Personally, I dislike skeuomorphic design in digital interfaces. But still... very cool!

That chatbot you're interacting with is not your friend. I take it as a fact (assumption? axiom?) that it can never be your friend. A friend is a human - animals, in some sense, can be friends - who has your best interests at heart. But in fact, that chatbot "is" a megacorp whose interests certainly aren't your interests - often, their interests are at odds with your interests.

Google works hard with branding and marketing to make people feel good about using their products. But, at the end of the day, it's reasonably easy to recognize that when you use their products, you are interacting with a megacorp.

Chatbots blur that line, and there is a huge incentive for the megacorps to make me feel like I'm interacting with a safe, trusted "friend" or even mentor. But... I'm not. In the end, it will always be me interacting with Microsoft or OpenAI or Google or whoever.

There are laws, and then there is culture. The laws for AI and surveillance capitalism need to be in place, and we need lawmakers who are informed and who are advocates for the regular people who need to be protected. But we also need to shift culture around technology use. Just like social customs have come in that put guard rails around smartphone usage, we need to establish social customs around AI.

AI is a super helpful tool, but it should never be treated as a human friend. It might trick us into thinking that its a friend, but it can never be or become a friend.

But a llm is not a human, and I think OpenAI and all the others should make it clear that you are NOT talking to a human. Repeatedly.

I think if society were trained to treat AI as NOT human, things would be better.

People think that building a software program is like building a house. And, I grant, in some ways it is. But in the end, the customer is not paying for anything tangible. He's paying for words and ideas.

But oh my. The quality of the printing is terrible.

https://rarediseases.info.nih.gov/diseases/9146/cardiofacioc...

Neil Postman (of whom I'm a big fan, to put my cards on the table) wrote very helpfully about the concept of "filters" (that may not be his word) in Technopoly, and I've been thinking about the concept a lot ever since. Certain things are inadmissable in court, and that is true because otherwise you'll just have bedlam. The analogy doesn't hold perfectly, but the same thing is true of other situations where people gather together to communicate, whether in person or online.

The other thing that's required to avoid total chaos is authority, and I think it's a common trait to be dismissive of the value and purpose of authority in this context. People have been dismissive about authority since, uh, forever, but I think there's something about the promise of the internet that makes people think we have finally arrived at the point where it is unnecessary. (Think blockchains and crypto, for instance.) But it's not.

The sooner we see that authority isn't a bug but a feature and begin to build for it in our tech tools, the better.

Any idea whether it is still getting updates?

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24267484

Points: 2

# Comments: 3

So, AFAICT, Hustle provides a service that's nearly as bad as robocalls. From their front page: "Hustle works because people read and respond to texts—and to communication that feels more human." So it's a bait and switch, just like a robocall: you contact me in a way that makes you feel personal, approachable and reasonable to me so that you can gain my attention.

Look, try to see this from my perspective. Without saying anything about the honor and motives of those behind Hustle, it's like I'm being attacked from all sides - Facebook, Robocalls, and now Hustle - to gain my attention. This has always been the case, perhaps, but our modern technology – coupled with a knowledge of human psychology – is a powerful tool (weapon?) for gaining access.

Here's an idea: I don't want to be assaulted all the time via the always-on electronic device I have in my pocket!

I still want to have access whenever I want it. Maybe I can't have it both ways?

- Are there full-length books out there that you'd recommend?

- Who is talking about this stuff currently? Where are their blogs and podcasts? I've listened to a fair bit of Stallman and Moglen recently, but they come at me with a host of assumptions that I'm not sure I'm willing to grant. I want to hear more and different voices in this discussion.

- Where is the "action" happening? In the courts? In software development? In shops like System76 and Purism?

I'm not interested in the Wayland vs. Xorg kind of discussion, and much more interested in fundamental issues. For instance, I'm becoming convinced, I think, that the alternative to the Free/Libre model of computing is Chinese-style censorship and social engineering... but I really don't know.

Thanks for the help!

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18495761

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

To head off an objection, I realize that the fraction of the worlds population that can read code is minuscule. And so, just like I have to trust my mechanic with my car, I’d have to pay someone else to review the code and trust their report. So trust would still be necessary, even if every bit of software running on your computer was free. But, I’d have a much greater ability to decide who I trust.

I don’t really see a way around my basic point: if you have non-free software running on your computer, it could be doing anything. Why should we accept that as the status quo? It’s one of the most compelling reasons I’ve seen for advocating and using Free Software.

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18198715

Points: 2

# Comments: 0