Being an author in the age of AI with Terry Persun

Here's what the clankers say about our special guest today:

Terry Persun is a multi-genre, award-winning author and marketing expert. Known for his intelligent, tech-forward fiction, he has written over a dozen novels across science fiction, mystery, and historical genres. A former electronics design engineer and U.S. Air Force veteran, he actively blends his technical background with rich storytelling.

Did they get it right?

 Special Guest Links

Terry Persun, award winning and Amazon bestselling novelist

Entertainment Engineering Magazine

Lee Chase pulp fiction series

One review says it all about Terry's writing...

"The Witness Tree
by Terry Persun (Goodreads Author)

Jason Pryde's review from Oct 30, 2025

it was amazing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Fucking clankers, fucking clankers, fucking clankers.

SPEAKER_07 0:16

Don't be fooled by the box that I got. I'm still Jimmy from the block. What's up, everybody? Hello. I used to sing that karaoke.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

I wondered, were you a chick magnet when you sang that in karaoke?

SPEAKER_07 0:30

They used to get me, uh they used to get me really sauced, which wasn't hard to do back in the day. Yeah, it's like here drink this. And I did a couple of karaoke songs, and Jenny from the block was big. And so I changed it to Jimmy from the block. And uh that's what I would do.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

Well, okay, wait, I'm keeping us on point here, Jimmy from the block, because today we have a such a special guest. We have an author friend of ours that goes back to our book trope days, and he is Terry Persson, as an ah, he's awesome. And I have an intro for you, Terry, that the clankers wrote for you. I thought it was so appropriate. So here's what the clankers say about you, our special guest.

SPEAKER_05 1:17

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Person is a multi-genre award-winning author and marketing expert, known for his intelligent tech forward fiction. He has written over a dozen novels across science fiction, mystery, and historical genres. A former electronics design engineer, which is a person after my own heart, because that's my AFAB that lives right up there, and U.S. Air Force veteran. He actively blends his technical background with rich storytelling. Okay, so did AI get it right, Terry?

SPEAKER_02 1:50

Oh, yeah, that's pretty close. I mean, all it does is go out there and collect information from everywhere else and it together. So, you know, that's as good as you can get.

SPEAKER_07 1:59

We were just looking to see if like there was some conspiracy though going on, you know, because we we we never trust the clankers at first clank.

SPEAKER_02 2:07

So well, they miss a lot of things. Like we, you know, like I emailed to you before that, you know, I've been involved with the spiritual stuff, numerology and tarot reading and uh shamanism and things like that for years. I've I've worked with horses and you know, psychological information and and you know, talking to horses to get people to open up and things like that. So I've I've done all these other things too, but um, but you know, the clankers are only gonna find what they find.

SPEAKER_07 2:40

So that's pretty interesting, bro, about the horses, because our friend Abigail, who uh we're actually gonna be on live stream with her tonight, she uh she she does similar stuff to that, you know. She does like uh she does like uh she Reiki with like animals and stuff, and like yeah, she sure does.

SPEAKER_01 2:58

Yeah, yeah, that's pretty amazing. You are and I I caught on your um, I went on your website, which I have links to in the show notes, but um, it says that you also like hiking, which that's totally me, and uh Native American lore, which I was really interested in. And that reminded Jesse when I told him that that you also are writing a new series about a shaman detective. Is that right?

SPEAKER_02 3:27

Um, yes, I've already written a couple of them. I may end up going back and writing more. I've written three, and then um yeah, I kind of move around and do whatever I want. I I've never been the kind of guy to stick with one thing, you know. For years and years, the publishers and agents and stuff say, oh, stick with one genre, do one thing. But that would just bore the shit out of me.

SPEAKER_07 3:51

I know, right? It's boring, huh? Yeah, I mean, I really want to read this shop because I I guess you you've you wrote that stuff since like we used to work together, we knew each other, you know. Like you you were writing a lot of sci-fi, like uh revision seven, DNA, and cathedral of dreams, and um uh you had uh double sight, which I guess is more fantasy, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:16

The one I really want to read is The Witness Tree. I just added it to my Goodreads because I was reading somebody else's review of it, and I just I'm I know I I have to read part of this review. It says, so many books I read leave me with a feeling that the author's ulterior motive is to sell the story to a studio willing to make it into a movie. I never got that feeling with the witness tree. The personal journeys that Lewis and the tree make are cerebral, not active, not always literal. The story reads more like poetry, painting experiences and feelings onto the reader's mind. Certainly not enough car chases to make a blockbuster movie. I can imagine readers of this book running out and buying up art supplies and disappearing into a forest, somewhere trying to recreate the transcendence, the communal relationship with nature that Lewis experiences only without the pain. Good luck with that. I just love that. And then he says if you're compelled after you like close the cover, if you're compelled to buy an extra copy or give your copy to the local tiny library, then you need to do it, which I thought was fantastic. That's awesome. High praise.

SPEAKER_02 5:29

Yeah, that's pretty cool. I I have not read that review. But um that's my very first novel.

SPEAKER_07 5:38

Is it? Yeah, I feel like I've read parts of that, bro. Yeah, yeah. It's I mean, it's been a it's been a minute, but I feel like I have. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:46

Oh, I can't wait to. It's I I'm just dying. I added it to my shelf on Goodreads.

SPEAKER_07 5:52

Didn't you republish it at one point? But back when we were, yeah, okay, that's that's how I that's how I yeah, I've read parts of that, and it's amazing, Jen. You should totally check it out.

