I am not using ChatGPT to write stuff but I am using it more and more to research things, play with the plugins and get a better handle on how to make it useful for how I work. I do find that feeding it data and asking it to add to it or format it to be quite positive. I am pretty sure when all this Copilot stuff is integrated into Office, I will be using it a fair bit.

I tried to use the Webpilot plug-in to read my LinkedIn profile and organize it but it wasn’t allowed to read the page. I cut and pasted it and asked it to grab the Technology Eras by years according to Bill Gates: 10 Breakthrough Technologies with Bill Gates | MIT Technology Review

Roughly it is explained as:

1. The first revolution (1970s-1980s): This was the era of the personal computer (PC). Gates and his Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen were instrumental in this revolution. Their vision was a computer on every desk and in every home.
2. The second revolution (1990s-2000s): This was the era of the internet and the World Wide Web. It transformed the way people access and share information. Microsoft’s Internet Explorer was a key player in this revolution.
3. The third revolution (2000s-2010s): This was the era of mobile computing, characterized by smartphones, tablets, and other portable devices. While Microsoft was less dominant in this era, it still played a role with its Windows Mobile and later Windows Phone operating systems.
4. The fourth revolution (2010s-Present): This is the era of cloud computing and artificial intelligence. Services like Microsoft Azure represent the company’s efforts in this era.
5. The fifth revolution (Future): Gates has spoken about several potential future revolutions, including quantum computing and further advancements in artificial intelligence.

Breaking it down specific to my roles:

1970s-80s with the PC Revolution: I was playing with my Radio Shack TRS-80, Vic 20, Commodore 64, Apple IIe and eventually some Intel clone computers.

1990s-2000s was the Internet Era and largely when I started working: I was on Wintel stuff mostly but also got into Unix and Mac’s. I was coding then as well and worked with Perl, C, Visual Basic and did some sysadmin stuff on Sun.

2000s-2010s was the rise of Mobile: To kick-off this era I was not working in tech for a lot of it so maybe missed really being a part of it for work but such is life.

2010s to Present brings the cloud and now AI: This section directly maps to my time as a VC (Cloud), my time at AWS (Cloud) and now my current job at MSFT (Cloud and AI). I feel like this was all timed pretty well but also not planned. Luck plays a big role along with just being around certain people.

It’s fascinating to look at the roles and titles by Era especially knowing a lot of my moves were not well thought out. However that path led me to where I am today and I am very fortunate to be working where I am during this AI Era. I also know that all the experiences and people I crossed paths with were instrumental in getting here.

Here are the job role groupings by Era:

Internet and the World Wide Web (1990s-2000s):

1. Engineer at State Net, Inc (Jan 1994 – Jan 1995)
2. Senior Web Technologist at Examen, Inc (1996 – 1997)
3. Principal Technologist/Evangelist and Technical Marketing Liason at WebLogic, Inc (Jan 1997 – Jan 1999)
4. Chief Technology Officer at MetaMarkets.com, Inc (Jan 1999 – Jan 2000)
5. Principal Technologist – CTO Office at BEA Systems, Inc (Jan 2000 – Jan 2005)

Mobile Computing (2000s-2010s):

6. Web 2.0 Development and Content Management, Technology Consulting at Entourage Bkk (2006 – Sep 2009)
7. Director of global tech initiatives at Yahoo (Sep 2009-2012)
8. Chief Product Officer at Spuul (Feb 2012 – Mar 2015)
9. CTO at HOOQ (Apr 2015 – Apr 2016)

Cloud Computing and Artificial Intelligence (2010s-Present):

10. Venture Capital Partner at SeedPlus (May 2016 – Nov 2019)
11. Head of Startup SAs – ASEAN at Amazon Web Services (AWS) (Dec 2019 – Mar 2022)
12. GM for Startups in APAC at Microsoft (Mar 2022 – Present)

SEO’ing that title a bit.

I am still doing my best to remain accessible and trying to help.

Here is the Calendly link for ASEAN Startup Coaching: https://calendly.com/dreampipe/asean-startup-coaching

For those that want to book that please let me know in the booking what you would like to discuss. I have NO set agenda for the call so the idea is you have questions and I will use the time to try and answer or discuss. If you book time with no agenda then it won’t be super useful for either of us.

Here is the Calendly link for a face to face Coffee: https://calendly.com/dreampipe/coffee

For this one I don’t need an agenda but still helps to know the purpose and what you hope to get out of it. Then I try to come prepared as much as possible.

If you want to connect on https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelsmithsgp/ and just DM me that also works.