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I think that the ideas of AI boosters and other tech maximalists will pretty much always "struggle to land" with normal people. (See also: the ring ad.)

I don't think "normal people" especially run-of-the-mill office workers, like the idea of AI or want it to succeed. Not that it's going to stop Silicon Valley from ramming it down everyone's throats.

Only when the underlying product sucks. "Here's how the Torment Nexus is going to torment you - subscribe now!" is never going to be a popular message because it is actively making the world worse.

People aren't being luddites or not understanding innovation. They know perfectly well what is being sold, and they hate it.

Contrast it with the Dotcom bubble, where people mainly thought it wasn't for them or that they didn't need it. Look at interviews of people back then, and the services advertised are at worst described as "unnecessary": you would've had very little trouble convincing them that there would be some market for them.

But with those extreme AI examples? Normal people understand it, and they hate it.


I think what mostly came across was "welcome to the next crypto bubble".

That's not a search box.

> the AI did respond graciously and appears to have learned from it

I have a bridge for sale, if you're interested.


Because it's simpler, duh. </sarcasm>


> The middle class have financially benefited very little from the past 20+ years of productivity gains.

More like the last 50 years.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-...

"For most U.S. workers, real wages have barely budged in decades"

The TL;DR is that in 1964 the average hourly wage was $20.27. As of 2018, average hourly wage was $22.65.


1974 median individual income was $28k 2024 median individual income was $45k

Over 50 years that’s a decent amount of growth. Obviously it could be better but it’s not nothing.

Source: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEPAINUSA672N


Sure but pretty sure with your 1974 28k you could buy a nice house, whereas with your 2024 (equivalent) 45k you can buy an OK car, not a house


In theory this graph is already inflation-adjusted.

In practice, I think this shows why economic statistics are borderline lies.


The problem is inflation. We have no way to reliably measure it over any long time-frame. Make the time long enough, and it even stops making sense as a concept.


Using an LLM for a "financial workflow" makes as much sense as integrating one with Excel. But who needs correct results when you're just working with money, right? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯


Humans are non deterministic yet they use excel, work with financial workflows and deal with the money.


And because one system that aims to achieve deterministic operation can’t quite perfectly do so, we might as well abandon any attempt at determinism?


Computers are not humans & suggesting such equivalence reveals more than you realize.


Do you mind to elaborate?


"Humans make math errors, yet they do math anyway, therefore this calculator that makes errors is also OK."

What do you call the fallacy where the universe is imperfect, therefore nobody can have higher standards for anything?

Mankind has spent literal centuries observing deficiencies and faults in human bookkeeping and calculation, constantly trying to improve it with processes and machinery. There's no good reason to suddenly stop caring about those issues simply because the latest proposal is marketed as "AI".


It can interact with deterministic and provable systems just fine.


I think stochastic modeling can be useful but if that's not what they are aiming for then they are misunderstanding the technical limitations & would be better served by learning how their tools actually work instead of believing & trusting the corporate marketing from AI companies.


Detecting "human speech" means shutting out people who cannot speak and rely on TTS for verbal communication.


Also speech impediments, accents, physical disabilities, etc etc.

Tech culture just refuses to even be aware of people as physical beings. It's just spherical users in a vacuum and if you don't fit the mold, tough.


Durable execution paired with an unpredictable text generator? Sign me up! /s



> An October 2024 report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime described the use of Starlink in fraud operations. About 80 “Starlink satellite dishes linked to cyber-enabled fraud operations” were seized between April and June 2024 in Myanmar and Thailand, the report said. Starlink is prohibited in both countries.

They knew about it over a year ago.

From a Wired article ("Elon Musk’s Starlink Is Keeping Modern Slavery Compounds Online"):

> Starlink connections appeared to be helping criminals at Tai Chang to “scam Americans” and “fuel their internet needs,” West alleged at the end of July 2024. She offered to share more information to help the company in “disrupting the work of bad actors.” > SpaceX and Starlink never replied, West claims.

The whole article is worth a read.


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