0:03:48.040 --> 0:03:51.600 clever poem about AI, but it didn't follow the Shakespearean 0:03:51.680 --> 0:03:55.960 sonnet rules, and I'm a stickler for form. Anyway, you 0:03:56.040 --> 0:03:59.600 could even have generative AI that can create images based 0:03:59.600 --> 0:04:03.280 on techs. You're all familiar with this, I'm sure, and 0:04:03.640 --> 0:04:05.800 even today you can get to the point where you 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:08.560 can create video clips with some of these forms of 0:04:08.640 --> 0:04:12.320 generative AI. And there's no doubt about it. Generative AI 0:04:12.640 --> 0:04:16.480 can be really impressive, at least when it's working properly. 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:20.200 When it's not working properly, it can be creepy or unsettling. 0:04:20.440 --> 0:04:22.800 Sometimes it could be like that if it's working properly too, 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:25.680 don't get me wrong, but man, even as recently as 0:04:25.800 --> 0:04:27.720 just a couple of weeks ago, I was using an 0:04:27.760 --> 0:04:31.880 image generator out of curiosity, just trying to create images 0:04:31.920 --> 0:04:35.279 of characters from a friend of mine's podcast. She made 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:37.160 this podcast, and I was just like, I wonder if 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:40.320 I could create some like character concept images. And I'm 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:44.440 not an artist, and I just did this out of curiosity, 0:04:44.480 --> 0:04:46.960 having no desire to actually use the images, but I 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:49.360 was wondering if I could make it happen, and still 0:04:49.640 --> 0:04:53.080 fingers are hard for AI, y'all. There were so many 0:04:53.440 --> 0:04:57.800 love crafty and monstrosities created by this image generator, and 0:04:57.839 --> 0:05:01.320 it made me really feel calm that if I were 0:05:01.400 --> 0:05:06.000 to actually help my friend create character images for some 0:05:06.040 --> 0:05:10.120 of her creations, I would actually work with an artist. 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:13.599 I would hire a human artist to work with, because 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:17.000 then I know I would be one helping an actual 0:05:17.120 --> 0:05:19.960 artist get work, which I think is really important and 0:05:20.040 --> 0:05:24.080 to get what I wanted. But countless startups have launched 0:05:24.120 --> 0:05:27.200 since late twenty twenty two, when open ai really got 0:05:27.240 --> 0:05:30.559 the ball rolling by introducing chat GPT. Though to be clear, 0:05:30.920 --> 0:05:35.520 there were already some generative AI applications available before chat GPT. 0:05:36.040 --> 0:05:40.000 I would just say chat GPT launched everything into the stratosphere. 0:05:40.120 --> 0:05:44.600 But here's my problem. Generative AI is just one implementation 0:05:44.720 --> 0:05:48.919 of artificial intelligence, and it's not the only kind. AI 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:52.479 is actually an enormous discipline. It covers a huge amount 0:05:52.520 --> 0:05:56.279 of ground like computer vision and image recognition that falls 0:05:56.320 --> 0:05:59.279 under AI. Natural language processing is part of AI, and 0:05:59.320 --> 0:06:01.680 obviously it has to be part of generative AI too. 0:06:01.760 --> 0:06:05.159 If you're going to get anything that even resembles what 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:09.040 you were asking for, a lot of robotics falls under 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:11.280 the category of AI. Not all of it, but a 0:06:11.320 --> 0:06:13.599 lot of it does. And on top of that, you 0:06:13.600 --> 0:06:15.720 know the fact that we have all these different kinds 0:06:15.720 --> 0:06:20.200 of AI and not just generative means that using the 0:06:20.839 --> 0:06:25.720 blanket term the umbrella term for one specific implementation is 0:06:25.800 --> 0:06:29.560 really not very accurate. But on top of that, some 0:06:29.600 --> 0:06:32.560 companies are using AI pretty liberally to cover stuff that's 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:36.840 not even really artificial intelligence, like stuff like just algorithms. 