this post was submitted on 19 Aug 2024
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Futurology
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The technology doesn't have to be better. It doesn't even have to be "as good as". It just has to be good enough. The main advantage is it can run 24 hours per day, and you can instantly scale up during high demand and scale down for low demand. At the moment they also believe it is cheaper than people. But it is heavily VC subsidized. That cost advantage will quickly disappear when it cone time for profits.
Given that "good enough" is a very slippery definition, let's say that's true.
AI just isn't good enough. And it doesn't look like it's going to be anytime soon.
Frankly, I don't think these tech behemoths laying off everyone are planning on AI replacing them at all. I think they're outsourcing all those jobs to the lowest priced tech-capable countries they can find. They say "AI" but - even they know that's not going to happen for a number of years at best.
Agreed. It is a scam and a bubble and an excuse to do whatever they really wanted to do in the first place. However they are selling it with the arguments I presented and I'm sure some people believe them.
This is the same argument we had about Automated Teller Machines.
We're looking like, half a century later, the invention of the ATM may soon reduce the total quantity of people employed as bank tellers.
It's really difficult to tell what the long term impact of a new technology will be.
But we can conclusively say, today, that laying people off while citing AI is just assholes being assholes. Today's AI is absolutely not covering the real costs (even at any reasonable fraction) of those layoffs to the future of the company.
For argument, let's put aside the ethics of layoffs,l - even just the shareholders have been better off with more people employed as bank tellers, for a full half century, after the invention of the ATM.
There was a dip in teller employment (fuck around) and a dip in bank profits (find out) after the introduction of the ATM, as well.
The predicted savings may materialize soon, a half century later. But even that is probably 100% due to the separate invention and adoption, and maturity, of online banking.
Anyway. This stuff is weird. But it's fair to call out blaming AI for the current layoffs, as bullshit.
Historically, even the shareholders they're claiming to serve would be served much better by a more conservative approach to retaining trained talent.