How to become an AI Influencer
Hi, it’s Brian.
I first wrote this on April 5th, 2024 to more appreciation than I had anticipated.
In celebration of its 2-year anniversary, I’m sharing it here on Substack. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it’s even more relevant now than it was then.
If you’ve ever been confused or frustrated by people claiming to be AI experts and it not ringing as true, this is for you.
(next week I promise to get back on topic—I simply had to share this one)
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“Follow me or be left behind.”
Curate your LinkedIn profile to sound like an AI expert. It’s okay that you don’t have experience—just put “AI Researcher,” “Startup Advisor and Investor,” or “Chief AI Officer of Stealth AI Startup.” If anyone asks, you’re not at liberty to say. Besides, you kind of are starting an AI startup, right?
Create a newsletter on an app where people can’t see how many subscribers you have. This is important so that you can tell them to join over 50K subscribers to your newsletter since you’re just starting out. Instant credibility. Update this number as you gain followers - a 50:1 ratio is a good start and you can taper once you get over 100K LinkedIn followers.
Sign up for X and Reddit and follow people who actually have experience in AI. Copy/paste the best videos and posts into LinkedIn. The people who notice won’t say anything publicly because they won’t want their personal brand to be detracting from/policing others on social media.
Write this down: Everything is going to change everything. The slippery slope fallacy is your best friend (don’t look it up, just trust me). A research lab has found that ChatGPT scores higher than a small group of MBA students on a test? That’s the end of MBAs. Which will change education forever. We won’t even need professors anymore. Or universities. See? It’s easy.
Mark your calendar for all the major tech events throughout the year. You want to be first to post a breaking video from CES or from NVIDIA, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, etc.’s conferences. Your fellow aspiring AI influencers will be doing the same thing - flooding LinkedIn with hundreds of copies of the same video, so it’s critical that you’re the first one.
You’re basically a reporter, and your take is: 👍👍 Here are some starters for posts: JUST announced!; Game changer; Just in!; BREAKING; AI is moving so fast, here’s what you missed this week:; OpenAI just...; AI is coming for your job; Someone with AI is coming for your job; This is the end of [leading company in sector]
Your other job is to entertain. People’s feeds are cluttered with news and “Thought Leaders” who are trying to give them resources and guidance for creating more value at work (yawn). Break up their feed with a meme that makes it seem like you understand data science or a video clip about how Tom from Tom and Jerry was the first person to have his job replaced by AI. Whew. That’s better.
When you’re not reporting or entertaining, tap into fear. People are on LinkedIn because they want to become better professionals, find jobs, or hire people. All of those people will react strongly to a statement about how an advancement in AI is going to replace jobs or a list of which jobs are most likely to become obsolete. Fish in a barrel.
Always remember your competitive advantage over the majority of others on LinkedIn—anyone with real experience in AI has something to lose by engaging with your posts. Someone who has worked at Microsoft or Apple has a real possibility of working at Google someday, so they’re never going to post something saying “Google is dead.” But you are never going to work at Google, so you have nothing to lose being as provocative as possible.
Once you have enough followers, you have enough credibility to land features in high-profile publications and at real events. Tread lightly, as this could backfire if people realize you don’t understand AI or have any experience in the field. Lean on your background in crypto, Web 3, or NFTs if you have it and act like people just don’t get it. This won’t work with people who do get it but can get you out of tight situations.
If you do get caught in a situation where there’s a real risk that someone will recognize you don’t have experience or expertise in AI, pivot the conversation to concerns about ethics, safety, and regulation of AI. One guy who’s never worked in AI wrote an article about bombing data centers and it got featured in TIME Magazine! Anything’s possible if you believe.
Thanks for reading,
Brian
Whenever you’re ready, here are 5 ways I can help you:
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