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:39.640 And yes, algorithms are part of AI, they can be 0:06:39.800 --> 0:06:42.800 part of AI, but that doesn't mean an algorithm by 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:45.760 itself should be described as AI. So if you've got 0:06:45.760 --> 0:06:49.800 an algorithm that is looking at what I'm browsing, you know, 0:06:49.800 --> 0:06:52.160 I'm looking at maybe vinyl record albums of the New 0:06:52.240 --> 0:06:55.240 York Dolls, and then it do you have a recommendation? 0:06:55.279 --> 0:06:58.040 Algorithm says, hey, maybe you should check out Velvet Underground. 0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:01.960 That's not exactly artificial intelligence, although it is an excellent suggestion. 0:07:02.480 --> 0:07:06.640 But because AI is so buzzy, right, it's such a 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:09.680 popular buzzword, there have been this ton of startups that 0:07:09.760 --> 0:07:13.600 have begun to use AI to describe their pitch to 0:07:13.800 --> 0:07:17.880 investors and to media. I can't tell you how many 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:22.760 unsolicited emails I get every single day from PR firms 0:07:22.840 --> 0:07:25.760 representing clients who are trying to position their business as 0:07:25.800 --> 0:07:30.280 the next big thing in AI, and sometimes, in fact, 0:07:30.320 --> 0:07:34.239 I would argue frequently, they have little to no connection 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:37.680 to the actual discipline of artificial intelligence. On top of that, 0:07:37.960 --> 0:07:41.040 I am also frustrated that so many businesses seem anxious 0:07:41.080 --> 0:07:45.360 to jump into AI or else. I guess they're worried 0:07:45.400 --> 0:07:47.880 they'd be left behind, but it seems to me that 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:51.360 many of these businesses have very little to no strategy 0:07:51.600 --> 0:07:54.560 that's actually connected to AI. It's almost as if the 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:57.200 idea of AI is some sort of fix all solution 0:07:57.320 --> 0:08:01.000 to every problem. That is going to be probably the 0:08:01.400 --> 0:08:06.120 coda for this podcast. The motto of this is that 0:08:06.560 --> 0:08:09.880 there are these buzzwords that people use, and it's almost 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:13.480 like a shortcut or a get out of jail free card, 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:18.480 where you've got this problem or challenge or goal in mind, 0:08:18.520 --> 0:08:20.480 but you have no idea how to achieve that goal, 0:08:20.600 --> 0:08:23.280 or overcome that challenge or solve that problem, So you 0:08:23.440 --> 0:08:28.520 just use this kind of blanket term to stand in 0:08:28.680 --> 0:08:32.040 place of an actual solution, and then you're just magically 0:08:32.360 --> 0:08:34.440 where you need to be, and we all know that's 0:08:34.480 --> 0:08:36.720 not really how the world works. I wish it were. 0:08:37.200 --> 0:08:38.560 I would love to be able to use that kind 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:40.560 of logic to fix all sorts of things in my life, 0:08:40.600 --> 0:08:42.960 but that's just not how it works. And you know, 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:45.400 you can't just open a big old box that has 0:08:45.440 --> 0:08:48.480 the label AI on it and then business will magically 0:08:48.520 --> 0:08:50.880 perform better. It's kind of like how I am with 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:54.040 electric guitars. So rather than practice on the electric guitar 0:08:54.120 --> 0:08:57.680 I literally have standing right next to me. Sometimes I think, 0:08:57.720 --> 0:08:59.640 you know, I should really buy a new guitar, as 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:02.240 if some how that new guitar is magically going to 0:09:02.280 --> 0:09:04.040 make me a better player. And I can tell you 0:09:04.040 --> 0:09:07.839 from experience that doesn't work either. And also my partner 0:09:07.880 --> 0:09:09.440 would likely kick me out of the house if I 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:12.240 try and do that again. So I think the four 0:09:12.280 --> 0:09:16.080 guitars I have are enough. Before we move on, we 0:09:16.120 --> 0:09:19.319 should lump in some other AI related terms in here, 0:09:19.360 --> 0:09:23.640 because AI, while that one alone is extremely buzzy and 0:09:24.160 --> 0:09:28.120 people misuse it or you know, misinterpret it all the time, 0:09:28.200 --> 0:09:30.880 there are others that fall into that same general category, 0:09:30.920 --> 0:09:33.800 like machine learning and deep learning. They do have meaning. 