Hey Pythonista,

I've spent the past couple of days in Sydney meeting people across industries, chatting, networking - all the stuff I love to do.

The immediate takeaway: it blows my mind how much and how quickly AI comes up in conversation without any prompting (pun intended).

Some tech leaders I spoke with wholeheartedly believed that the current AI hype will eventually lead to failure and devs will be needed to clean up the mess, while others embraced it completely.

For better or worse, the consensus was that AI and LLMs are the future and are here to stay.

Just as interesting though were the people in non-tech positions that wanted to talk about it. I met HR leaders who wanted to build engagement within their companies, as well as entrepreneurs wanting to speed up manual processes among other things.

It made me realise that AI really is a universal technology. It's not something reserved just for the technically minded. It's one of the few times we're seeing everyone out there paying attention.

I can't count how many people glaze over when I ask them if they know what Python is. Meanwhile, almost everyone has an opinion on AI!

This is why I think AI literacy is so important. Holding out and pushing against the tide doesn't help when people, like those close to me, are getting swept up in it whether they like it or not.

The industry really is moving fast and people and developers who embrace AI will stay relevant and thrive. As sad as it is, those that don't make the effort risk being left behind. That's why it's on us to keep learning so we can help build AI literacy in our communities.

It's also why we promote AI-assisted engineering in our coaching programs. We encourage clients to use AI to assist with coding, solving problems and troubleshooting infrastructure. At the same time, we also build awareness of the pitfalls that come with doing these things blindly.

What are you seeing in your world? How are the tech/non-tech people around you engaging with it? What are they saying?

I'd love to hear your thoughts so please join the conversation in our community using the link below!

Cheers,

Julian