Matt Hazard

Dear Friends of the Internet, I write to you with the utmost concern for the mental well-being of the tech CEOs, as they have most definitely lost their marbles. This week, I had to cancel a real meeting with an animated AI chatbot. Let that sink in.

My employer has brought in AI companion software that, on its own, tried to schedule what it called a “face-to-face” Zoom meeting. It had told me that the intent was to ‘get to know me and my needs, so it could be a more effective companion’.

First mistake, bot, assuming I want companionship. For that, I have my wife. And even then, if you ask her, it’s mainly because of a legal contract.

There seems to be a global trend that’s really pushing hard for AI integration.

The Ugly Side of AI

It takes a lot of power and resources to operate. Like, an obscene amount of power to operate. And I know, but that’s only for building the Large Language Models that it uses, not once it’s using a complete set! That’s the problem, the LLMs are never really complete. They’re always being expanded.

The demand is creating a shortage of memory chips. Similar to how bitcoin wreaked havoc on the video card industry, the AI boom is now driving up prices on anything that uses memory chips. Which is everything. From PC RAM to hard drives, prices have skyrocketed.

The misuse. There’s a debate surrounding AI, whether it’s worth having around or not. And yes, it absolutely can serve useful purposes, but the issue falls on the blind reliance on it for damn near everything. Do we really need another video with the entire cast of Friends as Arnold Schwarzenegger? Maybe don’t answer that..

The misinformation. Since almost nobody chooses to validate the garbage that ChatGPT and its rivals spit out, it’s no wonder this goes largely undiscussed. Lest we forget, those LLMs are trained on more than just facts; they’re scraping the internet, learning from opinions and false information, too.

The Obsession With AI Integration

It seems like every other week, we’re reading that another large company is racing to integrate AI into whatever platform they offer, wherever they can make it fit. The real question that no one seems to be asking is, do people really care?

Even the smaller, non-tech companies seem to be buying into this craze. They all seem to believe that AI is the magic answer to getting more production out of employees, or in some cases, replacing part of the workforce.

The track record of corporations making brilliant decisions isn’t exactly clean, with examples like the heel turn on the ‘work from home’ mentality, despite reports from those same companies showing increased productivity and reduced operational costs while having people work from home. Yup, that’s a mouthful, but worth all those words in calling out, well, idiocy.

Wrapping Up The Rant

By now, you probably get the picture that I’m a bit of a crusty old jerk who doesn’t like change. I feel that a lot of these companies that are blindly incorporating AI into an unorganized rat race could be better managed by high school dropouts. That aside, what if this entire investment ends up backfiring on these companies?

Wouldn’t it be ironic if AI actually cut out middle management, or even management in general, instead of the production employees?

What I find interesting is what AI is truly great at – human interaction. Ever use ChatGPT? It’s great at communication and making sense of what your asks are, isn’t it? In most cases, it can drive you to the answers that you were looking for, or inspire you to find your own solutions. Kinda sounds like what management in a company is supposed to do, doesn’t it? Couple that with some timesheet creation work and ‘face-to-face’ meetings, and you’ve got a plug-and-play AI manager, saving a corporation big on top-heavy management fees!

Anyway, I’m beating a dead horse here. I hate AI. It’s largely misused, taxing on the power grid, and it allows people to toss aside critical thinking through a heavy reliance without validation. Just remember, if something is free, you are the product.

I need to go outside and touch grass. Or currently, snow.