TechTakes

Quick update from Brian Merchant: he's looking for stories about AI screwing people over.

If you've got any, send them to AIKilledMyJob@pm.me

Derek Lowe comes in with another sneer at techbro-optimism of collection of AI startup talking points wearing skins of people saying that definitely all medicine is solved, just throw more compute at it https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/end-disease (it's two weeks old, but it's not like any of you read him regularly). more relevantly he also links all his previous writing on this topic, starting with 2007 piece about techbros wondering why didn't anyone brought SV Disruption™ to pharma: https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/andy-grove-rich-famous-smart-and-wrong

interesting to see that he reaches some of pretty much compsci-flavoured conclusions despite not having compsci background. still not exactly there yet as he leaves some possibility of AGI

Got a nice and lengthy sneer from film blog That Final Scene: the uncanny valet is not your friend (and other AI stories)

Beyond being an utter castigation of AI bros' "attempts" at aping art, its also wonderfully written from start to finish. Go check it out.

whoops e_thread

so it looks like openai has bought a promptfondler IDE

some of the coverage is .. something:

Windsurf brings unique strengths to the table, including a seamless UI, faster performance, and a focus on user privacy

(and yes, the "editor" is once again VSCode With Extras)

Unrelated to my recent posts on sciencefiction, and not sure if this is something I should ask here publically but it is the easiest place I could think off. But @dgerard@awful.systems is Rationalwiki dead or not?

New piece from Brian Merchant: Four bad AI futures arrived this week, taking a listicle-ish approach to some of the horrific things AI has unleashed upon us.

broadcom continuing to make vmware even more unappealing

bit of a fucking weird thing to do, too. guess they’re going full oracle?