SPEAKER_02 6:02

Because it's been published now by three or four different publishers, you know, including um Book Trope. But now I just do it myself. But that one's been passed around a lot, and uh it's one of Nicole's favorites, actually, my daughter. So um it's it's an odd it's an odd book, but you know, I as the first book I wasn't trying to do anything. You know, I was just writing things I knew and understood and cared about. And so a lot of it's nature, very much because I I you know a fair amount of at that time painting, because I was doing a lot of painting at the time. So it just all those little pieces of your life, you know how it is. You you both write. Your life comes through this stuff one way or another, no matter how it is. So it's kind of cool.

SPEAKER_07 6:56

When I think nostalgically about writing, it's that first book. You know what I mean? When you when when like uh independent publishing and all that stuff was like not that it was new, but you know, the the what we were into, the Twitter and the ebooks and all that stuff. And like you're so you just you're just writing this thing, you're not thinking about how you're gonna market it, you're not thinking about like what happens after you you write it. You're just you're you don't think anything is gonna happen with it really. You just you're like, I guess I'll just give copies of this away to my friends and stuff, man. You know?

SPEAKER_04 7:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 7:30

And uh it it was the it was the freest writing experience I think I've ever I've ever had because uh your your mind isn't all full of uh uh okay, well, what does the audience want? What is this, you know, how how am I gonna market this? Who do I think is gonna read this? How am I gonna promote this? You know, you're not thinking about any of that stuff. You're just like trying to get your story out.

SPEAKER_04 7:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:56

It's the best time, isn't it? What you're saying, you know, that if you think nostalgically about, you know, your writing, um I usually go back to that book, but I also go back to poetry because that's where I started. And just those moments that you're out in the middle of the woods sitting and you've got your notebook with you, and and just somehow things are downloaded, you know, and they yeah. It's exactly.

SPEAKER_06 8:23

I carry I can't I I just held up a field notebook. I carry one everywhere I go.

SPEAKER_02 8:27

Isn't that great? I I have a friend who runs his own publishing company here in town, Winter Texts, and um he's done a couple of um, you know, kind of field field books like that. Yeah. Goes out and wanders, you know. I mean, he's wandered through Thailand, he's gone all over the place, and he just takes the notebook with him and writes down his thoughts. I love that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_07 8:54

Yeah, don't you think that's kind of what we're supposed to be doing ultimately is being out in the world and like, you know, that that's that's that's where you that's that's where it hits you, you know.

SPEAKER_02 9:05

And interpreting that world around you because nobody else can do that, nobody can interpret through you, only you can. And that's you know, your AI stuff. That's it goes back to that, it's just useless. All it does is feed you back what you gave it in in a different format, you know, it's just insane. I was at a trade show in February for design engineers, and I was talking to one engineer and he he said something I thought was perfect about AI. And he I was asking him what they use and whether they like it. And he said, AI, I look at AI as a stagnation point because all it does is give me information that I already know. And he said, So there's no creativity, there's no innovation, there's nothing brand new that you can get from it. And I've been interviewing different engineers and at different companies for a while for years, and I'm hearing that from so many other engineers. But you have to remember painting and artwork and engineering, they're they're all creative things. Um in fact, I think people in general are creative people and that's what they do. And but relying on a machine to report to figure everything out for you just seems ridiculous to me.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Yeah, weird. I think so too.

SPEAKER_07 10:33

I I don't understand the point of it because so why if if you're just gonna let that thing, which is basically advanced Google or something, you know what I mean? Like uh it's an advanced Google search. If you're gonna let that thing create a thing, then what's the point in actually creating the thing? That's that that's that's the joy for me, is the process of creation. So why do I want to use that thing to do anything?

SPEAKER_02 11:01

That's a math tool, you know? It's a quick calculator, I guess. I mean, it does more than that. Of course, it does more than that, and it can be used for interesting things, but at the same time, um, I have quotes that I pull out all the time from different articles. And one of them is uh when models are fed flawed, biased, or fabricated data, they consistently produce outputs that sound plausible but are dangerously wrong. Yeah, exactly. I mean, that's really the deal.

SPEAKER_07 11:32

Yeah, we talk about that all the time. And and yeah, I agree with you. I mean, we're not completely uh no, no matter what our our podcasts call, I don't think we're completely anti-AI. I it but I I feel like there is a lot of applications that um it could be very useful for, you know. But uh I I don't I don't like when it wanders into the creative space or starts like thinking for people, or you start using it as your therapist or it becomes your girlfriend or whatever. You know, I mean that's that's where you're that's that's where you're you're crossing over into the danger zone as far as I'm concerned.

SPEAKER_02 12:10

Well, and at the same time, that's the place where it uses the most energy, most water, and yeah, that's the place where it's kind of depleting the rest of our life, yeah. Uh just in order to answer those questions and become your girlfriend or boyfriend. Exactly. But use it for the tool that it is to help cure cancer. Focus our AI attention on curing cancer.

SPEAKER_04 12:36

Right.

SPEAKER_02 12:36

Focus it belongs. Don't focus it on everybody using it to have a new boyfriend or girlfriend or or for doing making a decision whether or not I go to one movie or another movie. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 12:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:51

Stop doing that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_07 12:53

It's a tremendous waste of resources. You know, just just to even ask it, you know, driving directions or something. It's you know, you're you're you know, the the the the I I don't remember the exact calculation, but it's ridiculous how much energy and how much water and how much just to do like that simple task that let's be honest, uh it's not solving a problem that was that existed. It's we we were already doing that just fine with the old-fashioned Google machine, you know?

