Meet the Writer: Hacker Noon's Edem Gold, Technical Writer and Software Engineer

So let’s start! Tell us a bit about yourself. For example, name, profession, and personal interests.

My name is Edem Gold, and I am a 19-year-old Nigerian software engineer, currently pursuing my studies at the University of Calabar. I have a varying number of interests which include; Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Computing, History, Philosophy, Economics, and Psychology.

Interesting! What was your latest Hackernoon Top story about?

My Hackernoon Top story was on The Cognitive Paradigm: Exploring Brain-Inspired AI Development.

In the piece, I talk about the role the human brain has played in the development of modern Artificial Intelligence systems, how the modeling of AI systems after the human brain came to be a prevailing approach, and the challenges experienced in the process of building Brain-inspired AI systems.

Do you usually write on similar topics? If not, what do you usually write about?

Yes, I do. I plan to try very hard to write on the most complex questions to answer in the world of Artificial Intelligence, such as ownership of content in the age of Generative AI and when I am not talking about AI, I write about Quantum Computers, also trying very hard to make them more approachable and less cognitively tasking to understand and in the process try to reduce the barrier to entry caused by the esoteric nature of it.

As a matter of fact, I won the Hackernoon Contributor of the Year 2022 for Quantum Computing beating out a PhD holder, who came in second (it was a memorable moment for me).

Great! What is your usual writing routine like (if you have one?)

Well, my usual writing routine would go something like this: I get inspiration for an article, it is important to note that I think of articles like building blocks, and on that note, I try to figure out if understanding an article would require pre-requisite knowledge of any form by the reader and that gives me the input I need to decide on the structure for my articles. Once I have the article structure in the bag, it makes it easier to then visualize the article as chunks and this makes it easier to research and write content around each chunk.

I write a minimum of 3 hours a day and spend the rest of the time reading research papers and making research. It is important to note that I make use of ChatGPT in the generation of my article structures as it helps me make my articles as informative as possible.

Being a writer in tech can be a challenge. It’s not often our main role, but an addition to another one. What is the biggest challenge you have when it comes to writing?

Well the biggest challenge for me has, and still is, been growing an audience. I am not a naturally outgoing person, nor am I comfortable sharing my achievements but I am working on it and with the help of my girlfriend, she has been more than supportive making me believe when I doubt myself, I believe I can make it work.

Another slightly uncomfortable thing I experience when writing is the difficulty in reading my work once it is done. Sadly(or not), it is genetic as my dad recently told me he suffers the same issue when writing academic papers (he is a professor of Anaesthesia). I also believe I got my talent for writing, systematic thinking and research, which are evident in my articles from him.

But I have come to learn, the hard way, that second reading is crucial to ensuring an article reaches the heights you want it to.

What is the next thing you hope to achieve in your career?

Well I plan to write a book on Quantum Computers, I believe there is a certain lack of accessible information in that space. I hope to write about, in simple-to-grasp words, the core building blocks that power Quantum Computers such as Quibits, Quantum Measurement, Quantum Error Correction, superposition, and a host of other concepts.

My goal is to make Quantum Computers more accessible by breaking them into first principles and then building them all back up, and I hope this will make the idea of them more accessible to people.

I hope to achieve this before I turn 22 (before I leave the university), so I can turn my energy to other things. I am also working on a startup with my friend which we hope will make selling easier for vendors in Nigeria.

Wow, that’s admirable. Now, something more casual: What is your guilty pleasure of choice?

Well, that would be playing video games and watching recaps of football games while trying to guess the tactics behind the teams.

Do you have a non-tech-related hobby? If yes, what is it?

Well, that would be reading and watching YouTube Videos+movies.

What can the Hacker Noon community expect to read from you next?

I plan to write more AI-centric content which focuses more on providing a foundational understanding of AI as a concept for those who lack that, I feel in this current AI age, knowledge like that is crucial.

As I stated earlier, I plan to write a book on the core concepts powering Quantum Computers next year, but before then I plan to write about every one of these concepts in articles, in an effort to get my research straight before the book.

What’s your opinion on HackerNoon as a platform for writers?

Hackernnon is a really great platform for writers hoping to get noticed, they have really good SEO and they certainly do make the challenge of writing less daunting.

Thanks for taking the time to join our “Meet the Writer” series. It was a pleasure. Do you have any closing words?

The pleasure was all mine. I would like to give some advice: If you want to be better than others, you have to work harder than them, also, try to think long term and the way to do this is by avoiding anything that will make the short term look attractive.