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The BLC Connection Podcast is a fun and informative show from Ben Lomand Connect that answers your questions about the internet, Wi-Fi, home security and more, and brings you information on the stories and events in “Ben Lomand Country.” Bryan, Karen and Micah take you behind the scenes of Ben Lomand Connect, where the cooperative connects Middle Tennessee with the latest in communications technology and with businesses that are making a difference in our service territory. The BLC Connection Podcast also offers tips for business marketing and residential/workplace technology.
Bryan Kell:
We've got the whole crew here. It's a BLC Connection Podcast.
Karen, what do you have waiting for us in community connection?
Karen Wilson:
A lot. We're going to talk football.
We're going to talk fares. We're going to talk Wi-Fi fans.
So lots coming up. We're going to have some teasers about all the
things going on this fall.
Bryan Kell:
Okay. Micah, technology connection.
What you got?
Micah Lawrence:
We're going to talk about this buzzword of A.I.
or artificial intelligence. It's going to be great.
Bryan Kell:
Okay. And up next we've got the corporate connection.
And it's with our Warren County 911 Director,
Chuck Haston.
So with all that being said, let's do this thing.
I'm Bryan.
Karen Wilson:
I'm Karen.
Micah Lawrence:
And I'm Micah.
All Hosts:
Let's get connected.
Bryan Kell:
Welcome back to The BLC Connection Podcast.
I'm Bryan Kell. We are joined in here to talk all things 911 by
Warren County 911 director,
my former boss at one time, Chuck Haston.
Chuck, welcome into the podcast.
Chuck Haston:
Thanks for having me.
Bryan Kell:
Okay, now 911. Let's probably just start with the basics.
Walk us through the process of a call coming into 911,
and I know what you're probably gonna say.
What kind of call?
Chuck Haston:
Right. Where's the call originate?
Yeah. And so there are a couple of different pathways.
If it's a wireless device, cell phone.
This includes things like OnStar,
telematics they call it.
Your cell phone detecting a crash.
Those are all events that trigger a call to 911.
Wireless calls use a network. We used to call it Net TN.
Now it's the Next Gen 911 network.
So you're out there with your cell phone,
you dial 911, it reaches a tower.
The tower immediately starts to try to calculate where you are.
That information is provided to us.
I mean, lightning fast. You don't really even notice it.
But it takes a pathway where that call is switched.
In other words, it jumps on the 911 phone side of the of the
network,
and that switching takes place in Nashville.
Then it's routed back to us. That's for a wireless device or
sometimes VoIP
operates that way. Here, Frontier landlines and all wireless
devices and
any wireless device takes that pathway.
If you make a call from a Ben Lomand landline,
we went a little old school with
that. You may recall back was it 2 or 3 years ago when the fellow
decided to blow up the building in
Nashville, that contained 911 switching gear.
The only thing that worked were Ben Lomand landlines.
That's all we had. So that switched locally.
It doesn't take that pathway out of town.
And we're using the traditional pathways.
The term is called CAMA trunk, but it's a wired connection,
so to speak.
But all that switched here. So we're not subject to that problems
out on the larger network.
But they all get to us eventually,
but there is a difference between a wireless device and regular
landlines.
Bryan Kell:
I was going to say your time in the central office,
this is all like –
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah, oh,
Bryan Kell:
This is all this stuff you –
Micah Lawrence:
I was going to say, you are definitely familiar with this.
Chuck Haston:
But I'll finish that with it arrives at 911 here,
and that call is processed through our system.
And we have a couple of ways to locate people that work quite
well.
So but it's a big network out there.
Karen Wilson:
In thinking of the information and the communication that has to
go into being a 911 dispatcher,
talk to me, I guess, about your team and the skills that they
need to be a 911 dispatcher.
Chuck Haston:
Sure. You know, I always say that being a 911 dispatcher is
unlike any job anywhere else,
at least that I've been around. But the first thing that you look
for is someone who has a real desire to help people.
It's that basic. You know, you want to help.
You want to be part of the solution.
So we look for people who have that mindset.
The second one is being able to juggle all the inbound pathways
of information that you have.
Radio, ten channels, pathways to 911 via,
you want to call it phone lines,
you can, 17. Fax machines. State calling on a special network.
So it's like sometimes drinking out of a fire hose really.
