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Most AI integration is like this. It's not about building working products --- it's about bragging that you put a chatbox in your program.

bartread 8mo ago
This is such a stale take. In the past 3 years I’ve worked on multiple products with AI at their core, not as some add-on. Just because the corpo-land dullards[0] can’t execute on anything more complex than shoehorning a chatbot into their offerings doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of people and companies doing far more interesting things. [0] In this case, and with heavy irony, including OpenAI, although it sounds like most of this particular snafu is due to a bug.
- LordDragonfang 8mo ago
  I mean, to be fair, both things can be technically true. There can be lots of interesting things being done, even while most can be low-effort garbage. But this is just Sturgeon's Law (ninety percent of everything is crap), not an actually insightful addition to the discussion, and I very much agree it's a stale take.
- abustamam 8mo ago
  Kinda reminds me of crypto. There are certainly very interesting things happening in the crypto space. But the most visible parts of the crypto universe are the stupid parts (buying PNGs for millions, for example)
  - thereticent 8mo ago
    Genuinely curious, not being combative...what very interesting things have happened in the crypto space lately?
    - abustamam 8mo ago
      Oh, I dunno about lately (though I did stumble upon https://a16zcrypto.com/posts/article/big-ideas-things-excited-about-crypto-2026/ https://a16zcrypto.com/posts/article/big-ideas-things-excite... ) But when I was in the crypto space in 2018, there was a lot of interesting things happening in the smart contract world (like proofs of concepts of issuing NFTs as a digital "deed" to a physical asset like a house). I don't think any of those novel ideas went anywhere, but it was a fun time to be experimenting.
      - ulfw 8mo ago
        > like proofs of concepts of issuing NFTs as a digital "deed" to a physical asset like a house which went absolutely nowhere
        abustamam 8mo ago
        Yeah, like most startups. I'd argue that a majority of AI startups now will go nowhere as well. That's just how new technology goes. Lots of shiny objects, lots of hype, and maybe 1%, if that, goes on to become a foundation of society. Jury is still out on if crypto will become a foundation for society (if anything, it would be foundational for something boring and invisible like banking). I wouldn't bet on a startup doing that, but that's the only viable thing I can foresee crypto being useful for. But it doesn't mean that other applications can't be interesting and useless!
    - pocksuppet 7mo ago
      Teaching tens of thousands of programmers how the financial system actually works was interesting, heh.
- saghm 8mo ago
  > Most AI integration is like this. >> This is such a stale take. In the past 3 years I’ve worked on multiple products with AI at their core, not as some add-on. Just because the corpo-land dullards[0] can’t execute on anything more complex than shoehorning a chatbot into their offerings doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of people and companies doing far more interesting things. I feel like this is just a disagreement of what "AI integration" means. You seem to agree that the trend they're describing exists, but it sounds like you're creating new products, not "integrating" it into existing ones.

bartread 8mo ago

This is such a stale take. In the past 3 years I’ve worked on multiple products with AI at their core, not as some add-on. Just because the corpo-land dullards[0] can’t execute on anything more complex than shoehorning a chatbot into their offerings doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of people and companies doing far more interesting things. [0] In this case, and with heavy irony, including OpenAI, although it sounds like most of this particular snafu is due to a bug.

LordDragonfang 8mo ago
I mean, to be fair, both things can be technically true. There can be lots of interesting things being done, even while most can be low-effort garbage. But this is just Sturgeon's Law (ninety percent of everything is crap), not an actually insightful addition to the discussion, and I very much agree it's a stale take.
abustamam 8mo ago
Kinda reminds me of crypto. There are certainly very interesting things happening in the crypto space. But the most visible parts of the crypto universe are the stupid parts (buying PNGs for millions, for example)
- thereticent 8mo ago
  Genuinely curious, not being combative...what very interesting things have happened in the crypto space lately?
  - abustamam 8mo ago
    Oh, I dunno about lately (though I did stumble upon https://a16zcrypto.com/posts/article/big-ideas-things-excited-about-crypto-2026/ https://a16zcrypto.com/posts/article/big-ideas-things-excite... ) But when I was in the crypto space in 2018, there was a lot of interesting things happening in the smart contract world (like proofs of concepts of issuing NFTs as a digital "deed" to a physical asset like a house). I don't think any of those novel ideas went anywhere, but it was a fun time to be experimenting.
    - ulfw 8mo ago
      > like proofs of concepts of issuing NFTs as a digital "deed" to a physical asset like a house which went absolutely nowhere
      - abustamam 8mo ago
        Yeah, like most startups. I'd argue that a majority of AI startups now will go nowhere as well. That's just how new technology goes. Lots of shiny objects, lots of hype, and maybe 1%, if that, goes on to become a foundation of society. Jury is still out on if crypto will become a foundation for society (if anything, it would be foundational for something boring and invisible like banking). I wouldn't bet on a startup doing that, but that's the only viable thing I can foresee crypto being useful for. But it doesn't mean that other applications can't be interesting and useless!
  - pocksuppet 7mo ago
    Teaching tens of thousands of programmers how the financial system actually works was interesting, heh.
saghm 8mo ago
> Most AI integration is like this. >> This is such a stale take. In the past 3 years I’ve worked on multiple products with AI at their core, not as some add-on. Just because the corpo-land dullards[0] can’t execute on anything more complex than shoehorning a chatbot into their offerings doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of people and companies doing far more interesting things. I feel like this is just a disagreement of what "AI integration" means. You seem to agree that the trend they're describing exists, but it sounds like you're creating new products, not "integrating" it into existing ones.