Full transcript
0:00Is publishing dead? Is software dead? It
0:03seems like in an AI-saturated world,
0:05everything is either dead or dying. But
0:07I am here to tell you that nothing could
0:09be further from the truth. In this
0:11video, I'm going to outline for you
0:12where AI has come from, where it's
0:14likely going, what is super hot right
0:17now, aka what you need to know if you
0:20want don't want to be left behind, and
0:22what I strongly believe we will see in
0:24the future regarding AI and our culture
0:27and other institutions. So, let's get
0:29into it. So, first I kind of want to
0:30outline a little bit of how AI has
0:33progressed as we have seen at least in
0:35the last couple of years. Now, AI as we
0:37know it has actually been around for
0:39actual decades in some form or another,
0:42at least what would eventually become AI
0:44as we know it. But it didn't really kick
0:47off until ChatGPT was released in the
0:51towards the end of 2022. And that
0:53introduced the chatbot, which is a
0:55simple input and output scenario. And a
0:58lot of people are still operating from
1:01this mindset of the chatbot, even though
1:03the chatbot is now the simplest and
1:05probably least effective way to be using
1:07AI because it requires you to be there
1:10at every interaction. And back in these
1:12days, we were obsessed about prompts and
1:15trying to get the prompts just right to
1:17make everything perfect. These days, a
1:19lot has changed. But from there, we were
1:22introduced to this concept of projects.
1:25This is something I believe it was
1:26Claude that kind of did this first, but
1:28now pretty much every chatbot has this
1:30where you can set up a project and you
1:32give it instructions. And these
1:34instructions are what we call a system
1:35prompt. And it's essentially like a
1:37standing order that as long as you're in
1:40this project, I want you to behave in a
1:42certain way. And projects are actually
1:44super useful, particularly for any kind
1:48of repetitive task that you want it to
1:51do. So, it acts a lot like the chatbot,
1:53but with the added benefit of now you
1:55don't have to type in your instructions
1:57every time that you start a new chat
1:59conversation. You can just have some
2:00standing orders in your instructions in
2:02the project, and then you could just
2:04reuse that every time and not have to
2:06repeat yourself, which is a huge
2:08time-saver. Right around the same time,
2:10we also got a flurry of just general
2:14wrapper tools. So these are tools that
2:16are kind of designed for specific
2:17workflows, but even those were still
2:20kind of going with the same input output
2:22scenario where it just facilitated a few
2:25things. There are a bunch of tools out
2:28there that do this for writing, which is
2:30what this channel specializes in. Tools
2:32like Sudowrite, Novel Crafter, Raptor I.
2:35All of those kind of function in this
2:37way similar to a project, but kind of
2:41designing tools specifically for the
2:43workflow of a writer in this case. But
2:45there are also tools that are comparable
2:47for coding and other things. Then the
2:49next sort of level up from all of this
2:53was automations. And I uh about a year
2:56ago started getting deep into
2:58automations. There's platforms like Make
3:01or n8n, and I loved automations, and I
3:04still do. I love automations uh a ton.
3:07What automations essentially allowed you
3:09to do is it's similar to a project,
3:12except now you can have multiple steps
3:14that run in sequence. And so rather than
3:16just having one thing that happens for
3:18every chat, now you can give it your
3:21input and then have it do multiple
3:23things in order from that chat. So for
3:26instance, you could have it take an
3:28email that you get, and it can like
3:31summarize that email
3:33Actually, here's a good scenario.
3:35Imagine you have a whole bunch of
3:36newsletters, and you really don't want
3:37to have to like be wading through all of
3:39this information. You can have an AI
3:40take all of the best bits of that
3:42information based on what it knows about
3:44you, and kind of every time you get
3:45those emails, it'll condense that
3:47information, and then once a week it'll
3:49give you a summary of all of the
3:50important things that you need to know
3:52from all of those emails combined so you
3:55can save time going through all of the
3:57news articles and whatnot or whatever it
3:59is. In the context of writing, we would
4:01use this all the time to perform
4:02multiple steps where the the human
4:04didn't necessarily need to be in the
4:06loop, right? And I would use this to get
4:10far better results from the writing than
4:11I could get in a simple or in a single
4:13chat where I would say write this and
4:16then it would give me a result, right?