So you have to find people who can juggle that drink out of a
fire hose while you're on a unicycle,
you know? So, you know, be able to prioritize in the moment and
address what's most important next.
Karen Wilson:
And I guess they are, of course,
trained in all of the proper procedures and whatever medical help
that the person on the line needs until the ambulance service can
get there.
Or until first responders can get there.
Chuck Haston:
Right. All of our dispatchers, the official name now is
telecommunicators,
but there's a lot more to it than that.
But all of them are certified what's called EMD,
emergency medical dispatching.
And that's a course that you have to complete,
so that you can use these protocols.
We have written protocols for different types of medical events,
whether it be traumatic or an illness type.
So it takes about a year to really get good and confident at the
job.
So when you hire someone you know you have a long term.
It's not a sprint; it's a marathon.
Karen Wilson:
Yeah. Well, I was going to say it could be to me a very emotional
job too.
You know, you are the lifeline for someone who is in desperate
need of help.
And I would think it would be – you have to have some tough skin,
I would think.
Chuck Haston:
You do. A 23 year old dispatcher who comes into a job,
I always tell them,
"Look, you know, you're going to make more decisions that impact
people's lives directly your first day than someone else might
make in a career. So it's a serious job." But I also tell them
that by learning how to do it by the
book, best practices, you've given that person the best chance of
a positive outcome.
So yeah, you know, someone new coming in that has a little
different view of the world now than when they
started. We do something that's come up,
and you alluded to it a little,
and that is the mental health part of it.
Because if you sit all day and you are processing these calls,
some of which are quite graphic and
–
Bryan Kell:
Intense.
Chuck Haston:
Intense. How do you unwind from that?
So that's something that we as an endeavor.
I mean, 911 as a whole have started taking real seriously.
And, you know, even I mean, I think our local agencies,
field agencies,
have done the same thing. Certainly it's different when you see
things than when you hear things.
But I don't know. But that's something that we've really ramped
up.
Karen Wilson:
I think a lot of, we've become more mental health aware and jobs
such as social workers,
911, EMTs, all of them. They've got to guard against their own
mental health,
too, so they can be there to help others as well.
So I get that.
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah. So you you hinted on it earlier about,
you know, cellular calls and things like that,
being able to pinpoint people's locations and things like that.
So, you know, I know with kind of the traditional phone lines,
that was probably easy because you got a database tied to a
phone, but you know, which has an address and all that good
stuff.
But, you know, what's the the reliability of when they make a
cell phone call that that location is pretty accurate.
And, you know, I think working with some of the other 911s,
you are branching out into some new things,
like maybe being able to send them a link to start doing a camera
call with them or something like that.
Are you guys experimenting with that or?
Chuck Haston:
Well, as far as new technology goes and locating people.
We're actually in, I did want to mention,
that we are a text to 911 center.
So you can text us here.
Bryan Kell:
Okay.
Micah Lawrence:
Okay. Cool.
Chuck Haston:
And I know that Director Dodson in Van Buren County,
same thing.
So that's kind of the standard these days is for all text to 911.
So the question is, how do you locate a text?
Can we do it? The answer is yes.
Most times we can locate where that text message is coming from.
We also have the capability to,
and this is, I think, what you're talking about,
which is let's say that you are on the phone with us,
and it's a challenge to try to locate where you are.
We can send you a link. You accept that link,
and then it provides the information to us about specifically
where you are. And that can be accurate down to about ten feet.
Bryan Kell:
Wow.
Chuck Haston:
The government solution I'll call it,
the triangulation method, meaning,
you know, the tower in the field.
You're this far from this tower.
You're this far from this tower.
And you're reaching both at this.
They call it angle of attack, but that's a little less accurate.
And the accuracy there is about,
you know, 300-400ft.
The reliability of it is a lot better now than it used to be.
So, we are reliably able to find cell phones.
But still, you have to remember,
landlines have a wire, and that wire doesn't move.
Micah Lawrence:
Yes.
Chuck Haston:
So when it gives us that location,
we know that's where that call is coming from.
And there's a difference.
Micah Lawrence:
Yes.
Chuck Haston:
I always encourage folks. I don't want to use the word elderly.
Maybe our more senior friends. Keep that landline.
If you, you know, have a cell phone,
but keep the landline because that's a surefire way right now
that we know where you are without delay.
Bryan Kell:
I think most of us here watch some crime shows from time to time
and,
you know, in documentaries about the role that 911 recordings
have played in helping crack cases.
