Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable • Hacker News Board

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#41

Post by kogasa240p » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:49 PM UTC

deanCommie wrote: post #19

Every big tech company's embrace of AI is making all of their employees miserable. Whereas if you're half-competent and at a startup, the AI is an incredible opportunity to try to leap ahead while the prices are subsidized (by the big tech behemoths fighting wth each other) The reason is a complete inversion of Ownership and Agency. For a decade of ZIRP, big tech convinced its employees that they're "changing the wor…

Good post

>2021 was the first crack. The comps went crazy, half the industry turned over, and the ones who didn't felt a bitter sting where it became blatantly clear that all the new arrivals were just in it for the $$$, and the companies were willing to pay for the backfills but not to reward the loyalty of the missionaries.

Also SVB collapsed in late 2022, notice that AI hype started right after.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#42

Post by Ifkaluva » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:50 PM UTC

deanCommie wrote: post #19

Every big tech company's embrace of AI is making all of their employees miserable. Whereas if you're half-competent and at a startup, the AI is an incredible opportunity to try to leap ahead while the prices are subsidized (by the big tech behemoths fighting wth each other) The reason is a complete inversion of Ownership and Agency. For a decade of ZIRP, big tech convinced its employees that they're "changing the wor…

> the difference between 200k/year and 800k/year didn't feel much day to day (other than the ability to buy a house or something, and feel safe with a retirement nest egg)

I can’t believe I read this sentence, lol.

800k is the ability to buy a house and support a family on a single income. Do you see so many people lamenting the days when this was possible? So many memes about the lifestyle Homer Simpson could provide, and may modern families can’t? 800k makes it possible.

It’s a huge lifestyle upgrade, especially if your partner wants to do something artistic, academic, or otherwise less profitable.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#43

Post by layer8 » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:50 PM UTC

stephc_int13 wrote: post #29

I believe that any kind of partial automation is going to make the job more soul-crushing. Ford style assembly lines made the work of the factory workers more miserable. Partially automated cashier did the same thing. I don't think there is any point in trying to resist automation, as the efficiency benefits are too important.

Efficiency gains are more important than people not having to spend their working life with soul-crushing tasks? I don’t quite follow.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#44

Post by themafia » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:52 PM UTC

stephc_int13 wrote: post #29

I believe that any kind of partial automation is going to make the job more soul-crushing. Ford style assembly lines made the work of the factory workers more miserable. Partially automated cashier did the same thing. I don't think there is any point in trying to resist automation, as the efficiency benefits are too important.

> Ford style assembly lines

The ones with 10 hour shifts and mandatory overtime? Yea, I don't think it's the _line_ that's making them miserable.

> Partially automated cashier did the same thing.

I've not once heard anyone in the service industry make this complaint.

> as the efficiency benefits are too important.

You can squeeze every last drop of productivity from your employees. In the short term this may even evidence profits. In the long term it only works if you hold a monopoly position.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#45

Post by apsurd » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:54 PM UTC

themafia wrote: post #34

ost-ing wrote: post #3

As someone who has spent a vast portion of life believing technology would make life better, I've come to the realisation that this idea is a fallacy. Technology amplifies power and until we collectively redefine and enforce a value system that benefits us all, the advancements in technology simply serve as a means of subjugation

Technology is simply a technique to leverage and extend human desire. It's a tool. It's in the hands of those who control and use it. You shouldn't blame technology. You should blame the maniacs that have latched on to it as a way of extending their power. You should blame the government for their failures of regulation. You should blame the media for failing to cover this obvious problem. The people who want to subj…

"The problem is them"

no no, we're not doing that.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#46

Post by kQq9oHeAz6wLLS » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:55 PM UTC

rglover wrote: post #26

idle_zealot wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know what you're quoting, but I wish it were the case that something affecting a million people granted each affected individual about a one-millionth share in the decision. I don't think that would always yield good outcomes, but at least it would be democratic. Structures that enable that are what we should be building.

In some circles, he goes by Uncle Ted .

To quote a movie:

In the 1960's there was a young man graduated from the University of Michigan. Did some brilliant work in mathematics. Specifically bounded harmonic functions. Then he went on to Berkeley, was assistant professor, showed amazing potential, then he moved to Montana and he blew the competition away.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#47

Post by ismailmaj » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:55 PM UTC

toasty228 wrote: post #11

ost-ing wrote: post #3

As someone who has spent a vast portion of life believing technology would make life better, I've come to the realisation that this idea is a fallacy. Technology amplifies power and until we collectively redefine and enforce a value system that benefits us all, the advancements in technology simply serve as a means of subjugation

> As someone who has spent a vast portion of life believing technology would make life better, I've come to the realisation that this idea is a fallacy. I have to very regularly remind myself many people genuinely believe this shit and are not straight up evil/maniacs, it's getting harder

I'm thinking that personally, technology is not bad in a vacuum and not necessarily bad in society, but it just reveals that our system is ill-equipped to guarantee good usage of it.

We could have fun defining what's good usage but we're so far from it, it would just make me sad.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#48

Post by zzzeek » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:56 PM UTC

Forgeties79 wrote: post #17

ost-ing wrote: post #3

As someone who has spent a vast portion of life believing technology would make life better, I've come to the realisation that this idea is a fallacy. Technology amplifies power and until we collectively redefine and enforce a value system that benefits us all, the advancements in technology simply serve as a means of subjugation

> until we collectively redefine and enforce a value system that benefits us all Tons of us called for common sense guard rails and a little bit of actual intention as we rolled out LLM’s, but we were all shouted down as “luddites” who were “obstructing progress.” We all knew this was coming. It’s been incredibly frustrating knowing how preventable so much of it has been and will continue to be. Edit: these responses…

It wasn't "preventable" though. How would you prevent what's been happening ? Pass a law making GPUs illegal ? Just ..."convince" everyone that the machine that can write working software, business letters and render good enough banner and print advertising for nearly free is evil and just don't use it (ask Emily Bender how that's going)? There is no realistic way from stopping any of this from happening. Need a different approach.

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#49

Post by hamdingers » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:56 PM UTC

thih9 wrote: post #14

ost-ing wrote: post #3

As someone who has spent a vast portion of life believing technology would make life better, I've come to the realisation that this idea is a fallacy. Technology amplifies power and until we collectively redefine and enforce a value system that benefits us all, the advancements in technology simply serve as a means of subjugation

One attempt was open source. Or perhaps libre software? I guess it is not a success since only one of these looks mainstream.

It is curious how successful AI developers have been in trying to redefine "open source" as "the binary is free to download"

Re: Meta's embrace of AI is making its employees miserable

#50

Post by mat_b » Sat, May 09, 2026, 8:56 PM UTC

Forgeties79 wrote: post #17

ost-ing wrote: post #3

As someone who has spent a vast portion of life believing technology would make life better, I've come to the realisation that this idea is a fallacy. Technology amplifies power and until we collectively redefine and enforce a value system that benefits us all, the advancements in technology simply serve as a means of subjugation

> until we collectively redefine and enforce a value system that benefits us all Tons of us called for common sense guard rails and a little bit of actual intention as we rolled out LLM’s, but we were all shouted down as “luddites” who were “obstructing progress.” We all knew this was coming. It’s been incredibly frustrating knowing how preventable so much of it has been and will continue to be. Edit: these responses…

Except that it's not preventable. Technology is always an arms race. If you don't create it, someone else will, and then they'll have the advantage and subjugate you, so you might as well be the one to do it first. Whatever it is that you're trying to prevent, someone is going to do it if it gives them power.