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Human First AI Second : A Practical Approach to Success E168 · The FIT4Privacy Podcast | Exploring ISO Standards AI Privacy | Grow Skills Store

• 0:00
  I thought to myself, it seems silly now, but I thought, I
• 0:03
  really thought that that was, you know, immoral.
• 0:08
  I thought that it was wrong. The thought of creating like a
• 0:11
  username or having AI know who I was, my age, my personal
• 0:17
  information, I was terrifying to me and so helpful.
• 0:22
  It almost made me feel like I was able to express myself
• 0:26
  better than I could have without it.
• 0:30
  Like it really was motivating for me and it gave me that pull
• 0:35
  out of my writer's block. And so it had a huge impact on
• 0:40
  me. Hi, my name is Punit Bhatia and
• 0:42
  you're listening to Fit for Privacy podcast where AI meets
• 0:45
  privacy. This is not legal advice.
• 0:48
  Thanks for listening. Everyone is talking about AI,
• 0:52
  everyone is talking about technology, and everyone is
• 0:54
  saying that future is technology.
• 0:57
  Everything will be digital, everything will be
• 0:58
  technological. Yes, that is true, but I like to
• 1:02
  state it differently. Everything will also remain
• 1:05
  human. I think in my view, human 1st
• 1:08
  and AI or technology second is the recipe for success.
• 1:13
  Now why do I say that and how do others see that?
• 1:17
  Do others see the same way? And I found a person called JD
• 1:20
  McPherson who wrote a book, Human 1st and talks about
• 1:23
  similar concept in her words. And I invited her for a
• 1:27
  conversation in the Fit for Privacy podcast.
• 1:29
  So let's go and listen to her. And this is going to be even
• 1:33
  more relevant because we often talk about privacy, AI and
• 1:36
  technology, and we talk about the concerns, but it's also
• 1:39
  important to remain human. While it's important to
• 1:42
  implement ISO standards, while it's important to implement the
• 1:45
  GDPR and the EU Act, being human is important.
• 1:48
  And while you see at grow skills dot store the ISO 42,001 or
• 1:53
  other ISO standards, let's go and talk to Jerry McPherson and
• 1:57
  understand what does she have to say about human first year
• 2:00
  second approach. Hello and welcome to the Fit for
• 2:03
  Privacy podcast. And we are in an episode with JD
• 2:06
  McPherson. JD, welcome to the Fit for
• 2:08
  Privacy podcast. Thank you for having me.
• 2:12
  It's a pleasure to have you. And as a journalist, I like to
• 2:15
  ask you, I mean, you being a journalist, how do you see the
• 2:18
  space of technology, AI and so on?
• 2:21
  Because in the media, in news, there's no news without AI,
• 2:24
  there's no conference without AI, and there's no talk show
• 2:27
  without AI. But how do you see this space of
• 2:30
  technology and AI? Yeah, it's interesting.
• 2:33
  So I, I think coming from a writing background, so, you
• 2:38
  know, I was one of those sort of artsy kids when I was very
• 2:42
  young. I wanted to tell stories.
• 2:46
  I spent a lot of time writing in journals and I think a lot of
• 2:50
  people can relate to that. When you love reading and
• 2:52
  writing, it usually starts at a very young age.
• 2:55
  So that was me and I, I knew I wanted to be a writer and
• 2:59
  specifically I wanted to be an investigative journalist and
• 3:01
  sort of change the world with my words.
• 3:04
  You know, over the course of the last 20 years, like I went to
• 3:07
  journalism school in the middle of social media just becoming a
• 3:12
  thing, even online journalism, when I first started, I think I
• 3:15
  started journalism school in 2008 and there really wasn't
• 3:18
  even like we were still just looking at newspapers and
• 3:21
  television and radio. And in 2010, so we're only
• 3:25
  talking about 15-16 years ago, there was a shift in the
• 3:29
  journalism world into online journalism and it became
• 3:33
  something you could actually study.
• 3:35
  And at the same time, very, very soon after that, you started
• 3:39
  seeing a reduction in funding and a reduction in jobs in more
• 3:43
  traditional print media. And then with social media, you
• 3:46
  see almost everyone in a way, as a journalist, anyone with a cell
• 3:51
  phone can record what's happening in front of them and
• 3:55
  put it online in, in like a journalist would, right.
