[00:00:02] Speaker A: Ramping up your business.
[00:00:03] Speaker B: The time is near. You've given it hard, now get it in Gear.
[00:00:08] Speaker A: It's Passage to Profit with Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart.
[00:00:12] Speaker B: I'm Richard Gearhart, founder of Gearhart Law, a full service intellectual property law firm specializing in patents, trademarks and copyrights.
[00:00:20] Speaker C: And I'm Elizabeth Gearhart, not an attorney, but I do marketing for Gearhart Law. And I am the founder of Gear Media Studios, a full service podcast studio.
[00:00:29] Speaker B: Welcome to Passage to Profit, the road to entrepreneurship, where we talk with celebrities and entrepreneurs about their stories and their business ventures. Well, today's guest, Rob Greenlee, he's been podcasting since most of us knew the Internet. Talked back. Rob is a true podcast pioneer and early inductee of the podcaster hall of fame. He's launched more shows than Netflix.
And if there were a Mount Rushmore of legendary podcasters, Rob Greenlee would be right up there, probably with headphones on. And Rob, we want to talk to you today about AI and the media. So how is AI reshaping the future of media?
[00:01:08] Speaker D: Well, I think it's taking it in a bunch of different directions. It's making things more efficient.
It's actually able to create content in a way that is increasingly becoming more and more professional on the video and audio side. But I think the real revolution is on the video side. I think the audio side is still going to be an area that's going to be still strong with humans, but I think it is going to be as good as a human eventually. I think there's two different conversations. It's AI created audio and then there's cloned AI supported audio. Cloned of humans. And its ability to replicate what an actual human being would actually create is, I think, going to be a challenge for AI to actually do that. But that doesn't take away AI's ability to create audio. That sounds great, it's professional sounding, but it's probably going to be lacking in flaws. Right. Which is going to be its flaw is that humans are going to be able to detect a lack of flaws or, or a lack of errors. Right. That will really make it stand out.
[00:02:17] Speaker B: You've listened to AI voices and actually.
[00:02:21] Speaker D: Had them on his co host of my shows.
[00:02:23] Speaker B: So yeah, we need to get to that.
[00:02:24] Speaker D: Yeah. Right.
[00:02:25] Speaker B: But you've had AI and interacted with it. How do you feel knowing that it's not human?
[00:02:31] Speaker D: I'm not really that worried about it. I think at the end of the day, it's the value that it can bring and the information that it has access to.
And I think that is the key thing that we all have to think about also with the video side. I think it's going to create things that humans would never create. Right? So there's going to be fantasy, there's going to be all sorts of representations that are created in the AI generated video that will just be beyond our scope of our imagination. And I think that's where it's going to stand out. I think AI generated video is going to be huge. I think, I think humans are going to consume it at scale. It's already starting to happen and I think it's going to change the landscape. Now humans need to focus on the aspects that make them human when they do video that can't be replicated by the AI. And I think that's what we need to start really honing in on is how do we maximize our humanness in the content that we create as a kind of a way to come back from the increasing dominance of AI created content.
[00:03:33] Speaker B: If you're having an interview or a discussion with somebody, if it's not from a human being, how is there any credibility there?
[00:03:39] Speaker D: Well, that's the hard part about it. It's, it's really keyed on trust. Are we going to trust the information that AI is going to create for us? Does it have bias in it? Is it truth? Is it honest?
[00:03:51] Speaker B: Well, I mean, people can lie, right? I mean, so can AI.
[00:03:54] Speaker D: Well, yeah, exactly. I mean, AI was trained on humans, so of course it's going to have that capability. And a lot of people, people think that eventually AI is going to have emot and it could get offended. So there's aspects of this that we just don't know yet because it actually hasn't happened yet. But the impacts of this are going to be pretty profound. I mean, I saw this kind of back when I was doing my nationally syndicated radio show about the Internet, in the early years of the Internet, about its potential impact on the world. And we talked about that on the show and I think it's easy to just kind of look at it and say, ah, it's never going to be that significant or it's not going to have that big of an impact.
And I look back on what I did with my radio show about the Internet and I think to myself, God, what kind of monster did I create? I mean, really, I mean, it's impacted all of our lives. But there's also a downside to all these technologies that we all have to be aware of. So it's not Always a rosy picture, but there's opportunity that comes from it, too.
