He’s such a good guy
Genuinely one of the most fun performances I've ever been to, as well! The small venue accentuated Al's insanely huge personality.
Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
11–20 of 51 posts
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#12Best possible ad for Weird Al. How did we get here? Why am I, a lifelong tech enthusiast, on a tech enthusiast board championing someone for resisting technology? I’ve been on HN for years but it’s starting to feel absurd ever since I’ve been out of sync with the whole AI thing. Thanks for listening to my Ted talk.
As is often repeated here, "technology is a force multiplier".
AI has been multiplying the wrong things (for the common people) at an amazing rate, while the good things it multiplies have been few, arguable, and lagging behind.
Usually to be enthusiastic about new tech, it needs to be the reverse. New tech that multiplies the "good things" first while the wrong things catch up later (see Internet, cars, commercial aviation, smartphones).
Sure, fellow software engineers who spend 8+ hours a day writing code see it as the opposite, since AI _is_ seen as doing the "good things" (i.e. writing code). But eventually the bad things will catch up with us too.
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#13Best possible ad for Weird Al. How did we get here? Why am I, a lifelong tech enthusiast, on a tech enthusiast board championing someone for resisting technology? I’ve been on HN for years but it’s starting to feel absurd ever since I’ve been out of sync with the whole AI thing. Thanks for listening to my Ted talk.
There's a meme that goes:
Person A: I'm a tech enthusiast! I have the latest smartphone, smartwatch, smart car, smart TV, smart home... all networked together and automated to make my daily life easier.
Person B: I work in tech. The last piece of tech I bought is a printer from 2004, and I keep a loaded gun nearby in case it starts acting funny.
Once you understand how the sausage is made and what the incentives are, you become very suspicious of every hot new tech integration that comes along.
But humans just don't write commercial software anymore. Don't expect to keep doing that for a living.
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#14My personal meme is to occasionally weigh in with a comment about one of his videos being "Al-generated content". It is not my fault if people using sans-serif fonts get mad about it.
There was a guy on TikTok whose daughter (~10 yo) had discovered a "Weird A.I." that could "take any song and make it funny".
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#15Best possible ad for Weird Al. How did we get here? Why am I, a lifelong tech enthusiast, on a tech enthusiast board championing someone for resisting technology? I’ve been on HN for years but it’s starting to feel absurd ever since I’ve been out of sync with the whole AI thing. Thanks for listening to my Ted talk.
As is often repeated here, "technology is a force multiplier". AI has been multiplying the wrong things (for the common people) at an amazing rate, while the good things it multiplies have been few, arguable, and lagging behind. Usually to be enthusiastic about new tech, it needs to be the reverse. New tech that multiplies the "good things" first while the wrong things catch up later (see Internet, cars, commercial a…
The general public has never been enthusiastic about new tech until well after the benefits start rolling in and are undeniably obvious. https://pessimistsarchive.org/
AI is no different. People like to think they have some special new insight as to why "it's bad this time!" but the average person has always reacted to change with FUD.
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
As is often repeated here, "technology is a force multiplier". AI has been multiplying the wrong things (for the common people) at an amazing rate, while the good things it multiplies have been few, arguable, and lagging behind. Usually to be enthusiastic about new tech, it needs to be the reverse. New tech that multiplies the "good things" first while the wrong things catch up later (see Internet, cars, commercial a…
The general public has never been enthusiastic about new tech until well after the benefits start rolling in and are undeniably obvious. https://pessimistsarchive.org/ AI is no different. People like to think they have some special new insight as to why "it's bad this time!" but the average person has always reacted to change with FUD.
Usually this happens after the naysayers have been forcibly evicted from economic and social life
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#17Take the money while it’s still there.
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#18Best possible ad for Weird Al. How did we get here? Why am I, a lifelong tech enthusiast, on a tech enthusiast board championing someone for resisting technology? I’ve been on HN for years but it’s starting to feel absurd ever since I’ve been out of sync with the whole AI thing. Thanks for listening to my Ted talk.
There's a meme that goes: Person A: I'm a tech enthusiast! I have the latest smartphone, smartwatch, smart car, smart TV, smart home... all networked together and automated to make my daily life easier. Person B: I work in tech. The last piece of tech I bought is a printer from 2004, and I keep a loaded gun nearby in case it starts acting funny. Once you understand how the sausage is made and what the incentives are,…
Please don’t be sweepingly dismissive of people by framing like this. Printers lack mobility and firearms would only activate their defensive ink cloud reflexes, as every expert office IT worker knows (including you!). So the group B you’re describing is being portrayed as both excessively paranoid and blatantly incompetent in order to dismiss the views of tech experts that reject A.I. and support your own claim that they’re, to paraphrase your intent in last century’s terms, ‘dinosaurs’. That’s not a respectable form of rhetoric and your use of it paints both you and group A, the one whose beliefs you’re trying to promote, with a broad brush of skeptical disbelief.
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#19[deleted]
Re: Weird Al Yankovic Pulled Out of AI Ad Deal: 'I Can't Be the Poster Boy for AI'
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
The general public has never been enthusiastic about new tech until well after the benefits start rolling in and are undeniably obvious. https://pessimistsarchive.org/ AI is no different. People like to think they have some special new insight as to why "it's bad this time!" but the average person has always reacted to change with FUD.
Usually this happens after the naysayers have been forcibly evicted from economic and social life
And look at how far we have come. We are all the better off for it, by nearly every objective QoL measurement there is.