SPEAKER_01 13:27

Yeah. Exactly. There's a journalist, um, Karen Howe, and she's been kind of a superhero and she's been on the front lines of this whole conversation and really diving into the price that we're paying on, you know, with these data centers and and um the the psychological trauma done to the global south that has had to go through these images and this text and categorize them. And um there's a there's a professor at the University of Washington. She works at Paul Allen's um institute as well. And she says the fatal flaw is that they've gone for these mega LLMs, you know, these huge models, as opposed to she really feels like there should be niche models, mid-sized models that are grabbing data that's specific. So when you were talking, Terry, about like the um, you know, cancer, for example, it's a it's a small, it's like a Ferrari, right? It's a specialty. And you don't need the kind of resources you do with when you're trying to pull all the information from the entire world in nanoseconds and spit it back to a person in a really sweet way or you know, sycophantic way that gets them to thumbs up you afterward. And that's you know, we need to break away from that. That's the model, they don't know how to monetize it. And I think that's where that is coming from, is they want those thumbs up, those dopamine hits like they got with Meta, Instagram, um, Twitter, and all those. And they're trying to overlay it onto this AI tech and so that they can make it a subscription service. But I really think that the future should be we keep pushing back. I'm I'm so excited about humanity because we're pushing back on this. It doesn't matter what colored tie you wear, red or blue, it's wrong. This is absolutely we didn't consent to this. And maybe these smaller models are the key. I think there are uses for AI. How do you feel about these authors that are using AI to maybe write, research, or edit their books? How do you feel about that, Terry?

SPEAKER_02 15:49

So it's that's an interesting question because uh research is research. Right now, we people don't know how to research. What they do is they go to Google and they the AI get tells them something and it could be right, it could be wrong, and then they use it, which is uh uh useless. They need to learn how to actually research and dig deep and go to the sources that they know are honest and then read the pieces themselves. They need to actually do the research and not just ask a question of your neighbor, right? I I love these kind of things because how often is it that you ask your friend or something, you're out running around, you say, God, I wonder if it's gonna rain, and they give you an answer. They have no idea, they have no idea if it's gonna rain or it's not gonna rain, but they'll give you an answer. The same thing with everything else. You know, you ask a question and they try to answer it. That's their job, whether it's right or wrong. That's exactly what we're getting from AI and Google and all these other things right now. They're answering the questions without knowing the answer, right?

SPEAKER_01 16:51

It's like that saying always an opinion, but rarely right.

unknown 16:55

Yes, exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_07 16:57

Can you imagine like marching somebody up to one of those old university card catalogs? Like you remember, like, yeah, like we we had one of those things in my university library, and and and and that thing, you know, it was like a it was like a like a there's enough of those cabinets strung together, you know, you fill an apartment, you know, you know, like it was huge, you know.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

We had this thing at University of Washington. It was in the undergraduate library, which is pretty infamous because somehow we were listed in Playboy as like a good place to pick up people. Um, but they had this thing called the You know, so was my university. I love that we have that in common and we're also trauma bonded.

SPEAKER_07 17:40

The dorm we lived in was like the one of the number one party dorms, and like you know, it's like uh I don't see what they're talking about, but okay.

SPEAKER_01 17:48

Well, we had this answer wall. It was like a it was magic, it was a miracle. And you had a question. So, okay, um, why do we say I'm I'm trying to think of one of the questions that I asked the answer wall, and you'd write it on an index card. You'd say, where does the saying happy as a clam come from? And then you'd write it on your um index card, you'd pin it on the answer wall, and you'd come back later that day, and a librarian will have answered your question. And it's like the coolest thing ever.

SPEAKER_07 18:20

Okay, and that's fun. That that's cool, actually. That's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01 18:23

It totally is. Somebody should have that website, the answer wall. That'd be dope. And you turn it into a game, and then you turn it into fucking games.

SPEAKER_07 18:30

They didn't, they just shut down Ask Jeeves. So maybe we should bring back uh the answer wall.

SPEAKER_01 18:36

Ask Jen and Jesse. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 18:40

I don't know, but yeah, I I I mean, it it's really uh it it it kind of freaks me out that um so many people seem to be uh I I understand that the tech companies and social media have realized that um because they they're all about you know quarter-to-quarter growth, and they've realized that they've sort of hit the window. You know, it's like uh everybody who's using our stuff is already using it, and everybody who's never gonna use it is never gonna use it. So they had to create this new thing, you know what I mean, to suddenly uh to make people go, oh yeah, okay, do you know, to to to to get them, get them venture capital dollars rolling again and you know, start passing them bags of money around. The people though who don't have any skin in the game, who are the apologists for it, are the people that just like it it blows my mind. It's like uh why okay, why are you so actively defending AI? Just it's it's it it's just a tool, you know what I mean? If you if you want to just take it down to brass tacks.

SPEAKER_02 19:51

Well, we've been using these tools for years and years and years. I mean, every software package out there that does something, whether it's TAD and CAM and whatever else that's out there, that that's all this is. It's just some kind of data that we put in there. We said, This is what I need to do. Can you do that faster than I can? Well, sure, I can do that faster than you can. The thing is, and you hit on it over and over again, Jesse, and that's that it's about money. That's all it's about. So all of a sudden, um they want to do all these things and and the people want it too. So the people who are using AI to write their books and to make their paintings and do all this stuff, they're just lazy people, they don't have any creativity or don't know how to be creative in a way that fe that you can feel it. Because what we all know is that when you're actually in that that zone of creating it, there's a feeling to that. When you're working with AI, there's not a feeling, it's a it's a production, it's a project, a product, and all they're doing is they're trying to do it faster so they can make money faster. So the the idea that when you enter into it is all wrong. And this is always what happens with the world in general, is if you step into this with the wrong intention, you're going to get the wrong result. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_07 21:14

So yeah, no, I agree with you for sure.