• 3:59
  And so the, the whole world of journalism and media over the
• 4:03
  last 15 years has completely shifted and changed.
• 4:07
  You also get now really you're, you're trying to get eyeballs,
• 4:11
  you're trying to get clicks. So the, the whole media world is
• 4:14
  around just getting someone to click.
• 4:17
  And what that means is that there's a huge amount of
• 4:19
  emphasis on a headline even more than 15 years ago.
• 4:23
  Because the headline, the 1st 5 words, that's what people read,
• 4:26
  that's what people see. And that's the impression that's
• 4:28
  gonna or any image as well. That's what's gonna make them
• 4:32
  click on it. And so with artificial
• 4:34
  intelligence, I think specifically for the media world
• 4:37
  and we can get into, you know, being a a writer and using AI as
• 4:42
  a writer as well. But for journalists and for
• 4:45
  media outlets, they're able to now use artificial intelligence
• 4:49
  to help get those eyeballs in an even more, you know, efficient
• 4:55
  way, which ultimately is how they make money is through
• 4:59
  click, getting clicks and getting eyeballs.
• 5:02
  So that's a really interesting conversation in and of itself.
• 5:05
  But the other part of it is so for example, I think the New
• 5:10
  York Times and a few others now have subscription where you have
• 5:14
  to pay a monthly amount. So you might see a headline in
• 5:17
  the first paragraph in a newspaper when you click on an
• 5:20
  article online, but then they won't let you see the rest.
• 5:23
  And I think the New York Times is even more, you know, you, you
• 5:26
  have to pay in order to even read any, any of the article,
• 5:30
  which is a fascinating turn of events where it's now a pay to
• 5:35
  play. People are willing to spend
• 5:39
  money for real, you know, quote unquote, real, authentic,
• 5:44
  written, investigated journalism and subscribe to that service
• 5:51
  and sort of drown out everything else which is trying to get a
• 5:55
  click or, or free or, you know, probably largely now utilising
• 6:01
  AI. So it's, it's really
• 6:04
  interesting. I think, I think we're in a
• 6:06
  time, a period in time, and we have been for the last 15 years
• 6:10
  where things in media and journalism are really shifting
• 6:13
  and changing. They have been, they continue to
• 6:17
  and the way that people make money and the way what success
• 6:22
  looks like, both for an individual writer and individual
• 6:25
  journalist and also for organisations and companies.
• 6:29
  I think the, the definition of what that looks like, including
• 6:32
  profits is changing all the time.
• 6:36
  And there's, I will say also a real push and pull, almost like
• 6:41
  a tug of war between advertising, which is
• 6:45
  essentially what where where you're trying to get someone to
• 6:48
  click, you're trying to get that eyeball the click bait.
• 6:51
  You're really getting paid through ads.
• 6:53
  So it's an advertising profit model versus a subscription
• 6:59
  model, which is no ads, you know, and then leaning into that
• 7:05
  more authentic, real, you have to pay in order to get into this
• 7:10
  private club kind of experience. So yeah, I think, I think it's
• 7:16
  fascinating. And Meta now like social media
• 7:20
  large like Meta is the name, right?
• 7:22
  I think their ad like I, I talk about this in my book a little
• 7:26
  bit. I did, I did a deep dive on
• 7:29
  revenue because same with media, it goes into AI just in general
• 7:34
  as a topic. How are large language models
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  going to make money, right? How, how are organisations going
• 7:41
  to make money? And advertising continues to be
• 7:45
  at the top of that. And that absolutely is true with
• 7:48
  media as well. And that's not new, like you
• 7:51
  might have picked up, maybe you see them sometimes, like
• 7:54
  lifestyle magazines, like Metro News is an example.
• 7:58
  In the UK and Canada, we have Metro News, essentially a free
• 8:02
  newspaper, a free magazine. It's not free, it's ads.
• 8:06
  Nothing is free. Nothing.
• 8:08
  Is free. All about ads.