Can you speak of any firsthand dealings with this and/or stories
i guess throughout the industry lately that showcase the
importance of those recordings and the technologies used?
Chuck Haston:
I can tell you that at the local level,
we are supplying law enforcement,
district attorney, the court system records all the time.
Our operations director is engaged in that a lot,
investigations.
But I can give you, you know, 23 years,
things kind of run together,
but I can think of a couple of interesting examples.
One happened about 15 years ago where the individual called 911.
Well, as soon as you hit the one,
the recording starts.
So we're recording before we pick up the phone.
Bryan Kell:
Wow.
Chuck Haston:
And we received a call, and the records were requested.
And before we picked up, there was a discussion about flushing
things so that evidently gave reasonable suspicion that,
okay, well, must be more going on.
And there was. And that was just kind of a fluke.
Bryan Kell:
Yeah.
Chuck Haston:
Another interesting one. This has more to do with data than
recording that I thought was interesting was again ten years
ago perhaps. There was a this was kind of out in an area where
there wasn't great coverage,
cell phone wise. And there a gentleman killed another one.
He killed him. Left. And his defense in court was that it was
self-defense.
And the proof was that immediately after leaving,
he was making attempts to call 911.
So in the system, our system would log attempts whether or not we
answered or could answer that call.
So it was just a little bit out of range,
intermittent coverage,
but they used that data to defend to claim self-defense,
which I thought that's one of the few
in my time where they actually dug into.
Okay. What is your your call processing system recording as far
as transactions.
So that was a couple of interesting ones.
And I believe that that case, I believe it was successful for
that person,
that he didn't just kill somebody and take off.
Kill someone, and then tried repeatedly to reach 911 in an area
where he just didn't have good coverage.
But that was presented in court,
which I thought was kind of interesting.
Karen Wilson:
Might be the difference in the sentence that the person receives.
Chuck Haston:
I believe it was.
Karen Wilson:
I would think so, yes.
Chuck Haston:
I can't speak officially for, but yeah.
Micah Lawrence:
So you've talked about, you know,
the recording of the phone calls.
You've talked about, you know, being able to triangulate cell
phones,
text to 911, all that good stuff.
Obviously, that's technology. That's technology,
and I know from the the 911 centers we've worked in,
it just seems to constantly change.
From your perspective, you know,
what are you seeing?
Are you seeing a lot of technology change?
You're seeing, is it making leaps and bounds?
Is it just kind of, you still hanging on to some older stuff?
What are you kind of seeing in your side?
Chuck Haston:
Yeah, it's all that. It's all of that.
Bryan Kell:
Easy answer.
Chuck Haston:
Because we have to move hopefully at the speed of the available
technology.
Like when a new pathway emerges,
like, you know, one of these watches you make phone calls on,
not to mention brands. But okay,
how do we handle that?
You know, how does that get to us?
Do we have the technology to process those events that come from
these devices in the field?
So like, much like you all, we're always looking for that next
thing.
One in particular that we implemented,
and we've had this probably eight years,
is a system called Rapid SOS. There was a story in Metro
Nashville about them using that.
That is integrated into our 911 system.
And if you're a propeller head,
you might appreciate this is.
It gets data from that cell phone off of what they call the
transport network.
It bypasses all the switching, all the gear,
say, in Nashville, and it provides it to us.
So we get two methods of locating a call at once.
That's pretty interesting. But,
you know, the next thing on the horizon would be video.
And my question always is, "Okay,
it's great if the dispatcher sees it,
but how does the police officer see it in the moment?
How would a deputy see it? How does fire see it?
Our local in the city, our fire department and police department
–
Bryan Kell:
City of McMinnville, we should say.
Chuck Haston:
Yep. Have mobile data terminals.
So they have laptops in the vehicles that are connected to our
system.
So they see things real time. That would be the pathway for that,
on the city side. And hopefully,
you know, our county agencies will take a look at the higher
level of technology we're able to serve.
And all being on the same platform is kind of a new thing.
And, but yeah, video is one of those that we struggle with a
little bit because,
yeah, we see it, but we can, you know,
you sit there and describe it,
but really the people going to it need to see it.
Micah Lawrence:
So later in our show here we're going to be talking about AI.
Any of the conferences you've been going to,
do you see anybody integrating stuff like that to –
Chuck Haston:
Yes.
