Jaron Lanier on parallels between AI and social media | Hacker News Reader

Jaron Lanier on parallels between AI and social media

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43 pointsmusha68k11 comments

I really recommend the book “You are not a Gadget,”. It’s old but it doesn’t seem old because it was so prescient.

People have moved on to worry about AI. So many of the dangers of AI come from the insecurities created by tech. Vulnerable software in IoT. Data scooped up everywhere and centralized. No privacy. Human interactions intermediated by machine.

If we could just start to address some of those issues I would have more faith that we will ever really do anything to regulate AI.

100% agreed on the book recommendation. Lanier is, along with Victor Papanek, one of the few pontificators on design and philosophy that I feel could state a cogent, actionable thesis. It was so refreshing to read the plain language and clear ideas and come away with a sense that these were solvable problems.

Does Jaron not consider YouTube social media?

Yes, and? What's the point you're trying to make? Social media does capture the bulk of attention and it's okay to use it to criticise social media practices themselves. What's wrong with that?

As Microsoft’s Prime Unifying Scientist in the Office of the Chief Technology Officer (which one has to presume includes AI) and then feeding social media, is an interesting way to try change the status quo.

Responsible criticizing can benefit from deep knowledge.

I would much rather that role lie with someone who feels conflicted than with a cheery true believer

IMO He has always been wildly out of touch with reality. He routinely makes claims that other prominent/trusted people in the community don't agree with, his ventures always fail spectacularly, and so he ends up just, talking... a lot, about nonsense.

Since the 90s people have been oddly hailing him as the "father of VR" even though all he did in that space (besides a lot of talking) was a failed business after leaving Atari, making eye-wateringly expensive, funny-looking VR goggles that didn't work.

having successfully made money and agreeing with famous people is a pretty narrow standard for evaluating someone's ideas

I'm always curious to see how someone's past predictions have held up before I listen to their last ideas. Jaron wrote a piece in the New Yorker in 2023 called "There is No AI" pitching the standard academic "stochastic parrots" view of AI where the AI has no comprehension or intelligence. In my view that take was already wrong at the time, and led Jaron to totally underestimate what was coming next.

He was correct. It doesn't have comprehension or intelligence. But it is certainly a very powerful tool.

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