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I do not want AI to "polish" me

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Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#181

Post by nicbou »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #64
burkaman wrote: post #32

Obviously the AI version is bland and terrible, but arguably more importantly it has also completely changed the meaning of the message. The AI version: - apologizes - implies the recipient was "promised" this email as a "response" to something - blames a hectic schedule - invites questions None of this was in or was even implied in the original. This is not a "polished" version, it's just a straight-up different ema…

The AI has some ... "ideas" ... of its own on what workplace relationships apparently need to be like.

And those ideas seem far more in line with millenial Silicon Valley culture. It's weird when they expect Germans to fake that sort of overly formal, overly cheery tone. People just don't talk like that.

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#182

Post by swiftcoder »

BearOso wrote: post #104
layer8 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Notepad.exe is getting sloppified: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/use-rewrite-in-n...

I read that and saw: Tip: If you don’t have Windows Notepad installed, you can download it from the Microsoft Store. I have too much to say about that, so I'll just leave it.

... I did not know that one could uninstall Notepad

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#183

Post by robwwilliams »

Yes amusing, since unsolicited polishing, but I sincerely doubt this was forced on our fine humorist. English to English editing or “translation” from snarky to suave is straightforward to understand and fix.

But what about translation by professional human translators between languages? is it really any better at preserving the intent and sub-text?

Kundera has an amazing essay—- “The Sentence”—-in his collection of essays “Testaments Betrayed” on the woes of translation of, yes, a single sentence from Kafka’s “The Castle”.

As he (or his translator Linda Asher) say: The sentence “describes the coition of K. and Frieda”.

Under the bar too ;-) Not a topic I tend to associate with Franz Kafka.

When AI systems can match Milan Kundera (translated from the French) then we will have definitely gotten to Pro level. “Write me a brilliant essay in the style of xxxx, on topic yyyy in French, and translate it into Mandarin for grins. I would be a wreck if I had to translate Kundera.

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#184

Post by nicbou »

Freak_NL wrote: post #178
yawnxyz wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is like when my manager once yelled at me for not writing in corp speak enough

“OK Fine. But could you at least yell at me in corp speak?” It's no surprise LLMs are using corp speak and vapid marketing prose as a template. There is so much of it out there. This is from that Autodesk post last week where they admitted their mistake and… Nope it's corp speak: “We are excited to share some important updates regarding Archiving and our Idea Boards and Forums that aim to enhance your experience and…

> Look, we need to align on language here. If you’re not speaking in scalable, results-driven terminology, you’re slowing down the team. We don’t “talk about things”—we sync and strategize. We don’t “try something new”—we leverage data-driven insights to drive innovation.

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#185

Post by the_snooze »

rsynnott wrote: post #174
the_snooze wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a design that's in companies' best interests. You can have a computer that's a "friend." One that you trust but ultimately has a mind of its own. This contrasts with a computer that's merely a tool, that serves you exclusvely at your pleasure and has zero agency of its own. Which approach gives companies more control over users? Which one allows companies to sell that access to the highest bidder?

Based on the experience of 20 years ago, though, users are _extremely_ turned off by it. There's little reason to think this has changed (if anything it is likely more pronounced because Clippy came in kinda without baggage, whereas LLMs have a lot of baggage and most of it ain't great). > It's a design that's in companies' best interests. I really don't think it is. Clippy was reputationaly damaging to Microsoft and…

Modern Big Tech doesn't particularly care what users think. They know they have network effects on their side and that switching costs are high. So what if it's "reputationally damaging?" What are users going to do? They're just resources to be exploited. Microsoft, Google, and their ilk can treat users with contempt if it means more control and more shareholder value.

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#186

Post by jorgeleo »

rsynnott wrote: post #162
flatline wrote: post #26

> It’s like my whole computer is a toddler screaming “LET ME DO IT!” every time I try to create something. Every autocorrect or auto suggestion ever has felt like this to me, but the volume has been turned up to 11. The otherwise drab Adobe Reader is covered with colorful sparkly buttons and popups suggesting I need not even read the document because it can give me “insights.” First, no you may not ready my proprieta…

Thing is, we've been here before in a much more limited way; people _hated_ it when Microsoft's demonic paperclip did this in Office. "It looks like you're writing a letter". _Hated_ it. It is unclear what the industry thinks has changed, that people will now welcome "It looks like you're [whatever]".

The people. The people changed.

This forum (HN) attracts certain population that wants to do things, to understand, to share relatively well based opinions and have a discussion.

But look around, look at the new hires in the other departments. And by new I mean young, in their 20. A lot of them welcome this kind of things, they evaluate by popularity and likes. The marketing begin the AI bubble knows this, and so it pushes for it. Make it popular is more important than make it useful, because there is a tipping point were is popular enough that we capitulate.

Turns out that Idiocracy is not that far behind (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0387808/)

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#187

Post by [deleted] »

rsynnott wrote: post #165
escapecharacter wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people who want to replace most human interactions with LLMs assume that there is some objective set of cultural values true in all contexts, and that it is good and easy to encode these as axioms into an AI.

And those objective set of cultural values are, apparently... a sort of parody of 90s corporate culture, a sort of polite version of Michael Scott. Like, no-one ever _actually_ wrote like LLMs tend to write; it reads as a parody of a now slightly obsolete corporate-speak.

[deleted]

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#188

Post by layer8 »

swiftcoder wrote: post #182
BearOso wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read that and saw: Tip: If you don’t have Windows Notepad installed, you can download it from the Microsoft Store. I have too much to say about that, so I'll just leave it.

... I did not know that one could uninstall Notepad

Since Windows 10 at least: https://www.majorgeeks.com/content/page/remove_or_restore_no...

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#189

Post by ongytenes »

Soon everyone will be texting, emailing etc with an AI secretary doing it all.

"AI take a letter and polish it for me..."

Maybe even video conferences will use "Polish" to portray a recreated lifelike sophisticated avatar with real time grammar correction. When folks finally do meet in real life, they discover a socially awkward, an illiterate or tactless boor instead of the suave intellect portrayed by the AI.

Please forgive my comment, I didn't have any polish for it. LOL

Re: I do not want AI to "polish" me

#190

Post by fragmede »

ragazzina wrote: post #77
bloomingkales wrote: post #3

There is no way in hell anyone who knows me would get that email and not think I’d been abducted This person cares about not putting up a fake identity. That's pretty cool, but social media has exposed that a large number of people are perfectly fine presenting an illusion. People will have no shame passing off well written things as an output of their talent and hard work. Digital makeup has no bounds.

> People will have no shame passing off well written things as an output of their talent and hard work. Sometimes I don't want to waste my time crafting a professional e-mail to a bunch of jerks full of themselves. Maybe I want to write it as it comes off my brain, and let my digital scribe to reformulate it so that the people reading it feel respected/validated/flattered. Am I putting up a fake identity then? Am I p…

"Best Regards" vs "Bye" is one thing, but unless you're the owner of the company, sending a client "fuck you, pay me" just isn't professional and is probably going to get you fired.
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