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> - Extremely personal data on users - Novel way of introducing and learning more about sponsored products Doesn’t anyone think this is really, really bad idea

by isodev 11mo ago

> - Extremely personal data on users - Novel way of introducing and learning more about sponsored products Doesn’t anyone think this is really, really bad idea? We managed to radicalise people into the rise and fall of entire countries through analog ads, can you imagine how devastating it would be to infuse every digital product with all that?

tomaskafka 11mo ago
That’s how I read it, I’m surprised it would be meant as a positive (except for investors)
aurareturn 11mo ago
No, I don't think it's really bad. Most of the world doesn't care. Only in a small tech niche on the internet do they care a lot.
- isodev 11mo ago
  Are you sure? Because most of the world also doesn’t know how “this cloud thing” works… I think we need global, EU style consumer and data protection constraints before stepping into LLM-powered ads through personal assistants.
- LastTrain 11mo ago
  I just got back from Thanksgiving holiday with my family. Grade schools kids all the way up to great grandparents up to 81 years old. Engineers, active military, a nurse, high schoolers, two in college. Both coasts represented and Texas. Republicans, Democrats, and in-between. The one and only thing every single person had in common was an utter hatred of AI. And it wasn’t for a lack of understanding of how it will be used.
  - fn-mote 11mo ago
    Hatred of AI won’t stop others from steamrolling them and their jobs using AI. At this point, I have stopped hoping that LLMs will become vaporware.
    - lII1lIlI11ll 11mo ago
      I wouldn't bet on LLMs steamrolling jobs of a nurse or military personnel any time soon.
      - LastTrain 11mo ago
        There are so many more reasons to hate AI than just “it is taking my job”. But even if we’re just sticking to that, some people don’t like that it will replace their co workers, neighbors or family members job.
    - LastTrain 11mo ago
      I found myself thinking AI would make the perfect scapegoat for an enterprising political party. There is a lot of animus to tap into there.
  - senordevnyc 11mo ago
    How do you reconcile this with: 1. The absolute explosion of AI usage (revealed preferences) 2. The polling on AI, which is mixed and reveals lots of pessimism and fear among a slight majority of Americans, but hardly universal “utter hatred”. My guess is some combo of: your family is not representative, the hatred was not as universal as it appeared (bandwagon effect), or your own hatred of AI caused you to focus on the like-minded opinions shared and ignore any contrary evidence.
    - LastTrain 11mo ago
      I don’t reconcile it, I was giving an anecdote, one that would seem to easily fit in with your personal summary of some poll you read about.
      - senordevnyc 11mo ago
        No, the polls I’ve seen are more like 50/50, not the kind of universal utter hatred you’re portraying here. Color me skeptical.
        LastTrain 11mo ago
        What polls are you referring to? We did a non-anonymous poll at work which went something like “has using AI tool X made you more productive”, and the results were something like 50/50. If you asked my thanksgiving holiday crowd something like that you might get mixed results. If you asked them is AI an agent of good, do you trust what is happening with AI it would all be negative. People don’t like it.
        senordevnyc 11mo ago
        Just one example: https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2025/09/17/how-americans-view-ai-and-its-impact-on-people-and-society/ https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2025/09/17/how-americans... Again, more pessimistic than not, but hardly universal hatred
- array_key_first 11mo ago
  The part of the world who have experienced genocide because of Meta and their ad model cares.
- footy 11mo ago
  most of the world not caring doesn't mean it's not bad.
glenstein 11mo ago
>Doesn’t anyone think this is really, really bad idea? I mean I do. And you do. Probably a lot of people in this thread. I felt that way about Netflix doing it, but they did and the world just moved on. I think you're right that these ads will be, in a sense, worse, but not by the metrics that matter to OpenAI.
- isodev 11mo ago
  > about Netflix doing it, but they did and the world just moved on I think the main challenge here is that Netflix works around one of many ways to access entertainment. So if one service starts to show recommendations in that limited context of user data they collect - it's still has negative potentials but it's easier to regulate and there are alternatives. In the case of LLMs, we have service that are aiming to replace both the browser and the search engine. This means ending up in a situation where your entire access to knowledge and the world takes place via "AI". And the result is: ad-infused, tweaked to align with investor priorities, censored by the current politics of wherever the company is based service machinery that's constantly extracting personal information so it can learn better ways to refocus its priorities. I've read and seen a lot of sci-fi and dystopian history novels (actually read, not LLM-summarized for me) to know this is a very end-game kind of situation.
  - _23sd 11mo ago
    >In the case of LLMs, we have service that are aiming to replace both the browser and the search engine Most people already experience the internet as an integrated browser+search engine (and often, OS) experience from a single advertising company, Google, and it has been this way for over a decade. >And the result is: ad-infused, tweaked to align with investor priorities, censored by the current politics of wherever the company is based service machinery that's constantly extracting personal information so it can learn better ways to refocus its priorities. Exactly. This is not to say I like this outcome, but how is it not massive hyperbole to invoke apocalyptic sci-fi? I expect we'll plod along much as before: some people fiercely guarding their personal info, some people taking a "privacy is dead anyway" approach, most people seeing personal computers as a means to some particular ends (scrolling social feeds and watching Netflix) that are incompatible with thinking too hard about the privacy and information environment implications.
bxguff 11mo ago
this was the goal the entire time, and they had the nerve to cynically call themselves a non-profit.
- edoceo 11mo ago
  That was just to set the trap. Start off with a trustable label, then rugpull.
  - big-and-small 11mo ago
    Also appeal to investors. Nobody would give tons of money to upstart which goal is to generate text porn, generated TikTok slop and make some needy teens suicide just to compete with Google Ads. Selling big AGI dream that will literally make winner take it all is much more desirable.
DrewADesign 11mo ago
You know, I thought stories of law enforcement and the military targeting people using commercially collected data, effectively skirting the sanity boundaries we applied to surveillance, would raise a little bit of awareness in the US. It didn’t. Then when the political scene got really into deliberately targeting political opposition, I thought that might raise more eyebrows about all of this data being out there, but it didn’t. Same with ICE and border patrol. I think the risk and mechanisms will remain too abstract for people to grasp until they’re one of the unlucky people staring down the barrel of a gun because they, or someone they were associated with, had the wrong opinions.
- raw_anon_1111 11mo ago
  It’s not that they don’t care - the current administration is targeting people that they specifically don’t like. And Trump has a cult of personality where many Republican politicians are literally afraid for their lives if they stand against him because they get death threats. Romney said other Republican politicians won’t stand against Trump because they can’t afford security like he can. Majorie Green Taylor said her family has started getting death threats and the Indiana legislators who were first opposed to redistricting are now holding a vote because they also got death threats
  - deleted 11mo ago
    [deleted]
- voakbasda 11mo ago
  This has echos of “First They Came” [0]. The current status quo begs a question that must have been asked in the time it was written: at what point does it have become morally acceptable for citizens to rise up and overthrow a violent government? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came?wprov=sfti1# https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came?wprov=sfti1#
  - mindslight 11mo ago
    The current dynamic IS based on the new gestapo thinking they're "rising up and overthrowing a violent government", due to a propaganda bubble thirty years in the making. Where do you think "ICE" is getting all of these new recruits from? The red state militias that have been seething about the slow creep of bureaucratic authoritarianism, now deputized and told they get to use their weapons to attack the other tribe. Which is also why said militias are silent now that it's actually time to defend our country from fascists - they are the fascists. Propaganda is a hell of a drug.
idle_zealot 11mo ago
It's one of the major issues of our era. Either society will be utterly captured, gradually and quietly, or there will be a reconning and ads will become tightly regulated along the lines of tobacco, sectioned off from polite society. I consider the latter unlikely.