SPEAKER_02 21:18

I switch jobs because I get paid better. Okay, well, let's see how that works out. Because no, most of the time they find that, well, I really didn't like that. I didn't like doing that. I love the people I've met over the years, and uh I do talk to a lot of engineers, and a lot of them are engineers, where they'll say, Oh, I was awkward to become the manager of the department but and make more money, but why would I do that? I love what I do, you know? Yeah, keep doing what I do. So I I just stay here. Let somebody else manage. And sure enough, the other person they put in management, we all know this, right? They get reached a point where they can't manage, they don't even know how, but they went for the money, and now they're unhappy and and disrespectful to everyone else because they're unhappy and they make everybody else miserable. It's not necessary. Let the managers manage it. If that's the kind of person you are and you're a good leader, then lead. But let's be honest and pay the people accordingly to what they're doing anyway. An engineer who chose not to be the manager is a great engineer. Pay them anyway. You know, pay them what they're worth. Then they don't have to do all this. My son once told me he said, you know that you don't quit your job anyway. You quit your boss. And yeah that's yeah you know that's a good point. You have a long boss and I've seen people right we all have they get a new job and they they're loving their job and their boss and they get along and everything and then the boss leaves and the new boss comes in it's like oh shit you know this isn't gonna work now you know it's happened to me yeah on one occasion.

SPEAKER_07 23:09

I mean what you're just what you just said about engineers I would take that back to what we were talking about like writing our first novels and stuff is like if you've ever felt that rush that you get when you're in that creative zone you know what I mean and and you and you're you're you know you're you're doing the work and yeah it it it sucks sometimes and like you're you're up late and you're tired and you're cranky and you're pulling your hair out and you can't figure out exactly you know how how how how are the how are these two plot points going to intersect eventually and if they don't then the this whole thing falls apart you know and I've wasted months. But um if you've ever felt that I would make the argument that there's no way you can take that step down to AI without having some ulterior motive like you're talking about like I'm just gonna crank these books out just as fast as I can you know the but I mean if you're if if you're in the zone, you know, I know people who don't use any of that stuff. They got a book coming out every two months you know and I mean I don't write like that I'm not that but like a lot of people are you know and they they get on that schedule and they're just they're just turning those things out and have been consistently for years.

SPEAKER_01 24:25

People you know that we used people that we used to be our colleagues you know well I think about um and what you guys are talking about is channeling. I mean when you are in the flow and you're actually in that creative space I remember that I would want to have the I couldn't start my first draft on Word, right? Uh that bouncing cursor and that blank page freaked me out. So it always started with notebooks for me pen and paper. It felt safe but sometimes I needed just the flow of empty words behind me. So I'd have the radio on where it's like talk radio I wasn't even listening to what they were talking about just to kind of get over my anxiety. I was in the mindset of letting the words flow and they were for sure but it's very isolating to be an author you have to be alone with yourself. You have to be in a space it's almost a meditative state in my situation and you have to just be open to being a channel for this idea of the universe is giving you and you're just kind of like the scribe for it in a lot of ways. And I don't know I feel like AI just it totally ruins the vibe. You give it to a machine and then it comes back and it's like the worst game of telephone to me.

SPEAKER_02 25:52

100% you know that the thing is is that we do this people live in general to feel like they're living and to feel that that sense of connection whether whether it's with yourself or with others or whatever else that that thing that goes through you. And this is why a lot of people don't like the you know the putting the hubcaps on the card type job you know it's just production and that's what AI feels like is is production. I you know I write a lot of technical articles for technical journals and these these days now they say well we we'd like you to do I was ideal with a couple agencies is to use AI to create the outline telling me all this stuff um it actually takes me longer to do all that and to have it look at it and tell me what words are important. Are you shitting me I know what words are important 30 years. So it takes me less time to just do the piece. For a while I was working with a company that they would do these FAQ kind of things and they send you an article or two and they'd say we just need questions but first you need to do the outline you know of what questions you're going to ask and then you you get that back and we approve it and then you answer and then it goes back and forth like this it's like ridiculous. You read the articles I write the whole thing and then I pull it out pull the pieces out and give them the outline right and it's always oh this is a great outline good because I already wrote the piece. And this happens I think with AI is that it slows you down. And there's more and more research and not only are you getting bad answers but you're getting people to not be able to work as much. I go back to the same thing I think we've had it siloed before we had all this these LLMs and if you were going to do something in biology you had the biology software and that's AI. You give it a lot of data and it spits out the information you need you have an expert somebody who's been doing it for years and years and years look at it and go, yeah, that looks pretty good. You know and then you move forward from there. When we started to spread this all out so that they could make money off the general public who gets addicted to this crap that's where the mistake was made. The government needs to step in and say okay we own AI this is our job not not your job so we're going to pay all these great programmers to cure cancer you know to to not ever have a problem with uh you know COVID again um we're going to get people on Mars and make it work actually work for us so that we can actually get there and not try to depend on companies like SpaceX which is fine but you know it's they have to make money too and start doing the things the right way so that we can get results that are actually beneficial for everybody. And I don't think having my girlfriend or at this point I'm thinking you know three or four girlfriends. I'm thinking maybe you know we go right I'll have five computers and a couple of phones and you know won't tell a and a mini Mac.

SPEAKER_07 29:42

Yeah don't have them networked and don't tell anything apparently the mini Mac is the key to this whole thing so it doesn't give away your API keys when you break up I knew I knew a kid back in time he had like uh he had like he had he had three girlfriends like in the in the little in different little towns around us and none of them knew about each other. And he would literally like uh he he he you know everybody you remember when we had those we'd had those notebooks in school that had that clear thing in there and you could you'd slide something in the cover of it you know like a grabbing or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 30:17

So if he was going to see one he'd like put uh you know uh Eugene loves so and so and then uh if he was gonna be in the other town he'd like switch them out you know he he had all this he had all his stuff his gear you know he'd make sure he was he was presenting like with the right stuff with the right girlfriend he was a high level player in the 80s I mean by God think about it yeah that that was uh some forward thinking back then you know that was the equivalent of having like uh three phones you know what I mean and uh that's right well we might as well start off all our relationships with dishonesty right because that always works out so uh always works out going back to AI because that's the roots of AI it's stole from everybody everybody yeah and and that is the roots of it and so you know my husband's a lawyer so it's not it's not the same as fruits of the poisonous tree it's not Jen that's different that's used in a very specific way but to me it kind of poisoned the whole thing because it's like they can take everything from us and now how dare they because they're going after certain um I'm seeing the AI model the Titans they're going you stole from our AI model and now they're actually suing each other over this and the massive taking of all of our creative stuff.

