AI Should Empower People

Build confidence. Collaborate with AI. Turn ideas into reality.

Hello everyone. I am going to write a free article today so that I can reach as many of my readers as possible. I hope they will read what I have to say. This is all happy, good, and exciting stuff.

For the last few weeks, I have been instructing several online training courses:

• 7/7-7/9/2026: I taught a class called GraphRAG from Scratch explaining how to build these kinds of AI interfaces from scratch using a pre-built Knowledge Graph.

• 7/14 and 7/16: I taught a class called OSINT for Everyone showing how this can empower anyone and demystifying the subject.

• 7/21 and 7/23: I taught and am teaching a class called AI for Everyone, and this is another empowering and demystifying class. If you want a class that cuts through the noise and hype of the AI and tech industry, this is it. This class is kryptonite for AI propagandists. You should get in on this.

And on July 31, I will be teaching an Agentic AI course with Packt.

Why do I teach what I know? Because I have been empowered by AI, and I want it to empower others. I have been building with AI since about 2018, not since LLMs.

I’ve had a great time presenting my knowledge and what I have learned over the course of my life, and I’ve really enjoyed learning from those who enrolled in the classes!

Today, I want to talk about things that I’ve thought about while giving these classes, and I want to show some fun AI generated imagery I have been playing with to communicate the value and importance of these classes. I am an old-school web developer from the 90s, and a BBS user before that, and a lifelong gamer, so I’m sticking with 8-bit retro/vintage imagery. I love this.

Each class was really exciting. Each class was 3-9 hours long (split between days), and the time passed by so fast. I enjoyed the discussions during and after each session. I’ve had a great time, and my students did too from what I have heard. You should enroll in my upcoming classes.

Let’s talk about some key insights.

AI is about People, Not Technology

There are important points to how I teach, based on my core philosophy:

• AI is for Everyone, period

• People first, not AI first

• Understanding leads to competence and then confidence

• AI should empower people

AI is not only for Software Engineers and Data Scientists. It is for everyone. Executives use it. Engineers use it. Everyone uses it. AI is everywhere, in many things we routinely use. AI is for Everyone.

But AI is not and should not be the star attraction. Reaching outcomes and goals is the star attraction. If you are not reaching your desired outcomes or goals, then something is wrong. AI is a tool and it can be an extension of ourselves. It is not the star attraction. Solving problems and reaching outcomes is.

If you learn from me, you will understand what this is, its history and where it came from, practical uses, hype vs signal, and how to use it responsibly.

If you gain competence and confidence, you can build anything realistic that you can imagine. You can build things that do not exist but should exist. I have. My technology is an example, and I built it while collaborating with AI.

You can even use it to design and create a business. I did.

AI is not the hero. The creator is the hero. She is the hero. AI is an extension of ourselves and a useful tool for knowledge work. I teach this in my AI for Everyone course, and you should enroll. This course will benefit anyone. I learn from the attendees as well. It is a discussion, not dogma. Enroll today.

Collaboration Changes Everything

Notice something about these images. I am not chasing tools. I don’t care about any tool in particular. Python libraries come and go and the latest techniques will be old in two years. Competency stays with you forever.

There’s so much you can do while collaborating with AI:

• Do some tedious knowledge work much more easily and without a headache

• Plan your weekend for maximal fun without spending any money

• Create a business plan and then start a business, gaining independence

• Learn guitar and keep learning forever

• Create imagery to describe abstract or complicated concepts

You can do a million things. Use your Natural Intelligence and think beyond my list of five. What do you think you could do if you were more competent in working with AI? What do you think you could do if you were empowered to the point that this was all easy to you? When you become competent, things become easier. What amazing thing would you do? What is stopping you?

This image makes me happy, because GrooveSeeker helps do these things. Speaking of, GrooveSeeker is now available for iPhones and you should download it. It is free to use and there are no ads on it. You should download it right now and tell your friends about it.

GrooveSeeker is global and we have users around the world. Download it.

Check out these videos, and please tell your friends.

GrooveSeeker was built via AI Collaboration. It wasn’t built with Vibe Coding. If you want to learn to collaborate with AI more effectively, learn from me.

Platform access for World AI is also open. You can buy access to the databases and APIs, and soon you will be able to integrate directly using MCP.

The Bigger Picture

I teach four classes, and to an untrained eye they may seem unrelated. If you think they are unrelated, you should absolutely sign up for my classes.

Here are the four classes I teach. Think of them as software functions. Each is an output that the other things need.

• OSINT → Knowledge Graphs

• Knowledge Graphs → GraphRAG

• GraphRAG → Agents

• All → Human Empowerment

Do you get it? These are not separate things. You cannot build World AI without World Awareness. You cannot build World AI without the ability to answer questions based on World Awareness. Your agents will be incomplete without World Awareness. And all of these things together combine to empower humans.

AI’s purpose is to empower humans.

Look closely at this fun image. Each class that I teach empowers students to do something. When you pull it all together, you build amazing things. You build amazing things because you are empowered to build amazing things.

It takes skill to build reliable things with AI. Is your goal to build a demo or to build production infrastructure? If you want to build reliable software with AI, you should learn from me. And if you want to just use what I have built, platform access is already open and has been for a while.