4:17That's the way the chat works, you give
4:18it input, it gives you output. With N8N
4:21or any kind of automation platform, I
4:23could give it the input and then it
4:24would generate some output, it would run
4:26some corrections to kind of check to see
4:29is it doing this right, is it doing that
4:31right, is it following the chronology,
4:32is it doing this, is the style good,
4:35rechecking it against my style guide,
4:37all of these things and it'll do these
4:39all in sequence and then by the end it
4:41gives me an output that would have been
4:42far better than if I just asked it in
4:44one chat to to give me one thing. And
4:47that's the power of automations. And
4:49there's a lot more you can do with
4:50automations besides
4:52just using it for multi-step writing.
4:54There's ways to tie it into your Google
4:56Suite, into, you know, whatever kind of
4:58tools you're creating. And I personally
5:00used N8N workflows for a ton of stuff in
5:03my business. So it's definitely one of
5:06my favorite ways to work with AI.
5:08However, we have started entering an
5:11even bigger age of AI more recently with
5:15agentic workflows. So this was kind of
5:18kicked off by Claude Code coming out and
5:20being actually a really useful tool not
5:22just for coders but for anyone who wants
5:25a more project-based thing where the AI
5:27can see everything in that project. It's
5:30similar to to the actual projects that
5:32you find inside of a chatbot, but in
5:34this case you can have like multiple
5:35files, it understands everything and can
5:38go and surgically make changes to things
5:41in those tools and can increase its
5:45memory and its skills and everything.
5:47And Claude also, I believe, was the
5:49first one to introduce the concept of
5:51skills, which are like little recipes
5:53that go and do specific things, and an
5:56AI can call on one or more of those to
5:58come in and do very specific things.
6:01Nowadays, we have even more powerful
6:03versions of this in tools like Openclaw
6:06or Hermes, which if If you haven't heard
6:09of those before, they are probably the
6:12single most important tools that people
6:15using AI need to be learning right now.
6:16I put it off for far too long. We're
6:18going to be making a lot more content
6:20about setting up Hermes agents and stuff
6:22like that, because Hermes agents, and
6:24I'm going to defer to Hermes, cuz it's
6:26better than Openclaw. What it is is
6:28essentially an AI assistant. And the
6:32reason I haven't really gotten into AI
6:33assistants and agentic workflows before
6:35is that it can be kind of costly,
6:37especially if you're using credits, pay
6:39as you go, that sort of thing. Can be
6:41pretty costly, unless you're running a
6:43lot of it on a local machine, or maybe
6:45you're running some of it through
6:47ChatGPT subscription or something like
6:49that. But regardless, it is still the
6:52most powerful way to use AI, because it
6:55can call on the sort of mixture of
6:56experts to come in and do specific
6:58things in your project, whether that's a
7:01coding project, or a writing project, or
7:03whatever. So, humanizers and
7:07you know, chronology checkers, and like
7:10comparing your your notes with your
7:12story Bible, all this stuff can really
7:15be brought up to 11 with agentic
7:18workflows. And And as I said, we're
7:19going to do a lot more around that. But
7:21when optimized correctly, these things
7:23can actually act like actual small,
7:27part-time employees, like
7:29especially when given really good
7:31instructions. And so, this is going to
7:32be super powerful, not just for writing,
7:35which again is what this channel focuses
7:37on, but I'm actually going to be
7:38building in the next couple of weeks,
7:40and probably months, a full system to
7:43essentially manage every area of my
7:45business for me and not just my
7:47business, but my personal life as well.
7:48So, uh tracking health metrics or
7:51uh transcribing my journals and stuff
7:54each day and uh helping me with task
7:56management and all of that. Tons of
7:58stuff, even helping me learn new things
8:00and uh retaining that knowledge. All of
8:03that can be done inside of Hermes. And
8:05so, I'm going to be doing a lot of work
8:07there. I definitely think it is
8:08something that authors in particular are
8:10sleeping on and definitely shouldn't be.
8:12I was sleeping on it for probably longer
8:14than I should have and that is going to
8:16change. But, you may be wondering cuz I
8:18recently launched my own software tool
8:20inside of my Story Hacker membership,
8:23which is by the way is the single best
8:25AI writing uh membership in the world.
8:28You definitely will not regret joining.
8:30Link down below if you're interested. We
8:32used to have it so that if you join that
8:34membership, you also had to pay for
8:36Claude or for uh Novel Crafter or
8:39Sudowrite or these these other tools.
