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I think this is even the case for tech companies. So many products I see now that offer AI where I go "is that really necessary?". Even in the case of my own st

I think this is even the case for tech companies. So many products I see now that offer AI where I go "is that really necessary?". Even in the case of my own startup, my business partner has been pushing me to figure out some way to integrate AI into our product and my response to him every time has been to convince him that it's not in our best interest to go down that road. I told him that even in a world where we could adjust our subscription prices to compensate for the added expense of AI, we would be burning valuable time on AI when we could be spending it in other areas of our product. Even though we are a tiny startup I have a feeling that this applies to many other tech companies as well.

eureka-belief 2y ago
The reality is, the economy is on a ticking timer for when it will be turned upside down by 1) LLM agent workflows 2) AGI 3) superintelligence. There are many companies who know this and want to hedge against that future but they simply don’t know how yet. The tricky part about productizing LLMs is that your product designers need to have a full understanding of LLMs and what they can and cannot do. So currently many of the existing product designs and AI user experiences still suck. The biggest misconception is that just because chatbots are now more capable that somehow that means that you should replace your UI with one.
- hatefulmoron 2y ago
  The timer might be much longer than it's fashionable to believe right now, which would make this sort of FOMO investment completely pointless.
  - alephnerd 2y ago
    Depends on the industry and use case. For example, AI leveraged SOC is going to be operational within 3-5 years, and there goes 50-70% of jobs in that sector. Others segments are significantly behind (robo-taxis) and I'm sure there are other segments much further ahead (call center automation), but the change is absolutely coming - not because of LLMs alone, but because the entire ecosystem around ML/AI is a 15 years old now, and there's an entire generation of SWEs that are just as competent as ML PhDs were 15 years ago.
    - SgtBastard 2y ago
      >there goes 50-70% of the jobs in that sector. Does this always follow though? Mass automation can just as easily make the existing staff far more effective, making the ROI easier to justify.
    - voiceblue 2y ago
      GP is rebutting the “upside downing” of the economy by superintelligent AGI. If you meant to argue that case, your points seem insufficient.
      - alephnerd 2y ago
        I don't think superintelligent AGI will occur in our life span. That said, most investment in ML/AI is around applications of ML in automating specific domains. My argument is against this: > FOMO investment completely pointless I have an example of a 10-11 figure TAM industry that is actively in the process of migrating to being majority automated, and there are plenty of other industries in the midst of this as well.
        hatefulmoron 2y ago
        The part of my post you're replying to concerns my thoughts on something much broader, though. My claim is not that all investment today is pointless, but that investment predicated on the belief that we're a few years away from the economy being "turned upside down by 1) LLM agent workflows 2) AGI 3) superintelligence" is bad. It feels like a Motte-and-bailey type issue. If I point out that the original claim doesn't have enough evidence and is purely speculation, I don't really want to hear about how call center jobs are being affected by LLMs. I don't disagree, but we're not talking about the same thing here.
        alephnerd 2y ago
        > investment predicated on the belief that we're a few years away from the economy being "turned upside down by 1) LLM agent workflows 2) AGI 3) superintelligence" is bad No one is investing on that assumption. I've been in the PE/VC for a couple years now and I've never heard anyone from Associate to LP say that straight faced and unironically.
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QuantumGood 2y ago
It's mostly the "staying relevant" subset of FOMO that is pushing such widespread adoption. Like FOMO, "staying relevant" is poorly defined and emotionally driven, making it effectively meaningless. Probably the smartest response is to slap something flashy on that does little, and took few resources to add. The more resources you apply to staying relevant generally the worse the decision is.
kevinventullo 2y ago
It sounds like your partner is not pushing for it because it will improve the product for users, but because it will improve the product for investors. It’s a branding exercise. So, if you’re doing anything at all that involves statistics, or multiplying matrices, using some kind of backtracking algorithm, maybe just call that AI and everyone wins. Or just slap a “genAI” button tied to a ChatGPT API next to your user input.

eureka-belief 2y ago

The reality is, the economy is on a ticking timer for when it will be turned upside down by 1) LLM agent workflows 2) AGI 3) superintelligence. There are many companies who know this and want to hedge against that future but they simply don’t know how yet. The tricky part about productizing LLMs is that your product designers need to have a full understanding of LLMs and what they can and cannot do. So currently many of the existing product designs and AI user experiences still suck. The biggest misconception is that just because chatbots are now more capable that somehow that means that you should replace your UI with one.

hatefulmoron 2y ago
The timer might be much longer than it's fashionable to believe right now, which would make this sort of FOMO investment completely pointless.
- alephnerd 2y ago
  Depends on the industry and use case. For example, AI leveraged SOC is going to be operational within 3-5 years, and there goes 50-70% of jobs in that sector. Others segments are significantly behind (robo-taxis) and I'm sure there are other segments much further ahead (call center automation), but the change is absolutely coming - not because of LLMs alone, but because the entire ecosystem around ML/AI is a 15 years old now, and there's an entire generation of SWEs that are just as competent as ML PhDs were 15 years ago.
  - SgtBastard 2y ago
    >there goes 50-70% of the jobs in that sector. Does this always follow though? Mass automation can just as easily make the existing staff far more effective, making the ROI easier to justify.
  - voiceblue 2y ago
    GP is rebutting the “upside downing” of the economy by superintelligent AGI. If you meant to argue that case, your points seem insufficient.
    - alephnerd 2y ago
      I don't think superintelligent AGI will occur in our life span. That said, most investment in ML/AI is around applications of ML in automating specific domains. My argument is against this: > FOMO investment completely pointless I have an example of a 10-11 figure TAM industry that is actively in the process of migrating to being majority automated, and there are plenty of other industries in the midst of this as well.
      - hatefulmoron 2y ago
        The part of my post you're replying to concerns my thoughts on something much broader, though. My claim is not that all investment today is pointless, but that investment predicated on the belief that we're a few years away from the economy being "turned upside down by 1) LLM agent workflows 2) AGI 3) superintelligence" is bad. It feels like a Motte-and-bailey type issue. If I point out that the original claim doesn't have enough evidence and is purely speculation, I don't really want to hear about how call center jobs are being affected by LLMs. I don't disagree, but we're not talking about the same thing here.
        alephnerd 2y ago
        > investment predicated on the belief that we're a few years away from the economy being "turned upside down by 1) LLM agent workflows 2) AGI 3) superintelligence" is bad No one is investing on that assumption. I've been in the PE/VC for a couple years now and I've never heard anyone from Associate to LP say that straight faced and unironically.
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QuantumGood 2y ago

It's mostly the "staying relevant" subset of FOMO that is pushing such widespread adoption. Like FOMO, "staying relevant" is poorly defined and emotionally driven, making it effectively meaningless. Probably the smartest response is to slap something flashy on that does little, and took few resources to add. The more resources you apply to staying relevant generally the worse the decision is.

kevinventullo 2y ago

It sounds like your partner is not pushing for it because it will improve the product for users, but because it will improve the product for investors. It’s a branding exercise. So, if you’re doing anything at all that involves statistics, or multiplying matrices, using some kind of backtracking algorithm, maybe just call that AI and everyone wins. Or just slap a “genAI” button tied to a ChatGPT API next to your user input.