[Animats]

"Microsoft Middle Manager 2.0" - it's getting closer.

Time to re-read Marshall Brain's "Manna".

[Terr_]

Saving folks a search: https://marshallbrain.com/manna

TLDR: Fiction about dystopic-vs-utopic outcomes from AI-management.

[saltwatercowboy]

I love Manna. It strikes such a tongue-in-cheek deal between outsized, sort of ridiculous outcomes that come off as completely bonkers but still somehow make you think.

"Automated management software replaces fast food workers" ---> "Utopians Bought Australia"

Hard to think of other stories that manage that tone. Huxley's Island:

"Self-serving journalist relates psychedelic ethnography" ---> "Magic Mushrooms Cannot Save You From the Forces of Capital"

and Cory Doctorow's Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, maybe:

"Disenchanted immortal undergoes social death" ---> "Cowboy Hats vs. Entropy"

[yencabulator]

Accelerando! https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/fiction/acceler...

[snerbles]

The author's "utopic" notion of having an AI between your brain and spine ready to intercept neural impulses and hijack your body the instant you step out of line is about as horrifying as the "dystopic" scenario at the start of the story.

[Terr_]

That seems a little "no true Scotsman", since every "utopia" can be twisted to hell if a few key elements get corrupted.

[snerbles]

By the author, sure. Both scenarios result in loss of agency for the individual.