8:40Now, because we introduced Story Hacker
8:42at OS, you don't have to pay those
8:43anymore. You just pay the membership
8:45price, which is the same as it was
8:47before I launched the this tool. But,
8:49one of the things that actually and an
8:50actual person actually said, funny
8:52enough, who's a competitor, is that
8:54software is dead and that none of this
8:56stuff matters because we have agentic
8:58workflows now. And I absolutely disagree
9:00with that. I think agentic workflows are
9:02great and they're fun to learn and
9:04everything, but we got to remember that
9:06most people are not even using AI at
9:08all. The vast majority of the population
9:10is not using AI. And so, even though
9:13these tools are available to us and we
9:16are going to see an increase of
9:18technology and tools to do certain
9:21things. Uh so, we're going to get more
9:23competition in the software space. Even
9:25though that is going to be true, the
9:26vast majority of people do not want to
9:28actually use these agentic workflows to
9:31come up with their own software for
9:33themselves, which is how I'm going to be
9:34using it a lot. And so, I think there is
9:38there is still a moat around a lot of
9:40these tools cuz most people don't want
9:41to learn how to create their own
9:42software, even if they don't have to
9:44learn coding. Most people just want
9:46something that's simple and easy to use.
9:48I was shocked when I launched a
9:50Storyteller OS, which is essentially my
9:53N8N automations in that's been hardcoded
9:56into a software along with some other
9:58features. I was shocked how many people
10:00had not been following my instructions
10:02on how to set up N8N, and they just
10:05preferred to do it in the software
10:06instead. And we had an amazing launch,
10:08and software is definitely not dead.
10:10However, it can definitely be a huge
10:13benefit to learn how to use these tools
10:17so that you could create your own
10:18software. Imagine creating your own
10:20software for your readers. Like if
10:23you're fantasy writer like like I am,
10:27you could create something that could be
10:29like an interactive wiki of your stuff.
10:32Or you could create something I don't
10:34know. Like I I have some ideas for
10:36myself, so I won't get into that, but
10:37maybe you you could have some kind of
10:39interactive tool where they could chat
10:40with your characters. There's all kinds
10:42of different things that you could do,
10:44and I just think that it's useful for
10:46authors to learn some of these tools so
10:47that they can do that. And also because
10:50I don't know anybody that is 100%
10:53satisfied with any software. There's
10:55very few softwares where I could say
10:57like, "Yeah, it is everything to in the
11:00world to me right now." There's always
11:02something that I wish was there. And
11:05this is this is why I think a lot of
11:07people will still want to create their
11:09own software. It's not for not to sell
11:12or anything, but just to help your
11:14yourself and all of that. So, that's why
11:16I think it's still useful to understand
11:19that software is not dead, but it's also
11:21useful to learn these agentic workflows
11:23and all of that. What about publishing?
11:25Is publishing dead? I don't think so. We
11:27are certainly seeing an influx of new
11:30material, but really all that matters is
11:33can we produce a quality book that
11:35readers enjoy. And right now, a
11:38unskilled human who's just using AI to
11:40generate slop is not going to do that.
11:42And those things don't get picked up by
11:45readers, at least not in the long term,
11:47because if it's not qual- a quality
11:49book, if it doesn't have some amount of
11:51marketing or word of mouth behind it,
11:54which you can only sustain if you have a
11:57quality book, that's just not going to
12:00happen for the slop. It's going to fall
12:02down to the bottom of the barrel
12:04somewhere in the darkest corners of
12:06Amazon and never get looked at again.
12:08And yet, if you have a skilled human,
12:11someone who understands storytelling and
12:13understands what they're doing with AI
12:15to make sure it actually writes
12:18higher-quality stuff and is appealing to
12:20all of the tropes that the readers have
12:21and all of this, then yes, that can that
12:25person can actually do a lot more. They
12:27get amplified by the use of AI. And
12:30people who are worried about the market
12:32being saturated and all that, the market
12:34was already saturated long before AI
12:36came around. There were literally
12:38thousands of books being published on
12:40Amazon every single day. And you know,
12:43people say, for instance, that
12:44nonfiction is being particularly swamped
12:47right now by AI books. My nonfiction is
12:49doing better than ever. Like my
12:51nonfiction outsells my fiction by a
12:52large margin right now. And that's
12:54because I'm doing other things to market
12:56those books like this channel, for
12:58instance, right? Uh and other s- other
13:00things that I'm doing to market those
13:01books. I'm running ads and stuff and
13:03they they perform really well. So, just
13:05because something is saturated doesn't
13:07mean that it's saturated with more good
13:11content than the readers can handle.
