It seems like discussion of artificial intelligence (AI) is everywhere these days, from the Open AI blowup which resulted in its CEO being fired—and rehired—to COP28 discussions on the topic and a European Union landmark AI bill paving the way for what could become a global standard to regulate AI risks for a more trustworthy AI environment.

As an owner or manager of a printing or packaging business, you might still be wondering what this has to do with your business. You might even be a little unclear on what AI actually is. We published an AI Explainer on WhatTheyThink that will help you in this regard. But we also recently spoke with a couple of industry executives from companies that are suppliers to the industry to understand what, if anything, they are doing or thinking about with respect to AI. It’s likely that this is where it will first show up in your business: implementations by suppliers to the industry. It’s already being used in search engines and other applications that you probably use every day. Perhaps we should call this “stealth AI”!

Another factor that confuses the issue is how machine learning plays into the picture. In our Explainer, we quoted Coursera, an online learning organization, that defined the two terms this way: