Right now, AI seems to fall into a few camps. One is add-ons to existing products. Seems every SaaS provider is adding AI to its offerings. Salesforce is trying to resurrect their flagging growth numbers this way. Another is pure chat like ChatGPT. These are open ended systems. Google Gemini, Microsoft CoPilot, and Applie Intelligence are big, but it seems like there are new ones every week.
Some are utilities like image or video generation. I suppose self-driving cars is another speciality. However, I was thinking the other day about uses for AI that don’t seem to be tapped quite yet. Maybe these things exist, and I am just unaware of them.
Accounting AI
I used to have all of our information in Quicken, but that seems to have dissolved in recent decades. I hardly know anyone who maintains a real budget with connections to all of their credit cards and purchases. The closest is some Google Sheet jockeys (Ethan!) who do it manually.
I know some people will freak out about privacy or other concerns, but I would like an AI tool that helps me understand how I spend my money and then optimize my taxes based on all of the relevant details. Accounting is a black box to me. What are the latest laws, the latest tax strategies? If I upgrade my home office, can I deduct that? How much should I spend?
This tool should manage the household budget and prepare the taxes.
Commerce AI
My wife needs a new Vitamix 5200. When is the best time to buy and from where? Are there voucher codes or specials? We are considering an electric car. I hate doing the negotiating. The amount of choices is overwhelming. An AI could email dozens of different dealerships within a hundred miles and try and find the best deal.
Traveling is another thing I buy once in a blue moon. Where should we travel? A river boat cruise or an AirBnB in a city? We have several family members with several different points of view. We need a mediator to help us decide what is the best for the family and also what the best deals are given all of the various factors.
The key of all of these shopping points of view are the incentives. There are services that help you buy things like Amazon.com. They make buying very convenient. However, their incentives are their own. Not mine. I want an AI that only cares about getting ME the best deal, not maximizing profit for the companies. I want an agent that prioritizes my needs and not those of some external corporation.
Analog Game Player
I usually have a game on my iPad that I play when I want to turn my brain off and get a dopamine drip. The games often are “grinding” games where you have to upgrade lots of things over time. Usually they have a clan system where you join with other people and war against other clans. When you are sleeping, you can’t progress very much.
I would love to see a robotic hand that an AI could use with an iPad. I know it’s more efficient to have it interact digitally, but I would actually like to see it use fingers to type like I do.
Imagine you introduced 10 independent AI agents into a game like this. They are free-to-play, so they don’t buy any upgrades. They can talk to people and play the game. I really wonder what would happen. Would they find the other clans and join with them? What would their play style be like? What would they optimize for?
This could be turned into a product if I bought the robotic hand and let it play my account while I was busy. In theory, it could also advise me. Is it better to invest here or there? This hero or that hero?
I imagine that these sorts of analog agents could be very interesting for research.
Lame AI Ideas
Wiring screenplays, composing music, making art, and other creative endeavors are a bad use of AI. I understand why they are being made, but these are things I think humans WANT to do. Taxes and budgeting typically are not fun endeavors. Let’s get the machines to do the work we don’t like and the work that stresses us out. Let’s leave the fun work to people! What other things are stressful that AI could help with?
Just some thoughts leading into 2025. Happy New Year!
Whatya think?