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0 pointsryandrake1mo ago0 comments

> The article almost reads like a practical manual for increasing perceived productivity inside a company.

I think the truth is that at many (most?) places, perceived productivity and convincing is all that matters. You don't actually have to be productive if you can convince the right people above you that you are productive. You don't have to have competence if you can convince them of your competence. You don't have to have a feasible proposal if you can convince them it is feasible. And you don't have to ship a successful product if you can convince them it is successful. It isn't specifically about AI or LLMs. AI makes the convincing easier, but before AI, the usual professional convincers were using other tools to do the convincing. We've all worked with a few of those guys whose primary skill was this kind of convincing, and they often rocket up high on the org chart before perception ever has a chance to be compared with reality.

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jdw641mo ago

I agree. but,In practice, the important thing is that, whatever one thinks of management, you still have to speak in terms they recognize and want to hear.

The target changes, but the mechanism is similar. This is often criticized, but it is also necessary even in ordinary conversation. The core skill is the ability to guide the agenda toward the place where your own argument can matter.

I do not believe that good technology necessarily succeeds. Personally, I see this through the lens of agenda-setting. Agenda-setting matters. I am usually a third party looking at organizations from the outside, but when I observe them, there are almost always factions. And inside those factions, there are people with real influence. Their long-term power often comes from setting the agenda.

From that perspective, AI slop looks like a failure of agenda-setting around why the market should need it.

They encourage people to exploit human desire and creative motivation. But the problem is this: the market still wants value and scarcity. From that angle, this mismatch with public expectations may be a serious problem for the AI-selling industry.