The RTO Show "Let's talk Rent to Own"
Ever wondered how a $8.5 billion industry keeps millions of Americans lounging in style? Step into "The RTO Show Podcast" – where the mysterious world of Rent to Own furniture finally spills its secrets! Your host Pete Shau isn't just any industry veteran – he's spent 20 years in the trenches, collecting the kind of stories that'll make you laugh, gasp, and maybe even rethink everything you knew about that couch you're sitting on.
From wild customer tales to industry shake-ups that'll knock your rented socks off, Pete brings the seemingly mundane world of furniture financing to vibrant life. Warning: This isn't your typical business podcast – expect real talk, unexpected laughs, and "aha!" moments that'll have you looking at every lease agreement in a whole new light.
Whether you're an RTO pro who knows your depreciation schedules by heart, or you're just curious about how that fancy sectional ended up in your living room, Pete's got the inside scoop you never knew you needed. Tune in and discover why the furniture business is anything but boring!
The RTO Show "Let's talk Rent to Own"
Part 1: Intergrating AI into your daily RTO operations.
In this episode of the RTO Show, host Pete Shau sits down with Daniel Hajduk from Vox Populi to kick off a six-part mini-series dedicated to understanding and implementing AI in the rent-to-own industry. As a marketing expert from Vox Populi, a platinum sponsor of the RTO Show, Daniel breaks down AI fundamentals and addresses common concerns about this rapidly evolving technology.
The conversation demystifies AI, moving beyond sci-fi fears of Terminator-like scenarios to explore its practical applications as a powerful business tool. Daniel explains how AI is already integrated into everyday technologies—from Facebook and Amazon to mobile phones—and discusses various AI platforms including ChatGPT, Claude, and Google's Gemini.
The discussion covers the accessibility of AI tools, from free versions to paid enterprise solutions, and explores how AI enhances rather than replaces human capabilities. Daniel emphasizes the importance of balanced AI adoption in business operations and provides guidance for both tech-savvy users and beginners. The episode delves into the distinction between early algorithmic chatbots and modern AI systems, offering practical ways to start incorporating AI into daily workflows.
Daniel emphasizes that AI should be viewed as a collaborative tool that augments human capabilities rather than replacing them. He compares AI to revolutionary innovations like electricity, suggesting it's a transformative technology that's becoming increasingly accessible to everyone. The episode provides practical advice for listeners at different comfort levels with technology, from complete beginners to those ready to implement advanced AI solutions in their businesses.
The discussion also addresses common concerns about AI, including job displacement and creativity loss, with Daniel offering reassurance that AI works best as a complement to human skills rather than a replacement. He encourages listeners to start small with free versions of AI tools and gradually explore more advanced applications as they become comfortable with the technology.
Host Pete Shau and Daniel preview the upcoming episodes in the series, which will dive deeper into specific applications of AI in office work, advertising, and other aspects of the rent-to-own business. They emphasize that staying current with AI technology is becoming increasingly important for maintaining competitiveness in the modern business landscape.
The episode concludes with information about Vox Populi's RED (Remember Everyone Deployed) initiative, a charitable program supporting deployed service members and their families through the sale of red shirts, with a goal of raising $1 million for the cause.
Don't miss the upcoming episodes in this informative series that will help you understand and leverage AI technology in your rent-to-own business. Follow the RTO Show on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and reach out with questions at pete@theRTOshowpodcast.com.
APRO ad after the pre registration ended on 1/17/2025.
Hello and welcome to the RTO Show. I'm your host, pete Chow. Today, we're talking a different aspect of rent-to-own. And, listen, this is something that I think is so important We've heard it time and time again and it's AI. Today, I'm talking to Daniel Hajduk from Vox Populi. Now, listen, they know a lot about everything marketing, including AI use, and so I thought it was a great idea to have Daniel here On top of that. Just so you guys know, vox is a platinum sponsor for their RTO show.
