5 ms·

Who cares? If you're getting laid off, the only thing that really matters is the severance package. Its all lip service - either AI generated or hand written.

lkbm 5mo ago
> If you're getting laid off, the only thing that really matters is the severance package. I don't think this is true. Humans typically prefer "thanks for the hard work, here's your severance" to "you suck, here's your severance, loser." Humans like being treated with respect, and words are a big part of that. Money is nice, but it's not the only thing we care about.
- rozap 5mo ago
  It's the only thing crypto folks care about, so idk, I think it's fitting.
- strken 5mo ago
  The difference between the "thanks" email and the "loser" email is that the second one is intentionally disrespectful. I'm not convinced a polite but AI-written email hits the same note. At the very least it's unintentionally disrespectful, which isn't a direct challenge. Your boss doesn't care enough to write an email by hand, but also doesn't care enough to burn bridges and insult you.
  - glaslong 5mo ago
    So it isn't disrespectful, and neither is it respectful. A perfect nothing, not a thought or care involved. Like a 1-click eCard mailer.
    - kuboble 5mo ago
      Genuine question. Let's say you are bad with words. If you ask AI to generate hundred different paragraphs and choose the one which best conveys what you actually feel and want to communicate. Is it is still a perfect nothing?
      - friendzis 5mo ago
        > Is it is still a perfect nothing? You do get how that's worse, right? The person rather spends their time arguing with the clanker than thinking about the person and putting those thought into words, however unstructured they are.
        ultratalk 5mo ago
        Yeah, but communication is a two-way street. It might not matter to me that my words are unstructured, but it will to the person I'm writing to if they can't make head nor tail of what I'm saying, or worse, misunderstand it as being insulting when it isn't.
        friendzis 5mo ago
        There is a whole industry built around [mis-]conception that people will take less offense on the content if it was presented differently. The predictable result is that it is actually rewriting content, not the presentation or tone. No amount of linkedinese corporate fluffery will wash off the core message that people are getting laid off unless you outright hide the message under ambiguity of double-speak like "slimming down operations", which can mean multiple things. So essentially you have three choices: 1. Spend time writing (or have written by a copywriter) in corporate fluff dialect, where the actual message is still understandable by all parties. At the cost of appearing tone deaf. 2. Spend time reiterating with a bot that speaks some undefined sub-dialect of LLMinese where the reception of the message is unknown. At the cost of appearing even more tone deaf and insulting than a corporate cog. 3. Spend time restructuring message in genuine voice. At the cost of maybe being heard more harshly than intended. I fail to see how option 2 can be perceived as anything but the worst, unless you assume that the target audience does not distinguish LLMinese from actual speech.
        aquariusDue 5mo ago
        Totally agree. I don't understand why people are averse to working on their communication "soft" skills compared to other "hard" skills. People who find it hard to express themselves have my sympathy but at the same time I'm flabbergasted how they function in a team or in the workplace. Not to mention people for whom English is not the native language treating LLMs like the Star Trek universal communicator instead of helping with language acquisition. And yeah, I know my tone is harsh and appears to lack empathy and I have only my writing skills to blame and a lack of time. That said I won't be the one to throw it in a LLM for "refinement" otherwise how would I improve? I'm not sure LLMs are to communication as are forklifts to lifting and moving stuff. As a side note, the general advice regarding code review in my experience was not to take it personally and it's kinda funny to me for reasons I can't pin point how people (like me) have started giving unsolicited advice or criticism in