[refulgentis]

Hear hear. I'm a founder of a GenAI startup, left Google to do it. And yet, cannot believe how much debasement has occurred, and trust has been lost, by every. single. product. and. company. thinking it has to have an AI story, and it has to be the story.

c.f. Google IO keynote this year. I couldn't tell you a single thing Google is launching this year, beyond limited, rushed features where Gemini chat is in a side pane.

And that's not on me: it's because Google literally didn't talk about a single other thing.

And as usual, Google is out of touch and doesn't get the joke, c.f. at the end, Sundar presenting their own count of how many times they said AI.

I sorely miss tech industry of the 00s, I simply cannot imagine ex. 2000 Apple/Steve Jobs falling for this. There's this weird vapid MBA brain drain in charge everywhere. But hey, stonk goes up.

[mattgreenrocks]

> And that's not on me: it's because Google literally didn't talk about a single other thing.

Most tech companies don't have a whole lot to show right now, so AI sucks up all the oxygen in the room. This becomes a feedback loop with the stock market, too.

> There's this weird vapid MBA brain drain in charge everywhere.

Yep. And Apple's playing along as well. Their latest WWDC presentation has the most weird tone I've ever seen in their presentations ever: "we added some AI features and they're pretty cool I guess...also it's super private! Here's all the ways it's kept private."

So much hedging going on. So little excitement. Because they're just playing to someone else's tune, and they're not good at doing that.

[refulgentis]

2004 Apple with AI: we need to get 100 people locked down and working on Finder 2.0 with this, and keep execs focused on reviewing it wholeheartedly. this year, let's lol at vista security via confirmation dialogs, vs our best in class OS.

2024 Apple with AI: this is our best year ever. Look at our CTOs hair. We fixed Siri being eons behind, now if it thinks ChatGPT can help you can tap a confirmation dialogue.

[hnlmorg]

> I simply cannot imagine ex. 2000 Apple/Steve Jobs falling for this.

I wouldnt be so quick to assume that. Let’s not forget that Jobs bought Siri and then integrated it into every platform they sold.

AI has been a buzzword for literally decades. It’s just exploding in popularity right now because the capabilities of GenAI have recently exploded.

It’s a little like how VR and AR has been around for decades. It’s just taken this long for the technology to make mixed reality a possibility for the masses.

[refulgentis]

Yeah, def not arguing my paycheck is thin air -- its that there's a surface level-only respect for it. "Eyewash", in baseball parlance.

[flakiness]

> And as usual, Google is out of touch and doesn't get the joke, c.f. at the end, Sundar presenting their own count of how many times they said AI.

Haha be kind to your ex-employer. This was supposed to be a joke. I agree they don't get it but they at least tried this time. I ranked this high on the Sundar-joke ladder (which is a low bar I know).

[asciii]

> I simply cannot imagine ex. 2000 Apple/Steve Jobs falling for this.

No he would not entertain any of this nonsense. IIRC he had a hard time with the Siri demo too. It appears Apple is happy to take itself and shareholders on a side quest with all their cash…good time to be earning interest on it too.