13:13Once we get to that point, then maybe
13:14we'll have something to worry about, but
13:15we are not anywhere close yet. The other
13:18thing I wanted to ask a question on, so
13:20we've covered software, we've covered
13:21publishing. What about Hollywood? Cuz I
13:23do think we are entering an age with AI
13:26where anybody who is a storyteller, you
13:29know, we used to be confined to our
13:31separate lanes. Like you are a writer,
13:33you are a filmmaker, you are a video
13:35game producer, and that was it. And if
13:38somebody wanted to be a writer, they
13:40could write a book at best in the
13:42luckiest scenario, maybe they could make
13:45that book popular enough that somebody
13:47wanted to pick it up to make a movie.
13:49These days, I think we're entering an
13:50age where it's not just you're a writer
13:53or you're a filmmaker, but we can but
13:56we're more like creative directors or
13:58storytelling directors who are in charge
14:01of a variety of different things that
14:03are accessible to us in a way that just
14:07was not possible before. And we saw this
14:09with the emergence of self-publishing in
14:11general back in the early 2010s where
14:14suddenly anybody could publish a book on
14:15Amazon and the Kindle was blowing up and
14:17all these all this stuff and people were
14:19calling that the death of traditional
14:21publishing. Obviously, traditional
14:22publishing is still around. They are
14:24struggling a little bit more compared to
14:25where they were 20 years ago, but I feel
14:27like there's a quote somewhere that and
14:30I don't know who said it, but that
14:31publishing has been ending for the last
14:34200 years. So,
14:37take that for what it what it is, but I
14:38do think we are going to see something
14:40similar in Hollywood because for the
14:41first time ever, smaller creators are
14:44going to have access to do things that
14:47couldn't have been done without a large
14:49team, very large and expensive team. And
14:52you know, I'm not one of those people
14:53that thinks that AI video will replace
14:56movies, especially live action stuff. I
14:59think people are just going to want to
15:00connect with people and it doesn't
15:02matter how far past the Uncanny Valley
15:05AI is able to get. I don't think we're
15:07going to quite have the same resonance
15:09with something that is fully AI and
15:12looks live action than not. But I do
15:15think that AI in the next 5 to 10 years
15:19will become the single default for
15:23for things like VFX. So, any kind of
15:25special effects added to movies on top
15:28of what was filmed by actual people, I
15:30think that's going to be almost entirely
15:33replaced by AI. I also think that it's
15:35going to become the dominant form of
15:36animation in the future. Even if you
15:38want to animate something like totally
15:41new in a unique way, all you have to do
15:43is create a few assets to sort of show
15:46the style that you're going for, and
15:47then AI can absolutely imitate those
15:49things very easily and it'll look
15:51completely original and unlike anything
15:53that's been made before because it's
15:55based on original assets. Anyway,
15:57I do think that AI empowers the small
16:00creator, but only 1% ish of the world is
16:04actually using AI now. So, now is the
16:06time to get in on the ground floor.
16:09Whoever can will get first mover
16:11advantage, and it's not too late, folks,
16:13cuz even though AI's been around for a
16:14while now and certainly things are
16:17starting to heat up, we're still at the
16:19very beginning of all of this. It's
16:21about to get crazy, and we definitely
16:23want to be on the ground floor as we do
16:25this because if we do, we will be the
16:28ones seeing the biggest benefit before
16:30the rest of the world kind of follows
16:31suit. For instance, we have a guy in my
16:33membership who this isn't writing
16:36related or anything, but like he learned
16:38a lot of the principles that I was
16:39teaching about automations at the time,
16:41and he applied those in his day job, and
16:43then then got a huge promotion, like I
16:46think it was like a 30-40% promotion
16:48over his work to be able to implement
16:50those things into his work. And it's
16:53just goes to show you that like the more
16:55we can be on the cusp of this, the
16:57better things will be. And I truly
16:59believe that if we use this, we will get
17:02ahead and it will help us to grow an
17:04audience which will insulate us a little
17:06bit from any potentially shaky markets
17:09changes that happen in the near future.
17:11Which there will be some, but if we're
17:13on the forefront of this, it won't be an
17:14issue for us. So, that'll are my
17:16thoughts. If you're interested in
17:18learning more about writing, I have a
17:19whole full course about that things like
17:21over 3 hours long that you can check out
17:23that goes from start to finish on how to
17:25write a book from the very beginning all
17:27the way until publishing it on Amazon.
17:29Go check that out and I will see you in
17:31the next video.