[00:04:50] Speaker B: But can AI ever really compete with human storytelling?
[00:04:55] Speaker D: Yes, but it'll be different. It's going to be a compilation, not a unique story from a human perspective.
[00:05:02] Speaker B: So it kind of goes out there and it collects data from a lot of stories related to the one that you want to tell, and it mashes it all together and it comes up with something.
[00:05:12] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:05:13] Speaker B: Is that even a real story?
[00:05:15] Speaker D: Doesn't have to be. I mean, I think AI has had a reputation for hallucinations. I don't know if you have heard that as well, where it just.
[00:05:22] Speaker B: I have friends who have suffered from those too. Right.
[00:05:25] Speaker D: But humans have hallucinations when they eat mushrooms. So, I mean, it's safe to say that AI is going to have that kind of experience as well at some point. It's not like AI is going to eat mushrooms, but it's going to learn from human experiences.
[00:05:42] Speaker C: I do think it's going to get harder and harder to tell between human generated content and AI generated content. I don't know which people are going to prefer, to be honest with you. And I do think it might be important for people to have in person gatherings. We were talking about this last night at the meetup, so that you know that it's real.
Right.
[00:06:02] Speaker D: Well, live is like live streaming and things like that is another kind of confirmation of life.
[00:06:08] Speaker C: Right, right.
Confirmation of life.
[00:06:12] Speaker D: I think that's going to be a term that's increasingly used, is that we're going to have technologies that will flag things as this is, this is real, this is live, not AI generated. And so we'll have to see how this plays out.
[00:06:25] Speaker C: Rob, we touched about this a little bit last night during the meetup. So what is going to happen to media, advertising and monetization as a result of AI? How will AI change advertising and media?
[00:06:37] Speaker D: I think it's going to change it in a couple different ways. It's going to make the ability to create advertisements much more quickly and get them also created in a way that maybe targets audiences better. And that's going to be on the audio and video side, because currently, right now, it's a pretty laborious process to create an ad spot or something like that where you have to bring talent in the studio. They have to be scripted, they have to have a performance element to them where that can all be done in AI and it can be done on the fly. So I think around targeting, you know, the podcasting industry has been moving more and more towards automatic advertising, which is called programmatic advertising.
And so that's where there's an insertion point in your content and the computer and the servers input those ads. But those ads have to be pre recorded by a studio, by talent, all those kind of things before they can be injected or the host reads that are prerecorded. So AI is going to generate those ads is the simplest explanation. And they're going to be done professionally, they're going to be done in the precise way that the brand wants them represented because there's lots of examples where talent will come in and create a spot and it just won't be just what the brand is really looking for. Right. And they'll be have to redo it over and over again to get get it right. And that slows down the process, adds a lot of costs. And these platforms want to be dynamic, right. They want to be able to create campaigns on the fly precisely how they want to have it presented. And this will be a way that it can do that.
[00:08:09] Speaker B: Rob Greenlee, he's been podcasting since most of us knew the Internet. Talked Back Passage to Profit with Richard and Elizabeth Gerhardt for our listeners. If you want to get more Passage to profit, you can listen to other episodes or follow us on social media. You can catch our past episodes anywhere you get your podcasts or you can go to YouTube, Instagram, Twitter or X I guess, as they call it now, and check us out there. So we'll be back right after this commercial break.
[00:08:36] Speaker A: Let me tell you a story about Bill. Bill was a normal guy in his 50s. He had back surgery about two years ago. Bill was in a lot of pain. He dealt with his pain by taking the Percocets his doctor prescribed for him. Bill took more and more and more of them to help with the pain. Until one day the prescriptions weren't enough to get rid of Bill's pain. Then one day, Bill found someone to help him get rid of the pain with illegal drugs he didn't need a prescription for.
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[00:10:39] Speaker B: Again, Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart.
[00:10:41] Speaker C: And our special guest, Rob Greenlee, the grandfather of podcasting.
[00:10:46] Speaker B: The great grandfather. The great, great grandfather of podcasting.
[00:10:51] Speaker C: So you did say something that really made us wonder about something. You said that you have a co host on one of your podcasts who is an AI generated co host.
[00:11:02] Speaker D: Well, I did an episode with Chat GPT and I, I, I asked him to play a role as my co host on a show. Chat GPT knows my podcast tips live show that I do. And so this was a live streaming show.
