No, not really. It’s a tool for the ultra-wealthy to masturbate with, that’s all. “AI” isn’t going to pay your bills or fill your pantry. It was never designed to benefit you, the majority of people who built it don’t even grasp what challenges you need addressed let alone have solutions. The very nature of the tech is to harm the middle and the poor. It’s the ultimate Veblen Good, a tulip trap for the 21st century.
Is there any good thing for using AI for the middle class and poor? Instead of just the oligarchs ripping off the middle class and poor?
Submitted 2 months ago by Patnou@lemmy.world to [deleted]
Comments
GreenBeard@lemmy.ca 2 months ago
howrar@lemmy.ca 2 months ago
We’re working on getting it to fill your pantry and do all your chores.
GreenBeard@lemmy.ca 2 months ago
No, you’re working on getting it to fill your pantry while the rest of the world goes hungry. There’s a difference.
trashcroissant@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 months ago
There are practical uses for it, but realistically it is only advancing the destruction of the planet and disproportionately affecting poor and working class people’s livelihoods first, so no there is no good thing.
deadbeef79000@lemmy.nz 2 months ago
I use it for doing tedious work as a programmer.
Note that it’s not replacing anyone, it’s just making me more efficient.
My recent usage (jargon warning) was to get it to monitor metrics from seven hosts while I scheduled heavy work loads on the hosts to find bottlenecks.
Malyca@lemmy.zip 2 months ago
I think it could help with medical research. But for the average person, it’s (incorrect) search results and plagerism machine only.
Thorry@feddit.org 2 months ago
Well in an ideal world it would make everyone more efficient, letting us do more in less time. Thus we would need to work less for the same amount of money. Like switching over to 4 days a week, same amount of hours per day, for the same salary.
But in reality we’ve already stepped up efficiency a lot and it never works out that way. It just devalues the work, so we need to produce more to get the same salary. We end up working the same or even more for the same amount of money, or even less money. All of the gains go to the people at the top, creating an ultra rich upper class that really should never exist.
However AI has so many more issues that even this best case scenario has huge downsides for everyone, which will hit the middle class and poor people the hardest. It’s really bad news across the board.
neidu3@sh.itjust.works 2 months ago
I have two practical use cases where I haven’t found a better alternative that LLMs:
- I can paste a huge log file and have it summarize where it went wrong (and often how to fix it)
- It can give me a simple introduction to any topic and provide practical examples.
Bluegrass_Addict@lemmy.ca 2 months ago
-
you assume it’s actually correct
-
you assume it’s vorrect
neidu3@sh.itjust.works 2 months ago
Wrong on both accounts. As with any other source of information, its correctness needs to be validated.
-
alexquiniou@lemmy.zip 2 months ago
Using local llm on your computer is ok. There are great open source tool out there :
- Comfy ui
- Anythingllm
schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 2 months ago
I used it for generating my profile picture here on Lemmy and don’t see anything wrong with that.
Patnou@lemmy.world 2 months ago
Can you give me a step by step how to do that? What did you go to a website said I want a kitten snuggled up and it spit out that photo? Sorry I am really dumb to this phase of humanity and plan on staying that way towards AI.
schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de 2 months ago
If I recall, I asked Gemini to generate an image of a kitten wrapped in a blanket.
It initially gave me a photorealistic image, then I asked it to turn that into a drawn image with the background removed, and that gave me what I have now (though I think I cleaned up some stray pixels in the background).
Kolanaki@pawb.social 2 months ago
If a business is using AI agents to make purchases through, like at a drive thru or something, you could theoretically prompt it in a way that it gives you everything you want for free.
QuinnyCoded@sh.itjust.works 2 months ago
I’d say I’ve definitely found some use for AI. Mainly programming stuff that’s outside of my comfort zone but where I still understand what’s happening.
For example I had it make a bash script I can run to terminate all of my VR programs and relaunch them for when SteamVR crashes instead of manually clicking all the tiny Xes and doubleclicking all the icons.