Speaker 1:If you guys have RTO marketing needs, you definitely want to see them. You definitely want to talk to them. But the reason that you're here today is because we're part of a six-part miniseries that we're going to go into. We're going to dive deep into AI and, when I say deep, the different aspects of it. Now, today we're going to talk about an introduction. I'm going to try to get Daniel to tell me that AI is not some Terminator that James Cameron and Arnold Schwarzenegger came up with a couple of years ago, but one of the ideas of how did it come about, where are we going with it, what can we do with it and, better yet, how is it going to make things better for you?
Speaker 2:So Daniel, why don't you introduce yourself? And we can get started that way. So yeah, my name is Daniel Hajduk. I have been working full-time at Vox Populi for over two years now with my dad, andrew, who's been on the show a couple of times, and, as you know anything about us, you know that we are not a technology company. We're not an AI company. We don't have any direct AI services, but we are using it and we felt the need of what we know with RTO and what we do with our marketing, what we're doing with our own company and AI that there was an opportunity to talk about here today.
Speaker 1:It really kind of steps up when you're talking about AI. We're doing with our own company and AI that there was an opportunity to talk about here today. It really kind of steps up. When you're talking about AI and you talk about all the aspects of it, the first thing that I think of is am I going to lose my job? Is somebody that can use AI kind of replacing the podcast series? Are they going to be able to replace me at work?
Speaker 1:But then, as we got talking, we started to realize. I started to realize it's not as scary as I thought it would be, but more like a tool-based system. So I mean, in a general aspect, you tell me you know a lot more about it than I do. If I was to just say AI and I'm trying to introduce the term AI to somebody who doesn't know it as much but they are terrified that one day they're you know, whatever they're doing is going to be subjective to something else and it's going to be replacement because it's cheaper, faster. It doesn't think it doesn't go home. What do you say? What is AI?
Speaker 2:It can mean many things and it should mean different things to people in all different kinds of settings. The basic level thing in my mind, it's a tool. It's a tool that anyone, anyone can use, and it's also a revolutionary thing, like electricity, like the atomic bomb that's something that's big, but it's accessible to literally anyone and, um, there's so many ways you can use it.
Speaker 2:It's it's it's kind of a tool. I like to look at it like an x-ray machine, as it helps your eyes see past what your eyes can normally see. Ai can help your brain and help you process things faster than you're able to naturally.
Speaker 1:So you said accessible, right. How does somebody access AI? Because I already know that there are some simple ways that it's being introduced into my life, but if I wanted to access it, I want to for lack of a better term talk to AI and have it talk back to me. What are the avenues that somebody who doesn't know anything about AI go okay? Well, all right. How do I get to know this better?
Speaker 2:It's quite easy. You are using AI pretty much in everything you do nowadays on your phone, laptop, computer, car, anything much in everything you do nowadays on your phone, laptop, computer, car, anything because, whether or not you think you're using it, the service you're probably using has ai embedded into it in some sort of form. If you're wanting to actually go directly and use it like the most common way people talk about chat, gbt or any kind of bot like that, you, you just go online, go to your search engine, whatever you use, and type in Claude, type in chat, gpt, any search engine there, and you'll be able to start chatting with the AI bot as quick as you can. But again, like I said, you're using it every which way. You're on your phone nowadays. So you go to Facebook, facebook's, using it. You go to what app do you use on a daily basis? Amazon, amazon.
Speaker 1:Everything amazon does has ai embedded into it well, I, because I do see that you can look up something, or it has like an ai. We can almost kind of describe what it is you're looking for. I've noticed that when I go on to facebook now it's giving me options. I couldn't even tell you why it's giving me option, but it does Uh and and so I get. I get one of those side faces like are you trying to, what are you trying to figure out? Like, what are you trying to learn? But then the flip side of that is you search faster.
Speaker 1:You search by your normal terms and not by the you know as explicit terms, but the terms that are very direct. You know I'm looking for this, this and this, and you can actually just say I'm looking for a brown sofa. You know contemporary leather boom, there you go, and then it'll spit out all these options. Or you know washing machine, maybe a little bit larger glass top preferably. You know energy specific energy star rating or whatever on a 110, 220 dryer, whatever the case is, and it changes all this aspect of it. But then we always go back to okay, if that's the case, then are we replacing somebody on the other end? Is there somebody who's no longer going to be able to pay the groceries or pay the rent because we're doing this.