0:09:33.880 --> 0:09:36.800 These terms actually do mean something, so does AI for 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:39.600 that matter. They have meaning and they have relevance, but 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:43.040 they are frequently overused or misused by various tech companies 0:09:43.080 --> 0:09:45.760 out there. And that's not good because you know, it 0:09:45.760 --> 0:09:49.920 can set unrealistic or incorrect expectations, and then when those 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:54.640 expectations aren't met because the person had the incorrect interpretation 0:09:54.720 --> 0:09:58.240 of what the terms actually meant, then support for research 0:09:58.280 --> 0:10:01.200 and development in those kinds of fields can decline. And 0:10:01.520 --> 0:10:03.760 I know that sounds kind of dramatic, but it's happened 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:06.559 again and again and again. It happened with virtual reality. 0:10:06.880 --> 0:10:10.600 You know, we're seeing it possibly happen with mixed reality. 0:10:11.080 --> 0:10:13.880 If someone's working on a research project and then they 0:10:13.920 --> 0:10:16.320 find out that their funding has been cut because the 0:10:16.360 --> 0:10:19.280 people who are in charge of the purse strings had 0:10:19.280 --> 0:10:22.800 the wrong idea of what your work actually is all about. 0:10:23.040 --> 0:10:25.040 And then once they find out what it is about, 0:10:25.080 --> 0:10:26.800 they're like, oh, well, that's not what I wanted and 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:30.000 they cut off funding. That stinks, right, That really did 0:10:30.040 --> 0:10:32.200 happen with VR in the nineties. You had people who 0:10:32.280 --> 0:10:36.000 are working on important implementations of VR. I'm not talking 0:10:36.120 --> 0:10:39.280 just like games, which I mean, I think games are important, 0:10:39.320 --> 0:10:43.319 but beyond that, using VR for things like treating mental illness, 0:10:43.600 --> 0:10:46.360 and then all the money for research kind of dried 0:10:46.440 --> 0:10:50.200 up because people were disillusioned with what VR actually was 0:10:50.600 --> 0:10:54.160 compared to what they thought it was. This stuff happens, Okay, 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:57.240 Next up, I want to talk about disrupt and disruption. 0:10:57.600 --> 0:11:00.079 So these terms have been around for a while, and 0:11:00.120 --> 0:11:02.800 it's a dramatic word. Typically, it just means that someone 0:11:02.800 --> 0:11:06.520 has figured out a new way to do something. Sometimes 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:09.160 it's not even a new way. Sometimes it's just a 0:11:09.160 --> 0:11:11.400 way that's a little bit different from how everyone else 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:14.200 is doing it currently. But it might be a very 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:16.760 old way that just fell out of favor and then 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:19.560 you kind of resurrect it. Now, the implication of disruption 0:11:19.760 --> 0:11:21.920 is that this new way of doing things is going 0:11:21.960 --> 0:11:25.520 to upend the industry it's in as a whole, and 0:11:25.559 --> 0:11:28.160 that it will threaten the security of companies that refuse 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:30.760 to adjust to this new method and it will leave 0:11:30.800 --> 0:11:33.160 them in the dust if they're unable to adapt. And 0:11:33.200 --> 0:11:35.680 it's easier to understand if we just consider a couple 0:11:35.720 --> 0:11:40.439 of examples. Amazon, for instance, disrupted retail. But how did 0:11:40.440 --> 0:11:43.440 it do it well? It did retail online starting with 0:11:43.520 --> 0:11:47.000 books and then eventually encompassing pretty much everything you can imagine. 