SPEAKER_07 31:47

And then they have the audience yeah they're they're building it unstolen unstolen information in the first place and then like now they're starting to have a dogfight about like well you stole my stolen stuff. Well you know you stole my stolen stuff.

SPEAKER_01 32:01

Maybe this is our country's karma because we are all on stolen land. Well the thing is it's part of the karma. Yeah with these companies what are you gonna do to them?

SPEAKER_07 32:16

They know that from all three of us in this chat okay they have they've definitely they have so much money what what are you gonna do to them? Yeah it's absolutely eventually have to pay us like it's nothing to them.

SPEAKER_01 32:30

Yeah the UK is actually it seems like the UK is the first one that's kind of leading the path and I think there's like three or four big publishing houses that are going after them and suing which is really good to see um it's something I mean I hope so I was watching something last night on YouTube um one of the publishers from one of the big publishing houses and he was talking about this and they had removed a book because it was done with AI.

SPEAKER_02 32:58

And like one of the questions was something about you know if I do the book with AI is that okay when he what was really interesting to me is that he said you know we can't copyright a book written in AI which means if I publish it in my publishing house any other publishing house can also publish that and he said we because we can't own something that wasn't done the contract says that you have to have written it and if you didn't write it then it doesn't belong to you and it doesn't belong to us either. And so he said we will not publish that now in the magazine business they use all the AI detection tools and what they do is they say if there's more than 20% of this is AI, we won't take it so there's all kinds of little things going on and so when you're self-publishing of course you can upload anything you want but the truth is and I thought about this I thought after I saw this I thought wow so all these people who are using AI and putting their novels up on online with AI I could download those and reuse them exactly the same way and publish it at 12 other places which is interesting. So that they really don't because they don't own it they can't come after me I don't own it they don't own it it's just out there. It's AI and so it's really an interesting thought to me about that because when you apply that to all kinds of other things that are going on then all these people generating what they think is creative stuff don't own any of it. Wow so they really they really didn't do it. That's the recognition is that you don't own it because you didn't you didn't do anything.

SPEAKER_01 34:55

It's a really interesting it totally is and then you have the algorithms I remember a few years ago I was thinking about um making audiobooks out of my um ya novels and Amazon you know people had complete uh careers as voice actors for these audiobooks and all of a sudden Amazon was basically um changing the algorithm so that AI voices got all the preferential treatment they were showing up um on the the search and doing all these different things and I just wonder if that's happening in the publishing um you know the e-publishing um field as well is like my daughter um I have a grad student daughter and their partner um he's an accountant there he just graduated with his undergrad my uh younger one that's in grad school she's about to graduate from her master's program in instructional technology design i mean you know very fluent in AI but they're finding that um some of these sites where they're applying they actually show a preference if you have AI have has run through your resume like you've used AI in some sense on your resume. And so then the AI bots that are grabbing the best resumes are showing preferential treatment and it's hard not to want to gain that system but they're like we're human beings that's our big thing is we're human real human beings giving real skills and real eyes to any task and we're teachable and we're you know shouldn't it be a good thing that we're showing that we're human beings but apparently they're being downgraded because they're showing that they're human beings.

SPEAKER_02 36:47

Right there again so the algorithm is in charge not the not the people and I wonder how they feel about that because when you interview somebody for a job um it's like you get to know who they are and whether they'll work with you and the other people in the office. But if all that's happened is your a your algorithm has gone through a bunch of resumes I've often in years and years when I was uh in corporate and hiring people it was always look you I don't hire a resume I hire a human and so when I hire a human what I want in a human is a certain amount of interest and motivation self-motivation curiosity things like that because I can teach them almost anything if I just if they have the basics in their resume. And I remember I've told this story a couple times I was going for a job with a company that was in the semiconductor business and they were using an agency to scan through the resumes and the guy wrote to me and he was trying to be nice and he just said you know I'm just trying to be helpful here. I don't want you to argue with me anything like this but he said I went through your resume and you didn't mention semiconductor anywhere in the resume index the job was for I didn't write back to him but I had written in the resume I had worked for three of the top semiconductor companies in the country and it's like well if you don't know who the semiconductor companies are you're just an agent and and so and this is exactly what I think AI an algorithm. You're totally right certain words and if I didn't use that word then somehow I'm not that person. But somebody who actually knows the industry and knows what's going on and so the bottom line was I would not have wanted for a company who allowed that to happen anyway.

SPEAKER_01 39:00

Yeah that's so true.

SPEAKER_02 39:02

So it's really interesting to me that we're we're going further and deeper and deeper into these dark woods. Yeah sort of getting out of it um but you're right I read more and more often that human traits and human interactions are becoming more and more important to the younger and younger people coming up I think the AI thing is it's it's gonna be interesting to see how it stands out. Right now they have all this money to play with it and keep it around but it's not going to last that long. Everybody's fighting you know the data centers now uh nobody wants to use AI. We're having a lot of pushback that's because they put it out to try to make money instead of putting it out when it was ready. It was not ready when they started to put this stuff out.