Micah Lawrence:
Maybe help out? What kind of stuff are you seeing?
Chuck Haston:
I'll give you an example. Hamilton County 911.
Now, all you're 911 centers. You know,
we're always looking for good people.
It's hard to to find people who you find good folks,
but maybe they're just not geared for the job.
It's a tough job. So what Hamilton County did with their
non-emergency phone numbers is
incorporated an AI system.
Micah Lawrence:
Okay.
Chuck Haston:
And so, you know, that's doing some of the work,
but it's not because they wanted to get rid of people.
It's because everyone has a hard time finding people for the
positions.
That's what's driving AI in the 911 world.
But I would hate to think that an emergency call would be routed
to an AI.
I'm just. I'm old school.
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah.
Chuck Haston:
Someone needs to be there.
Micah Lawrence:
But I think what would be good is kind of like what we use it for
is more of almost like a knowledge base.
Being able to find the answer quickly to maybe something that's
going on out there but.
Chuck Haston:
You know, as far as in the moment AI use,
we're not quite there.
I can think of an example that would be quite good,
quite good application for that.
And that would be hazmat events.
We use a book. We look in it, you know,
placards on vehicles, finding out the best way to treat that
scene through AI would be an interesting concept.
Micah Lawrence:
Oh, great.
Chuck Haston:
You made me think of that. I haven't thought about it before.
Karen Wilson:
So when someone is, you know, sitting there with the phone in
their hand,
and they need to keep in mind 911 versus 311.
Kind of tell us the difference between the two and maybe give us
some examples.
Chuck Haston:
Yeah. You know, the 311 system is more informational type things.
And that's kind of a transparent thing for us.
Those come through our non-emergency numbers and really
informational things.
Karen Wilson:
Like you're reporting someone speeding or someone driving
recklessly,
something of that nature possibly?
Chuck Haston:
Well, the 311 is more like community information,
but
668-7000, which is our non-emergency line,
that would be the case would apply to the scenario
you were given there. But 911, when you dial 911,
that triggers a few extra things like
location and 668-7000 doesn't have that.
It's just a regular telephone. And we have caller ID,
of course.
But you know, if you have a question in your mind as to whether
or not this should be a 668-7000 call or a 911 call,
call 911. Yeah, you know.
Micah Lawrence:
I was about to ask you, what do you classify as an emergency,
or is there a good definition of that?
Chuck Haston:
Immediate threat to life property.
You know, a wreck with injuries,
certainly an emergency.
And things that aren't would be things that maybe happened in the
past.
Like you need a report made. But we still get calls occasionally,
we'll get a call over the non-emergency line of fire or
something.
I'm not fully. I don't understand why they didn't call 911,
but it's fine.
Same people answer it. And I will say on text messaging,
it's the same people.
It rings in just like a 911 line.
Bryan Kell:
As we wrap up here, is there something that we haven't touched on
that we need to let the folks out there know about when it comes
down to 911?
Chuck Haston:
No, I think getting the word out about text to 911 is important.
I think getting the word out about listen,
landline 911 calls are as absolute as you can get.
There's no wasted time trying to pinpoint your location.
So I always tell people if you're caring for someone or if you
live alone,
or if you, you know, those with a little more experience than us,
keep the landline phone because that's your lifeline.
If you leave the house, obviously cell phones,
but I think those would be the two things I'd like to.
Micah Lawrence:
Can you give me a description of the text to 911?
Like what's the expected experience there?
I mean, is it a, you know, just trying to get an emergency where
maybe we can't get a voice call out?
Or is it more of, you know, let's get you this information.
Send pictures. Like what kind of stuff are you looking at?
Chuck Haston:
Okay, we've had several of these.
Where let's say that we had one fella locked his – it was a
domestic
event, and she was locked in the closet on purpose.
He was holding her hostage. And she could not make a voice call.
So she used text to 911. "Hey, I can't talk."
Micah Lawrence:
Oh.
Bryan Kell:
Wow.
Chuck Haston:
You know, I've thought to myself,
well, if anybody ever locked me in a trunk of a car,
and I have my cell phone, and I couldn't talk,
hey, I can text.
So, we've been doing that a while.
We test it ourselves. But all the carriers provide that.
So I think text to 911 is important.
We'd rather talk to you, though.
