That's certainly ... words.
Incidentally, each "wave" justifies massive investment in the same technology: GPUs, for transformations that do not materialise _at scale_.
That raises the questions: why? Who captures the value? Who bears the cost? Why are we always skipping the audit? What happens when the "GPU bubble" bursts?
Rewind the clock further and the contrarian play was to talk about how WebVan and Pets.com failed, proving that internet commerce was a fad that was going away. There were so many identical stories about how dumb investors were to be spending money on e-commerce after Pets.com and WebVan proved that nobody wanted to shop online and that delivery was unworkable.
More recently I remember the endless stories about how ride sharing was going to fail and Uber and Lyft were going to disappear after the VC money ran out. There were blogs just like this one predicting that those dumb investors were going to lose all their money on such a stupid idea.
This type of contrarian reporting always operates on a sliding window of recent failures, trying to convince you that the current thing they're on about is identical to past failures
These articles get traction on HN, but when I read them there isn't a coherent argument inside. It's just a collection of different headlines and stories meant to imply that AI is bad across the board and nobody wants it, but there isn't an argument being formed. It's appealing to those who already have the conclusion in mind, but there is no convincing argument in this post
The government and courts are currently arguing whether Uber is legally the employer of the drivers [2], but that's not very debatable to be honest given the very clear subordination of drivers to Uber (one of the many criteria for a contractor to be legally reclassified as an employee).
They have taken all the power and benefits, and discarded all of the responsibilities and risks associated with employment. That's a strategy that only pays off through political corruption, and not a clear example that their profits are somehow unavoidable and that investing in Uber 10 years ago was wise.
Otherwise, investing in the mafia's drug trades might also be a lucrative opportunity. Which does not make it moral, nor a safe bet.
[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/business-62057321
[2] https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2026/02/02/france-d...
E-commerce succeeded, but not in the form Pets and WebVan proposed, and not in the timeline their investors needed.
The question is not: is it useful, but (as any investor asks): does this bet, at this valuation, deliver what it promises, in time? That's the audit we need.
When the bet distorts global semiconductor supply chains, displaces workers, and rides on mass IP infringement... skepticism looks more like due diligence than contrarianism.
But the inflation of expectations and investments in them because of GenAI, when this inflation bursts may impact everything and everyone.
I have no love for Zuckerberg or Lucky or Musk or any of those gadooshbags, but I don't hate generative AI. It's a useful tool and I've been using it consistently every day for well over a year. I'm part of "everybody", so that's at least one counterexample.
> Everybody hates tech.
And although it's a bit ripped out of the context, which is as follows:
> It will be proven wrong because everybody hates it. A decade ago, people saw that photo of Zuckerberg, waltzing past the masked men at MWC and shuddered. "That's dystopian," almost everyone muttered. "That's dystopian," many of us are still saying, but now even more loudly, more fervently. A recent survey by NBC News found Americans rank the favorability of "AI" below every major politician in the country, below ICE.
> Everybody hates tech. Everybody hates tech billionaires. Nobody wants their bullshit.
I think that's either unluckily mistaken wording or simply a bad-faith overstatement. "Everybody hates tech" - if this is about "big tech giants", then although it's not true (because it's not really everybody who hates them, especially if you will ask usual people), but it's closer to the truth. But the original stance - "Everybody hates tech" - in my humble opinion, even regarding the context, reads rather like "Everybody hates technology as a whole" which is simply false.
And, to be honest, in me personally the whole article is provoking some kind of... uncanny feeling. I can't tell if it was generated by AI or something like that, but it just feels unnatural and... strange. Sorry, I don't even know how to express this clearly...
/s
In a week there will be another screed like this, with another flurry of links and quotes for readers to work through (or not). And who gets wiser from it?
EDIT: This substack is non-stop grievances about AI posted multiple times per week. There's an audience of people who want to be as angry as possible about AI and this Substack is here to sell you subscriptions to that with gems like this designed to make you bristle with anger at the enemy
> They are trained on racism, misogyny, homophobia, ableism, nationalism, anti-Semitism
> The technology industry sells a story of inevitability. It is, in no small part, a profoundly anti-democratic story, one that dismisses if not denies any attempt at agency, let alone resistance. "There's nothing you can do," investors and CEOs and pundits parrot. "Resistance is futile," they smirk (yet another example of their incredible inability to understand the science fiction they like to reference).
And by the way, who will produce this "model that you can run on your own computer"? Although, to be honest, right now in most cases that's not Meta or OpenAI anyway, even though they have some (outdated) open-weight models.
For the same reason how movie companies are reaping record profits from streaming services - convenience and fearmongering.
"You wouldn't download an AI, would you?!" or "Think of children and elderly!" or satanism, or billions of other tricks they already employ to keep you docile.
Also, majority of people do not have hardware to run models that compete with LLM vendors, at this point I'm pretty sure majority of people don't even own a PC anymore.
I haven't seen this one in the wild (while seeing others) LOL. How does this even work? I mean, like... "if you download the film/LLM you will summon a demon"? I honestly can't understand : )
Yes… kind of. I am old and always have been, so naturally I don’t like things I believe children falsely claim they cannot live without. Social media comes to mind.
we both know there is an obvious difference between “using Ghost to share a hypertext article” tech and “the metaverse and palantir” Tech
This is a free tier post on a paid subscription Substack that she charges $6/month for. She's posting this content to drum up an audience who will pay monthly for more of it.
You don't see the irony of the anti-tech blogger trying to cash in on tech hype using the most hyped paid blogging platform? She's not "using Ghost to share a hypertext article"
Sure. Everybody wants real things. Nobody wants to work in factory assembly lines or construction sites. But it must be AI's fault.