Speaker 2:No, I think with any invention or any new technology, there are things that change, but no matter what that's going. New technology there are things that change, but no matter what that's going to happen, there's things that go obsolete. With every little thing that comes out, it's more of just going to enhance things and if people are using it right, it's enhancing. So where you're seeing error with customer service, that should enhance customer service. You should be able to point people in the right direction before they just wander off and or get stuck on the phone talking to the wrong person.
Speaker 2:I do not think it'll take away anyone's job outside of anything. That's just naturally going to fade out, no matter what ai does or how big it is, because there's there's leaning views on how impactful it's going to be. There's people who think it's going to become everything. There's people who think there's just going to be another thing that people really aren't going to notice and it's not going to be this huge, monstrous thing. So I don't think there is going to be a big overtaking of everything and I don't think it's going to be. I don't think it's going to be fast. It's just making things better and I think if that's why we're emphasizing the importance of using it because, while I don't think it's going to take away someone's job, it should make your job easier. If you're not using it, you could get behind and your competitor who is using it?
Speaker 1:so it's it's just just go along for the ride so if you have because I know that it happens generationally you have an older aspect of people, the older geographic demographic. You know, in certain areas, like in rural areas, they probably don't see it as much more in the cities, when you have the Uber taxis in some place in San Francisco where they're driving by themselves right now, or you're in the city where you're looking for a train, you can talk to something that's going to give you back the train stops the times running late, not running late going to airports or whatever and you're more rural areas and your geographic areas where they just don't use it. You know, it's just not one of those things. I use my phone for a phone call and I might check my email, my Facebook, every once in a while, but I really don't use it that much all the time. How do you get those people to understand on both ends that, like you said, ai is a tool and not necessarily something that's going to replace who's on the other end of the phone?
Speaker 2:I think it's however, they can use it. So I think you and your life are going to use it differently than someone my age coming out of college might use it. You're going to find different needs. An older person might use it for something completely different. They might use it to assist them from doing things that they no longer want to do or finding things. There's so many tools out there to use that. I think if you just start trying things out and looking for things, and hey, what is an AI friendly tool for this? Whether it is a grammar chatbot or whether it is a shopping thing or organizer tool, whatever it is, it's, however, people are going to and it's going to take slower or less time, more time for other people to adopt than others, as every technology new thing does and just getting out there, really it is.
Speaker 1:Well, for instance, you've mentioned something that I really didn't know of until I actually started speaking. With BoxPod, you hear chat GPT. That's everywhere. That is the most well-known because that's just what started right, almost like it's Windex and Window Cleaner.
Speaker 1:We call everything Windex, because that's what came out first. It's the brand name for the product, right? But it doesn't necessarily mean that's what it is. So you know, you've got the Galaxy version, you've got the Alexa version, you've got every other version, but you mentioned Claude. So, as far as paid AI goes, because that's a whole different ballgame from what people use for free, right? So, if we're using that as an introductory course and how it works and how can I get something out of it, how does chat, gpt or Claude differ in that sense? And what exactly do you use that for?
Speaker 2:So, the difference between a chat GPT, a Claude or whatever it is. Those are chat bot names that different companies have created. Chatgbt is OpenAI's chat engine and within that they have different engines. So there's ChatGBT Mini and a bunch of different ones, and they're going to keep coming out with new ones. A variance of what?
Speaker 2:they do Right here. We use Claude on a daily basis and we have a paid version, and there are like three or four different kind of chatbots within Claude. So there's Claude 3.5 Sonnet, right now, which is their most intelligent model. There's Claude 3, opus, which excels at writing and complex tasks, and then there's another kind of normal chatbot, same thing with chat, with chat GBT. There's also ones like Grok, which Twitter has, or X, whatever you want to call it. There's also ones like GROK, which Twitter has, or X, whatever you want to call it. So, again, those are just certain companies or organizations, their chatbot. So if the RTO show came out with their own chatbot, that could become its own thing.
