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Ed Zitron
@edzitron.com

This article is dogshit for many reasons, chief of them that it doesn’t ever actually discuss what AI does or why it’s such a big deal, just that it’s not just “predicting the next token.” Its only argument is that “the left” (which includes the New York Times!) should use AI for some reason.

Albert Pinto@70sbachchan.bsky.social

is there a technology that "the left" is excited about? www.transformernews.ai/p/the-left-i...

transformernews.aiThe left is missing out on AIAs a movement, it has largely refused to engage seriously with AI, ceding debate about a threat and opportunity to the right
Mike
@misaligned.markets

This is legitimately a rehash of a Kelsey Piper article from last summer. But this newer piece is unique in that it just gets critics wrong. Doctorow is the funniest name to include if your argument is "the left doesn't want to use AI." Kelsey at least had the sense to not name specific people.

1 repost7 likes

Gryphon
@gryphonmyers.dev

Understood, thanks. I was worried there were some pro-AI Doctorow takes I had missed but it sounds like he basically just finds voice transcription useful

Changa_Husky
@changa.gay

I mean I don't see him as a supporter: "AI is the asbestos in the walls of our technological society, stuffed there with wild abandon by a finance sector and tech monopolists run amok. We will be excavating it for a generation or more." and "It is a way to create tech debt at scale."

Mike
@misaligned.markets

Not saying he's a supporter. I'm pointing out the premise of the Transformer article is wrong. 1. More than just "the left" is frustrated about LLMs 2. Frustration centers on how it's being pushed out. Article deliberately misses the nuance and says critics just don't know how LLMs work.

Mike
@misaligned.markets

These people can't engage with substantive criticism so they've just tared everyone as "the left" who all have a single philosophical hang up. Meanwhile, you've got pretty much everyone who isn't in tech genuinely pissed because this LLM rollout, for lack of better word, is ruining everything.

Mike@misaligned.markets

This is such a good point. But beyond this LLMs are pissing in everyone’s beer. Noisy DCs, rising electricity costs, end of consumer technology, spamming open source projects, list goes on. This is not a partisan issue. Ironically a better “rollout” probably could’ve made the worst uses palatable.