We get monthly sales statements from a client. The information is a composite of all sales. We use ChatGPT to parse out the date, move it to a new spreadsheet that we can upload into QBO. After I came up with the prompt, I asked chat to modify and improve the prompt. Now it works fine and saves us time/effort getting data prepared for upload.j

We got sick and tired of the online to-do task apps for work groups. They were expensive, they did not do what we wanted. They could not be modified. So we used AI [Claude] to develop our own. We used PHP 8.3/JavaScript/CSS and MySQL, and put it onto a domain we own. We are still making modifications/fixes/improvements, but it is going great. It would have taken me forever to get up to speed (I last worked on PHP 5) and then written the code.

You may have seen a lot of discussion online about Anthropic, Claude, the U.S. government and OpenAI — and not all of it is clear or accurate. Here’s a concise summary of what’s been happening, why it’s significant, and a chance to hear your view. 📌 What triggered the dispute Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Defense (Pentagon) demanded that Anthropic grant unrestricted access to its Claude AI for military use, including lawful purposes that could include domestic surveillance or autonomous weapons deployment. Anthropic’s CEO, Dario Amodei, refused, citing ethical guardrails the company has built into its AI — especially prohibitions on mass surveillance and fully autonomous weapons without human oversight. When Anthropic stood firm, the Pentagon threatened to cancel a significant contract (≈ $200 million) and label the company a “supply chain risk.” Shortly thereafter, President Trump directed all U.S. federal agencies to stop using Anthropic’s AI technology, citing national security concerns. Anthropic has publicly stated it plans to challenge the “supply chain risk” designation in court and maintain its ethical stance. CEO Amodei characterised his decision not to relent as compatible with defending democratic values — even if it means falling out with government authorities. Meanwhile, OpenAI struck a separate deal with the Pentagon to supply AI for classified military networks, which some commentators believe reflects a different approach to the same set of ethical red lines. 🤔 Why this matters for anyone using AI tools This isn’t just about military contracts — it highlights key tensions in our industry: 1. AI ethics vs. use case pressureCompanies are being pushed to bend their internal safety guardrails in the face of external expectations about how their AI should be used. The Anthropic standoff shows how far a company might go to stick to its principles — and the real consequences when it does. 2. Competition and positioningAnthropic is also promoting easier switching to Claude, even offering tools to import chat histories — part of a broader strategy to attract users amid the controversy.

👉 You can register for the live session here. Most people know AI matters. But knowing that… and actually using it well inside your business… are two very different things. A lot of people have tried ChatGPT. They’ve tested a few prompts. Maybe even a couple of tools. And then quietly thought: “Why isn’t this saving me much time?” The problem isn’t effort or intelligence. It’s structure. On February 25, I’m running a live, practical AI working session for accountants and bookkeeping firm owners. This is not a theory session. Not a tool demo. And not AI hype. I’ll show you how AI is already being used inside accounting firms to remove friction, reduce thinking time, and make day-to-day work feel lighter. 👉 You can register for the live session here

Hey folks! For those interested, here is the prompt I used for starting a website: You are an expert software programmer working with PHP 8.3, JavaScript, MySQL, and CSS. Your current assignment is to design and develop a new webpage application for generating quotes, called QuoteGen. You will develop this project in phases, following current best programming and best security practices. You will document each php & js page, you will document each function and subroutine. In all js and php files add a header. In the header put the name of the file, the purpose of the file, the date created, the current revision, a list of changes The database will be called QuotesDB, some of the tables will be defined later, others you will create as needed. The first phase is to design a login page. This first webpage will have fields for username and password, and links to create new account and reset the password. Upon successful login, open a temporary landing page. I am developing on my laptop, using WAMP server 2.