regard to writing when in actuality both (code and writing) reflect personally on the human on the other side of the screen. Anyway, I pretty much went off on my own tangent here with an apparent lack of empathy to boot but if we end up disregarding such fundamental human skills then what's to stop us from becoming dunces in a few generations? Sure, I'll add another abstraction layer even if it has a lot in common with reading tea leaves because it's not like I manually flip switches to input a program but I'll try my best to keep my individuality where it matters to me, specifically when it comes to expressing myself. Thank you for coming to my TED rant.
    - deleted 5mo ago
      [deleted]
  - friendzis 5mo ago
    > At the very least it's unintentionally disrespectful There is ZERO CHANCE they have used ai unintentionally > also doesn't care enough to burn bridges and insult you. By actively using ai they are stating that you are so much beyond them that even a personal "eff you" is not worth the time. One would have to actively try and poke some personally hurtful areas to come off more insulting than use of ai.
    - strken 5mo ago
      "Unintentional" was perhaps the wrong word. There's a difference between your boss not caring about you (does any boss really care?) and your boss actively disliking you enough to call you a loser when they expect to gain nothing from it. In the former case, disrespect is a side effect of laziness, while in the latter it is the whole point.
      - friendzis 5mo ago
        My point is that presence of LLMisms is in itself a form of disrespect
        strken 5mo ago
        My point is that it's disrespect of the same kind as your boss forgetting your name when you've been working for them for ten years, not as being called a loser.
  - schrodinger 5mo ago
    I don't understand — I use AI to write email particularly _because_ I care about the recipient, and am confident the resulting email will more eloquently and accurately express my feelings. I'll also often edit it afterwards to ensure it's in my voice. Regardless, I don't think it's fair to presume that my boss doesn't case because an LLM generated the email. ^ This was written 100% by hand. Let's have Claude proofread it and make any suggestions: I'd argue the opposite — I reach for AI because I care about the recipient. It helps me express my thoughts more precisely and eloquently than I might off the cuff, and I'll often edit the result to make sure it sounds like me. Presuming that an LLM-assisted email signals indifference seems like a category error. The care is in what you're trying to communicate, not which tool you used to get there. -- https://claude.ai/share/3d3d1a78-381c-4fcf-9354-69b10f2d6f4a https://claude.ai/share/3d3d1a78-381c-4fcf-9354-69b10f2d6f4a
- triceratops 5mo ago
  But what if was "Thanks for the hard work, here's your legal minimum severance" vs "You suck, here's a lavish severance so you don't ever come back"?
  - t43562 5mo ago
    Money IS the ultimate respect. Talk is cheap. The only talk that has real value is "Hey, hire this guy - he's excellent and did an incredible job!"
- JV00 5mo ago
  Words are fake, money is real.
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]
  - renticulous 5mo ago
    In Fire & Blood, it is said "words are wind, but wind can fan a fire," so be polite folks.
  - glaslong 5mo ago
    Noted. Handing bro a cool $20 instead when he asks me to dial 911
- maharajatever 5mo ago
  [dead]
- LightBug1 5mo ago
  Quaint.
- TitaRusell 5mo ago
  Yeah but in American corporate culture workers are entirely disposable. Which ofcourse leads workers to treat their employers as disposable.
lwhi 5mo ago
If the main guy's email is written by AI, at this point we're actually in an invasion of the body snatchers scenario. Who actually is required? .. fundamentally, it's only the person collecting payment.
johannes1234321 5mo ago
There are other audiences, too. One group are the ones who are staying. They lose teammates, they have to restructure work and fear whether there will be another round soon, which may hit them. And then there are customers, investors, ... who need to be assured they are not dealing with a failing company.
freejazz 5mo ago
>Who cares? People with dignity.