by isodev 11mo ago

tomaskafka 11mo ago

That’s how I read it, I’m surprised it would be meant as a positive (except for investors)

aurareturn 11mo ago

No, I don't think it's really bad. Most of the world doesn't care. Only in a small tech niche on the internet do they care a lot.

isodev 11mo ago
Are you sure? Because most of the world also doesn’t know how “this cloud thing” works… I think we need global, EU style consumer and data protection constraints before stepping into LLM-powered ads through personal assistants.
LastTrain 11mo ago
I just got back from Thanksgiving holiday with my family. Grade schools kids all the way up to great grandparents up to 81 years old. Engineers, active military, a nurse, high schoolers, two in college. Both coasts represented and Texas. Republicans, Democrats, and in-between. The one and only thing every single person had in common was an utter hatred of AI. And it wasn’t for a lack of understanding of how it will be used.
- fn-mote 11mo ago
  Hatred of AI won’t stop others from steamrolling them and their jobs using AI. At this point, I have stopped hoping that LLMs will become vaporware.
  - lII1lIlI11ll 11mo ago
    I wouldn't bet on LLMs steamrolling jobs of a nurse or military personnel any time soon.
    - LastTrain 11mo ago
      There are so many more reasons to hate AI than just “it is taking my job”. But even if we’re just sticking to that, some people don’t like that it will replace their co workers, neighbors or family members job.
  - LastTrain 11mo ago
    I found myself thinking AI would make the perfect scapegoat for an enterprising political party. There is a lot of animus to tap into there.
- senordevnyc 11mo ago
  How do you reconcile this with: 1. The absolute explosion of AI usage (revealed preferences) 2. The polling on AI, which is mixed and reveals lots of pessimism and fear among a slight majority of Americans, but hardly universal “utter hatred”. My guess is some combo of: your family is not representative, the hatred was not as universal as it appeared (bandwagon effect), or your own hatred of AI caused you to focus on the like-minded opinions shared and ignore any contrary evidence.
  - LastTrain 11mo ago
    I don’t reconcile it, I was giving an anecdote, one that would seem to easily fit in with your personal summary of some poll you read about.
    - senordevnyc 11mo ago
      No, the polls I’ve seen are more like 50/50, not the kind of universal utter hatred you’re portraying here. Color me skeptical.
      - LastTrain 11mo ago
        What polls are you referring to? We did a non-anonymous poll at work which went something like “has using AI tool X made you more productive”, and the results were something like 50/50. If you asked my thanksgiving holiday crowd something like that you might get mixed results. If you asked them is AI an agent of good, do you trust what is happening with AI it would all be negative. People don’t like it.
        senordevnyc 11mo ago
        Just one example: https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2025/09/17/how-americans-view-ai-and-its-impact-on-people-and-society/ https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2025/09/17/how-americans... Again, more pessimistic than not, but hardly universal hatred
array_key_first 11mo ago
The part of the world who have experienced genocide because of Meta and their ad model cares.
footy 11mo ago
most of the world not caring doesn't mean it's not bad.

