“Conversations are more productive when I have the literacy, the questions to ask, [and] when they know the maturity or the priorities I have,” said Joshua Nafman vice president of data and operations at Diageo.
From a nuisance to breaking trust
For now, AI washing is more of a time-wasting nuisance than anything more sinister. Gabriel gets roughly 20 emails a day from firms liberally applying window dressing to their tech.
But the nuisance of marketers’ tech partners masquerading their tech as AI would eventually reach brands’ customers, potentially severing trust—and then impacting sales—around a tech that is already under increased scrutiny by people, regulators and business leaders. We’ve already seen how gen AI itself can be used awkwardly by publishers disguising content created by bots to damaging effects.
“I don’t see the tide [of AI washing] receding any time soon,” said Nafman. “[but] there is a massive lift in AI literacy and what are the foundations needed to be productive. There are fundamental changes around what are the outcomes [we’re] looking for rather than tech solutions.”
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