I'm already seeing departments in active conversations. The circle will be complete. It always does. The only question is how much institutional knowledge walks out the door. Kudos to those companies for rehiring terminated employees and seeing the value in human work.
We should get a raffle ticket or a medal for watching this trainwreck happen in real-time. This stuff is bananas. That glue on pizza line is just perfect expression of how tech lacks basic human common sense.
The people most enthusiastic about replacing humans with machines have almost always been the ones least interested in what it actually costs the humans being replaced. Not financially, I mean. Personally.
Neelaaaaa, first of this is brilliant. Big tech and almost every other company is currently standing in front of AI like “look at all the money we’ll save” while a cloud invoice quietly loads in the background like a horror movie villain.
The funniest part is how predictable we are as humans. We see something impressive once and immediately start announcing the extinction of jobs, civilization, common sense, and probably Linda from accounting too (folks from LinkedIn have tagged people who call out the problem "complainers or AI spotters").
Meanwhile the machine is burning through electricity, infrastructure, cooling systems, engineers, and billions in compute just to help someone rewrite “Hope you’re well” five different ways.
This “reality has a habit of arriving eventually. Usually, carrying an invoice” belongs on a T-shirt.
Texas is forgoing at least $1.3 billion this year in foregone tax revenue due to data center exemptions, according to the Texas Tribune. Virginia granted $732 million in fiscal year 2024 alone, according to the state's Annual Comprehensive Financial Report. The consumers will always pay the price. Thank you very much for taking the time.
Did you hear about MSFT’s VRP? Early retirement pre-empting possible future layoffs and clearing the runway to spend more on AI. Impossible decision for many. Was talking to an old friend as he did the math and one factor was he uses AI so much at work now (all the tokens you can eat!) that anyplace else he went probably wouldn’t be able to support his habit.
This is why I’m convinced the companies that win long-term won’t be the ones simply jumping on the AI train and laying people off. The real winners will be the ones empowering their people with AI and turning them into supercharged humans. That feels like the smarter way forward, both from a business and employer branding point of view.
Also, Neela, the stages reminded me of my “stages of grief” graphic from a few weeks ago that you shared with your hilarious comments. I still laugh out loud when I think of it. Apparently, emotional frameworks are how we survive the AI era.😂
Great post. Thank you for adding your valuable thoughts to this conversation. 🩷🦩
So you're asking if everyone could calm the eff down, then?
"The public still imagines AI like a one-time construction project. Train the model, plug it in, fire the humans, cue dystopian soundtrack."
This is what it seems like from here. I just heard that the US has ten fast-tracked nuclear facilities planned, which to some might sound reckless, but to some of us it sounds like "about time we pushed nuclear."
I keep hoping the consolation prize of this round of AI is actually cheaper energy for everyone. I worry it will just be more plants, more energy, bigger data centers, and disappointing AI.
Next week's post will show how they can't even get the thing to work the right away lol
There is a lot of money changing hands in those infrastructure builds.
Whether the AI justifies the infrastructure or whether we have just built a very expensive monument to a technology cycle that did not deliver is the open question.
and a microwave that still leaves one frozen ravioli in the center like a tiny iceberg---i can't stop laughing because this is true. Then we have to do an additional 3min and they come out like lava. This, my friend, is something I've been pondering over for a long time. Glad I'm not alone.
Never late when the comment adds something worth reading. I am less optimistic about these companies facing reality. The sense arrives, but it tends to arrive in the form of a budget meeting rather than an epiphany, and by then, some of the decisions that should not have been made already have been. The week has been kind thus far. No one is bothering my squirrels, so I am happy.
“Sir, we have harnessed planetary-scale computation.”
“Incredible. Are you curing disease?”
“Well… some of it is helping marketing managers rewrite emails in a more synergistic tone.”
Really glad seeing more and more folks writing about this. One other point relevant to the Uber CTO running out of budget is that IT budgets have been relatively flat for years. AI is expensive.
