AI hits plywood

Friday 10 February 2023. – Lately, there has been a lot of fuss around artificial intelligence and the ChatGPT application. The company behind, OpenAI, has started a race where the search engine giants are followers. Once again, somebody coming from the outskirts of the industry is disrupting the market. That’s refreshing.

I have my head so deep in the wood that I didn’t expect changes in search engines. Now things cascade quickly. This week Microsoft’s Bing renewed its search field, and also Google came out saying that they’ll launch Bart AI.

During the week I’ve tried several times to access ChatGPT without success. All the publicity has directed plenty of traffic to the site and it is at its capacity. While not able to access it, I’ve used the time wondering what would I ask the “robot” to write, once I get the line open. Here are some options:

  • Write a prognosis of the plywood market in 2023.
  • Write a report on the Russian plywood industry development.
  • Write an explanation to a customer why plywood delamination has happened even though our production has no glue what has happened. 
  • Write a short explanation to a customer about why the plywood prices are increasing. 
  • Write a short text to a customer about why the plywood delivery is late. 
  • Write a polite email to a plywood supplier that you want to cancel some orders.
  • Write arguments to a plywood producer about why it pays off to invest in a new veneer sorting line.
  • Write a compact strategy for a poplar plywood company.

Plywood is a niche business. It will be thrilling to see how precise answers the machine can provide when it comes to industry-specific issues. Will it be flawless or out in the woods? Could this be something that could help plywood purchasing, sales, production, or marketing already in 2023?

Before getting the answer I have to be patient and wait in line for ChatGPT. While waiting more writing requests will pop up. Like “write a blog post to Plywood This Week”. If the chess player Garry Kasparov lost to IBM’s Deep Blue already in 1997, I’m severely afraid that I will lose the blog writing competition to AI in 2023.