Speaker 1:Coming to you soon is the RTO show chatbot that we're going to be able to use. You can talk to my AI voice Because, the way I see it is, you know there's going to be the entry level somebody who probably won't use it as much or uses it very sparingly.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You have people who, like you said, the younger version of people coming out of college or using that iteration of I already out of college. Now I'm into my work and making that happen. And now you've got chat GPT. You've got chat gpt. You've got claude. You've got paid versions. So if there's free, why would I want to pay for it?
Speaker 2:I don't think you really need to pay for it yet. If you haven't gotten started and you just need to get started on something, you do basic things, just start using it. Chat gpt does not cost to start using. If you want to go see, go onto chatGBT and say, hey, what are some ways I can do X task, it'll tell you that you don't got to put credit card in, you don't got to send it a check, you just put that in.
Speaker 2:Now the paid version comes in handy when you are start using it more, when you want to use it for your company. For example, at Vox we only used a free version. Or people use their own different chat bots for whatever we use it for for a few months and then we're like all right, we had a certain buy-in and we got an account on cloud for the whole company and it gives you a certain level user. It gives you longer chat, um, usually more up-to-date information, because just because they're, I mean they're able to update the engines more, because these are huge computers. Basically, at the end of the day, these are huge information centers where these things are running from, so they're not always up-to-date Like a normal chat GPT. You're not going to just go on there and see what happened in the news yesterday. You're going to have a better chance doing that with a paid version.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, that makes a lot more sense then Okay.
Speaker 1:So then, if I'm, I guess I'm coming along. I want to get to know AI. I have the free version. I don't need a paid version. I start using it.
Speaker 1:Part of what I wanted to talk about and once we get past this introduction period is how many different ways that we can affect the lives of somebody in rent to own. How do we get them to understand it? Not only is this something that can be better, but I've also heard it's a tool, right, and so you're only as good as your tools, and your tools are only as good as you, right, so you can't take a chisel and you can't make a Mona Lisa, and you can't take a brush and fix the car. Right, there are different tools for different things. You've got to find the right tool for the right thing. So there's a way to use AI in your life that we're going to break down in the next five different episodes, where we're going to say, in this episode, we're going to tackle this and we're going to tackle this and tackle this, and how do you use AI to really get there, and we're going to tackle this and tackle this, and how do you use AI to really get there. But there are a lot of different versions of how we can make that happen, because, in essence, we're eventually going to be talking about office work right, and how does that work? And how does that make my office work better, faster, cleaner and give me more time to get away from my desk and advertising, and why it works in advertising better and what can I use it for. And I think one of the reasons that it interested me when we wanted to sit down and talk about this because so we did a live episode of the RTO show at RTO World this year and one of the speakers, you know, chip Guy, was talking that AI was going to take over not take over, but it's going to be more prevalent in what's going on. That's probably the biggest growing thing that's going on right now.
Speaker 1:He's not the only person who said that. I've had three other people mention it up to that point and I've mentioned it. It was even one of my vendor spotlights and it was like so what's the next thing that's coming up? You know what's happening. And Brian Rosen was like what else could it be? It's AI. And even at that moment, when we had said that just a couple of months ago, there were a couple of, like you said, different versions of things that came out. I had a phone update and all of a sudden now it's saying I can AI this and AI that and I can AI search. But the fact that AI is so prevalent now gives a lot of people worry, and so I want to bring back that veil of saying there is no reason to worry about it, especially at this point. I don't think they have Determinators loose quite yet.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But this is what you can use it for, how you can use it and a display of what can happen. Now, if you're breaking yourself into this, you said you start slow. How would you gradually move up? What do you think is a good way to get somebody to go from I have no idea what AI is to something that you're doing where you're actually paying some you know you're playing foreclaw to have everybody available to do this to help your everyday. You know day-to-day work.