SPEAKER_07 39:59

70% across party lines in in the newest surveys um across party lines don't like data centers and don't want them built anywhere near the where they live wow I mean talk about an issue that unites everybody. Yeah like everybody's on the same page with that they're just like you know if if uh as soon as one shows up somewhere you know that the the the protests are they're having to sneak you know they're having to buy land in secret you know because uh I read a story this morning where um like a a couple of uh council people I think it was in Michigan or at least one of them resigned at city council meeting because they were starting to get death threats from like farmers you know from from well I mean I'm not gonna throw farmers under the bus but people in the community who were just like no you know we don't want this thing and obviously uh you should not be death threatening anybody you know that's not that's that's not where we're not going for violence we're going for trying to point out an example of I I really feel like this is gonna get to a very dangerous spot you know and and I I think people need to be cognizant of that you know that it's uh I'm scared that somebody's a lot of somebody's are gonna get hurt over this because it's such a divisive issue.

SPEAKER_01 41:29

I don't know how it happened I guess because of our podcast and um Substack is a smaller group but it was what a month ago Jesse that somebody tagged me um he's a doctor and they were um and other people in the AI sphere were tagged on it. He wanted to get people's opinions because the state of Utah had made a contract with a company out of the Bay Area and the Bay Area had this AI bot that would basically fill prescriptions but specifically psychiatric prescriptions um automatic, you know, and they were using this AI interface and Utah said we're the testing ground for it. We need this because we have so few you know RNs and doctors that can actually fill these prescriptions. It's going to really be a blessing. And I was like you have just pushed a lot of buttons because I know uh personally it's not my story to tell but it's my story that I lived is if you especially with psychiatric drugs, it can feel like somebody's life preserver, their last life preserver. And so they need a human being to say have you had more suicidal ideation? Have you felt like this? Have you felt like that? And the human being you can go nope I don't know what you're saying. But the human being can see in the person and dig deeper and say there are other solutions. We can do things with other remedies so um and we'll see that where a bot's like oh okay they said no problems and we refilled it 10 volt or whatever it's pretty scary and we need human beings. And I'm like this is you know what is the actual root of the problem? Why doesn't Utah have RNs and doctors there? Why what are they actually spending their time on? And I would argue maybe their hospital managers are saying incorporate AI into your business day and they're having to do 90% of their work of ignoring or pretending to go through the hoops and they're losing that interface with their patients. Like there's another problem and this is a bad solution that literally will end lives. I am so against that.

SPEAKER_07 43:46

So start with the abysmal state of most healthcare in the the you know the United most prosperous nation in the world you know and it's it's it's a situation where um It's once again solving a problem. It's the wrong solution to s to solve the problem.

SPEAKER_02 44:06

Yeah. But the wrong people are being asked and talked to. Um I get a lot of reports and a lot of uh surveys and stuff for marketing in my job. And so I I'm always reading through those. And you notice that I notice all the time with these companies, the uh executive management say we're we're using uh AI a lot and we're going to use it more. The people below the engineers and the technicians and secretaries and everybody else down below, they're all saying, We're not using it, and we would would rather not use it more. So what's happening is just what we uh we continually talk about this, but the executives think I'm gonna make money. I'm gonna save money, I'm gonna make money, and my god, you know, I'm gonna have all this stuff going on. The people down here doing it are saying, geez, this is a pain in the ass. It does work and it's not wrong, and then I have to work harder, I don't want to use it anymore. And this is it, and we get we have these two uh two levels similar to what you're saying. So the hospital thinks, oh, I'm gonna save something, or even the doctor, I don't know. The doctors, uh the doctor group that he works with says, Oh, we're gonna save some money here, and we're gonna use AI instead of you, and we're gonna have more trouble. We already know that AI tells people to kill other people and commit to a side and everything.

SPEAKER_01 45:32

Yeah, we should unfortunately.

SPEAKER_02 45:34

I think it was in um futurism, but it was Victor Tangerman.

SPEAKER_01 45:40

He's our favorite. Uh uh, look at the Terry throwing him out.

SPEAKER_07 45:44

We talk about his fan club. We we dropped his name and like futurism like every Tuesday. I swear to you.

SPEAKER_01 45:53

Victor Tangerman, yeah, futurism.

SPEAKER_02 45:56

He says the brain didn't in one of their cognitive tests at MIT, the brain didn't fall asleep, but there was much less activity in the areas corresponding to creativity and processing information. Of course there was, they're handing over their brain to AI. It's just and and so now we want that person. This is the fucked up thing, these uh you know, executives in these companies. I'm gonna use more AI because I want my people to be that stupid.

SPEAKER_04 46:29

Oh, it's like great.

SPEAKER_02 46:31

It's like, what are you thinking? Like, you're going to replace this guy, he's getting dumber. And you think this is a good thing for your company?

SPEAKER_07 46:41

Oh god, it's like that old, it's like that old trope that you used to see in 80s movies a lot, where like what you got the two security guards who are like watching a bank of monitors, you know, and then they're just kind of like, you know, laying back and like you know, about to fall asleep in the middle of the night. Yeah, like or yeah, token it up, yeah. And uh and then like uh you know, and then like the the heist or the monster, like it's the apes are just you know what's dragging, yeah. Cause because they're just there, they're just there like chilling, like uh just watching the water. And I mean that that that but that's that's that's it, you know. That's how they want those of the things that we want to that we want to put in charge of like literally everything right now, you know?

SPEAKER_02 47:29

It's so true. It's so true. You know, it's so funny because I and I don't remember where I read it, but somebody was on a long article, and they said at the end of it, they said, because of the same thing, they said, you know, the thing is is that AI can replace the presidents and executive staff of these are these companies easier than they can replace the people actually doing the work.