0:11:47.080 --> 0:11:49.400 And I would argue that Amazon really isn't that much 0:11:49.440 --> 0:11:52.960 different from other huge retail companies in that many of 0:11:52.960 --> 0:11:55.840 the strategies employed by Amazon are similar to ones that 0:11:55.880 --> 0:11:59.520 were honed by companies like Walmart. It's just that Amazon 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:02.000 cut out the brick and mortar stores for the most 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:06.720 part and employed some other technologies to personalize the experience. Plus, 0:12:07.000 --> 0:12:09.760 you know, buying stuff online means people don't have to 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:12.920 interact with other human beings, and for a not insignificant 0:12:12.920 --> 0:12:16.120 slice of the population, that is a huge selling point. 0:12:16.240 --> 0:12:18.360 Oh I don't need to talk to a person, I'll 0:12:18.400 --> 0:12:21.480 just buy it online. Uber Lift and other ride haling 0:12:21.520 --> 0:12:25.360 companies disrupted the taxi industry, which obviously has been a 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:28.120 real sticking point in various places around the world where 0:12:28.160 --> 0:12:31.160 taxi companies have a great deal of influence. We've seen 0:12:31.400 --> 0:12:34.240 examples of local governments cracking down on these kinds of 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:38.160 startups for sidestepping regulations that the taxi industry must obey, 0:12:38.440 --> 0:12:40.840 and there have been attempts to refer to these as 0:12:41.000 --> 0:12:46.520 ride shares, but because it's actually all about funneling money 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:50.040 through to the parent organization like Uber or lyft or whatever. 0:12:50.240 --> 0:12:53.600 It's not really ride sharing, it's ride haling, so it 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:56.360 really is more like a taxi service than say, just 0:12:56.559 --> 0:12:59.360 connecting people who happen to want to get to the 0:12:59.360 --> 0:13:01.360 same place the same time. And there are a lot 0:13:01.400 --> 0:13:04.319 of other examples. Of course, Airbnb is disruptive to not 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:07.160 only the hospitality industry but also real estate. I mean, 0:13:07.160 --> 0:13:09.200 it's hard for folks who are just starting out to 0:13:09.240 --> 0:13:11.520 go out and buy a house when the market caters 0:13:11.559 --> 0:13:14.160 to rich people who want to add to their portfolio 0:13:14.240 --> 0:13:18.280 of rental properties. But not everything that's being called disruptive 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:23.000 is actually upsetting apple carts. Sometimes the things that are 0:13:23.000 --> 0:13:25.720 being called disruptive are just a new kind of business. 0:13:26.080 --> 0:13:29.040 Sometimes it's describing a way of doing things that's different, 0:13:29.120 --> 0:13:32.959 but it's not necessarily advantageous compared to how the industry 0:13:33.000 --> 0:13:36.040 as a whole is doing whatever the thing is. And 0:13:36.080 --> 0:13:38.720 a lot of leaders really hate the term disruptive because 0:13:38.760 --> 0:13:41.960 it can distract folks into pursuing disruption at the expense 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:44.760 of actually making a business model that works. If you're 0:13:44.800 --> 0:13:49.960 banking on everything causing disruption in an established market and 0:13:50.000 --> 0:13:52.520 you're not actually spending effort making sure that your approach 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:56.240 even makes sense. You're just trying to watch the world burn. 0:13:56.679 --> 0:14:00.560 Related to disrupt is the term game changer. That phrase 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:03.760 implies that the business model forces a change on an 0:14:03.960 --> 0:14:10.280 entire industry, it changes the game. That very rarely happens. Instead, 0:14:10.320 --> 0:14:13.320 we often hear game changer applied to businesses that are 0:14:13.559 --> 0:14:17.280 just new, even ones that aren't doing anything particularly that 0:14:17.360 --> 0:14:21.280 differently from their competitors or performing better than their competitors. 