Speaker 2:So you start somewhere with like anything. You start with the training wheels on, so you go on somewhere where you can't do much damage You're not going to break your business, you're not going to commit a crime, you're not going to hurt anyone's feelings at the end of the day by just going on a chatbot and using it for that. Then you start thinking about a way to get more comfortable with that and you start realizing what its capabilities are in that. Oh cool, this is really cool. And then that leads to other tools. So it's not necessarily a chatbot, but it's AI, integrated things with different platforms used within your company. If you look for it, pretty much any company you use for anything has AI in and out.
Speaker 2:Today I was listening to something earlier today. It was the Adobe CEO talking about AI, ai, ai, with their new products coming out. So your creative system, your accounting system, whatever you're using, is going to have ai involved with it and it's how you use those tools and you're just going to get more comfortable, naturally over time with using different things. So I think just start somewhere and you're going to start seeing it. It's going to become more prevalent in your mind. I didn't think a year ago I was like cool, whatever it is, I think it's only really the tech guys using it. They're using it in some weird way that doesn't really know. It's behind closed doors, it's not going to affect us, it's just going to be a thing that runs that no one really notices, right?
Speaker 2:But that's not the case and I think most people are waking up to that now that everyone can do something with it, literally from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep. So it's finding those tools and getting comfortable with it and knowing what it can help you with because it's not good for everything and we'll go into it over the next five episodes but it's not going to replace who you are as a human and what you do in your business and what makes you special. It never will. I don't think until I don't think we're all here no longer. So I think we're all going to be okay. But it's just getting comfortable and you learn so much every day and you're never going to learn everything. There's literally a new invention or a new company program coming out with it every single day. If you start watching the business news, every five minutes they're talking about what their new initiative is with the chips, with the sweets, with the chatbots. Everyone has their own chatbot now, which we'll go into, but it's getting crazy.
Speaker 2:It's all you hear now whether it's a customer thing or a business thing, everyone uses it, so it's just getting comfortable.
Speaker 1:So there's the other side of the coin too, because I've heard I've tried to do as much homework on this as I can and it's out there. Like you said, it's out there Every time you flip a page, every time you click a link, there's something going on out there. There's also the idea that if I start using a chatbot I'm not going to say which one, any specific brand but if I start using a chatbot, what the other side of the coin is? People say, well, it takes away the creativity of the user. You kind of start using it as a crutch.
Speaker 1:If I'm a reporter and I put in my several topics, boom, it comes out, I got it, I'm writing it. If I'm writing a paper for college, well then what do I do? I give it a couple of ideas. I say that, boom, I've got a complete college essay out there. I even heard somebody say you know what? Sell your book on Amazon, just put a couple of things together, get this paid version and the paid versions really aren't as expensive as somebody might think Boom, you get a book. And then, as the time goes on, I've heard the well, you become less creative because of it.
Speaker 2:What is your take on that? So it is something you got to be careful with, and that's where I think the take over the world, or mess things up for the worst of things, comes in plan, where it takes over things and it makes people not think anymore, and that's where the whole. You know people that go into the deep rabbit hole, the people in the basements just typing up their things and thinking the world's going to end tomorrow is the whole AI is going to become their own thing and they're going to be the superior species on the planet, which is it's that. That is something that we don't need to worry about now, in my opinion, because humans just become reliant on everything it does. So and it's easy to kind of get reliant on some things like, oh, just do this for me and write every single thing and you have to be careful with it, whether it is your marketing, your sales, your administration task, your daily life.
Speaker 2:You cannot rely on for everything. First off, it's not good for you and it's not going to give you what you're looking for, and it is going to have issues. They are brand new things coming out. This is like the car coming out back in the day. It is not perfect and not what it's going to be, so there's a balance to it with how you use it. Just balance it out and you'll be fine.