And so I prepped him, I plugged him into my mixer through my phone and just brought him into the conversation and introduced him. And, and he, he joined me in my conversation. I asked him questions like a, like a host would ask a guest. And he answered the questions.
[00:11:37] Speaker C: Oh, my God.
[00:11:38] Speaker B: What was, what questions did you ask him? I'm curious. I mean, what.
[00:11:41] Speaker D: Well, the whole podcast is about podcasting. So it was all about what he thought that the future of podcasting was and the direction it was go and the impact that vintage video was going to have and, and what he saw on the horizon for podcasting. And it gave me very, very succinct and very thoughtful answers, I thought. So it, it created an amazing dynamic in the conversation. He's, there's, sometimes there can be a little bit of a delay in his answer. But I called him a guy. Could have been a girl. I could have, you know, and I'll probably do that.
I'll probably have another conversation in one of my other shows with a woman who's from ChatGPT. But he's probably going to give me the same answers. It's just being a different voice.
[00:12:29] Speaker C: Our chatgpt suggested that we ask you this.
[00:12:32] Speaker D: Okay.
[00:12:34] Speaker C: The rise of AI voice. Is that the end of the human host?
[00:12:40] Speaker D: No, I don't think so. It's going to have an increasing role. The AI voice is going to just like I've experienced because it can create an interesting conversation. And the Google platform, the Notebook LLM platform does have the ability to have two AI co hosts do a show together.
[00:13:00] Speaker C: I did that. I had it do a show about cats. Because I have a show about cats. I gave it like three sentences. It did a 10 minute podcast with a man and a woman about cats and brought in stuff from all over the Internet and stuff from my query and it was good and it even.
[00:13:18] Speaker B: Introduced a few flaws. Oh, just to make it. Yeah.
[00:13:21] Speaker D: Is that like an extra little toggle you have to do to the setup?
Please include some flaws, a few filler words, Ohms and oz, please.
Yeah, I think that that's probably going to happen though. I think the thing is different with audio. I'm not sure that the audio AI is going to have the same impact as, as video AI.
I think the video AI is going to have a much bigger impact on society. The audio AI is going to play a supportive role or maybe a co host role. Humans are going to, I think, dominate on the audio side. Continue to dominate.
[00:13:58] Speaker B: Why do you think that is?
[00:13:59] Speaker D: I just think that the inflection, the ability of humans to share unique stories that are not maybe contrived. I think AI can be a little bit too fluffy in its commentary.
I think it's been programmed to be positive about everything and not come across as authentic and real with human like emotions and the inflections and how it's how the audio is presented, where video can create almost like a fantasy experience that's almost like eye candy. Right. And that's, that's kind of a different experience.
So yeah, I think the future of audio with humans is strong still.
[00:14:41] Speaker B: Good.
[00:14:41] Speaker C: Well, that's good.
[00:14:42] Speaker B: Yeah. Good for us, I guess. You know, when I think of it, sometimes part of the service that communicators provide to an audience is showing people different slices of life from different people and that creates some relatability. So this person had this happen to them and, and this is how they felt and this is what came out of it. Right. You're telling that story and if it's coming from a person, then it's relatable because it's another person that experienced that. If it's coming from a computer, it's just.
It lacks the credibility and the authenticity, I think.
[00:15:24] Speaker D: Yeah. And I think AI also is very factual.
I think AI is good as like a color commentator on a sports program, right?
Where the host just like what we're doing with this radio show, I'm sharing stories, I'm sharing kind of futuristic projections that are based on my own human experience.
And that's what's different than what AI will present to you.
So when I use AI, I usually use it to just deliver the facts, right, the research. So I would ask it, you know, what research have you seen? And cite it in your comments that tells this story.
It's very good at looking up data.
And so if you use AI for what it's good for and then play up the strengths of the human capabilities in your content, then I think that's the good balance.
[00:16:16] Speaker C: I had one more point that I really wanted to bring up with you today, and I think you explained this beautifully last night.
We're starting to hear the term agentic AI and AI agents.
Can you please explain what those are for the normal person?
[00:16:32] Speaker D: Well, an agent in the AI realm is really, if you take this analogy of like a virtual assistant, right?
