Unlocking Creativity with Prompt Engineering

With every new technology, some jobs are lost while others are gained. People often focus on the former, but in this episode we chose to highlight the latter – a highly creative role that emerges alongside AI: the prompt engineer. Until AI can close the loop of its own, each tool still requires a set of prompts. Just like a composer feeds an instrument the notes to play, a prompt engineer feeds an AI a map of what to produce. And if we know anything from music it’s that composing great music takes great skill! In this episode we explore the emerging importance of prompting with Guy Parsons, the early learnings of how to do it effectively, and where this field might be going. Will the prompt engineer be more like the highly sought after DevOps engineer, or a proficiency like Excel that you find on every resume? Listen in to hear Guy’s take. Interested in the prompt competition? Email us at podpitches@a16z.com. Resources: DALL-E 2 Prompt Book: https://dallery.gallery/the-dalle-2-prompt-book/ Find Guy on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GuyP Guy’s combining image experiment: https://twitter.com/GuyP/status/1612880405207580672 Guy’s amorphous prompt experiment: https://twitter.com/GuyP/status/1608475973300948993 Guy’s space duck: https://twitter.com/GuyP/status/1601342688225525761 Prompt base: https://promptbase.com/ Lexica: https://lexica.art/   Topics Covered:  0:00 - Introduction 01:49 - DALL-E 2 Prompt Book 05:29 - Parallel skills 06:51 - 80/20 prompting 10:16 - New ways of prompting 13:44 - Pulling the AI slot machine 18:09 - Comparing models 21:04 - Requested features 26:34 - Learning with AI 27:58 - Practical use cases 32:08 - A top 1% prompt engineer 36:17 - The most popular images   Stay Updated:  Find us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/a16z Find us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/a16z Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: https://a16z.simplecast.com/ Follow our host: https://twitter.com/stephsmithio Please note that the content here is for informational purposes only; should NOT be taken as legal, business, tax, or investment advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security; and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any a16z fund. For more details please see a16z.com/disclosures. Stay Updated: Find a16z on X Find a16z on LinkedIn Listen to the a16z Podcast on Spotify Listen to the a16z Podcast on Apple Podcasts Follow our host: https://twitter.com/eriktorenberg   Please note that the content here is for informational purposes only; should NOT be taken as legal, business, tax, or investment advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security; and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any a16z fund. a16z and its affiliates may maintain investments in the companies discussed. For more details please see a16z.com/disclosures. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.