Speaker 1:How accessible is a chat bot on your phone? I know that I use it on a laptop, I use it on a desktop. I go in, I type it because I'm doing my work, but is it something that I can put in my pocket? And I'm not. I'm not just talking about the Alexa version, or I'm not just talking about, you know, the Facebook version, but an actual chatbot, gbt, that I can say. You know, I need some ideas of X, y and Z, or can you place this in an order of, you know, importance to least, importance of larger to not not so large or mass, whatever Is that also on a mobile platform, to where you can just kind of go into it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's what makes it so great and that's why there there's no excuse for anyone not just to have it available or know what you kind of can use it for. Again, I'm not saying you need to live your life and become a tech nerd and do everything with the, with the chat bot, and you need to become on your phone 24 7, but you can with, again, the same account I have on my laptop that I use for work every day with claude. I use the same app on my phone. Same account I have on my laptop that I use for work every day with Claude. I use the same app on my phone. Same account. It has the same stuff. So if I'm at work, I can type on the same thing. I can continue that conversation on my phone. If I'm sitting on the couch, same thing with all the other bots. They have apps wherever you're using it.
Speaker 2:Your phone's a computer. Our phones are AI powered, everything powered. You can do it on your phone so that, again, that's the whole thing it's. You can use it anywhere, anytime. You're standing in a line at mcdonald's, you want to, you're working on a project. You don't have to wait to go back to the office. You can continue while you're sitting on your phone instead of scrolling through facebook and looking at stuff that's probably not going to matter in 10 minutes brain rot.
Speaker 2:If you're working on a project, keep working on it. And it makes it so nice because, again, you might just be walking along on the weekend and you're like, hmm, what about this? You might have a thought come to your mind, put it down, see what it gives you. You can always go back to it. It'll say, hey, if you're in that same chat, save it for later. It'll go back to it. It'll save it for you can recopy it down later if you want to wait to put it into an email or work a project you're working on later that day so when you're when you're talking about uses, when you're talking about tools, what are some of the basic ways that I could use a chat, gpt?
Speaker 1:I can use a cloud, what? What are some of the basic things that I could say? You know you're right and now you got me thinking. Okay, there are plenty of times where I'm wasting my my time during the day not because I can't be doing something else, because I feel I physically can't right. Like you said, I'm in line.
Speaker 1:I'm doing something, I'm going somewhere now I'm waiting, or I'm in the car with somebody else. I'm not exactly at my office, but now you're saying I can not only can have it mobily, but I can use it to do things that I can probably make a lot faster.
Speaker 2:How do?
Speaker 1:I do that. What are some of the basic tools that AI has that I can say you know what? This is a great idea.
Speaker 2:So it's pretty basic and it's quite easy. Really, anything you put on Google, you can do that there. Again, depending on how up to date, what version you're using, you might not be getting exact yesterday's information, but if you're looking for hey, how do I do this kind of task? Or how do I give me a recipe for spaghetti, it can give you that. It's not going to give you hey again, what happened to the news yesterday? Because, again, most of them aren't that up to date. But use it for that. How do I write a good resume intro to put on my resume.
Speaker 1:Now we're in trouble If everybody starts doing that at Rent to Own. We don't want you going anywhere.
Speaker 2:Just like when I was in school there was these kind of tools started coming out where you could use grammar things and have things written for you. If you look and you actually read into something, you can tell when something is fully written. So don't go in just copy and paste something and copy it over Again. We'll go into all this with the different sales things and marketing things, but don't just copy it over. It's not going to. People are going to tell it's going to have errors that don't sound like you and who you are, and you got to balance your authenticity with AI and who you are and the. You got to balance your authenticity with ai. So really anything if you want to go, but it's great, for you have a. You have a paragraph that you need to send to someone in an email and you want just to look over.
Speaker 2:Hey, give me a grammar checker check for an ear that's what I use it for every single day, by making sure, just look through it one more time or how I could word this better, and it'll give you that. That's that's the easiest thing.
Speaker 1:Or organize these couple things that you have in a whole in a document, kind of just tell me what the important things are well, you know, as we're going through this and I going back to what you said about earlier iterations right, there was an earlier situation that kind of related to something newer and a little bit newer, and now we're getting updates every day with the AI bot kind of integrated in somehow, and so I remember when it first started, it was basically like an algorithm.