0:14:21.320 --> 0:14:25.600 Sometimes they're performing worse. That's hardly changing the game. Okay, 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:28.600 we've got tons of other buzzwords to get through. Before 0:14:28.640 --> 0:14:30.560 we do that, let's take a quick break to thank 0:14:30.600 --> 0:14:43.240 our sponsors. We're back. Time to talk about some more 0:14:43.240 --> 0:14:46.360 buzzwords that get a lot of hate on these lists. 0:14:46.520 --> 0:14:49.520 This next one is a huge one. It sometimes ranks 0:14:49.600 --> 0:14:51.960 is number one depending upon the year, and that is 0:14:52.360 --> 0:14:56.960 digital transformation that popped up on multiple most hated buzzwords 0:14:57.000 --> 0:15:00.640 and tech lists. John Moore of tech Target first this 0:15:00.960 --> 0:15:05.120 definition of digital transformation. He says, it is quote the 0:15:05.240 --> 0:15:11.240 incorporation of computer based technologies into an organization's products, processes, 0:15:11.320 --> 0:15:16.520 and strategies. Organizations undertake digital transformation to better engage and 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:20.880 serve their workforce and customers and thus improve their ability 0:15:20.920 --> 0:15:26.120 to compete end quote. So it's kind of like modernizing really, 0:15:26.240 --> 0:15:28.240 is what I would call it. You know, you're trying 0:15:28.240 --> 0:15:30.920 to figure out how can we take these various legacy 0:15:31.360 --> 0:15:35.120 systems and processes and bring them into the digital age, 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:40.880 potentially making things easier to manage and monitor and measure 0:15:40.960 --> 0:15:45.080 and all those sorts of things. Cindy Jondon of IFS, 0:15:45.120 --> 0:15:48.640 which is a cloud computing company, says, quote, it's really 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:53.000 a seismic shift forcing organizations to better enable their teams 0:15:53.040 --> 0:15:56.920 and improve asset usage and customer experiences end quote. To me, 0:15:57.040 --> 0:16:00.560 that's teetering pretty darn close to being too vain to 0:16:00.640 --> 0:16:03.400 be really useful. But at the same time, you could 0:16:03.600 --> 0:16:06.120 argue that each organization is going to have its own 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:09.840 specific set of requirements and challenges, and so therefore it's 0:16:09.880 --> 0:16:12.880 impossible to get specific, right because if you get specific, 0:16:13.080 --> 0:16:16.200 then you're leaving out lots of other use cases, so 0:16:16.240 --> 0:16:19.160 you have to be really general. But yeah, that particular 0:16:19.640 --> 0:16:23.640 description to me borders on not being very useful. Now, 0:16:23.680 --> 0:16:27.600 as pointed out on CMC Globals site, and issue with 0:16:27.760 --> 0:16:31.520 the concept of digital transformation is that there's a tendency 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:35.360 to treat it again as a magical panacea similar to AI, 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:39.440 right that by somehow just porting processes over into a 0:16:39.480 --> 0:16:43.160 computerized system, maybe even one that's networked, based on the cloud, 0:16:43.200 --> 0:16:47.400 whatever it may be, you have somehow transformed the business inherently, 0:16:47.600 --> 0:16:50.120 even though it's the exact same processes and everything, it's 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:53.240 just now it's done in a different way. Business strategy 0:16:53.280 --> 0:16:57.520 is still absolutely important, and without business strategy, shifting how 0:16:57.560 --> 0:16:59.960 you do things from one model to another doesn't actually 0:17:00.160 --> 0:17:03.920 address fundamental issues. Again, it's like you're slapping a band 0:17:03.960 --> 0:17:06.720 aid on something and you don't even understand it. It's 0:17:06.720 --> 0:17:08.879 like if someone had a cold and you put a 0:17:08.920 --> 0:17:12.520 band aid on their arm doesn't really address the problem. 