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ChatGPT currently has ~ 120 to 190 million daily active users ~ 800 million weekly active users ~ 450 million to over 800 million depending on the data sourc
by bko 1y ago
ChatGPT currently has
~ 120 to 190 million daily active users
~ 800 million weekly active users
~ 450 million to over 800 million depending on the data source and methodology.
Get a grip. Hundreds of millions of people are using it, most of them for free. I would say "society" has benefited.
This has to be peak HN.
Create the fastest growing consumer product in history.
HN anon: yes, but who will benefit?
- ceejayoz 1y agoFacebook has more. Was it a benefit? Does the benefit outweigh the harms?
- bko 1y agoYes, Facebook is a benefit. Among other things, it gave me React which much of the modern web is built on, and React Native, PyTorch, GraphQL, Cassandra, Presto, and RocksDB just to name a few. The question is, what are billions of people doing on Facebook if it's harmful? I don't know. My daycare sends me updates, my barbershop tells me when they're closing and I used it to sell my fridge. This hole Facebook irrational hate is ridiculously overblown. It's an app, and compared to things like TikTok that is essentially a Chinese psy-op, it's really a great product.
- danielheath 1y ago> The question is, what are billions of people doing on Facebook if it's harmful? Perhaps _you_ don’t know. It’s quite notorious for being the place to organise the genocide over in Myanmar. IMO, that should disqualify every executive or engineer who knew (and did nothing) from ever again being involved with widely-used infrastructure.
- uncomputation 1y ago> what are billions of people doing on Facebook if it's harmful? I don't know. This is extremely naive and akin to asking "why do people drink if it’s bad for you then??" Popular != healthy
- rafaelero 1y agoTbh, it's not clear that if we all stopped drinking the world would be better.
- gtowey 1y agoYeah, and maybe it would be better still if we all tried heroin!
- Foxhuls 1y agoAre you legitimately trying to compare alcohol to heroin?
- DangitBobby 1y agoI think they are legitimately mocking the notion that we wouldn't all be better off without alcohol.
- gloosx 1y agoI don’t want to spoil anything for you, but ethanol is actually a very reactive molecule — and in some ways, it acts similarly to opioids like heroin. It, among other things, stimulates endogenous opioid pathways, leading to the release of β-endorphins and activation of mu-opioid receptors. So, alcohol works indirectly, heroin directly – but both enhance opioid signalling. If you’re curious, this study explains it really well: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3728478/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3728478/
- rafaelero 1y agoFood can also indirectly enhance opioid signaling. What's your point?
- gloosx 1y agoFood activates it within normal biological limits, alcohol and heroin artificially push the same system far beyond normal range, forcing the brain to compensate by downregulating receptors or reducing endogenous opioid production, so it's totally legit to compare alcohol to heroin
- kovac 1y ago> My daycare sends me updates, my barbershop tells me when they're closing and I used it to sell my fridge. To consider the other side of this, read "The age of surveillance capitalism" by Shoshana Zuboff (really read it though, not chatgpt the summary :). All the benefits you mentioned are real. But, at what cost and could we have reaped the same benefits without surrendering all agency to those who can't be held accountable?
- bko 1y agoWhat are the costs? Seems like a huge benefit to me considering the alternative would be... I don't know. No updates? Maybe some shitty custom app that would 100% for sure have worse data security and privacy rights than something like Facebook? Everyone's talking vaguely about the costs but no one actually makes a concrete case, where I made a concrete case of the benefits.
- an0malous 1y ago> Yes, Facebook is a benefit. Among other things, it gave me React No, this is peak HN
- amrocha 1y agoIt’s hard to believe this is not a rage bait AI comment given the last paragraph. Both are terrible for society but I use facebook tools so Chinese app bad, USA app good i guess? Is that what you’re trying to say?
- weregiraffe 1y ago>much of the modern web is built on, Was modern web a benefit?
- weregiraffe 1y ago>The question is, what are billions of people doing on Facebook if it's harmful? Why do everyone get sick and eventually die if it's harmful?
- bko 1y agoIt's amazing how much leftist discourse is just them pretending not to understand things, thus making discourse impossible.
- grafmax 1y agoFacebook and many of these other VC companies have worked by building a moat through network effects by burning money to build something free and awesome. Then once you HAVE the network effect then it becomes hard to leave. Your history is on there, people know you through it, your friends and family are there; are you really going to leave? That’s when Facebook starts turning the screws. Ads. Manipulative algorithms. Polarizating recommendation algorithms. Social isolation. Making deals with dictatorships. Censorship of the worst crimes humanity can commit against itself (genocide). Why? They are making money through all of it. It’s called rent extraction. You OWN something valuable. You no longer have to produce something of value. You can just charge people money for what you own. Rent. It’s various forms of rent. Sucking out money and souls into it. One of countless ways we’re leeched on by these companies and their billionaire owners. Do the benefits outweigh the harms? Facebook and the VC playbook is boiling a frog and we are the frog.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- genghisjahn 1y agoIt’s fast because there already gobs of people on the internet because of all the other products that came before. Facebook didn’t grow as fast because there weren’t as many people on line then. Gmail didn’t grow as fast because there weren’t as many people online then.
- platevoltage 1y agoI use it for free, and when it stops being free, I will stop using it.