Speaker 1:Right, it was an algorithm out there and it had responses based on what you said, not necessarily an AI in the sense that, because I know they're close to a point, but I would say, if you said this, there was a simple response to that my name is John, what's yours, whatever it needed to be, it would say I'm the computer for Bank of America. Whatever the case is Nothing too integrated, but now it's not. What are the differences between the earlier algorithms? And, as you're saying, now we're talking about AI, how does it interact with you differently than the algorithm sense? When you're talking to AI, is it more like I'm talking to you now and I'm typing something in and it kind of just gives me a reference like hey, pete, how are you doing? This is what I'm typing.
Speaker 2:I don't know if you've seen the Google commercial lately. That's been going on during the NFL games that I watch, but it's all over. It's just people talking to their phones, yes, and, but it's all over. It's just people talking to their phones, yes, and it's like their version of their Siri and it's literally just people talking to it, kind of like it's their best friend. It's kind of weird, because we don't want to all just become friends with our phones and we're going to have no life.
Speaker 2:We're going to be relying on our technology phones. You can kind of do that. You can really just kind of talk to it Again. It's not just a hey, fix the errors in here. It's hey, let's have a talk through this with me. If you were just trying to go through something and get its opinions on something you've written, hey, talk to this with me. Get its opinions on something you've written, hey, talk to this with me. If you have a podcast you want to talk about and go through questions that might come up based off certain topics, you can do that Again. It's not a human, but it can kind of break down the different scenarios it sees from its knowledge. It's only going to give you what it knows, though. Now, it's not a human, so it doesn't process like us. It does it a lot faster. And it's not a human, so it doesn't process like us. It does it a lot faster and it's pulling differently. It doesn't have a motion, so you can be mean to it. Don't be mean to it, because it's just weird.
Speaker 1:You can have like an.
Speaker 2:Einstein, five-year-old, you know Right, you can be. Hey, just talk through a scenario with me. What happens here? I mean, we can try it out now if you have any kind of ideas in your head.
Speaker 1:How about we look up? Why should I not be afraid of AI? And you tell me who are we talking to. Is it Claude?
Speaker 2:I have it open, and the best thing about this is we can try out different versions and see what the difference it gives you. So we can try our paid version of Claude, we can pull up a free version of ChatGBT and we can also just ask Google, because, if you haven't noticed yet, every time you google something it's their ai, it's the gemini google, yes, which it's kind of just. It used to just give you suggestions or a suggested answer, but you can see how much better it is nowadays and how much more information. There's some things that I don't even have to ever click on a link anymore, and if you do, you can go back and see where you're sourcing it from. But it's so much better than it was even earlier this year. So you want to ask why we shouldn't be afraid of AI. Correct, let's see what it says.
Speaker 1:Now for everybody's watching the podcast. He's literally doing this in real time, so we're going to see real quick, on the introduction to AI podcast and the start of the six podcast miniseries. What's going on with AI? Well, we're going to find out right here. What does it say that we should do or not do. Should we be afraid of AI? And what does it say?
Speaker 2:See, ai doesn't do anything unless you reconnect to the Wi-Fi, so at the end of the day, it's not that powerful. So I simply asked why shouldn't we be afraid of AI? Okay, let me share a balanced perspective on this important question. While AI does present some legitimate concerns that we should carefully consider and address, there are several key reasons why excessive fear may be unwarranted.
Speaker 2:Number one AI systems like myself have clear limitations. We're tools designed for specific purposes, not general purposes autonomous agents. Three there's significant ongoing work in AI safety and ethics. Many researchers, companies and policymakers are actively working to ensure AI development remains beneficial and aligned with human values. And the last one four current AI systems work best in collaboration with humans, augmenting rather than replacing human capabilities. We're most effective when working together, combining AI processing capabilities with human judgment, creativity and wisdom. So, like we've been saying this whole time, it works with you. It's a tool, it's an assistant, in your own kind of words, to help you with things and just help save you time. That's the best way I can say to anyone that anyone in the RTO business, any business it'll save you time. I know we all complain about not having enough time to do this or do.