That's where AI is going to take us next, is that they're going to string together functional processes that are run by AI bots of sorts, right. That can do like a. Like a workflow. It can actually accomplish something. It'll actually take this input, or it will go out and do research, pull that input in and generate a report for you, or it will actually create a tangible action in the real world.
So that's the path of this, is that the intelligence can gather all the information and then funnel it into, let's say, booking a. A trip to Europe. Right. You can tell the AI to find the best flight at this price point in this date range and go ahead and book it, and here's my credit card number.
And it'll go out and actually find the best deal. It'll find the best dates, it'll. It'll configure it based on your preferences and what you want to do and maybe even book hotel rooms for you, too. So that's kind of where this is going, is that it will actually do things for you in the real world.
[00:17:47] Speaker C: I love that. I mean, we're going out to Portland to visit our daughter, and I was racking my brains trying and using AI and everything, trying to find a really high quality hotel that didn't allow smoking anywhere on the grounds. And you can't find that on TripAdvisor. It doesn't say whether hotels are non smoking or not all the time.
So I had to rely on AI for that. And I think I found one. I hope so, because I put this there.
[00:18:11] Speaker B: I hope you did too.
[00:18:12] Speaker D: By the way, the other use of this same technology is that kind of is a replacement for a human. Right? So you're probably with this technology going to put some people out of work.
[00:18:23] Speaker B: Maybe, but I mean most of that is automated now anyway, right? So they're just making it, you know, that's true.
[00:18:29] Speaker D: And they're going to need to have people to manage these agents too, to some degree.
So, you know, I don't know that we're going to be 100% trusting of them.
[00:18:37] Speaker B: Do you think creators should be obligated to acknowledge that AI helped create part of their content?
[00:18:44] Speaker D: I don't know. I think that is a big question. I think each creator needs to answer that for themselves to some degree. And the audience has to step in and make a choice about this too. And I think that's probably what's going to happen. But you know, there's different levels of adding AI to your content creation process and I'm not sure all those areas need to be disclosed.
So, you know, I think up to this point it's, it's really mostly being used in pre production, post production type of processes. There's not a lot of it being used in the actual production of content.
So.
But that is going to change.
And when that changes, I think a big debate that needs to be had. Is there going to be labels that are going to be put on this kind of content. Kind of like rating labels that have been around TV and film for many years.
[00:19:38] Speaker B: Well, when they first start marketing AI movies, they're going to be proud to put it on there because everybody's going to want to see the new AI movie, right?
[00:19:45] Speaker D: Everybody's going to be able to make an AI movie if they understand how to do it. It's not going to be expensive. It's going to be like. I think the current quote right right now is to make a movie like a Hollywood blockbuster will cost you $17.
[00:19:59] Speaker C: Richard.
[00:20:00] Speaker B: That's our next impression now.
[00:20:02] Speaker D: So is that an opportunity or is that disruption? And it's probably both. It's an opportunity to create content that is compelling.
[00:20:12] Speaker B: We're already saturated with so much content. I don't know if I can handle.
Seriously.
[00:20:18] Speaker D: That's a different argument, right? You know, it's just.
[00:20:20] Speaker B: There'll be so much anyway, we've got to move on to another AI topic. So, Rob, where do people find you if they want to learn more about you?
[00:20:28] Speaker D: I think the best way to find me
[email protected] and I'm also on on YouTube. I have a. I have a YouTube channel as well, OB Greenlee. And then I'm on all the social platforms. I'm easy to find and also have a podcast network called adornetwork.com so there's a bunch of my podcasts that are up there. Audio and Video Podcasts Passage to Profit.
[00:20:51] Speaker B: Is a nationally syndicated radio show appearing in 38 markets across the United States. In addition, Passage to Profit has also been recently selected by Feedspot Podcasters Database as a top 10 entrepreneur interview podcast. Thank you to the P2P team, our producer, Noah Fleishman, and our program coordinator, Alicia Morrissey, and our social media maven, Carolina Tavares. Look for our podcast tomorrow anywhere you get your podcasts. Our podcast is ranked in the top 3% globally. You can also find us on Facebook, Instagram X and on our YouTube channel. And remember, while the information on this program is believed to be correct, never take a legal step without checking with your legal professional first. Gearhart Law is here for your patent, trademark and copyright needs. You can find
[email protected] and contact us for a free consultation. Take care, everybody. Thanks for listening and we'll be back next week.