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah. Well, and I guess that's kind of what I was thinking. In my
mind is, if it's an emergency,
I'm picking up the phone and dialing,
but I never really thought. Well,
at first I was thinking probably this the generation of cell
phone kids.
I was like, there was going to send text. I'm like,
why would they not phone call? But then that makes a whole lot of
sense. There are some occasions where it's probably more
dangerous to have a voice call as opposed to to a text as it
sounds like.
Chuck Haston:
And, you know, when we all were working in the endeavor to get to
having the equipment to accept text to
911, you know, we were all sitting around,
all the directors sitting around thinking, Okay, are we going to
have this flood of text messages?
And the answer is no. People, I still think,
at least the generations that we are with
now, still think of muscle memory as dialing 911.
Bryan Kell:
Yeah. Well, I think you shocked all three of us at the table when
we talked about 911 text, right?
Karen Wilson:
Yeah, oh yeah.
Bryan Kell:
I think so. Yeah. That's great information.
Thank you for representing your industry for all the different
you know Micah has talked about this. We work with 911 you know
agencies all throughout our service area.
Thank you for representing them and your team.
Chuck Haston, 911 director here at Warren County. Thank you for
everything.
Chuck Haston:
Thank you. And we appreciate the partnership with Ben Lomand.
Bryan Kell:
Absolutely. Back with more BLC podcast in just a bit.
Micah Lawrence:
Now we're back for the Community Connection segment.
Karen, what have we got going on in the community?
Karen Wilson:
Well, we are getting very busy. And of course,
football season is upon us,
and I wanted to make a big announcement.
Are you all sitting on the edge of your seat here?
So we are adding Channel Six is adding Grundy County football to
our coverage this year.
Micah Lawrence:
Awesome.
Karen Wilson:
Yeah, we're excited. We are excited to work with Grundy County.
We're going to be sharing the time with White County.
So there'll be you know, games will be split up and stuff,
and we'll be making decisions on which games are covered.
All of that's going to be going on.
It's our busiest time of the year because county fair time.
You know, we cover, Channel Six covers,
all the pageants that we possibly can,
plus a lot of other fun things going on at the fair.
And then, that's about it as far as Channel Six goes.
Now, BLC Connection magazine's coming out soon.
I think it is the September/October issue.
We've got some great stories on,
did y'all know we had a cow rescue here in Warren County?
Bryan Kell:
I went to that ribbon cutting, but I was love the story that we
did with it,
yeah.
Karen Wilson:
It's awesome. Samma Cow Rescue. She's got a great story.
I know we're all beef eaters, but who doesn't love a nice,
cuddly,
cute, sweet, little faced cow? You know,
so you want to rescue those if possible.
And then, of course, the FRS Youth Tour.
We got a story about that in there,
too.
And then, Bryan, you might want to tell us about some of the
Wi-Fi van events that we're going to be at.
Bryan Kell:
Karen and I have said that this year could very well be the
biggest Wi-Fi van event tour that we've ever done,
and we've been at this for, Micah was a part of helping get that
kind of together.
We've been [doing] that with probably nine years,
eight years, some,
some probably in the nine to maybe even ten.
Karen Wilson:
Time flies.
Bryan Kell:
And so, yes, we've had a lot go on in June and July.
But yes, in August there's a couple of ones.
In fact, you know, we keep getting new events.
This is one of those, but there is a a Wi-Fi van event,
Battle in the Cornfield Car Show.
I love whoever came up with that,
but that's going to be at 5454 Frank's Ferry Road in Walling.
Basically, it's Gum Springs Baptist Church. They're going to be
putting that on over there, so that is on August 16th.
And then I believe it's that next week as I lost my place there
for a minute.
I believe it's the next week after that.
Maybe a couple after that, the 29th of August,
we'll start kicking off the White County Fair.
And so for now, like we said, close to ten years,
it's been a situation to where we've got that Wi-Fi van
positioned in the grandstand area.
Usually for the folks that jump on that,
Karen and I see those numbers.
A lot of folks end up utilizing that during the fair.
So that is back for yet another season to provide that
connectivity at the White County Fair.
Micah Lawrence:
You know, it'll be a great video on YouTube is to see how many
funnel cakes Bryan Kell can actually fit in his mouth.
Bryan Kell:
I'm not a huge funnel cake eater.
Micah Lawrence:
What?
Bryan Kell:
I don't know.
