I am two years into the AI realm after leaving Bloomberg. I use AI heavily every day. I am neck deep into using primarily Claude, but also Gemini, and occasionally ChatGPT. I intentionally am using it for as much of my API Evangelist operations as possible to understand how my audience sees the world. I use so much of it that I get outreach from companies wanting to work with them because I show up on top performers radar because of my Claude commits across my GitHub organizations.
I would say I am two years in, but only one year has been deep inside the AI sausage factory. The first year I was still holding my nose. I’ve gotten used to the stench. My positioning hasn’t changed. If you go back to my initial response to the AI movement, which likely sounds extreme anti-AI–nothing has changed. I’d say I am even more adamant that AI in its current LLM format and investment approach is a bad idea. It’s enshittification on steroids. It’s smoke and mirrors. It is lying as a core business model. Very few truly beneficial things will emerge from the AI circus in coming years, but this won’t stop it from being a thing.
From my vantage point deep in the sausage factory, there is no defensible position to take. You can’t say I use it for X, and this is good. I use it for X, Y, and Z, and there are benefits and business value generated by how I use it, but nothing I’d stand on a soap box and say–AI is worth it. Anytime I begin to delude myself of this, position my soap box, I step back and think about the environment, labor, and intellectual property havoc being unleashed. Nothing I use AI for erases this. Nothing justifies my usage or adoption. There is no way that I can confidently champion any use case. AI is bad, and is being used for bad things, and will have many, many irreversible negative consequences on our society.
There are many business and engineering folks who will disagree with me. They’ve opted to be ignorant of the environment, labor, and intellectual property consequences. You will never find me defending AI in any circumstances. If you catch me defending it, call me out. This doesn’t mean I won’t be using it. Understanding how the machine works is what I do for a living. I am not creating art, providing healthcare, or other critical aspects of society. I make a living understanding how the Internet powered system we’ve built works, the good and the bad. But don’t let anyone ever tell you that you have to use AI to be a critic. You don’t. Be a critic. Find your position and own it. I am going to stay inside of the sausage factory for now. It is important to me to keep shining a light on what is happening. Finding stories. Meeting people. And calling bullshit on this game from within the bowels of the beast.