0:17:12.760 --> 0:17:15.800 There's no denying that modernizing systems so that they're more 0:17:15.840 --> 0:17:19.320 easily accessible and adaptable is really important. But as Mark 0:17:19.359 --> 0:17:24.199 Bilger of One Call puts it, quote digital transformations do 0:17:24.359 --> 0:17:28.159 not magically transform the business. A fool with a tool 0:17:28.560 --> 0:17:31.639 is still a fool, end quote. Kind of dig that. 0:17:31.960 --> 0:17:33.439 There are a lot of companies out there that do 0:17:33.520 --> 0:17:36.719 consulting work on digital transformation. I'm sure some of them 0:17:36.720 --> 0:17:39.320 are quite good at it, but in my experienced consultants 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:41.840 are the absolute worst when it comes to leaning on 0:17:41.960 --> 0:17:45.679 buzzwords in jargon to obfuscate what they mean. And I 0:17:45.680 --> 0:17:47.960 feel like I can say that with some authority because 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:52.679 in my previous professional life, before I ever worked for iHeart, 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:55.159 before I work for Discovery Communications, before I work for 0:17:55.240 --> 0:17:58.879 house stuffworks dot com, I spent more than seven years 0:17:58.920 --> 0:18:02.040 working for management consultants. And I've read a lot of 0:18:02.080 --> 0:18:04.760 proposals and a lot of reports, y'all, And one thing 0:18:04.800 --> 0:18:07.720 I walked away with is that consultants just love to 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:11.840 use language that ultimately doesn't mean very much but sounds good. 0:18:12.280 --> 0:18:15.800 Another big buzzword that makes these lists, and it's been 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:19.320 around for quite some time at this point, is the cloud. Now, 0:18:19.320 --> 0:18:22.320 there's a meme that goes around that is one hundred 0:18:22.320 --> 0:18:25.560 percent accurate that says there is no cloud, It's just 0:18:25.800 --> 0:18:29.679 somebody else's computer. That's true. That's the basic truth of 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:33.720 what the cloud is. Cloud computing, cloud storage, cloud development, 0:18:33.720 --> 0:18:37.040 whatever cloud service you're talking about. Ultimately, these all describe 0:18:37.080 --> 0:18:40.080 a situation in which the thing you are using is 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:44.159 a computer system that's provided by a third party, and 0:18:44.200 --> 0:18:47.879 that's it. That's the magic of the cloud. So It 0:18:47.920 --> 0:18:51.159 may be that it's an operating environment. It may be 0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:54.520 that it's you know again, storage. It could be any 0:18:54.520 --> 0:18:57.240 of those things. But really it just means that these 0:18:57.640 --> 0:19:00.840 these services are living on computers that are some else. Now, 0:19:00.880 --> 0:19:03.679 cloud solutions free up businesses so that they don't have 0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:07.800 to host their own services on premises or in tech speak, 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:11.200 on prem. I cannot tell you how much I hate 0:19:11.320 --> 0:19:16.000 on prem not the concept but the actual use of that, 0:19:16.320 --> 0:19:18.920 as if on prem is somehow saving you a huge 0:19:18.920 --> 0:19:21.560 amount of time as opposed to saying on premises. In 0:19:21.640 --> 0:19:23.800 my humble opinion, on prem is just a way to 0:19:23.840 --> 0:19:28.080 create a code language that in small ways excludes outsiders 0:19:28.119 --> 0:19:30.040 from your group. It's kind of akin to the Little 0:19:30.119 --> 0:19:34.040 Rascals having the he Man Woman Haters Club, though I 0:19:34.080 --> 0:19:36.280 really guess only a fraction of y'all probably know who 0:19:36.280 --> 0:19:39.560 the little Rascals are. I'm old, but anyway, my commentary 0:19:39.560 --> 0:19:44.600 aside the issue many take with cloud terminology is that 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:47.439 people will frequently use the phrase, similar to what we 0:19:47.480 --> 0:19:50.800 saw with AI and digital transformation, that it's some kind 0:19:50.840 --> 0:19:54.119 of cure all for any business challenge. There are definitely 0:19:54.160 --> 0:19:57.800 really good reasons to use cloud services, right like you 0:19:57.920 --> 0:20:01.000 might not be able to scale your services to your 0:20:01.040 --> 0:20:05.240 customers if it became really popular. Right, if you host 0:20:05.359 --> 0:20:08.879 everything yourself and everything's running on servers that are in 