I’m pretty against AI for most of the same reasons, but it seems really self righteous to write this. I understand wanting to get your feelings out and at this point it really is just screaming into the void, so I’m glad this guy has an outlet, but his anger is at the wrong people. He is the exact person he’s talking about.

He’s upset that someone said “it is what it is” after trying and failing to resist the AI push then goes on to say:

At some point soon, I will have to figure out how to work with AI coding tools if I want to stay in the industry I’ve put my entire adult life into.

People have different lines, and he seems to be upset at people whose lines are ever so slightly before his. He makes it clear he’s not lambasting that particular person, but most people with the “it is what it is” mindset are not champions of AI. They are seeing dramatic changes to their industries and are unable to stay afloat and keep payroll without making drastic changes. He talks about how Amazon and android and these other big companies are terrible, and yet he still uses them. Is he not then also part of the problem? The thing is, there are alternatives to all of the services. We could all just go live in the woods if we really wanted. He seems to be directing his anger at the wrong people. I don’t know this guy’s exact politics, but this does not feel in line with class solidarity. Most people that resign themselves to that mindset feel as though they do not have the power to make a change. Generally, those are not the people that are making the decisions. His ire is misdirected. I’m not saying that we don’t all individually have a responsibility to the planet and each other, but without solidarity movements crumble. This kind of article does not help build solidarity. Would love to have seen him talk about how this experience has made him willing to pay more and get less, and more willing to be inconvenienced in order to avoid these big companies, but no, he fails to see this as an option still. People are still out there resisting Amazon and Google and they could write the same exact article about him. This is his pet issue, so this is the only line worth still defending to him. Seems hypocritical to call others viewpoints selfish when he is unable to see it in himself. Don’t get me wrong, I understand the anger and frustration, but I’d love to see what he’s doing about it other than pointing the finger at a bunch of people that have made the decision that he admitted to potentially also making.

I’m also not thrilled about the obsession with copyright. I was against copyright in the 90s. I was against copyright in the 2000s. I was against copyright in the 2010s. And now these people want to call integrity lack of ethics just because I’m not willing to endorse yet another extension to a legal monopoly forbidding me from running arbitrary algorithms on data supposedly owned by someone else?

I’m sympathetic to the environmental arguments. Though I also would point out there are much greater areas of marginal waste to cut on. Online advertising uses more energy than AI. I look forward to the day it’s banned.

But the whole “we’re going to play pretend that I can ban you from transposing text I wrote through a matrix” thing? Absolutely not. Nothing good comes out of that.