me: do you sell ducks?

him: yes, but they're going quick

me: ok I'll take one

[later]

duck: quick

me: I see

Even if “AI” worked (it doesn’t), there’s many reasons why you shouldn’t use it:

1. It’s destroying Internet sites that you love as you use chat bots instead of actually going to sources of information—this will cause them to be less active and eventually shut down.

2. Pollution and water use from server farms cause immediate harm; often—just like other heavy industry—these are built in underprivileged communities and harming poor people. Without any benefits as the big tech companies get tax breaks and don’t pay for power, while workers aren’t from the community but commute in.

3. The basic underlying models of any LLM rely on stolen data, even when specific extra data is obtained legally. Chatbots can’t learn to speak English just by reading open source code.

4. You’re fueling a speculation bubble that is costing many people their jobs—because the illusion of “efficiency” is kept up by firing people and counting that as profit.

5. Whenever you use the great cheat machine in the cloud you’re robbing yourself from doing real research, writing or coding—literally atrophying your brain and making you stupider.

It’s a grift, through and through.