Benedict Cotterill
The California gold rush didn’t exactly strip its coast bare; It made way for an economy that sits at number 5 when compared to every other country on the planet. The movement of pumping money straight from the ground gave way to a colossal force, and economic battleship that seems to continue to churn out pure magic every century. It started with the gold rush, then came Hollywood, then came Silicon Valley; Each generating ‘gold’ from what seems to be thin air, but not without cost. Both the gold rush and the Hollywood dream lured ambitious dreamers, both eager and foolish to find themselves trapped in California's hills. Although we may not be due for California's next gold rush, it's here, and like the 19th century gold rush and Hollywood before it, the stragglers are stripping its land bare. Whether it's by removing the forests for mere nuggets of fools gold, or generating entertainment so successful it borders on ‘oppressive,’ Silicon Valley has ushered in a new area, in which companies that are erected to fulfill the desires of themselves rather then its users begin stripping the land clean, or in this case, the internet. Some emerging companies with hearts in the right place, focusing on their users and using the emerging state of AI to launch some really hardy product still have potential of reaching a solid nugget or making the next Citizen Kane.
As soon as ChatGPT became a household name in the summer of 2023, the notion that AI would sell out was on every eager entrepreneur's radar. Every company that had an online presence sought to automate their services for the purposes of cheaper labor and effectively keeping up with the trends of featuring an ‘AI service,’ proving their validity in an ever changing online world. Quite quickly, mass layoffs at tech companies rendered many offices empty, and many products that were otherwise decorated in human touch soon became projects worked on solely by the hands of programs, ghosts left behind from the employees that coded them to begin with. Although this was all done under the guise of making the user experience that much more effective, it seems to be doing quite the opposite for the most part.
Using AI to automate experiences have shown both on Spotify and Apple that it can dehumanize not only the experience by exclaiming to the user that suggestions and work is done for them by the AI, but the AI effectively dehumanizes the user as well, reducing users to their data entries and providing services for their data entry alone [1]. In the case of Spoitfy, their new AI sorting algorithm has said to categorize people based solely on their music listening patterns, grouping individuals down to their data based on their activity which has resulted in users finding the apps music listening suggestions tasteless, predictable, and otherwise cold at the hands of a machine [1]. In the case of Apple, their AI can oftentimes make sore judgements based on the users race or gender, exacerbating the biases by its programmers or its source material, furthering the issues it was designed to solve [1].
In addition, the user experience is being dominated by AI. Some spaces are so inundated with AI that it can be impossible to navigate on a social basis. When certain activities that are meant to be a test of human ability, knowledge, and understanding are reduced to the understanding of a single product used to cater to a single user's advantage it can effectively ruin the entire experience for the rest of its hobbyists [1]. Effectively put by Culum Brown in the Economist, “It is really getting kind of unfair. If you are going to use GPS to take you to a location, sonar to identify the fish and a lure which reflects light that humans can’t even see, you may as well just go to McDonald’s and order a fish sandwich.” [2]
With these two examples in mind, it's important to note just how much of the internet is inundated with AI. As the dead internet theory states, most of the internet's content, activity, and traffic is AI and bots rather than actual users [3] and in 2016, it was recorded for the first time that the majority of the internet was in fact AI generated [3].
With this knowledge at hand, it's important to note the success of the same variety. Hollywood gave way to one of the largest industries in the world, and the results of the gold rush funded the next global empire. The AI movement is inundated with faulty businesses without the consideration of the public, but for those companies that intend to use this technology for the benefit of its peers, it can effectively extend the human touch rather than attempt to replace it. Every industry at its launch works as a cautionary tale that provides an example for those that attempt to follow in its footsteps.