The hype behind the fad
There has been a lot of buzz about prompt engineering in the media, and many thought it was the perfect job where you don’t have to carry an incognitive load, as you don’t have to code or learn complex things like deep learning. It sounds too good, doesn’t it?
But the hype around prompt engineering has cooled down, as it turned out that almost no organizations are looking to hire prompt engineers any more. So the question is, is prompt engineering a fad? Probably not, because it’s the art of getting your desired output from AI tools such as ChatGPT, Bard, or any AI image generator.
Think of this as a recipe for cooking a meal. Just like using better ingredients makes a delicious meal, better input can make for better results. The more detail you provide in the prompt, the better the machine understands it and can provide a better reply in the form of writing emails, generating software codes, or generating images. See the two examples below and check the difference.
You can see that, if provided with more detail in a simple query, the response of the AI tool changes a lot. The first one is a vague question where the tool gives some random options. The second question was more focused on a specific recipe for Alfredo pasta, and the tool replied in the same context. This applies to all the professional tasks that one tries to figure out with AI tools.
Can prompt engineering lend you a job?
Well, prompt engineering is an important task, and it holds promise, but not as we view it. The perspective of quick engineering is the reason for much of the debate around the topic. And experts consider it a way to find out the out the capabilities of AI and its potential to be a creative partner. AI systems have the ability to produce outputs that even outsmart human beings.
But the crux lies in the reality that no software house will hire a layman to write prompts for generating codes from a chatbot. They will rely on their engineers to write prompts to speed up their workflow. You are getting it right; only writing prompts won’t lend you a job, except for some really enthusiastic Silicon Valley startups, but still, it’s not a viable option.
So we return to the same question, Is prompt engineering a fad? Like many technologies that are considered to change the world we live in, the media celebrates them, creating an overhype. Think about the early days of Google or folding cell phones. While they do have an effect on our lives, the trends lose their hype over time and become routine. Prompt engineering is also the same phenomenon, at least till now. As it is beneficial for those who apply it correctly in their own work fields and are not trying to craft a field out of itself.
You must have a rational mindset to better prompt input, as LLMs have their own limitations, but they will develop into a more sophisticated art with time. We can safely say that prompt engineering is basically learning to use words correctly in these times. The better we use them, the easier our tasks become with AI tools to speed up our daily routines.