Micah Lawrence:
What about candy apple, caramel apples? Something?
Bryan Kell:
What about you and soft tacos?
Micah Lawrence:
Uh, no, we're not going there.
Bryan Kell:
Okay. All right.
Karen Wilson:
I'd be in on some funnel cake. I've seen the videos where people
wet the hot dogs and put the whole bun in their mouth.
Bryan Kell:
Can't do it.
Karen Wilson:
Yeah, but I might would try that with a funnel cake,
maybe.
Micah Lawrence:
Hey, hey, I'm in at cotton candy.
That's what I'm saying.
Bryan Kell:
You're in that? Okay.
Karen Wilson:
Yeah. It would take a lot to fill me up on that.
Yeah.
Micah Lawrence:
So got a lot of stuff going on in the community,
so that's our Community Connection segment.
Karen Wilson:
Welcome back to the BLC Connection Podcast.
We've got a great and very timely segment coming up where we ask
Micah about AI.
My word, that is the hot topic going right now.
We've all dabbled in it a little bit,
but just talk to the ones that maybe have never even heard of
what's going on in the industry,
well, in the world right now.
Micah Lawrence:
That's right. So yeah, AI is definitely a big buzzword.
Some people are highly utilizing it,
and then some just don't have a clue as to what it is.
So basically, at this point in time,
it is think of just a big brain full of knowledge,
and you can go ask it any question.
You know, one of the things that I was telling people earlier
that,
you know, where we used to spend hours,
you know, searching through Google searches to try to find the
answer to something because, you know,
there's so many different pages out there with different answers.
AI helps kind of narrow that time down,
but it also does a lot of other things as well.
So, but, so what we're using it for primarily at Ben Lomand is or
at least in our department,
we're using it to.
Bryan Kell:
Managed IT.
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah. Managed IT. We're actually trying to,
you know, help us to track down some kind of rare issues where
you have to go look it up and, you know,
it does take time.
Karen Wilson:
Kind of, cutting research time down.
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah. Cutting research time down because,
you know, as much as I would love to know everything about
everything, unfortunately, that just doesn't work.
So anyways, we use that to kind of help cut some of that research
time down.
But also, what is very helpful is the programing side of things.
A lot of the AI's out there, you can say,
"Hey, I need a website to look like this or that." And,
you know, in a matter of a few seconds,
it's built the entire website.
It does all the programing for you without you having to have
that programing knowledge.
So it's very handy for such things like that.
So, some of our customers I've had to build,
you know, custom applications for it to do something specific.
And it's helped me write that. You know,
it's not perfect.
And I would, you know, I joke around to people that I've asked
it,
you know, if I was born in August in 1982,
how old would I be?
And this was in July. And it says,
"Oh, you're 43." I said, "No,
I'm 42." And, you know, I said,
"August hasn't came in." It's like,
"Oh yeah, you're right. You are 42." Or so.
So it's not perfect. They are absolutely making leaps and bounds
of making it really,
really good. So, I do like kind of the way some of them are
taking it to where they're making a voice mode where you can
kind of talk to it and you, you pretty much have a full on
conversation with it.
So there's a lot of positive stuff happening with AI,
and I'll let Bryan,
tell us about some of the stuff he's used it with.
Bryan Kell:
Well, before we get off of you real quick,
I do think it's important to mention – and if he's not going to
toot his own horn or Managed IT – I will.
But there's a particular customer that you were working with,
and this was some time ago, and you were looking to be able to
make without getting into a whole lot of detail,
you were trying to make,
you know, two pieces of equipment I think be able to talk to each
other. And so writing that code.
The thing that I loved about it,
after you told me about how quickly this particular platform that
you were using, the AI platform did this for you.
It immediately hit me is the benefit to the customer from a time
perspective,
from money, all those kind of things.
That was a win for you and your department and also a win for the
customer as well.
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah. And in that particular project,
what I thought was very interesting is,
you know, first I said, all right,
I need a script that does this.
And after a little bit of back and forth with it,
you know, explaining,
here's how I want it to do it. Here's how it should function.
We finally worked out the details.
And now it's like, okay, now that you got it working,
I said, build me a web page that when I press the button,
it runs that script. And I was like,
well, give me fancy buttons,
fancy looking buttons. Give me a cool little logo at the top. It
does all that in just a matter of a few seconds,
so you know, it drastically reduced the time of me having to sit
there and figure it out.
Or there's a lot of occasions where you know what the customer is
just going to have to do with what they've got, because there's
no official programmer there to do that.
Karen Wilson:
Right.
Micah Lawrence:
And so this helps a whole lot in,
in efficiency for customers and things like that.
And like I said, it's a benefit to a whole lot of people.
Bryan Kell:
Yeah. On the marketing side, I will say this,
if and we're recording this July 31st,
right? So we've got a campaign that's running right now,
grilling,
chilling and streaming in which we're encouraging folks to send
pictures in of their folks grilling,
chilling and/or streaming. And,
you've got a chance to be able to win not only a nice $300 Weber
Grill, but then also have your internet paid for a month as well.
The genesis of that was, and we can say the different AI
platforms,
right? You used Gronk, right?
Micah Lawrence:
Grok.
Bryan Kell:
Sorry Grok, which is the Twitter esque based.
I used ChatGPT for this. And so it just started off with internet
service provider or internet service provider
in Tennessee summer. And it started,
you know, give me some phrases.
You know, and in the past and Karen knows this,
I mean, you'd sit and you'd think,
what do we want to call this? And,
you'd spend quite a bit of time with it.
And it's amazing the different phrases or different slogans is a
better term for that,
that they would start shooting out and be like,
hey, I like that grill and chilling and streaming right there.
Let's expand off that a little bit more.
And so a vendor that we use, and Karen's dealt with for a long
time,
and Pioneer that we utilize. I was like you know it'd be really
nice to kind of get the ball rolling on
being able to use ChatGPT to go,
here's what we're kind of wanting to capture in the image that we
put forward to summarize, grilling,
chilling and streaming.
And so literally I go, you know,
it's Tennessee.
It's grilling, chillin and streaming. Give me some images or give
me an image to be able to help capture that.
And sure enough within you know no more than a minute probably.
Sometimes images can take a little bit longer to be able to do
that.
It shoots you back an image. And it was like,
yes, that's capturing it now,
just like what Micah said, when it comes down to it's not
perfect.
When you looked at that original image that it shot back to us,
there was a can there for a drink that was hovering
in midair. You know, you can pick out some different things there
with somebody's hands.
Hands are also still a little bit wonky at times.
But the goal of what you're trying to do,
to say, give me an image to help with our vendor to get them
going so that they can build off of that,
it's tremendous.
And it cuts down time tremendously on both,
kind of helping you brainstorm and also try to capture what
you're trying to do to move forward.
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah. And to kind of, you know,
that's a good segue into talking about kind of the negative side
of this. So, you know, when we talk about it being able to
generate images,
one of the things that I've noticed so far,
for some reason, it struggles like if you say,
hey, you know, give me a desktop wallpaper that's a picture of an
astronaut in space.
You know, I mean, in a matter of a few seconds,
it will do it, and it's creatively generated for you.
You can say here's the color scheme I want.
Here's that. But here's the one thing I've noticed it struggles
with the most, and I really don't understand why – it's text.
You can say I want it to say this.
And when you do that, generally the first time around,
it'll get it right.
But what will happen is, is over time of you saying,
well now let's add this.
Now let's add that, it starts struggling with text.
And I don't know if that's a limitation that they're having or
with their algorithms or whatever that might be,
but there is room for improvement,
I guess, is what I would say there.
But then what I would say as far as the negative,
the big negative side of this is because AI is so smart,
and it is able to process things really fast,
it becomes a security concern.
So I'll explain why. So lots of times I go out to businesses,
and I'll do some security awareness training.
And I think you've probably heard some of this.
One of the things I encourage a lot of our businesses to do is to
give me a strong password.
You need to make sure you get a good,
strong, long password.
And they said, well, how long should it be?
Well, my suggestion is at least 15 characters.
Now at that point, people roll their eyes at me.
They don't like me at that point because they're like,
I can't remember a 15 character.
Bryan Kell:
You're not a huge fan either, and you're in the,
right?
Micah Lawrence:
Yeah. I mean, yeah. I'm in the business to do that.
But yeah, so but here's the reason why.
So as far as, this was done in 2023,
as far as how fast it takes a hacker to brute force your
password. If your password is traditionally eight characters
long,
which is right, it takes them five minutes to crack it.