SPEAKER_07 47:52

That I believe I believe would that be. I get honestly, like I no clank or CEOs. I could I could be into clank or CEOs. Yeah, that's where all your money and resources are going, you know?

SPEAKER_02 48:08

Yeah, so they don't they don't get to travel, they don't get to have two houses and a boat, they don't none of the crap.

SPEAKER_01 48:15

They just have to work 24-7.

SPEAKER_07 48:17

Look, these these companies are not hurting for money. No, okay. They're not. No, no, no, you know, it they they they have the money to pay actual coders, engineers, you know, uh they they they have the money to take care. You you you shouldn't have to uh piss into a uh an old snapple, an empty Snapple bottle because you can't take a break, you know, at the warehouse, you know, because you're afraid that the oh my god, they're gonna replace me with the robots, you know? And uh, you know, it that's ridiculous.

SPEAKER_01 48:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 48:54

And we all know who I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_01 48:57

Yes, we do.

SPEAKER_07 48:58

And who else I'm talking about, and the other one I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_01 49:04

Well, Terry, before we hit the one hour mark, um, is there anything else that you wanted to share with us before um uh and and then also we want uh our listeners to send you the love and know where they can reach out to you too.

SPEAKER_02 49:20

Oh, sure. Um it's just my name at uh you know, www.terryperson.com. And then all my books and stuff like that are there, so they can see all that stuff and do whatever they like from there. I do write a lot. I'm I'm in the middle of another series right now. I I just started putting up a series. I wrote all six books there were uh novellas. My daughter, my daughter calls them baby books. I wrote six baby books. Um kind of like uh pulp fiction, which I really liked pulp fiction in the old days, you know, thousand words or so, and they were just kind of fast and quick.

SPEAKER_05 50:02

And um, I want to read those. I'm gonna do it.

SPEAKER_07 50:05

I do too.

SPEAKER_01 50:06

I'm queuing up though.

SPEAKER_07 50:07

All I do is watch film noir on the like the Criterion Channel and stuff.

SPEAKER_01 50:11

Terry, I just pictured them on one of those wire racks that circles around and they're stacked up in there.

SPEAKER_07 50:16

Oh god, I miss those. Terry's sitting there like wearing a fedora, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_02 50:22

Smoking and watching everybody that's buying the books, but it that's a pseudonym, and it's Lee Chase, L-E-E-C-H-A-S-E. It's perfect, it is perfect, and my daughter talked me into that too. Nicole, you know, she writes too. She's got three pseudonyms. She's really writing three different groups of books.

SPEAKER_07 50:42

Well, I was gonna ask you if Nicole was still putting out books, but yeah, obviously, yes.

SPEAKER_02 50:47

Yeah, uh unbelievable that girl. She um, well, she was working with um Lake Union through Amazon. Yeah, they bought a couple of her books. One of them they put on first reads that she had 125,000 downloads in a day.

SPEAKER_05 51:03

Wow, good for her. I yeah, Nicole's great.

SPEAKER_02 51:07

She's now doing some romanticy type books, um series she's working on. So, yeah, those kind of things. So she talked me into using a pseudonym. She said, just try it out and see how it works.

SPEAKER_07 51:17

So that's what I did. But Lee Change. Yeah, maybe we'll maybe we'll have to talk to Nicole and uh get the you know, and get get the get the that perspective of the active, like uh that that sort of like uh what's going on with like the book talk the industry stuff, yeah, you know, because uh I I wouldn't say that my my fingers on the pulse of book talk or not anymore.

SPEAKER_01 51:40

Mine isn't either anymore.

SPEAKER_07 51:42

It's not really, but I mean, but I'm interested in it because I think it's a huge marketing, you know. For yeah, I mean, that's a that's a lot of no that's a lot of downloads like that, you know.

SPEAKER_01 51:52

So we'll have links to that. And is the um since it's a pseudonym, do you have it on a different uh website or we can find it on your website?

SPEAKER_02 52:01

Okay, perfect. Very personal, yeah. You can find um Lee Chase. I there's a thing in the nav bar somewhere that says the Lee Chase novels, and so you'll see all six of them there. Right now, there's two of them available and one for pre-order kind of thing.

SPEAKER_01 52:20

Wow.

SPEAKER_06 52:21

Well, I know what I'm gonna be reading.

SPEAKER_01 52:22

I know me too. I know what I'm doing when we're off uh Zoom.

SPEAKER_02 52:27

It was a lot of fun. I you know, my my wife is reading the first one, and she's like, I'm not sure I like this one guy. And I'm like, good, I'm good. You shouldn't, you know, you're not yeah, he's very I he's you're not supposed to. Yeah, he's he's he's he's a cool guy. I like him a lot, honestly, but but he's uh he's a foul mouth kind of joker, anti-hero kind of yeah, yeah, you gotta have some of that. Says all the wrong things, you know, yeah, to the women in the book.

SPEAKER_07 53:03

What are we doing it the other? Yeah, see, yeah, yeah. All these names, see, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's what you want. That that's the genre, man.

SPEAKER_01 53:11

It's yeah, it totally is. Oh my gosh, it was a lot of fun. You're always welcome back to the show anytime to talk about anything. Um, even if something weird happens to you on a hike, like it always happens to me. You're you know, you have an open invitation, just let us know, and we'll book around you. Okay, that sounds good.

SPEAKER_07 53:29

Yeah, man. Hey man, that the the the insight into like you know, with you being in that world and like you know, with with the articles you write and like having that having those those those uh relationships with all the engineers and stuff. I mean, that's I I learned a lot today. I did too.

SPEAKER_01 53:47

I appreciate it too.

SPEAKER_02 53:48

If you have engineers, I mean tell them to subscribe to entertainment engineering.

SPEAKER_01 53:53

Okay, you know, we'll put the links to that in the show notes too.