Then add in the additional problem of an overall lack of IT talent (that vibe coding isn't a replacement for) and the still under-discussed problem that AI relies on accurate information and most companies have so much ROT (redundant, outdated, trivial) that they don't know what content is accurate (worse on the unstructured data side).
I was thinking about writing a ROT article soon - maybe I will.
ROT, being the foundation on which companies are building their AI strategies, is a governance problem that was always there and is now suddenly expensive in ways that were not visible when the data was just sitting in a server somewhere, costing storage fees
AI makes bad data faster and more confident. The combination is considerably more dangerous than either one alone. Thank you for always supporting Bryant.
Yup. That's the corner of the IT industry I've lived in most of my career. I think we (AIIM) did one of the early ROT-focused research studies. Think i still have it if youre interested.
Companies like hubsopt, service now, and Salesforce get the importance of clean unstructured content (Salesforce and I think service-oriented bought doc management companies, can't remember if hubspot did).
You'd think the potential of AI would be enough to get execs to get their content in order, but i am not holding my breath.
There’s nothing quite like watching a tech executive’s "efficiency" fantasy collide with a utility bill that could power a small nation.
It’s the same energy I see in health and creative tech, where we’re constantly told AI will automate the "human mess" out of research and design, only for us to realize that paying for the compute to simulate a single human intuition is actually more expensive than just hiring the human.
Turns out, "Linda from accounting" (my favourite part) is a bargain compared to an idling GPU cluster, tragically accurate as always. So happy to be back after finally finishing my exams yesterday! Missed you.
Friggin Linda showed up in the comments, and I am genuinely delighted. For the record, the article was always on your side. I also have a theory that LINDA will outlast us all lol
So, when do we complete the circle and companies start rehiring all the people they laid off to replace with AI to save money? Shall we place bets?
Ahhh, the bets are already being placed.
I'm already seeing departments in active conversations. The circle will be complete. It always does. The only question is how much institutional knowledge walks out the door. Kudos to those companies for rehiring terminated employees and seeing the value in human work.
Hope your week is going well, Amanda.
Thank you for being here.
We should get a raffle ticket or a medal for watching this trainwreck happen in real-time. This stuff is bananas. That glue on pizza line is just perfect expression of how tech lacks basic human common sense.
Common sense is apparently not a token. It does not compress hahahahaha
It still shocks me that there is a lack of it even 10 years later.
Thank you for being here, Anna
I hope your week is going well.
Any post that references Tesla, a vintage Sesame Street skit, and pizza glue is a winner!
Fascinating point about computing cost vs employee cost. You're right, no one is talking about this. Bubble pop incoming?
Tesla, Grover, and pizza glue are the range I aspire to lol
On the bubble question, I think the pop is not dramatic.
Expectations will be much tamer in 12 months lol
Hopefully.
Happy Tuesday, bro.
Thank you for being here.
Axiomatic: If you have little fellow-feeling toward others, you will come to love the machine.
Thanks as always for shining a light so cleverly on what’s going on out there, Neela! 👏
That's very true, Baird.
The people most enthusiastic about replacing humans with machines have almost always been the ones least interested in what it actually costs the humans being replaced. Not financially, I mean. Personally.
Happy Tuesday afternoon to you.
Thank you for being here.
Neelaaaaa, first of this is brilliant. Big tech and almost every other company is currently standing in front of AI like “look at all the money we’ll save” while a cloud invoice quietly loads in the background like a horror movie villain.
The funniest part is how predictable we are as humans. We see something impressive once and immediately start announcing the extinction of jobs, civilization, common sense, and probably Linda from accounting too (folks from LinkedIn have tagged people who call out the problem "complainers or AI spotters").
Meanwhile the machine is burning through electricity, infrastructure, cooling systems, engineers, and billions in compute just to help someone rewrite “Hope you’re well” five different ways.
This “reality has a habit of arriving eventually. Usually, carrying an invoice” belongs on a T-shirt.
The funniest part is the predictability and the saddest part is also the predictability.
Thank you for taking the time Funke.
I appreciate you sharing on LinkedIn
The trick is to offload compute costs to others.
