Although today’s short one (nothing wrong, just busy), life is intervening, I wanted to highlight another example of imitation AI as an ideology rather than a business decision.
The CEO of Shopify is a lovely all-around worker who works to finish cancer research in a country that is not even himself, and instructs all his employees that they must use imitation AI, and they cannot hire people until they are judged about how much they will use it and prove they cannot do their job with imitation AI. This is insane, and perhaps the business killing level is insane.
First of all, imitation AI can’t do anyone’s job right now. Given the hallucination problem, all outputs should be checked by experts to ensure that the output is available. It can’t leave it to do the job on its own, as it does something that lies about New York City law or gives tax advice that can be audited. It reduces the quality of your code and introduces security flaws. This is something that shopping cart systems like Shopify should be keen to eliminate. These things need to be babysats as if they were Godzilla-sized toddlers who have not yet taken a nap.
Secondly, I fully believe that people somewhere have integrated imitation AI beneficially into their workflows (I don’t believe there is enough demand to support these small advancements in supporting the enormous amounts needed to make these viable products, but that’s another argument), perhaps by summarizing the stupid emails from the CEO. But those people found instances of them not because they were told they had to use them in a specific way, but by working through their own processes. Forcing people to use tools that aren’t suitable for their job is frankly stupid. But it is an ideological stupidity and driven by someone who is not doing the job.
I’ve talked about this before, but the majority of pushes for imitation AI is because technology leaders hate their workers. They hate the need for the talent of these workers to make money, and the dislike their workers fulfilling vague promises to make the world more serious and better. It gets in the way of making even more money than the indecent amount they already have. And there’s nothing to interfere with it. The CEO of Shopify wants to live in a world where he doesn’t have to pay workers for his talent.
Here’s what happens to Shopify if this is actually in place: First of all, many people are planning to leave. The mission of using tools that the combination of overwork brings my employment and often makes your work easier is that it will already be miserable to work there. It will push people to leave. They usually start with the best people because they leave and find work. Second, CEOs force many people to waste a lot of time and money. If they’re really checking their use, Shopify will spend money and then do the job as they have because they don’t have the time or incentive to babysit bullshit machines. Truly cheating and clever people will write scripts that will always use things while doing real work in the background. So, in addition to worsening people’s production and lowering job satisfaction, this mission inoculates a culture of lying to leadership. I am sure it is not harmful in any way.
If you have an online store, you may start looking at Shopify alternatives.
Shopify CEOs have not made business decisions. He has an ideologically driven choice. He is trying to force the world to succumb to his preconceived notion of how it should be, not how it is. He says that mimic AI cannot be an effective alternative to workers than canoes can curb the rise in the tide (he says that STEM people are culturally illiterate). In his heart, he is the business of the Lord, and all Lego bows to him. He wants to know that there is not enough glue to connect his delusions to the world.
Do you want something like this weirdness? You can subscribe to my free Newsletter
