LLMs Have Come of Age

I put “AI & Digital Marketing Strategist” on my website in 2017. For six years, I watched and waited. The technology was promising but not ready. Chatbots were frustrating. Voice assistants were limited. Machine learning required massive teams and data science expertise.

Last week, I had my first real conversation with ChatGPT. Not a demo. Not a gimmick. A conversation.

I asked about quartz heating tubes versus carbon fiber heating elements. Obscure question. The response came back in fifteen seconds — clear, accurate, conversational. I asked follow-ups. About plywood ignition temperatures. About IR radiation. About ceramic heating elements. Each response built on the last. Within the conversation, it remembered what we’d discussed.

This is what I’ve been waiting for.

LLMs have come of age. Not because they’re perfect — they’re not. But because the interaction model has finally changed. I’m not searching, I’m not clicking through results, I’m conversing, and the model is keeping up.

I’ve seen hype cycles come and go in twenty-five years of tech. This feels different. Not because of what the models know, but because of how they engage. The interface barrier is gone.

I don’t know exactly what this means for my work yet. But I know I’ll be spending a lot more time with this technology. I’ve been tracking AI all of my life, and not the solution I positioned for in 2017 is finally here.