lkbm 5mo ago

> If you're getting laid off, the only thing that really matters is the severance package. I don't think this is true. Humans typically prefer "thanks for the hard work, here's your severance" to "you suck, here's your severance, loser." Humans like being treated with respect, and words are a big part of that. Money is nice, but it's not the only thing we care about.

rozap 5mo ago
It's the only thing crypto folks care about, so idk, I think it's fitting.
strken 5mo ago
The difference between the "thanks" email and the "loser" email is that the second one is intentionally disrespectful. I'm not convinced a polite but AI-written email hits the same note. At the very least it's unintentionally disrespectful, which isn't a direct challenge. Your boss doesn't care enough to write an email by hand, but also doesn't care enough to burn bridges and insult you.
- glaslong 5mo ago
  So it isn't disrespectful, and neither is it respectful. A perfect nothing, not a thought or care involved. Like a 1-click eCard mailer.
  - kuboble 5mo ago
    Genuine question. Let's say you are bad with words. If you ask AI to generate hundred different paragraphs and choose the one which best conveys what you actually feel and want to communicate. Is it is still a perfect nothing?
    - friendzis 5mo ago
      > Is it is still a perfect nothing? You do get how that's worse, right? The person rather spends their time arguing with the clanker than thinking about the person and putting those thought into words, however unstructured they are.
      - ultratalk 5mo ago
        Yeah, but communication is a two-way street. It might not matter to me that my words are unstructured, but it will to the person I'm writing to if they can't make head nor tail of what I'm saying, or worse, misunderstand it as being insulting when it isn't.
        friendzis 5mo ago
        There is a whole industry built around [mis-]conception that people will take less offense on the content if it was presented differently. The predictable result is that it is actually rewriting content, not the presentation or tone. No amount of linkedinese corporate fluffery will wash off the core message that people are getting laid off unless you outright hide the message under ambiguity of double-speak like "slimming down operations", which can mean multiple things. So essentially you have three choices: 1. Spend time writing (or have written by a copywriter) in corporate fluff dialect, where the actual message is still understandable by all parties. At the cost of appearing tone deaf. 2. Spend time reiterating with a bot that speaks some undefined sub-dialect of LLMinese where the reception of the message is unknown. At the cost of appearing even more tone deaf and insulting than a corporate cog. 3. Spend time restructuring message in genuine voice. At the cost of maybe being heard more harshly than intended. I fail to see how option 2 can be perceived as anything but the worst, unless you assume that the target audience does not distinguish LLMinese from actual speech.
        aquariusDue 5mo ago
        Totally agree. I don't understand why people are averse to working on their communication "soft" skills compared to other "hard" skills. People who find it hard to express themselves have my sympathy but at the same time I'm flabbergasted how they function in a team or in the workplace. Not to mention people for whom English is not the native language treating LLMs like the Star Trek universal communicator instead of helping with language acquisition. And yeah, I know my tone is harsh and appears to lack empathy and I have only my writing skills to blame and a lack of time. That said I won't be the one to throw it in a LLM for "refinement" otherwise how would I improve? I'm not sure LLMs are to communication as are forklifts to lifting and moving stuff. As a side note, the general advice regarding code review in my experience was not to take it personally and it's kinda funny to me for reasons I can't pin point how people (like me) have started giving unsolicited advice or criticism in regard to writing when in actuality both (code and writing) reflect personally on the human on the other side of the screen. Anyway, I pretty much went off on my own tangent here with an apparent lack of empathy to boot but if we end up disregarding such fundamental human skills then what's to stop us from becoming dunces in a few generations? Sure, I'll add another abstraction layer even if it has a lot in common with reading tea leaves because it's not like I manually flip switches to input a program but I'll try my best to keep my individuality where it matters to me, specifically when it comes to expressing myself. Thank you for coming to my TED rant.
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]
- friendzis 5mo ago
  > At the very least it's unintentionally disrespectful There is ZERO CHANCE they have used ai unintentionally > also doesn't care enough to burn bridges and insult you. By actively using ai they are stating that you are so much beyond them that even a personal "eff you" is not worth the time. One would have to actively try and poke some personally hurtful areas to come off more insulting than use of ai.
  - strken 5mo ago
    "Unintentional" was perhaps the wrong word. There's a difference between your boss not caring about you (does any boss really care?) and your boss actively disliking you enough to call you a loser when they expect to gain nothing from it. In the former case, disrespect is a side effect of laziness, while in the latter it is the whole point.
    - friendzis 5mo ago
      My point is that presence of LLMisms is in itself a form of disrespect
      - strken 5mo ago
        My point is that it's disrespect of the same kind as your boss forgetting your name when you've been working for them for ten years, not as being called a loser.
- schrodinger 5mo ago
  I don't understand — I use AI to write email particularly _because_ I care about the recipient, and am confident the resulting email will more eloquently and accurately express my feelings. I'll also often edit it afterwards to ensure it's in my voice. Regardless, I don't think it's fair to presume that my boss doesn't case because an LLM generated the email. ^ This was written 100% by hand. Let's have Claude proofread it and make any suggestions: I'd argue the opposite — I reach for AI because I care about the recipient. It helps me express my thoughts more precisely and eloquently than I might off the cuff, and I'll often edit the result to make sure it sounds like me. Presuming that an LLM-assisted email signals indifference seems like a category error. The care is in what you're trying to communicate, not which tool you used to get there. -- https://claude.ai/share/3d3d1a78-381c-4fcf-9354-69b10f2d6f4a https://claude.ai/share/3d3d1a78-381c-4fcf-9354-69b10f2d6f4a
triceratops 5mo ago
But what if was "Thanks for the hard work, here's your legal minimum severance" vs "You suck, here's a lavish severance so you don't ever come back"?
- t43562 5mo ago
  Money IS the ultimate respect. Talk is cheap. The only talk that has real value is "Hey, hire this guy - he's excellent and did an incredible job!"
JV00 5mo ago
Words are fake, money is real.
- deleted 5mo ago
  [deleted]
- renticulous 5mo ago
  In Fire & Blood, it is said "words are wind, but wind can fan a fire," so be polite folks.
- glaslong 5mo ago
  Noted. Handing bro a cool $20 instead when he asks me to dial 911
maharajatever 5mo ago
[dead]
LightBug1 5mo ago
Quaint.
TitaRusell 5mo ago
Yeah but in American corporate culture workers are entirely disposable. Which ofcourse leads workers to treat their employers as disposable.

lwhi 5mo ago

If the main guy's email is written by AI, at this point we're actually in an invasion of the body snatchers scenario. Who actually is required? .. fundamentally, it's only the person collecting payment.

johannes1234321 5mo ago

There are other audiences, too. One group are the ones who are staying. They lose teammates, they have to restructure work and fear whether there will be another round soon, which may hit them. And then there are customers, investors, ... who need to be assured they are not dealing with a failing company.

freejazz 5mo ago

>Who cares? People with dignity.