It even lies about why it lies. Definitely good to know, and even as an AI skeptic I admit that part of me would still be expecting a straight answer from a LLM when it “breaks character” and acknowledges what it is and how it functions… but of course nothing has changed but the tone, the answers are generated the same way as always.
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Or, put another way, people who get overly reliant on AI will soon not know one’s ass from a hole in the ground.
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When looking at these sort of products, look at what they’re trying to privatise, commoditise, monopolise, enshittify, and ruin for their own profit.
Email. (Gmail, O365 Outlook and Exchange)
Logging (Splunk)
Data storage and access (Oh so many)
Hotels (AirBnB)
Taxis (Uber)
In this case, we can see what the AI companies are trying to enshittify.
It’s rational and critical thought itself.
It’s so blatantly obvious that the business model is to make it free, cheap, and easy to offload your cognitive effort (and interpersonal interaction, and creativity, and curiosity, and memory) to AIs, get it so tangled up in your workflow that you can’t operate without it, then systematically kick out the free tier so you have to pay them for access to what is now a critical part of your life.
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I don’t remember hearing about them before today, & now that’s maybe* the 2nd time today someone here has mentioned them.
*@KathyPartdeux mentioned “McKinsey gibberish” in another thread & I wasn’t sure what that meant. I wound up at the Wikipedia article for McKinsey & Company, I’m not sure that’s the same “McKinsey” or not, but… wow. How had I not heard of them before?! Or, why don’t I remember!?
So, reading about McKinsey:
According to a 1997 article in The Observer, McKinsey recruited recent graduates and “imbue[d] them with a religious conviction” in the firm, then cull[ed] through them with its “up-or-out” policy… McKinsey’s culture had often been compared to religion, because of the influence, loyalty and zeal of its members… McKinsey’s internal culture was “collegiate and ruthlessly competitive” and has been described as arrogant…
And they were connected to Enron. Which is weird(?), because they’re not the only company connected to the Enron scandal which could be described that way; I interacted with another at one of my old jobs. FWIW. I don’t know if anyone still puts any credence in the “Type A vs. Type B personality” idea, but my goodness, there sure were a surfeit of Type AAA there. Or, I’m just that much type B? (B- ?)
You just reminded me how some agent kept listing some properties a few blocks from here, depicting notional houses on actually-empty lots.
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Wait, what? The boys in blue? The oldest and largest of the “Big Three” management consultancies? The management consultancy every other management consultancy tries to emulate? The inventors of downsizing? Involved in basically every aspect of post WW II corporate fuckery, globally?
And Galleon, Valeant, Saudi Arabia (suppressing dissidents), China (the 13-year ‘Made in China’ plan), ICE (yes, that ICE), Purdue Pharma (Oxytocin), and… the list goes on (and starts in 1926).
It’s a bit cult-like/multilevel marketing internally. You either raise to the top or quit at some point. Those who don’t burn out in the process and leave usually wind up in senior positions in large companies. Highly connected in itself via their clients plus a network of alumni in the corporate world. Ensuring getting both new contracts and a steady influx of people who want to work there as a springboard for their career in business.
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AI combined with nuclear reactors – what’s the worst that could happen?
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And their advice is often just awful. They have people giving advice with zero understanding of the field. At least that’s what I saw in government.
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I’m glad the community there wised up, these data centers are obviously power hungry but in places like Arizona the biggest problem would be the large amount of water such data centers would need.
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Hopefully this really is a meaningless PR stunt rather than a serious bid:
Google has been enshittifying its own products just fine on its own, thank you very much. No need for an AI start-up to turbocharge that decline.
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I think this says that’s what it really is.
Perplexity did not respond to queries about how the proposed deal would be funded. In July, it had an estimated value of $18bn.
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Do i have to use that as a signature to all of my posts? 
… May not be used to train AI
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So we can all agree that AI-generated slop that puts VFX artists out of work is bad. But apparently Amazon is pushing the envelope trying to make something even worse:
Using actual footage of a fatal plane crash for a stupid, ill-conceived War of the Worlds remake is incredibly disrespectful.
Fortunately probably not too many people will see it, given the 0% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
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This reminds me of (and will probably be about as effective as) those viral Facebook posts:
Goodbye, Meta AI. Please note that an attorney has advised us to put this on; failure to do so may result in legal consequences. As Meta is now a public entity, all members must post a similar statement. If you do not post at least once, it will be assumed you are OK with them using your information and photos. I do not give Meta or anyone else permission to use any of my personal data, profile information or photos.
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Last night my wife was frustrated that here in California she legally can’t purchase a simple red bulb that she wanted which screws into a regular light socket even though it was a LED because the color temperature falls outside the range of California regulations for what’s acceptable for general lighting as spelled out in California Energy Commission Title 20. (You can get a color-changing LED bulb that you set to red but that wasn’t the type she wanted). Not super relevant to AI except for the fact that why the hell are we not allowed to buy that red bulb in the name of energy efficiency when companies are building data centers here that use more power than a damn city??
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