AI is super expensive to run, yet these companies do EVERYTHING to make sure we are using it all the time - Microsoft is bundling it on every native app. They also openly admit they’re not able to make it profitable even when considering the people paying expensive subscriptions to use it.
So isn’t this contradiction suspicious? What’s really the reason behind making sure we will use AI even when we didn’t ask for it?
I suspect the plan was to dump it on everyone for free, get everyone reliant on it, then jack up the prices to make the investment back. Classic big tech play book, did it with cloud storage, did it with web hosting, did it with ride share.
But people haven’t really picked it up en mass, let alone made it something they’re reliant on. So they can’t jack up the price to pay for the cost of building out all the infrastructure. So they’re doubling down and trying to force it on everyone, hoping that somehow that will get people reliant on it.
If you can get people suck on your generative tech, in any capacity, you get them stuck on a service that can tweak and filter the truth in real time, and whose statements aren’t accountable to anyone. This is maybe a bit more valuable than money.
The Elon / grok white genocide gaffe from a few days ago is really funny because he is and always has been an inept moron, but there’s the evidence. It is definitely scary.
Positive feedback loops in two directions. First: normalize it and sanitize its image via astroturfing, making it both ubiquitous and accepted, so people want to use it more, making it even more ubiquitous and accepted. Second: mine all the data possible from everyone using the AI through various apps and services that all have varying permissions settings on myriad devices, enabling it to be better at advertising its value as well as advertising anything else the AI owner/investor wants, driving more money to the people with skin in the game, of which they then also use some fraction to provide funding to further the first step I mentioned.
This is the song that doesn’t end,
Yes, it goes on and on, my friend…
We need better privacy laws. Until then, we need people to understand the difference between what is free and what is free*
AI is super expensive to run, yet these companies do EVERYTHING to make sure we are using it all the time - Microsoft is bundling it on every native app. They also openly admit they’re not able to make it profitable even when considering the people paying expensive subscriptions to use it.
So isn’t this contradiction suspicious? What’s really the reason behind making sure we will use AI even when we didn’t ask for it?
I suspect the plan was to dump it on everyone for free, get everyone reliant on it, then jack up the prices to make the investment back. Classic big tech play book, did it with cloud storage, did it with web hosting, did it with ride share.
But people haven’t really picked it up en mass, let alone made it something they’re reliant on. So they can’t jack up the price to pay for the cost of building out all the infrastructure. So they’re doubling down and trying to force it on everyone, hoping that somehow that will get people reliant on it.
It could be prices. It could also be information.
If you can get people suck on your generative tech, in any capacity, you get them stuck on a service that can tweak and filter the truth in real time, and whose statements aren’t accountable to anyone. This is maybe a bit more valuable than money.
The Elon / grok white genocide gaffe from a few days ago is really funny because he is and always has been an inept moron, but there’s the evidence. It is definitely scary.
Oh, it is way worse than that.
Positive feedback loops in two directions. First: normalize it and sanitize its image via astroturfing, making it both ubiquitous and accepted, so people want to use it more, making it even more ubiquitous and accepted. Second: mine all the data possible from everyone using the AI through various apps and services that all have varying permissions settings on myriad devices, enabling it to be better at advertising its value as well as advertising anything else the AI owner/investor wants, driving more money to the people with skin in the game, of which they then also use some fraction to provide funding to further the first step I mentioned.
We need better privacy laws. Until then, we need people to understand the difference between what is free and what is free*
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