Data centers get sweetheart deals, reduced tax rates, don't pay market rates for electricity and water. Etc
Happy New Week, Zerenner
The offloading is real.
Texas is forgoing at least $1.3 billion this year in foregone tax revenue due to data center exemptions, according to the Texas Tribune. Virginia granted $732 million in fiscal year 2024 alone, according to the state's Annual Comprehensive Financial Report. The consumers will always pay the price. Thank you very much for taking the time.
Did you hear about MSFT’s VRP? Early retirement pre-empting possible future layoffs and clearing the runway to spend more on AI. Impossible decision for many. Was talking to an old friend as he did the math and one factor was he uses AI so much at work now (all the tokens you can eat!) that anyplace else he went probably wouldn’t be able to support his habit.
Oh, my article for next week got signed off lol
It will be a doozy lol
Can't wait!
"All the tokens you can eat - hah
I did - I have a few ex-colleagues cashing out.
The VRP program is what, like, 900 mill? That's what MSFT set aside for this program.
My friends are fed up with tech anyway. They want to catch a break and probably travel a bit.
Happy Friday, Andrew...
I had a chortle at this one. I wonder how far big business will go before they admit the Emperor's New Clothes element of all this? Here we go again!
The funniest part is everyone in the room already knows. The CTOs know. The CFOs definitely know. The next 2 years will be wild.
Happy Friday Tina
I hope you have the best weekend.
I'll buckle up and see what happens! I had a great weekend thanks, went visiting family.
always nice to visit family for nothing else but the home-cooked meals.
I am glad you had a good weekend, Tina.
We did have a nice BBQ one day
yayyyyy Tina.
I am glad for that.
I am always in the mood for a nice BBQ
Enjoy the rest of your week.
You too, Neela
This is why I’m convinced the companies that win long-term won’t be the ones simply jumping on the AI train and laying people off. The real winners will be the ones empowering their people with AI and turning them into supercharged humans. That feels like the smarter way forward, both from a business and employer branding point of view.
Also, Neela, the stages reminded me of my “stages of grief” graphic from a few weeks ago that you shared with your hilarious comments. I still laugh out loud when I think of it. Apparently, emotional frameworks are how we survive the AI era.😂
Great post. Thank you for adding your valuable thoughts to this conversation. 🩷🦩
I agree with you, Pinkie.
Unfortunately, not many people are using the smart approach.
The next two years should be very interesting.
It was just a great way to frame your post and this one.
Gotta add some humor into the mix to keep us sane.
Thank you for being here, Pinkie.
I enjoyed reading your article yesterday.
So you're asking if everyone could calm the eff down, then?
"The public still imagines AI like a one-time construction project. Train the model, plug it in, fire the humans, cue dystopian soundtrack."
This is what it seems like from here. I just heard that the US has ten fast-tracked nuclear facilities planned, which to some might sound reckless, but to some of us it sounds like "about time we pushed nuclear."
I keep hoping the consolation prize of this round of AI is actually cheaper energy for everyone. I worry it will just be more plants, more energy, bigger data centers, and disappointing AI.
Calm the eff down is the entire point.
Next week's post will show how they can't even get the thing to work the right away lol
There is a lot of money changing hands in those infrastructure builds.
Whether the AI justifies the infrastructure or whether we have just built a very expensive monument to a technology cycle that did not deliver is the open question.
Happy Thursday Damon
Thank you for being here.
and a microwave that still leaves one frozen ravioli in the center like a tiny iceberg---i can't stop laughing because this is true. Then we have to do an additional 3min and they come out like lava. This, my friend, is something I've been pondering over for a long time. Glad I'm not alone.
The frozen center + lava exterior is the universal microwave experience. No one escapes it bro. No one…
Thank you for always taking the time :)
This one was fun to write.
I am late to the party in the comments but this is one angle to the shining age of AI that I haven’t seen highlighted enough.
This is a brilliant and eye-opening read. I hope companies are already seeing sense!