• 8:10
  It's all about, as you rightly said, grabbing attention,
• 8:14
  gaining the eyeballs and getting them to click.
• 8:18
  And you mentioned the New York Times trying now to make that
• 8:22
  click a paid click because you have to subscribe.
• 8:24
  And so you give in the story, you get the attention, and as
• 8:28
  the person gets interested, maybe you'll read a few lines
• 8:31
  and then you have to pay. And that's where it's getting
• 8:34
  tricky. And you mentioned earlier that
• 8:36
  when you had a maternity leave and then when you came back, you
• 8:40
  were fascinated by this topic of artificial intelligence and how
• 8:43
  it's advancing, and you did some research.
• 8:46
  What did that research that you do about this artificial
• 8:52
  intelligence revealed to you broadly, apart from the things
• 8:55
  you already shared in a nutshell?
• 8:59
  Yeah, so as I mentioned, I, I come from this background of, of
• 9:03
  wanting to be a writer my whole life.
• 9:06
  I'm, you know, my degree is in journalism and theatre.
• 9:11
  I play the violin. I studied philosophy and
• 9:14
  undergrad. I I'm, I was always sort of the
• 9:19
  artsy kid, you know, I and I feel like coming in to this
• 9:27
  world we live in now. And especially as you say, I
• 9:30
  went on a maternity leave in 2004, which I, it felt like to
• 9:35
  me at the time I went on maternity leave, AI didn't even
• 9:38
  exist. Like large language models.
• 9:40
  Chach BT was not in common conversation.
• 9:45
  And then I returned to work last year and it was everywhere,
• 9:50
  right? And so I almost missed, it felt
• 9:53
  like to me at at the time, I missed the transition, like it
• 9:57
  was like all or nothing. And in the year and a half that
• 10:00
  I was off, that happened. And so when I, when I went back
• 10:03
  to work, it was 2000. It was, yeah, 2023 when I went
• 10:06
  on maternity leave. And I went back to work late
• 10:07
  late 2024, coming into 2025. And I had a friend, I write
• 10:14
  about it in the book, but I had a very, very close friend who
• 10:18
  sort of was like, you know, have you tried Chachi BT?
• 10:21
  And I was at the time I was having some writer's block and
• 10:24
  struggling coming back to work after being off for a year, a
• 10:29
  little over a year, really struggling trying to write, you
• 10:32
  know, 1000 word articles on a regular basis, which is what
• 10:36
  journalists do, writers do. And I was really struggling.
• 10:40
  And so my friend who I really trusted said, have you tried
• 10:43
  this? And at the time, I thought to
• 10:46
  myself, it seems silly now, but I thought, I really thought that
• 10:49
  that was, you know, immoral. I thought that it was wrong.
• 10:55
  The thought of creating like a username or having AI know who I
• 11:00
  was, my age, my personal information was terrifying to
• 11:05
  me. And yeah, like, I thought that
• 11:08
  it was. I thought it was immoral.
• 11:09
  I really thought it was almost like a sin to use AI to write or
• 11:15
  to help me be productive. And so I very nervously,
• 11:20
  tentatively started using it. And I used it like Google for a
• 11:24
  long time, and I think a lot of people are still using it like a
• 11:27
  Google search engine. But so I would be working on
• 11:30
  something and I would be like, you know, I literally used it as
• 11:32
  a thesaurus. So what's another word for being
• 11:35
  too cold? And then it would give me this
• 11:37
  like beautiful. Yeah, synonym, you know, in a
• 11:42
  way that was, it just felt good. Like it felt better than, for
• 11:47
  example, in Word, you know, you can right click and you get a
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  thesaurus right there. And that's been there for years,
• 11:53
  like, and that's the other part of this is artificial
• 11:56
  intelligence in some form. I think we've been living with
• 11:58
  for a long time. But Chatty or other one, Claude
• 12:02
  and some of these others, like it's a very different experience
• 12:04
  where you almost you get this like back and forth.
• 12:08
  And so at the time I was trying to write and it was so
• 12:11
  validating and so helpful. It almost made me feel like I
• 12:16
  was able to express myself better than I could have without
• 12:22
  it. Like it really was motivating
• 12:24
  for me, and it gave me that pull out of my writer's block.