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:13.040 your own office space or garage, whatever it may be, 0:20:13.359 --> 0:20:16.080 and you suddenly get really popular, you could end up 0:20:16.119 --> 0:20:19.240 having your service completely overwhelmed and now you can't provide 0:20:19.280 --> 0:20:22.639 services to anybody. And this is also kind of a 0:20:22.680 --> 0:20:24.560 good problem to have. It means that your services are 0:20:24.600 --> 0:20:27.679 resonating with customers, but you don't want the experience for 0:20:27.800 --> 0:20:30.600 them to be to log in and find out they 0:20:30.640 --> 0:20:33.639 can't access the thing that they're paying for. That's bad. 0:20:33.960 --> 0:20:37.119 So leaning on a large, established cloud provider could be 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:39.600 the solution. It might be that, oh, well, we can 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:44.080 scale just by purchasing more compute power or more storage 0:20:44.119 --> 0:20:48.240 from this provider. But just poorting stuff from your own 0:20:48.280 --> 0:20:51.440 systems to the cloud doesn't automatically make them work better 0:20:51.760 --> 0:20:54.560 or reach more customers. It's not like the company providing 0:20:54.560 --> 0:20:56.920 the cloud services is going to be doing your marketing 0:20:57.000 --> 0:20:59.680 for you or anything, because they've already got their customer. 0:21:00.080 --> 0:21:02.639 Their customer is you. It's your job to go out 0:21:02.680 --> 0:21:05.600 and get your own customers. But yeah, cloud computing is 0:21:05.640 --> 0:21:08.760 often used as sort of this hand wavy way of saying, 0:21:09.000 --> 0:21:12.440 don't worry about these problems, we got it covered, when 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:14.919 in fact, the cloud does not magically solve stuff on 0:21:14.960 --> 0:21:17.280 its own. Again, this is a real issue with a 0:21:17.280 --> 0:21:19.920 lot of these buzzwords. If I'm being honest, it's really 0:21:19.920 --> 0:21:24.280 it's not the word's fault necessarily, it's that folks are lazy. 0:21:24.480 --> 0:21:27.480 People are lazy and they don't want to have to 0:21:27.600 --> 0:21:31.840 really tackle and define the real challenging business or tech 0:21:31.880 --> 0:21:35.120 issues that they're facing. That's hard. This is very hard 0:21:35.160 --> 0:21:40.639 to actually identify and then solve these tough business problems. 0:21:40.680 --> 0:21:42.879 It's really hard work. So it's way easier to just 0:21:43.000 --> 0:21:45.639 use a phrase or a term and to take a shortcut, 0:21:45.760 --> 0:21:49.000 especially if you're an executive, and then you foist the 0:21:49.040 --> 0:21:53.040 actual problem onto your underlings and it's their job to 0:21:53.119 --> 0:21:55.320 actually figure out, Okay, well, how do we do the 0:21:55.359 --> 0:21:58.080 thing that our boss wants us to do when all 0:21:58.119 --> 0:22:02.280 our boss says is cloud compute or digital transformation. To me, 0:22:02.520 --> 0:22:05.720 this is kind of like the underpants gnomes in South Park, 0:22:05.880 --> 0:22:08.199 You know the underpants domes. They say phase one is 0:22:08.240 --> 0:22:11.359 collect underpants, phase two is something, and phase three is 0:22:11.440 --> 0:22:14.159 profit that's what a lot of these buzzwords are. You know, 0:22:14.240 --> 0:22:17.520 the buzzwords are phase one, Phase two is completely undefined, 0:22:17.560 --> 0:22:20.480 and then phase three is somehow huge success. And I'm 0:22:20.480 --> 0:22:23.240 sad to report again it usually does not work out 0:22:23.280 --> 0:22:26.200 that way. All right, So what's next? Well, I guess, 0:22:26.280 --> 0:22:27.840 I mean, I didn't want to have to do this 0:22:28.000 --> 0:22:31.679 because I really don't like covering these kinds of things, 0:22:31.720 --> 0:22:35.280 but it's time to tackle blockchain and the related buzz 0:22:35.359 --> 0:22:39.640 terms around that. So blockchain is a thing, right, I'm 0:22:39.640 --> 0:22:43.240 not saying that blockchain doesn't mean anything. It absolutely does 0:22:43.400 --> 0:22:46.720 mean something. It's mostly a thing that people associate with 0:22:46.760 --> 0:22:50.480 cryptocurrencies because that's where it's seen the most use and 0:22:50.520 --> 0:22:54.880 I would argue the most success. But blockchain evangelists proclaim 0:22:54.960 --> 0:22:57.639