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Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

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Re: Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

#21

That’s probably why they pushed out Phil Spencer and handed over the Xbox division to a very pro-AI employee.

To be fair, the fundamentals that pre-2019 Xbox (and all other consumer gaming) relies on were already slowly going away and have recently been confirmed to have an extremely tiny chance of recovery, if at all. Embracing the pivot to gambling and tobacco-style customer retention philosophies is purely an effort to salvage the sunk costs in an industry whose traditional customer base is being forced to shrink and inpu…

What fundamentals are those?

Re: Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

#23

Literally every company on the planet would jump at the chance for their product to be addictive.

Yeah but you’re not supposed to say it out loud. The bigger part of this story is Nadella saying (paraphrased) that he has no clue who wrote the document and that guy should look for a new job.

Re: Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

#24
post #19

Maybe trying to engineer addiction is what should be illegal, and if you want to question "how do you define whether something is addictive" you don't need an objective measure: you determine whether it seems like the people making the product seem to think that's their goal.

"you know it when you see it"

More demonstrating intent

Re: Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

#25

Literally every company on the planet would jump at the chance for their product to be addictive.

Imagine a world where every car company would get money every time someone uses their car.

Instead of monthly subscription for self driving or heated seat, it would just cost a few cents a minute.

This would be a strong push to try to destroy public transportation everywhere

Re: Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

#26
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, the fundamentals that pre-2019 Xbox (and all other consumer gaming) relies on were already slowly going away and have recently been confirmed to have an extremely tiny chance of recovery, if at all. Embracing the pivot to gambling and tobacco-style customer retention philosophies is purely an effort to salvage the sunk costs in an industry whose traditional customer base is being forced to shrink and inpu…

What fundamentals are those?

The console market is shrinking and video games are becoming synonymous with PC gaming ( and handhelds I guess but Xbox isn't doing handhelds I think)

Re: Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

#28

Literally every company on the planet would jump at the chance for their product to be addictive.

Imagine a world where every car company would get money every time someone uses their car. Instead of monthly subscription for self driving or heated seat, it would just cost a few cents a minute. This would be a strong push to try to destroy public transportation everywhere

>Imagine a world where every car company would get money every time someone uses their car.

So oil companies? Moreover car companies do get more money with more car use. More driving means more parts required, more servicing needed (from their dealership network), and cars that need to be replaced sooner. It's not as instantaneous as uber charging your card every time you do a ride, but I don't see how that makes a material difference.

Re: Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to Its New AI Assistant

#29

Literally every company on the planet would jump at the chance for their product to be addictive.

I don't think that's actually true. Heck, from my own experience, I can definitively say it's not actually true. I've worked in several organizations where I helped create and sell products whose job was to provide value, then let people get on with their day. I wouldn't have worked at those places otherwise.

Not saying that intended addictiveness is not common, but let's not normalize corporate sociopathy.

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