• 12:31
  And so it had a huge impact on me as a young mom, as someone
• 12:36
  who wanted so badly to be a writer, continues to want to be
• 12:39
  a writer, still trying to be a writer.
• 12:42
  My experience with it was just right.
• 12:45
  It completely blew my mind and it was a very positive
• 12:48
  experience. And then I started using it more
• 12:51
  and feeling more confident and asking it questions and just
• 12:55
  being myself. And I started seeing my friends
• 12:59
  and my colleagues, even my husband really be anti AI.
• 13:05
  So that was a big also a motivator 'cause I couldn't
• 13:09
  believe it. I was calling my parents, I was
• 13:11
  calling my friends, I was talking to my husband and nobody
• 13:15
  wanted to use AI. They thought it was, you know,
• 13:19
  same sort of thing, privacy issues, maybe it's cheating.
• 13:23
  And again, in my circle, most of my friends and colleagues are
• 13:27
  writers, musicians. They do fall into that category,
• 13:33
  I guess. Like not as much technically
• 13:36
  savvy. Like they're not necessarily the
• 13:40
  same as me. Like, I'm not a a write, like
• 13:43
  I'm not a tech bro, you know, So there was a lot of resistance in
• 13:48
  my immediate life. And it has resistance, but I
• 13:52
  like to pinpoint on one point, which you mentioned, sure, you
• 13:55
  mentioned that you felt it was cheating.
• 13:58
  Now there's a group of, I understand the reluctance to use
• 14:01
  it, concerns around privacy, concerns around should I
• 14:05
  shouldn't I? But there's another group of
• 14:07
  people like you mentioned, your friends and your family.
• 14:09
  They're reluctant, but there's another group because most
• 14:13
  people start like that and you mentioned you were also
• 14:15
  reluctant, but by using it and over time you overcame
• 14:18
  reluctance. So reluctance you overcome like
• 14:20
  that. But then the other aspect is you
• 14:23
  generate content. You can't generate images, you
• 14:26
  generate writing or articles or or maybe ask you to edit your
• 14:30
  article, improve your article, suggests changes.
• 14:33
  And there the two, there's a school of thought who say it's
• 14:36
  plagiarism. Of course, if you copy somebody
• 14:39
  else's text, it's plagiarism. If you use AI for assistance,
• 14:43
  it's different. If you use AI for generating and
• 14:46
  creating and dumping it in your name, that's different.
• 14:48
  But what's your view? Do you think using AI for
• 14:51
  creative work like journalism, like writing book cheating, is
• 14:56
  it ethical? Is it plagiarism?
• 14:58
  Is it breach of intellectual property rights?
• 15:00
  What's your view on that dimension?
• 15:05
  Yeah, I think this is AI think this is a really fascinating
• 15:08
  subject and I think it's complex.
• 15:13
  I think though basically my answer is no, I don't think it's
• 15:16
  plagiarism to use AI to help you write something.
• 15:21
  But I mean, I think there's there's the part that makes So
• 15:24
  what I think is critical thinking skills.
• 15:27
  It's, it's about a return to the thing that makes something worth
• 15:33
  reading, something compelling, something thought provoking,
• 15:39
  something that engages both yourself and others around you.
• 15:43
  And that's where I think the, the ethics around specifically
• 15:47
  around this, like plagiarism or cheating, like like high school
• 15:52
  students using AI to like write a, an essay or something like
• 15:56
  that. I think that it, it puts a lot
• 16:00
  more demand on the teacher. I think that professors and
• 16:06
  teachers are put in a position now where assigning an essay or
• 16:14
  a multiple choice, you know what I mean?
• 16:17
  You can't anymore. The and I actually think it's,
• 16:20
  it's more about supporting our educators to come back to this
• 16:26
  place of OK, so this is AI is here.
• 16:31
  You know, it's not going anywhere.
• 16:32
  Being able to solve math equations, being able to
• 16:37
  generate text very quickly. You know, that's not going
• 16:41
  anywhere, but being able to think outside the box, being
• 16:45
  able to take something that AI has generated and then making it
• 16:51
  worthwhile, right? That is where things for me
• 16:56
  start getting really interesting.