But everyone has different goals, so I have decided to make a change to how we are selling our classes in order to empower students. I don’t want people to give me money for things that they do not need. This is a transaction. I have a lot of experience and knowledge. I share decades of experience and useful insight for the price of admission. My consulting fees are much more expensive than my training. :)

So, let me explain my new strategy to empower different people.

Bundles of Classes

We have removed the flat 50% discount off of our classes. That was only available for the first cycle of the new classes. I told you those were temporary, and some of you saved money.

However, there are still ways for you to save money:

• Buy a bundle

• Be a return student

• Bring your friends

If you buy a bundle, you will save 10% x the number of classes in a bundle. If a bundle contains two classes, then you’d save 20% of the price of those two classes added together. If a bundle contained four classes, you’d save 40% of the combined price of those four classes. That means, if you buy the full four-course meal, you will save more than a thousand dollars. If you feast on individual courses, you pay the price of each one. In other words, you save money by buying the bundle that is relevant to you, and we will be flexible in scheduling your classes to fit your flexibility. We are flexible.

Here are the bundles I currently have in mind:

• World AI Architect: OSINT for Everyone, AI for Everyone, Knowledge Graph from Scratch, GraphRAG from Scratch (40% discount)

• AI Architect: KG from Scratch, GraphRAG from Scratch, AI for Everyone (30% discount)

• OSINT Architect: OSINT for Everyone, KG from Scratch (20% discount)

• All four individual classes are available separately at full price.

This is our current thinking. We may adjust the percentage down the road. It will not go higher. It may go to 5% per class. So, if you want to save money, now is the time. Enroll today.

And if you would like to buy a bundle right away, let me know which one you want and we will hurry up with the payment links. I plan to have these online by early next week, but we can get them online sooner if you are ready right now. Send me a message on Substack or LinkedIn.

Bring your friends and coworkers/team!

Another way to save money is with referrals or a group discount. We have not decided on how much of a discount to give yet, so reach out to me if you want to do this. It will be a significant discount, like with bundles. Bring your friends, family, coworkers, and/or team and save money! You can also email me at info@verdantintel.com if you are interested in group training.

Return students save money, too.

If students want to return, we are also happy to give them a significant discount. We really like return students. There is always more to learn. Ever watched a movie twice and noticed that you get more out of it the second time? Training and learning is like that, too. I’ve enjoyed re-reading books that are important to me. I’ve even enrolled in trainings for a long time just to have access to material. I don’t just GIVE training, I am a lifelong learner.

So, if you have ever attended one of our courses and want to come back, let us know and we will give you the discount code.

One of our students likes our courses so much that he is insistent on paying the full price and not getting a discount code. I don’t mind that, either, if you are super duper charitable. :p

But we do provide discounts to return students who want them.

Stuff is extremely cool right now

My company is starting to finally take off, and GrooveSeeker has taken off. If you are here reading this, then you are benefiting from my words. If you would like to support me back, please buy my products, enroll in my training, become a paying reader, or at the very least download the free app that we built that has no ads.

And don’t stop there. Don’t stop at personal gain. Pay it forward. Tell five of your friends. GrooveSeeker makes everyone’s life better and easier. Tell your friends that GrooveSeeker is cool and they should download it. Have an Android, not an iPhone? Then tell your iPhone friends about David’s awesome app and follow them around to fun things. We will have the Android app out soon enough. Just wait a bit. Tell your friends with iPhones and hang out with them. :)

AI is for Everyone

Let’s return to what I came here to say. AI is for everyone. AI empowers you. It is an extension of you. When you collaborate with AI, it learns from you and hopefully does what you want to do. If you give AI too much agency and do not collaborate with it, it will drive you off a cliff and delete your production database.

It is important to learn from experience. I have been an AI Engineer since before LLMs. I wrote a lot about tokens and Natural Language Processing when people thought it was boring and unrelated to Software Engineering. My book predicted the importance that GraphRAG would fill a few years after my book came out. My book is on the importance of Language and Graph, and that is what GraphRAG is.

I want you to become more competent and then more confident. I want to reduce confusion and uncertainty and help you reach your goals. I want to empower you. This is not hype. I don’t teach the tool of the day. I teach this in a way that will boost your overall competency, empower you, and help you achieve your dreams and goals.

And do take OSINT for Everyone very seriously. This class will be especially empowering to anyone. This is serious stuff and will benefit anyone who enrolls and learns.

I demystify it and make it fun. Are you ready? Let’s go.

For the rest of my readers. I’ve asked a few times for my readers to be a bit more supportive of this blog and to become paying readers. Only 2% of my readers are supporting me and the thousands of hours I have spent thinking and writing about Graph and NLP. Come on, let’s get this to 3%.

Please upgrade your subscription if you want to read my technical and premium articles.

Please do it. This all takes time and a lot of work. Please put money in the tip jar.

Have a great day! See you in class! This is really fun and empowering stuff, and I would love to hang out with my readers.

I’ll close out this article with some other fun imagery I have been collaborating with AI on today. Which is your favorite? My technology is a cool fusion of old and beyond cutting edge. So my imagery is often retro. I am old-school and a gamer. Enjoy!

Who wants to learn how to hunt? Enroll today.

Who already knows how to hunt and wants to get to it? Platform access is open.

Have a great day. I’m going hunting. I just went hunting for information and expanded GrooveSeeker into Asia. Today, I am working on expanding it into Turkey for one of my users. If you use GrooveSeeker, tell me where you are and I will make sure you have good event coverage. We support those who use our tech.