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Automate the CEOs

hamiltonnolan.com

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Re: Automate the CEOs

#141

Post by boringg »

bumby wrote: post #86
boringg wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power is the amount of energy transferred or converted per unit time. Whereas energy is the ability to do work. Power is the ability to do more work, faster.

That's the engineering definition of power. The sociological definition is the ability of an group or individual to exert control or influence. (Note power in the sociological sense can also be used to prohibit 'work'. E.g., if someone is powerful in Congress, they can stop a bill that would might be more productive in the sense of the engineering definition.)

True - power can go both ways. I think the physics definition still applies to the sociological definition - its essentially the same thing.

Re: Automate the CEOs

#142

Post by bumby »

boringg wrote: post #141
bumby wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the engineering definition of power. The sociological definition is the ability of an group or individual to exert control or influence. (Note power in the sociological sense can also be used to prohibit 'work'. E.g., if someone is powerful in Congress, they can stop a bill that would might be more productive in the sense of the engineering definition.)

True - power can go both ways. I think the physics definition still applies to the sociological definition - its essentially the same thing.

My point is that they are very different things. A powerful Congressperson can block an infrastructure bill. That bill would result in a lot of work in the physics definition. The sociological power definition is at odds with the physics power definition; more sociological power can lead to less physical work. In contrast, more physical power leads always to more physical work (or, at least more work per unit of time).

Re: Automate the CEOs

#143

Post by nickelcitymario »

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #138
nickelcitymario wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a marketer, I'm curious about what you mean by this. What are you saying is marketing's endgame? (I'm not sure if I'll agree or disagree yet.)

You probably won't agree, because it's not a very charitable thing to say about marketers, sorry. My position is that democracy works well when the will of the people gets translated into action in a way that still resembles what those people organically need. Marketing is the process of tampering with that translation such that what actually happens benefits the marketers' customers, typically at the expense of the…

Would it surprise you that I largely agree with you? Or that I'm at least sympathetic?

For context, I just published a book called Insurgent Marketing. The central thesis is that the world is being shaped by propagandists, has been for a long time, and that the best (and most pragmatic) way to combat their influence is to play their game better than they do.

All businesses market themselves. Try running a business without doing anything remotely resembling marketing, and let me know how that goes. But that doesn't mean marketing (and marketers) should get a free pass for the damage many of us cause.

I think of marketing as neither positive nor negative in it itself, much like speaking or any form of communication. Some of us speak love. Some of us speak hate. Most of us spew garbage.

The problem isn't marketing, per se, but human greed. Both are as old as written history, and probably older. By blaming marketing, we excuse ourselves from taking responsibility of our role in shaping the world around us. The problem is "other people", those evil marketers. (Or politicians. Or bankers. Or the alt-right. Pick your bogeyman.)

Regarding this "Shoe Event Horizon", I hadn't heard of it before. My initial take is that as long as businesses keep getting bigger, quality will suffer. But we live in a time when it's easier (not easy, just easier) to launch a business of your own and produce shoes (or any product) of the quality you're looking for. Yes, most people will shop at Wal-Mart for the cheapest thing. Again, human greed, on behalf of both the corporation and the customers.

But thanks to technological advances, we're at a turning point where anyone with a smartphone can effectively market their goods. It's not the sole domain of corporations and governments anymore.

My hope, and my personal belief, is that more people will seize this opportunity so that we start to see an explosion of independent entrepreneurs producing products they're proud to stamp their names on.

Re: Automate the CEOs

#144

Post by __MatrixMan__ »

nickelcitymario wrote: post #143
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You probably won't agree, because it's not a very charitable thing to say about marketers, sorry. My position is that democracy works well when the will of the people gets translated into action in a way that still resembles what those people organically need. Marketing is the process of tampering with that translation such that what actually happens benefits the marketers' customers, typically at the expense of the…

Would it surprise you that I largely agree with you? Or that I'm at least sympathetic? For context, I just published a book called Insurgent Marketing. The central thesis is that the world is being shaped by propagandists, has been for a long time, and that the best (and most pragmatic) way to combat their influence is to play their game better than they do. All businesses market themselves. Try running a business wi…

It only surprises me a little. After all, I'm a software engineer and I have lots of criticisms about software engineering.

I like where you're trying to go re: independent entrepreneurs. If that were the norm I'd likely have no bone to pick with marketing.

I'm skeptical, though, because I think that having 2x as much money doesn't just make you 2x better at shaping the narrative as the other guy, it makes you 4x better. So power concentrates in the hands of the few, and it's their misbehavior that I take issue with.

> By blaming marketing, we excuse ourselves from taking responsibility of our role in shaping the world around us.

If all we do is blame, then yes. But I don't really blame marketing. As you say, something like it has been going on forever. I blame technologists like myself for building the web in a way that that is so easily abused by marketers and propagandists.

I want to see a world where it's considered rude to share a link data that contains ads, or malicious javascript, or anything else with ulterior motives. Instead, you should strip the malware and share the cleaned version.