• 16:57
  And it's, and it's where I wish more people, I wish more people
• 17:02
  were putting a voice to that because there are so many like
• 17:06
  myself, There are people like we're going through this
• 17:10
  incredible period of time, right?
• 17:13
  And I feel like we need, now more than ever, people like
• 17:18
  ourselves, people who are willing to engage critically and
• 17:22
  talk about it. Use AI, push AI, explore AI, you
• 17:28
  know, use it for art, use it for writing and then document that
• 17:33
  process. And we have to allow for people
• 17:37
  to do that and you can't. So for me, I can't write.
• 17:41
  I have my book right here. I'm going to show you I can't
• 17:43
  write a book about AI without using AI.
• 17:46
  And you can't punish, you know, you can't punish.
• 17:49
  You shouldn't be punishing people like artists as well, I
• 17:53
  think are falling into this category where like I think I
• 17:57
  saw Comic Con. I don't want to like put them on
• 17:59
  blast specifically, but book fairs, you know, advocates,
• 18:05
  right? This is what I'm saying.
• 18:06
  Like people who are organisations who are supposed
• 18:10
  to be really supporting independent authors, artists are
• 18:16
  sort of banning AI use. And that I think is a mistake.
• 18:22
  I think that we should be having more conversations about what
• 18:28
  ethical AI use looks like and put like saying that it's just
• 18:34
  cheating using AI like carte blanche, banning books from book
• 18:39
  fairs or, you know, from Book Awards because they've used AI
• 18:44
  just carte blanche. You know, of course, upsets me
• 18:49
  from like coming from a a perspective where I didn't just
• 18:54
  get a book from ChatGPT and put it in the world, right.
• 18:59
  I'm trying to engage with this in a critical way and there's a
• 19:02
  lot of people doing that and and having these conversations and
• 19:09
  yet they're being penalised. No, I agree with you.
• 19:12
  I think the human element is very important.
• 19:15
  The AI and human will coexist rather than AI or human.
• 19:20
  It's not an or question. It's an and question.
• 19:22
  How do you coexist and how do you use your humanity not for
• 19:26
  mundane tasks, but for critical thinking, for using it to make
• 19:30
  it more unique and your perspective.
• 19:32
  So if there's anybody could write an average book 10 years
• 19:36
  ago, but to write a good book and with the help of AI, if you
• 19:40
  can develop it further and make it an excellent book, that's
• 19:43
  where AI is to be used. The idea, the thought, the
• 19:45
  concept, the inputs have to be yours, but they have to be
• 19:48
  enriched, they have to be refined and they have to be
• 19:50
  helped. As if an assistant would do it
• 19:53
  for you. But you mentioned earlier that
• 19:56
  you have written this book Human again.
• 19:59
  So I fully agree with the title. I haven't read it yet.
• 20:07
  If there's any time to be human in the history, it's now, and
• 20:10
  it's now from now on. Because earlier you could live
• 20:14
  sleeping Lee, or half awake or half conscious.
• 20:17
  But if you have to be alert, if you have to be alive, and if you
• 20:20
  have to be in this AI world going forward with robots around
• 20:23
  you in 10 years, you got to be human.
• 20:26
  You got to be able to differentiate and you got to be
• 20:29
  alive and kicking. So what is this book Human again
• 20:32
  all about? It's about exactly what you're
• 20:34
  saying. Like what?
• 20:35
  Where you're saying basically what we're both saying is the
• 20:39
  baseline, it was here and now it's here, right.
• 20:43
  So the first draft like everyone is going to have access to a
• 20:49
  certain level for free immediately, right?
• 20:53
  Like whether it's today, a year from now, five years from now.
• 20:57
  And So what is going to make somebody succeed and thrive in
• 21:03
  their day-to-day life, but I think especially in their
• 21:06
  workplace is their ability to express themselves, their
• 21:13
  confidence, their taste, their perspective, their uniqueness.