glenstein 11mo ago

>Doesn’t anyone think this is really, really bad idea? I mean I do. And you do. Probably a lot of people in this thread. I felt that way about Netflix doing it, but they did and the world just moved on. I think you're right that these ads will be, in a sense, worse, but not by the metrics that matter to OpenAI.

isodev 11mo ago
> about Netflix doing it, but they did and the world just moved on I think the main challenge here is that Netflix works around one of many ways to access entertainment. So if one service starts to show recommendations in that limited context of user data they collect - it's still has negative potentials but it's easier to regulate and there are alternatives. In the case of LLMs, we have service that are aiming to replace both the browser and the search engine. This means ending up in a situation where your entire access to knowledge and the world takes place via "AI". And the result is: ad-infused, tweaked to align with investor priorities, censored by the current politics of wherever the company is based service machinery that's constantly extracting personal information so it can learn better ways to refocus its priorities. I've read and seen a lot of sci-fi and dystopian history novels (actually read, not LLM-summarized for me) to know this is a very end-game kind of situation.
- _23sd 11mo ago
  >In the case of LLMs, we have service that are aiming to replace both the browser and the search engine Most people already experience the internet as an integrated browser+search engine (and often, OS) experience from a single advertising company, Google, and it has been this way for over a decade. >And the result is: ad-infused, tweaked to align with investor priorities, censored by the current politics of wherever the company is based service machinery that's constantly extracting personal information so it can learn better ways to refocus its priorities. Exactly. This is not to say I like this outcome, but how is it not massive hyperbole to invoke apocalyptic sci-fi? I expect we'll plod along much as before: some people fiercely guarding their personal info, some people taking a "privacy is dead anyway" approach, most people seeing personal computers as a means to some particular ends (scrolling social feeds and watching Netflix) that are incompatible with thinking too hard about the privacy and information environment implications.

bxguff 11mo ago

this was the goal the entire time, and they had the nerve to cynically call themselves a non-profit.

edoceo 11mo ago
That was just to set the trap. Start off with a trustable label, then rugpull.
- big-and-small 11mo ago
  Also appeal to investors. Nobody would give tons of money to upstart which goal is to generate text porn, generated TikTok slop and make some needy teens suicide just to compete with Google Ads. Selling big AGI dream that will literally make winner take it all is much more desirable.

DrewADesign 11mo ago

You know, I thought stories of law enforcement and the military targeting people using commercially collected data, effectively skirting the sanity boundaries we applied to surveillance, would raise a little bit of awareness in the US. It didn’t. Then when the political scene got really into deliberately targeting political opposition, I thought that might raise more eyebrows about all of this data being out there, but it didn’t. Same with ICE and border patrol. I think the risk and mechanisms will remain too abstract for people to grasp until they’re one of the unlucky people staring down the barrel of a gun because they, or someone they were associated with, had the wrong opinions.

raw_anon_1111 11mo ago
It’s not that they don’t care - the current administration is targeting people that they specifically don’t like. And Trump has a cult of personality where many Republican politicians are literally afraid for their lives if they stand against him because they get death threats. Romney said other Republican politicians won’t stand against Trump because they can’t afford security like he can. Majorie Green Taylor said her family has started getting death threats and the Indiana legislators who were first opposed to redistricting are now holding a vote because they also got death threats
- deleted 11mo ago
  [deleted]
voakbasda 11mo ago
This has echos of “First They Came” [0]. The current status quo begs a question that must have been asked in the time it was written: at what point does it have become morally acceptable for citizens to rise up and overthrow a violent government? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came?wprov=sfti1# https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came?wprov=sfti1#
- mindslight 11mo ago
  The current dynamic IS based on the new gestapo thinking they're "rising up and overthrowing a violent government", due to a propaganda bubble thirty years in the making. Where do you think "ICE" is getting all of these new recruits from? The red state militias that have been seething about the slow creep of bureaucratic authoritarianism, now deputized and told they get to use their weapons to attack the other tribe. Which is also why said militias are silent now that it's actually time to defend our country from fascists - they are the fascists. Propaganda is a hell of a drug.

idle_zealot 11mo ago

It's one of the major issues of our era. Either society will be utterly captured, gradually and quietly, or there will be a reconning and ads will become tightly regulated along the lines of tobacco, sectioned off from polite society. I consider the latter unlikely.