Confessions of a (Recovering) Luddite Working in AI

Before anyone comes at me: no, I've never actually been a Luddite (sorry for the clickbait).

I've spent most of my career around technology. I studied it, worked in tech, innovation consulting, payments, and even started building my own startup for a hot second.

BUT I've also always been skeptical of overly simplistic narratives around technology and that all its uses are good.

I never bought into the metaverse. I still don't know what to think about crypto. I haven't started tracking all my sleep and steps. And while I've certainly been wrong before, I've never been convinced that every new platform, tool, or system would or should fundamentally change the way humans live and work.

And yet, here I am, working in AI.

Being somewhat of a skeptic, "surfing the AI wave" wasn't really the deciding factor for me. What convinced me was the team I joined.

At micro1, I wasn't met with unquestioning optimism or neatly packaged answers about AI. What I found instead was a group of highly intelligent people asking a lot of thoughtful questions.

Not just "What can AI do?" but "How does it change the way people spend their time, attention, and energy?" "Where does human expertise matter most?" and "How do we build technology that actually helps people do more of what they are uniquely good at?"

I encountered a deep respect for human expertise. Whether it's researchers pushing the frontier of science, engineers building systems, doctors making clinical decisions, lawyers navigating nuance, journalists validating information, or countless others who have spent years developing their fields, there's a recognition that this knowledge matters. It's the very thing progress should build upon.

The future of AI (and humanity) isn't shaped by replacing expertise. It's shaped by learning from it, building on it, and using it to unlock even more space for human discovery, judgment, and creativity.

That vision was refreshing. Not because it replaced my questions with answers, but because it took the questions into account as we shaped the future of frontier technology.

Humanity is still scratching the surface of what's possible. What excites me about micro1's  isn't the belief we should have AI will do the scratching for us, but rather, that it can help us scratch deeper.

Maybe that's the version of AI I've found hardest to be skeptical of.