Hope you’re having a great week, Neela 🤗❤️
Never late when the comment adds something worth reading. I am less optimistic about these companies facing reality. The sense arrives, but it tends to arrive in the form of a budget meeting rather than an epiphany, and by then, some of the decisions that should not have been made already have been. The week has been kind thus far. No one is bothering my squirrels, so I am happy.
Thank you for being here sis.
This made me snort-laugh:
Imagine explaining this to Nikola Tesla.
“Sir, we have harnessed planetary-scale computation.”
“Incredible. Are you curing disease?”
“Well… some of it is helping marketing managers rewrite emails in a more synergistic tone.”
Really glad seeing more and more folks writing about this. One other point relevant to the Uber CTO running out of budget is that IT budgets have been relatively flat for years. AI is expensive.
Then add in the additional problem of an overall lack of IT talent (that vibe coding isn't a replacement for) and the still under-discussed problem that AI relies on accurate information and most companies have so much ROT (redundant, outdated, trivial) that they don't know what content is accurate (worse on the unstructured data side).
I was thinking about writing a ROT article soon - maybe I will.
ROT, being the foundation on which companies are building their AI strategies, is a governance problem that was always there and is now suddenly expensive in ways that were not visible when the data was just sitting in a server somewhere, costing storage fees
AI makes bad data faster and more confident. The combination is considerably more dangerous than either one alone. Thank you for always supporting Bryant.
I hope your week is going well.
Yup. That's the corner of the IT industry I've lived in most of my career. I think we (AIIM) did one of the early ROT-focused research studies. Think i still have it if youre interested.
Companies like hubsopt, service now, and Salesforce get the importance of clean unstructured content (Salesforce and I think service-oriented bought doc management companies, can't remember if hubspot did).
You'd think the potential of AI would be enough to get execs to get their content in order, but i am not holding my breath.
I am definitely not holding my breath.
I love living lol
Banged this sis!
There’s nothing quite like watching a tech executive’s "efficiency" fantasy collide with a utility bill that could power a small nation.
It’s the same energy I see in health and creative tech, where we’re constantly told AI will automate the "human mess" out of research and design, only for us to realize that paying for the compute to simulate a single human intuition is actually more expensive than just hiring the human.
Turns out, "Linda from accounting" (my favourite part) is a bargain compared to an idling GPU cluster, tragically accurate as always. So happy to be back after finally finishing my exams yesterday! Missed you.
Disregard my last question on exams, then.
Welcome back and congratulations on finishing the exams.
It's the same shit everywhere, sis.
Linda is a bargain. Linda will outlast all of us.
Thank you for thinking about me, sista Ral.
I'm glad exams went well???
Me too. How's everything over there
It's been a quiet week so far.
Thank goodness 😂
Friggin Linda here. The proof is in the pudding, which you so deliciously
whipped up here. I like people and Wikipedia.
Please bring them back.
Thanks Neela for this
article. It crackles.
Friggin Linda showed up in the comments, and I am genuinely delighted. For the record, the article was always on your side. I also have a theory that LINDA will outlast us all lol
Happy Wednesday to you.
I hope all is well on your end.
Glorious Wednesday to you
Neela! I love being the Linda, the one who can undo little clogs in the process to get things flowing again.
You are the only person, on the other hand, who can make this exciting to read.
I feel so fucking well informed now (as if) 😂🦋💙
Yayyyyy. It's a serious topic, so a little humor helps.
Thank you so much Linda.
I'm reaching for my 4th cup of coffee.🙈🤣
hang in, girl ❤️
I will 🤗
Now I have to redo my pizza cuz I can't get the Elmer's glue off.
What a thoughtful, reasonable article - how'd it end up on the internet?
Thanks. I learned, and need to keep doing so. Aiming to reach step #7 personally (when you tell me what it will be).
You must let me know how that works out for you :)
I wish it would convert some subscribers hahahaha
Step seven is currently classified
I will keep you posted.
Thank you for taking time out of driving to read and engage, bro.
Enjoy the rest of your Wednesday!