I could have leaned how to do it myself, but I don’t really want to spend 2 hours troubleshooting windows bash scripts I won’t use again
SlumDogGazillionaire@piefed.social 2 months ago
One use would be as a tutor like how it’s used for Project NOMAD. However, you could argue it’s not a super strong use case as the information could still be researched yourself.
I have found it to be useful when learning a subject like math and I need more practice exercises on a topic when I’ve run out of them from a book. I also may use it to create quizes for assessing my own understanding of a subject.
Skylordd78@lemmy.zip 2 months ago
Im autistic so I use it to help me navigate certain social situations I wouldn’t understand otherwise, its helping me reflect more on my behavior and helping me change myself for the better. Don’t get me wrong I still have an actual therapist and doctor and I don’t use it for everything just when I get confused in public.
TheStaffmaster@lemmy.world 2 months ago
as someone who started a substack recently, having the AI image generator make cover art is a nice convenience as I neither have the time to do it myself or the cash flow to hire someone. I’m not going to use stock images because then I’d get watermarks and The AI gen is slightly more professional seeming.
There is a youtube channel that used AI to illustrate it sci/fi fantasy narrative about a multiversal extraplanar setting called “The Archive In-between” which uses a dreamlike retro aesthetic which really fits well with AI generated imagery. Most people who are fans agree this is a FANTASTIC use for AI.
LunarLoony@lemmy.sdf.org 2 months ago
Counterpoint: if I see a generated image then I’m immediately checked out, and I know of many, many people who do the same. Doodling on a post-it would be preferable
TheStaffmaster@lemmy.world 2 months ago
counter-counterpoint: I’m trying to develop branding, and if it gets popular enough, the intent is to get an artist. Also I’m just starting out.
the_mighty_kracken@lemmy.world 2 months ago
unsplash.com has free stock images. If you want to be nice you can thank the photographers on social media, but it’s not required.
donnywholovedbowling@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 months ago
Fwiw you get stock photos without watermarks when you buy the right to use them
vsg@lemmy.world 2 months ago
What if the person is too poor to buy the stock images, though? Although that doesn’t excuse the usage of AI.
TheStaffmaster@lemmy.world 2 months ago
money is required to purchase goods and services.
pyr0ball@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 months ago
I’m working on some applications that use LLM’s for some features, and everything you run yourself is 100% free:
Source: got.opensourcesolarpunk.com
FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world 2 months ago
You can use ChatGPT to find the lowest price on a given item you need. That is objectively a good thing, one just has to weigh the ethics of it.
PriorityMotif@lemmy.world 2 months ago
Not really trustworthy since they could easily have a company pay to have their products in the results plus there’s alternatives and other considerations depending on your buying preference like locally available if you need something today vs a better price.
Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de 1 month ago
I really do think we as individuals should just wholesale throw it in the bin, the only people who should be using it are teams of workers like scientists/medical staff where it can unequivocally have a big benefit which helps everyone and is thus worth it.
But even then usage should go through a vetting process, so it’s justified and not going to lead to worse results.
CannedYeet@lemmy.world 2 months ago
Apepollo11@lemmy.world 2 months ago
For information based things, absolutely.
Something that people don’t seem to understand is that there’s a difference between AI and GenAI.
And that within GenAI, there’s low cost stuff like text and graphics, and high cost like video and audio.
And that with tools developed with GenAI often do not use GenAI when it is run.
AI (not GenAI) is super useful and you use it in a bunch of applications already without even realising it. The camera that interprets speed signs and displays them on your dashboard = AI. Spam filters = AI. Google translate = AI.
redsand@infosec.pub 2 months ago
I don’t want a camera that interprets speed signs and displays them on my dash board. Get that shit the fuck away from my car.
Apepollo11@lemmy.world 2 months ago
I hate to inform you, but you might be onto a losing battle. It’s been a mandatory safety feature on all new cars in the EU for a few years now.
jimmy90@lemmy.world 2 months ago
It’s teeny tiny bit obvious what OP’s world view is.
I wonder if they keep asking questions like this about the world and getting good answers they might snap out of the cult
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 months ago
Why don’t you go murder some Palestinian children