AI Agents: Can They Get Our Sushi Orders Right?
Today's post is inspired by a combination of my experience at a restaurant last night and the latest Bloomberg Technology podcast I listened to.
Ordering Sushi x AI Agents!
AI is going to remain a hot topic in 2025. But what’s especially exciting is how AI agents are evolving. These are highly autonomous tools capable of making complex decisions without constant human oversight.
Think of AI agents as digital assistants who don’t just answer questions but take action on your behalf. They can place online orders, book hotels, send emails, and even manage schedules.
For example, you could ask an AI agent to plan a weekend trip. It could find the best flight deals, reserve your hotel, and book dinner at your favorite sushi spot—all without you needing to check multiple websites yourself.
But here’s the catch: this all depends on whether the agent understands your instructions correctly.
It's easy to mess up orders. Just last night, I went out with my cousins for sushi, and the waitress misunderstood our request—leading to four servings of nigiri (8 pieces total) instead of the four pieces we intended.
Language can be tricky. Human communication is full of nuance—sarcasm, poetry, wordplay.
And just like my sushi order got mixed up, an AI agent can misinterpret vague instructions too.
That’s why I believe the people who will benefit most from the AI revolution are those who master Prompt Engineering—the skill of giving AI clear, specific instructions to reduce misunderstandings.
The more precise your prompts, the better results you’ll get.
AI agents are already transforming industries, helping businesses and individuals save time and reduce manual work. Here are a few standout examples categorized by use case:
1. Personal Productivity & Automation:
- Zapier AI: Automates tasks between apps, such as automatically saving email attachments to a Google Drive folder or sending Slack notifications when a task is updated.
- Rewind AI: A personal memory assistant that records and recalls your digital activity, helping with note-taking, meeting summaries, and information retrieval.
Key Impact: Simplifies repetitive tasks and enhances digital organization for busy professionals.
2. Customer Service & Sales:
- Forethought: An AI agent for automating customer support by resolving tickets and suggesting answers based on historical data.
- Drift: A conversational AI sales agent that can engage website visitors, qualify leads, and even schedule meetings autonomously.
Key Impact: Reduces response times and improves lead conversion for businesses.
3. Finance & E-commerce Management:
- Klarna's AI Agent: Helps users make smarter purchasing decisions, offering payment flexibility while providing product recommendations.
- Finta: An AI-powered finance automation tool that assists startups in managing financial reporting, projections, and investor relations.
Key Impact: Automates financial decision-making and payment processing for consumers and businesses.
4. Creative Tools & Content Generation:
- DALL·E 3 (by OpenAI): Generates high-quality images from text prompts, useful for design, marketing, and creative projects.
- Runway ML: A video creation and editing platform powered by AI, capable of generating entire video clips and enhancing visual effects.
Key Impact: Empowers creatives by simplifying complex design tasks and speeding up content creation.
5. Code Generation & Development:
- GitHub Copilot: A code completion AI agent that helps developers write and debug code faster within their IDE.
- Devin (by Cognition): A fully autonomous AI software engineer capable of building, testing, and deploying entire software projects with minimal human input.
Key Impact: Accelerates software development and reduces coding errors.
Final Thought:
The rise of AI agents brings incredible potential—but also new challenges in communication. Whether you're ordering sushi or asking an AI to book your next vacation, the clearer your instructions, the better your results.
Resources
📖 Books:
- "Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans" by Melanie Mitchell
- "The Art of Prompt Engineering with ChatGPT" by Nathan Hunter
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