• 21:18
  And to use your words, to be able to refine it, to Polish it,
• 21:24
  to put their own stamp on whatever it is that they're
• 21:29
  working on is going to become the maybe not 50 years from now,
• 21:35
  but in the coming 51015 years from now, I think it's going to
• 21:38
  become absolutely imperative. And I, and so that's what the
• 21:43
  book's about. And, and so and I talk about how
• 21:45
  we do that. And So what I, one of the
• 21:49
  chapters that I again feel so passionate about is that I say
• 21:54
  the liberal arts are going to have a massive comeback.
• 21:57
  So right now and for the last, I think several decades really, at
• 22:02
  least for me, my generation, my parents and many of my friends
• 22:06
  parents, you know, it was engineering lawyer, doctor, like
• 22:12
  there's, there's a set amount of business, there's a set amount
• 22:15
  of professions that our parents sort of wanted us to do to get a
• 22:19
  job right, to succeed. And so the liberal arts largely
• 22:23
  are kind of they've, they've taken a back seat in a lot of
• 22:27
  universities, I think around the world.
• 22:29
  So in, in other words, education for education's sake, right?
• 22:33
  So going and, and studying philosophy, studying English
• 22:36
  literature, of course, these are still important and they're
• 22:40
  vital, but I do think that they've, they're going to become
• 22:45
  almost mandatory, like in order for you to really succeed in
• 22:52
  life with artificial intelligence pretty much across
• 22:55
  every sector, the ability to think critically.
• 22:59
  And in my opinion, that comes from things like travelling,
• 23:03
  right? Going and seeing other places,
• 23:06
  experiencing other cultures, looking at art, making feeling
• 23:11
  uncomfortable, being bored, listening to music.
• 23:16
  Those are things that make us feel human.
• 23:19
  They make us feel things and, and ultimately they help us sort
• 23:25
  of become ourselves, become unique, have our a unique
• 23:30
  perspective and develop, develop those things, develop our taste
• 23:34
  and our confidence and our point of view, and then apply that
• 23:40
  when using artificial intelligence.
• 23:44
  And, and, and I just think that's such a, if it's true what
• 23:48
  I'm saying, what a cool like, and like for me, it's just like,
• 23:55
  you know, like it just makes me feel so good to think that 10
• 24:01
  years ago it would have been computer science.
• 24:03
  And maybe 10 years from now it's going to be studying literature.
• 24:07
  You know what I'm saying? Human first, AI 2nd, and that's
• 24:12
  the going to be the recipe for success in future because
• 24:16
  previously you could be human tech or techie, but now it got
• 24:20
  to be human first. Bring in your humanity, bring in
• 24:23
  your salience, bring in your critical thinking, bring in your
• 24:27
  skills, bring in your idea, bring in your concept.
• 24:30
  And then use AI to develop it. Then use AI to further it, to
• 24:34
  enrich it, to make it look better and do it for you.
• 24:38
  So AI is going to be your assistant, AI is going to be
• 24:42
  your partner who makes you more powerful, more better, more
• 24:46
  sharp, more relevant. And with that, if people want to
• 24:51
  get access to this book or want to talk to you, what's the best
• 24:55
  possible way to get handle on this book?
• 25:00
  It's available, I think pretty much everywhere.
• 25:02
  Barnes and Noble at Amazon. You can just Google human again
• 25:06
  in the AIH. JD McPherson.
• 25:08
  My e-mail is jd.mcpherson1990@gmail.com.
• 25:13
  I'm also on Instagram handle at JD McPherson.
• 25:20
  But yeah, no, yeah, I think that's and I also have a
• 25:22
  website, but I think it's all pretty easy to find online.
• 25:27
  Good. Yeah.
• 25:27
  These days it's easy to find people online as long as you
• 25:30
  want to, and that's where the human aspect comes in.
• 25:34
  But with that, I would say it was wonderful to have you in
• 25:38
  this human first, AI second approach and hear your thoughts
• 25:42
  about it. And I would love to get a handle
• 25:44
  on your book. And thank you so much for being
• 25:47
  here. Thank you so much for having me.
• 25:50
  Pleasure. Thank you for joining us on the
• 25:53
  Fit for Privacy podcast. We hope you found today's
• 25:56
  conversation valuable and thought provoking.
• 25:58
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