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Should we heed the warnings of potential human extinction from this artificial superintelligent technology or proceed with haste and abandon any misgivings? 

Is AI the best thing since sliced Bread? The Jury is out! 

Likely you have your own experiences, challenges and thoughts as we embark on a journey into this brave new world of AI!  

Already, opinions are varied and divided. Headlines abound with examples, such as; 

• AI needs to work for us, according to a local AI infrastructure company. A spokesperson suggested Australians could enjoy safe, higher-speed access to artificial intelligence while using less water and energy. 

• Booming data build increases rate risk! A leading Bank has warned the building spree of Australia's $175 billion data boom is now big enough to help keep interest rates higher. This spree will make the Reserve Bank's inflation fight harder. 

• Perhaps eventually AI will make many humans unemployable! But there are no signs of it yet, with the Bureau of Labour Statistics reporting the economy added more jobs in August than expected. In this article, The Economist reported that AI is creating a lot of jobs to replace those it has destroyed. 

   

• Hindsight is a blunderful thing if we don't wake up to AI. Warnings that AI could maliciously take over the entire internet within the next year....a call for the slowdown in development before it outruns humanity’s ability ‘to understand and control these systems’. 

• Keep an AI out for cost-cutting as major players seek to beat rising wage costs by embracing AI capabilities. 

• Major corporate titans, including supermarkets, have shifted jobs offshore seeking to beat rising costs and harness the power of AI. 

• Two major supermarket players are vying for our AI-fueled spending. 

• One has identified conversational shopping and agentic commerce amongst its expansion opportunities. It is now looking to use AI to enhance personalisation and product discovery. 

• An Online retail behemoth started distributing fresh groceries in Australia thanks to a deal with NSW Farm Markets. This service is in competition with existing food chain operators. 

• Global investment in the infrastructure powering AI will surpass $US3 trillion over the next five years! AI-assisted Alexa, already operating in the US, promises to deliver a range of shopping features. 

• AI is supposed to make our working lives easier. Welcome to botsitting, a hidden cost of our brave new AI world. This is the work, human effort needed to make AI useful. 

• The Prime Minister vows to protect the nation’s creatives from having work ripped off by AI. He declared he will establish a dedicated Office of Artificial Intelligence in his department. 

• We don’t fully realise AI’s real power. We think that AI is going to collapse the time and cost to discover new drugs and therapies.... It will help us diagnose diseases before they’re even symptomatic. 

• Be alert! Is there a data Centre coming to your neighbourhood? What are the implications: cost to amenity, lifestyle? 

• Canberra moves to regulate the sector boom. National cabinet-backed mandatory standards covering the energy, water and land used by large data centres, with Federal legislation planned for early next year. 

Time will tell; perhaps I will be replaced by a Siri, Serena or Sam! Watch this space!