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by mjhay 766 days ago
I'm really looking forward to the Trough-of-Dissillutionment phase of LLM's hype cycle. This insistence of shoehorning it into everything is getting beyond stupid.
2 comments

This remind me of when they were shoehorning voice assistants into everything. “Alexa can play music through my smoke alarm? Alexa can start my microwave for me instead of pushing two buttons? Why not”
This remind me of when everybody and his dog was shoehorning blockchain into everything. Blockchain-based pet platforms, pet owners earning tokens for participating in community, pet care services fueled by smart contracts, and the like.
When the metric for success starts and stops at "engagement"!
The big problem with these things is that the people responsible for the misery they cause will not feel any of the consequences.
In fact, they'll likely be rewarded for delivering results.
What misery? The hyperbole here is astounding.
Misery might be a bit hyperbolic, but I'm referring to the larger scale model of engagement being a tier 0 metric for success. Instagram & cohorts stealing people's attention spans is something I'd describe as negative and almost evil, with the larger scale problem of the smartest people in our industry having been at ad companies for the past 2 decades.

In the context of LLMs I think that they're useful tools, and if "we" play it right they can be a great boon. Short-term they'll lead to the enshittification of the internet even more though imo.