That's an unreasonable ask in today's web. Ain't nobody got time to re-host cleaned copies of everything they want to talk about. But in a content-addressed world, it's a little different, users have a bit more control over which version gets circulated.

So I'm trying to build a web where it's easier for users keep it clean and harder for outsiders to corrupt. It's slow going, practically everything root-of-trust is off limits (dns, ssl, ...), but at least it feels like meaningful work.

Re: Automate the CEOs

#145

Post by gremlinsinc »

nickelcitymario wrote: post #24

Close. Automate middle management. All the things mentioned in the article really are prime candidates for automation. But that's management, not leadership. Management is primed to be automated. See Marshall Brain's book "Manna" for a great take on what's possible here. Leadership is not. LLMs are great at doing the right things when there's a general consensus on what the right things are. Best practices, etc. But…

I'd say there are most CEO's that probably could be replaced, assuming that CEO isn't also the founder, you can't replace the 'visionary leader' of a platform, or if the CEO is someone like Steve Jobs who I guess was sort of a founder of apple so that's kinda moot.

80% of CEO's could easily be replaced in a few years, then that can trickle down to other managers, and eventually lead towards more "flat" organizational hierachies which hopefully are more equitable and pay better for all employees, not just a rich few.

Re: Automate the CEOs

#146

Post by nickelcitymario »

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #144
nickelcitymario wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would it surprise you that I largely agree with you? Or that I'm at least sympathetic? For context, I just published a book called Insurgent Marketing. The central thesis is that the world is being shaped by propagandists, has been for a long time, and that the best (and most pragmatic) way to combat their influence is to play their game better than they do. All businesses market themselves. Try running a business wi…

It only surprises me a little. After all, I'm a software engineer and I have lots of criticisms about software engineering. I like where you're trying to go re: independent entrepreneurs. If that were the norm I'd likely have no bone to pick with marketing. I'm skeptical, though, because I think that having 2x as much money doesn't just make you 2x better at shaping the narrative as the other guy, it makes you 4x bet…

I fully agree with you! Although I think it’s possible to market without violating data privacy. There’s a small but growing movement among marketers and advertisers to ditch all of that, to the best of our abilities.

I can’t help that Google and Facebook track everything, but I CAN avoid using those aspects of their tools.

I like to target based on content, not user profiles. Google Search ads, for example. Yes, Google is absolutely building profiles on everything you click, but we don’t have to use their remarketing tools and the like. We can simply say “show my ads on related content” or “show my ads on related searches”.

Do most marketers do that? Absolutely not. But I’d like to think the tide is turning, if only because of the public backlash.

Re: Automate the CEOs

#147

Post by boringg »

bumby wrote: post #142
boringg wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True - power can go both ways. I think the physics definition still applies to the sociological definition - its essentially the same thing.

My point is that they are very different things. A powerful Congressperson can block an infrastructure bill. That bill would result in a lot of work in the physics definition. The sociological power definition is at odds with the physics power definition; more sociological power can lead to less physical work. In contrast, more physical power leads always to more physical work (or, at least more work per unit of time…

I understand your point, but i would say that his power by blocking that work is work and thus the definition still stands. Pretty much same thing to be honest and i’m just having fun with it but i would say they are quite similar.

Re: Automate the CEOs

#148

Post by xp84 »

kristopolous wrote: post #127
xp84 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope this isn’t a hot take, but after seeing the apparent endgame of “democracy” play out over the last 10 years or so, I’m fine with business being done using a completely contrasting system.

You should consider all possible systems then and include the possibility that the system your criticizing isn't a very good democracy or maybe is democratic in ineffectual ways.

shrug Maybe you know some good governments that I don’t. It’s just that all democracies I know about are in various stages of being hacked by bad actors in bad faith. I think it’s because none of them were developed in an environment that had the tools being used now to convince people of lies that are profitable for those doing the convincing. So they’re not particularly resilient to this stuff.

I don’t want to see any company that I want to succeed making decisions like a democracy does today.

Re: Automate the CEOs

#149

Post by patrickk »

calvinmorrison wrote: post #34
nickelcitymario wrote: post #24

Close. Automate middle management. All the things mentioned in the article really are prime candidates for automation. But that's management, not leadership. Management is primed to be automated. See Marshall Brain's book "Manna" for a great take on what's possible here. Leadership is not. LLMs are great at doing the right things when there's a general consensus on what the right things are. Best practices, etc. But…

50% of what middle management is what secretaries used to do. If I ever run my own company I will hire a team of secretaries to work with my developers and our productivity will shoot through the roof. No everyone is organized, good at scheduling, following up on things, focusing at work, interpersonal discussions, sending memos, navigating bureaucracy, etc. A great secretary allows you to focus on getting developmen…

I heard a similar sentiment from a high performing colleague from a company my employer partered with. He said something along the lines of "if they (client) wants me to make constant PowerPoint reports, they better pay extra for an intern in the contract because I am not wasting time on that".
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