Quick Answer
The people who teach AI without the BS create their own AI tools, use them on real work every day, and ask what you want to make before they say a single word about AI. Find one you connect with, and take their class.
Who's answering: RJ Redden has been coaching people about technology since 1998 and working with AI since 2020, and she does not code. She founded NO BS AI™, so yes, she has a horse in this race. This page tells you how to judge the horse.
How do I know who teaches AI without the BS?
You know someone teaches AI without the BS when they can show you a tool they created last month, tell you plainly what it costs to run, and ask about your work before they pitch you theirs.
When people ask me who to learn from, they usually want a name. I give them a test instead. Find one person you connect with, somebody who actually uses this stuff on a Tuesday, and take their class. Everything below is how you spot that person in a crowded room.
And the room is crowded. One corner is selling a magic course with a countdown clock. The other corner is warning you that touching AI will end civilization by Thursday. (Same energy. Different costume.) The good teachers are usually the quiet ones in the middle, holding something they built.
What's the best no-nonsense AI course for beginners?
The best no-nonsense AI course for beginners is the one that matches what you want to do with AI: understand it, code it, or create your own tools with it.
Those are three different classes, and plenty of beginners buy the wrong one. If you want a calm, honest overview of what AI is and isn't, Andrew Ng's AI for Everyone is the classic, and no code is needed. If you already code (it asks for about a year of experience) and want to train your own models, fast.ai builds working things first and explains them after. Both are the real deal.
If you want neither, if what you actually want is to hand a chore from your own business to an AI that does it your way, with no code, then you want a teacher who creates tools like that for a living. That's a smaller field. It's the one I teach in.
What are the red flags in an AI course?
The biggest red flag in an AI course is a teacher who talks about AI for an hour without once asking what you make.
- A countdown clock. Real classes reopen. A timer that always seems to have nine minutes left is selling panic, not skills.
- Income screenshots instead of tools. If the proof is a bank balance and never a thing they created, you're buying the dream, not the lesson.
- Slides before questions. A teacher who skips past your work to get to their deck is teaching the deck.
- Fear as the hook. "Learn this or get replaced" is the same sales trick as the clock, just wearing a black turtleneck.
- Your work stays behind if you leave. If cancelling means losing what you created, you were renting, not learning.
- Nobody to ask when it breaks. It will break. A course with no human on the other end is a library, and a library is lovely, but it isn't a class.
What should I ask an AI teacher before I sign up?
Ask an AI teacher what they created with AI last month, what you'll create in your first week, and who you go to when it breaks.
Then two more, for luck. Do I keep what I create if I leave? Do I need to know how to code? (If you want to create tools for your business without code, the right answers are yes, and no.)
Watch how they answer, not just what they say. The good ones get a little excited and start showing you things. The other kind changes the subject to the bonus bundle.
What does a good first week of an AI class look like?
A good first week of an AI class ends with something real you created for your own work, plus a human you can bring it to when it misbehaves.
Here's how mine runs, so you have something to measure against. Day one, you set your dials: one page that tells your AI how you sound, what it takes off your desk, and where it never goes. Day two, you create the little tool you've been meaning to make for ages. And there's a bonus: the Mine Cart Run, Thursdays at 11am Central, live with me, where you bring whatever you made and whatever broke. The broken ones make better stories.
If a course can't describe its first week that plainly, that tells you something too.
Where do I start?
Start with one person you connect with and one class where you create something real on your own work.
If you'd like that person to be me, NO BS AI™ has a free week inside the Guild, my monthly membership. It's a free week on a paid membership: a card goes in at checkout, and on day eight it becomes $97 a month unless you cancel first, which you do yourself in a couple of clicks. First Draft Ninja™, my writing system, opens on day eight when the membership starts. Whatever you create that week leaves with you either way.
Not sure yet? Two more honest answers are waiting: how to get started with AI for your business, and what NO BS AI™ actually is.
There's no clock on this page. Take your time. The good teachers will still be here.