Speaker 2:X. How are we doing that? How can we be more efficient with our time? Are we wasting an hour on something that might only take five minutes? If we do it in a chatbot or do it in an AI service? That's how we use it. Bot or do it in an AI service? That's how we use it. One point I wanted to bring up here there's ongoing work in AI safety and ethics right. So the balance of government working to go against it in good ways and bad, and what companies are doing it. It's only going to give us right now what we give it. It's only going to learn and know things from that. It cannot go take something that someone hasn't programmed into it. So there's also that. That's another difference you'll notice in between different chat bots and different systems. There can be difference in how they say things or word things, and you can notice opinionated differences from certain companies.
Speaker 2:Uh, chat bots so really it's only going to give you what it, what, what it has again. So there, there it's there. So it's not just an unleashed animal like we see with many things nowadays. There's not just like the NIL and college football. It's not like that. I think we have AI much better control right now than we do with that. But again, right now it's a tool and that's why it's helping and there's things it's doing really well and I think it's going to continue to do that.
Speaker 1:Well, I agree with you 100 yeah, right now, what we wanted to do was just kind of give you an insight of what we wanted to talk about, how ai is here and what it's going to do for you. The truth is, one day we used to scoop sand with our hands and then we became a shovel and then we got one of these big excavators and, before you know, we're building these monstrous buildings because technology just built on itself. Well, here we are. We first started with our handwriting, then we got into word processing and it kind of just took care of us there. We got into computers where we're processing and everything else was built in and, before you know it, we're sending PDFs to our telephones just to get things done.
Speaker 1:Well, here is another iteration of AI and how we can make that work, simply by working with these tools. It's a tool that we're going to use every single day in Rent to Own and we're going to get into with you how to do that. So you're going to see me and Daniel going over it. I want you guys to know we do appreciate you spending some time with us. If you can see me on the podcast, I'm wearing the red team shirt that I got from Vox Populi. Listen, this is for. Why don't you explain it? Because this is something that I really believe in and I knew that as soon as I saw it I was going to take part in that. But, daniel, why don't you explain the red shirt?
Speaker 2:So the red shirt is. If you look on the right sleeve on Pete's shirt or any red shirt you might get from us, red is a organization stands for Remember Everyone Deployed. I don't know when we started doing it every day at Vox. We Remember Everyone Deployed. I don't know when we started doing it every day at Vox. We've done it with Buddies. We've done it with a couple other companies. We've really pushed it these past couple years.
Speaker 2:It's been easier to push around Veterans Day for obvious reasons, but we have put a program in this year where we are donating. I think it was $5 for every shirt or every item. It was going directly to the organization supporting family members, service members, all deployed. It's a pretty cool thing. At Vox it's again. Way before I started, a couple of years ago full time, we were wearing red shirt Friday. So whether it's just your polo, whatever red, we have our team meeting and the full circle of everyone is wearing a red shirt. It's pretty cool. And again, again, something we've been doing with some of our clients, like Buddies, Superior Rent to Own. They love it and we did some stuff for them this year. Great, it's just great to see people wearing it.
Speaker 1:So there was a goal right on top of this, because I know that we're talking about AAB, but I wanted you guys to know that you can get a hold of Vox at voxpopulicom and order your red shirt, because this is important not only for you but for them, knowing that they have a goal to reach. Is it a one million dollar goal that we're trying to reach?
Speaker 2:I think. So we got. Yeah, we have a. I think it's a one million dollar goal. The more the merrier um we don't have to stop at one million dollars we don't have to stop, we don't have to, we don't have to hit it. We are going to do and it's only going to go to a good cause. We enjoy it Again. It works into your corporate uniforms and it supports something well, so you might as well put your money to even better use. Well.
Speaker 1:I needed a shirt so I made sure it was a red one. Listen, we do appreciate you listening to the podcast today. We're starting on episode two very soon and that will come out to you and we're going to explain AI a little bit more and how it's going to help you. If you have any questions, please always hit up at the show, at Pete, at the RTO show podcastcom. If you want to get a shirt. Vox Populicom and I will tell you. We are on Facebook, instagram and LinkedIn. There's a big. I see Vox is doing really big on LinkedIn right now and you can see us on there. Always feel free to hit us up and I will tell you. Guys, as always, keep your collections low to get your sales high. Have a great one.
