College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos • Hacker News Board

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#11

Post by jfyi » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:34 PM UTC

tyleo wrote: post #4

bogzz wrote: post #2

The kids are alright.

Every one of these posts about boos at commencement speeches has one of these comments near the bottom. I feel like I’m failing some pop culture quiz. What does this mean?

It's a song by "The Who". Though given the controversy their lead songwriter (Pete Townshend) has been through, I personally would refrain from quoting him on the topic of kids.

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#12

Post by ghaff » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:35 PM UTC

Correctly or not (probably to some degree correctly) new grads are hearing AI is a major reason why they're having trouble finding jobs which is simultaneously 1.) Probably mostly has always been the case--I no longer have the vast sheaf of rejection letters when I ever got one at all and 2.) Is anecdotally actually the case for a variety of reasons that also include pandemic overhiring and probably an out-sized AI effect on junior engineers, probably especially programmers.

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#13

Post by Y-bar » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:37 PM UTC

> “There is a fear in your generation that the future has already been written, that the machines are coming, that the jobs are evaporating, that the climate is breaking, that politics are fractured, and that you are inheriting a mess that you did not create.”

The total lack of self-awareness that Schmidt and his cohort of tech billionaires has significantly contributed to all this is screaming even louder than the boos.

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#14

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:37 PM UTC

sarreph wrote: post #10

Discussed here (2 days ago): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48177785

[deleted]

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#15

Post by dude250711 » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:38 PM UTC

They just have not considered the massive shareholder value being captured, which under capitalism is certainly guaranteed to trickle down, as it had been historically proven time after time.

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#16

Post by dijksterhuis » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:39 PM UTC

sarreph wrote: post #10

Discussed here (2 days ago): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48177785

other recent related submissions based on searching for "commencement"

- Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt booed at Arizona U commencement speech https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48204166 - 26 points | simonebrunozzi | 5 hours ago | 6 comments

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Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#17

Post by analogpixel » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:43 PM UTC

> Tennessee State University suggested AI was "rewriting production as we sit here" and told his audience to "deal with it" as they jeered him in response.

Guess it doesn't take much to see what's under the mask.

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#18

Post by Frusn » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:45 PM UTC

[flagged]

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#19

Post by nemomarx » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:47 PM UTC

Y-bar wrote: post #13

> “There is a fear in your generation that the future has already been written, that the machines are coming, that the jobs are evaporating, that the climate is breaking, that politics are fractured, and that you are inheriting a mess that you did not create.” The total lack of self-awareness that Schmidt and his cohort of tech billionaires has significantly contributed to all this is screaming even louder than the b…

His next line was about agreeing with that fear so his messaging is just incoherent to me. I guess very "well we did it anyway, get ready for your jobs to go away and to deal with a big mess we made"?

Re: College students drown out AI-praising commencement speeches with boos

#20

Post by internet_points » Wed, May 20, 2026, 12:48 PM UTC

dude250711 wrote: post #15

They just have not considered the massive shareholder value being captured, which under capitalism is certainly guaranteed to trickle down, as it had been historically proven time after time.

?