SPEAKER_02 53:56

Yeah, because our purpose in doing that, we came up with this magazine because all the other business-to-business magazines and engineering magazines, they do the same all the time. Most of it's products, you know. Like, here's a new product, and here's all the benefits, and here's all the features, and then the engineers got to look at that and say, Can I use this or can I use this? So we we thought, first of all, we just give them solutions. You know, this was actually being used in this product, period. And then we do the coolest ones that we can find, and that's why we call it entertainment engineering, because this is the stuff you would see on the Discovery Channel and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_01 54:37

No, yeah. All right, is it like a quarterly thing or is it monthly? It's weekly. Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_07 54:44

Guess what's getting added to my RSS?

SPEAKER_02 54:46

Mine too. We pump out a lot of stuff, and um it most of it's aggregated, we find it all over the place. Um, but we're getting more and more companies who are sending us articles and stuff like that. So we've done some pretty cool things, and you know, it's Nicole's done a couple of them. Um, you know, we went to see the Lion King on stage and went behind the scenes to see how it was done and what kind of equipment they use and all the time. I'm so cool. Stuff like that's just a blast.

SPEAKER_01 55:16

And you don't mind if we blast it out on our Substack, do you?

SPEAKER_02 55:20

Oh gosh, no, I please, please.

SPEAKER_01 55:22

Okay, good.

SPEAKER_02 55:23

Yeah, absolutely. Honestly, I think engineers well, I know because when I go to the trade showers, they tell me the engineers say this is the coolest thing. And yeah, we have in this business, there's now I'm giving you a damn pitch, but I love it. Business, um you know the reading time on line is like 50 some seconds, you know, average and ours are like three minutes. We have things people on our site um 12, you know, 11, 12 minutes. They're they're just wow reading and reviewing things and checking out the next thing to see what's going on. There's some really cool pieces on there, bro.

SPEAKER_07 56:04

I still subscribe to stuff like The Atlantic, so you're you're fine. I'll I'll read all your articles. Yeah, that's that's um, I'm not one of those that's like oh my god, okay, I gotta get out of here quick. It's this is gonna take more than 20 seconds to read this. Yeah, that's not me.

SPEAKER_02 56:19

I read everything, same.

SPEAKER_01 56:21

So I do too. Well, thanks for coming on our show. And um, as I said, you're welcome anytime. We can't wait to do it again.

SPEAKER_07 56:31

Yeah, you're our science and engineering consultant now. So welcome. Officially, yes, welcome aboard.

SPEAKER_01 56:37

You're like right there with Victor Tangman tied for first. That's all right, I'll go there.

SPEAKER_02 56:44

I have listened now to like five or six of your things, and at first, I gotta be honest, I thought, oh, not another podcast. I'll I'll listen and see what's going on. But it's so fun. I think the the the way you guys interact in the subjects you talk about and the way you allow the conversation to go wherever it wants to go, I love that, and it makes it interesting. And so um, so I I now when I'm scooping um horse poop at the farm.

SPEAKER_07 57:18

Listen, yeah, that's a perfect place to listen to us.

SPEAKER_01 57:21

Hell yeah. You talk about clankers and you're shoveling shit.

SPEAKER_07 57:25

That is that's exactly what we designed it for. No, I honestly do bro, I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_01 57:31

I didn't I appreciate it too. I had goosebumps.

SPEAKER_07 57:34

All we all we all we're all we're trying to do is just like uh like like have a conversation with people and just be real, you know, and not you know, because I'm like you, man. You know, I listen to a lot of podcasts and you it it it some of it can become a slog, you know, and it's like uh we're just trying to keep it fun and like yeah and keep people entertained.

SPEAKER_01 57:56

Yeah, and also we're trying to glad you're enjoying it. I am really glad to hear that too, because really my whole goal is to just transmute the anxiety and fear around this into love, into understanding, into curiosity. And uh so that's our whole goal behind it.

SPEAKER_02 58:13

And we're just many of the podcasts are trying to teach me something, yeah, and I can shove it down your goal exactly, or they're saying the same things repeatedly over and over and over again, which is fine. Yeah, um, I could probably read their book, yeah, same stuff, you know, or I have already read their you know, their their books, and and so I I I like the conversation again. We get back to this is human. It's human, and so you don't get this anywhere else, you know. If trying to teach me something, I can get that, you know, AI can do that too, and and teach me the wrong things, but nonetheless, it can teach me stuff, it can make it can make you hallucinate too.

SPEAKER_01 58:55

Well, and every like going back to that too, everything we're doing is on purpose. Like our dogs will bark in the background, we will, you know, the stuff happens. We cuss. Um, the art for it, I did that. It's a sharpie pen art that I did. I want it to feel human because it is a beautiful thing to be in this human vessel and be connected to everything. I talk about it all the time, but it's like this is a very special thing to be insuled in this human vessel. And uh so I'm so glad you caught that vibe. Yeah, life is now you're okay, forget it. Jesse, he's our favorite over Victor Tangman, isn't he? Now, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 59:37

I mean, you're a favorite now. There is definitely easy, yeah. I mean, I already liked him, but now I like super lucky. You know what?

SPEAKER_01 59:45

Just add it to your list of awards, Terry. You win. You win.

SPEAKER_07 59:52

Yeah, man. And it's really it was it was really good to connect with you again, man. Like, don't be a stranger, you know where we hang out. And uh if you're if you if you got if you hang if you're hanging out on online, like if you're you know, if you're still rocking the Facebook page or in the Instagram or any of that, make sure you send us the links. We'll put them all up. We sure will.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:12

All right, much love to you.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:14

Okay, same bye. Bye-bye, clankers. Fucking clinkers, fucking clinkers.

unknown 1:00:32

Fucking clinkers.