But if you do a 15 character password,
that's, you know, special case,
uppercase, lowercase letter, 15 characters will take them 77
million years.
Karen Wilson:
Oh, wow. So that made a huge difference in your timeframe.
Micah Lawrence:
So that makes a huge difference. So to impress upon our
listeners,
have a good long password. Now,
with that being said, this is where AI comes into play is hackers
are using something like ChatGPT to try to crack the people's
password even faster.
So according to this, and like I said,
in 2023, with a character or with eight character password,
you know, very complex. It takes them now one second.
Karen Wilson:
Oh, wow.
Micah Lawrence:
But it takes a 15 character password 232,000 years.
So I think we're still good there.
But the point is you notice there's a huge difference in time
that it takes to crack a password.
So the good news is we can talk about,
you know, all the cool stuff that it does and how it helps
businesses and makes it very efficient.
But what it also does is it helps these threat actors and
hackers,
it helps them with their side. So it does have some positives and
negatives when it comes to AI.
Bryan Kell:
One big thing that I know that you all have heard of,
and especially in our industry,
be very careful, the business information that you put into
ChatGPT.
Correct? You want to kind of take it from there?
Micah Lawrence:
Yes. So there are a lot of disclaimers out there when you do
ChatGPT and some of these other ones.
If it is free, odds are they're going to use any information that
you put in there to help train the AI to give
it knowledge. But if you pay for their services,
I know ChatGPT in particular,
they say at the bottom, you know,
your information is not going to be used to train the AI.
So in other words, confidential information is not going to be
put out there.
I would still practice caution,
you know, I wouldn't be putting in passwords and things like
that. But, there are some risks to that.
So, free is great for playing around with it,
but if you're looking to do something confidential,
you know, I would be very careful about that.
Karen Wilson:
Well, great information. I know we probably could talk about
ChatGPT.
There are so many other aspects of it.
I know Congress and people like that are starting to really look
at how this is going to affect our future with our
kids and things like that, because there's just a million uses of
it.
Bryan Kell:
This won't be our first segment,
probably –
Karen Wilson:
No.
Bryan Kell:
on The BLC Connection Podcast.
Micah Lawrence:
Probably not.
Bryan Kell:
So yeah.
Karen Wilson:
Yeah. So Micah, thank you for giving us a quick rundown on that.
And we'll be back again in just a moment with another segment of
the BLC Connection Podcast.
Bryan Kell:
Hey, we actually got together and had a group podcast.
Karen Wilson:
We did. I'm so proud of us.
Micah Lawrence:
How did that happen?
Karen Wilson:
Lots of scheduling.
Bryan Kell:
Yes. All right. Micah. Folks have questions.
They've got ideas for segments or ideas for guests.
How can they get in touch with us?
Micah Lawrence:
Absolutely. They can email us at BLCpodcast@BenLomand.net.
You can send us your questions in or information or how weird
Bryan Kell is.
I'm okay with either one, but as far as listening to us,
you can listen to us on iTunes,
Spotify, Google, Amazon, anywhere that you can find a podcast,
we're pretty much on there.
Bryan Kell:
And also remember, too, that this podcast can be seen not only on
all those places,
but the BLTV Channel Six and also on the Ben Lomand Connect
YouTube channel,
so you can check both those out as well.
Karen, BLC Connection episodes that you've been doing with
businesses,
small business going great. What's next for that?
Karen Wilson:
Well, we made a great visit a few weeks ago to the Rock Island
Trolley Stop,
so we're doing a special BLC Connection Podcast geared towards
them.
What a fun place. I didn't get to sample anything.
Bryan Kell:
Are you kidding?
Karen Wilson:
Well, I have previously, but just not that time.
But, that's a very interesting story,
so I'm looking forward to sharing that.
Bryan Kell:
Look forward to that.
Micah Lawrence:
Ice cream.
Bryan Kell:
We've all done, yeah. And we've also had them featured in our
Connection Magazine before too,
which was one of my favorite covers because it looks just
amazing.
So can't wait to see that. As far as our next connection podcast,
who knows who might be here? Give us a guest idea.
It'd be great to be able to do that,
but stay tuned as we look to try to get this crew back together
on some kind of regular schedule here,
and bring you more information from throughout our service area
with different businesses and different entities,
and offering information from technology to community.
Thanks so much for being a part of this.
Thanks for listening. Stay safe and definitely stay connected.