I’m in IT at an upper level and know painfully well what “AI” really is and that it’s not the disruptor people think it will be. However I feel like I can’t post it anywhere without being judged about it as almost every exec I know has bought into it hook, line and sinker. Even other people I talk to about the issues and limitations look at me like I’m completely weird “you’re in IT and you don’t embrace AI? wtf is wrong with you?”
So what do you all do? I don’t want to make things career limiting but I feel like I’m screaming in the dark seeing where things will really go. It reminds me a lot of the move to cloud and everyone going all in on it without knowing the real ramifications.
Just lay low, change topic and laugh from failures, it’s only approach that would keep you healthy instead of being frustrated. It’s not worth it, you can’t change people.
I don’t embrace AI, but I don’t necessarily hate it. The problem with AI is that your average user is not going to understand it. This means that they will trust LLMs to do things that LLMs aren’t supposed to do. Like when people talked about how an Atari can beat ChatGPT at chess… Of course it can, the Atari program was purpose built to win at chess. ChatGPT was purpose built to aggregate text so you wouldn’t have to read multiple sources to get an answer (not always the right answer, but an answer) for your query.
I’m trying to get a job (and failing) after a layoff at the end of last year, and maybe 1/4 of the job postings I see mention you need to be familiar with “AI.” So, yeah, in interviews, when AI is brought up, I try to be pro-AI, but cautious. I even messed around with stuff like LangChain/LangGraph because I see so many job postings that require stuff like that, but the results are underwhelming. Now I’m seeing a lot of job postings that require experience in Azure’s cloud AI stuff, but I’m not paying to learn that. I have “real” ML experience, and it frustrates me that many of the responses I get back from applications just want me to glue shitty LLM tools together.
I can’t even hide my disdain for the marketers including the word “intelligence”.
I feel like I have to at work, 100p. Many of my coworkers use it, and I just can’t bear it myself. I don’t think I’ve ever used AI in a professional context.
Now, in a non-professional context, like a Twitch stream, hell yeah I use AI. They can say some funny shit!
My problem is search has become so horrible escpically when looking up tech questions. AI is ok at this at least faster then wading through outdated search results looking for the one that uses the new code.
I’m a data scientist. I feel your pain. I write neat ML algorithms and yet I hate 98% of everything that passes for AI these days
Im not great at coding but I have been attempting to use AI as one tool to teach myself to get better. From my experience AI is good for very basic and repetitive processes. Its can reproduce a stand alone function and sometimes it’ll interact with other functions correctly. But trying to use it to troubleshoot any issue is like making photocopies of photocopies of photocopies. After a while it becomes meaningless gibberish.
I don’t work in IT, but I work in a specialty retail setting where I do technical support for materials. Last week I was helping an annoying repeat customer and as I was helping him load his material into his brand new Tesla, he decided he needed to tell me all about its full self driving, and how on his 3hr drive the other day he used chat GPT to write a white paper about some bullshit while the car drove itself, then he had to get chat GPT to give me a summary of the white paper. (some scammy sounding marketing BS.)
It took every ounce of professionalism I had left to just give him the “uh huh, thats cool. yep. good for you.” instead of going on an angry anti musk/tesla/AI rant.
i feel like there will be a moment of realisation for this person where people around them understand they are not adding any value, and therefore completely replacable. … maybe…
Recent blog in The New Oil nails it. AI is here to stay and also, AI is being rammed in everywhere with billions being spent on it
So was the metaverse though, we have seen massive investments turn to dust in the past. I don’t think LLMs will ever go away, but I’m not convinced they’ll stick around making no money and burning resources forever.
Oh. I absolutely agree. This bubble will burst creating another massive international stock market fiasco.
I work in IT and we have to go through a whole process to get a licence to use it, so I’ve just not done that. Other people on my team have, it’s a ticking time bomb and I’m just sitting here watching them all ignore the obvious signs.
Just last week someone was complaining about the AI randomly adding files to our code, and when I mentioned yeah these AI keep deleting customer data and stuff, they just brushed it off. We’re in an industry that’s super regulated so this is gonna end with legal action I’m sure. I’ve also watched people use AI to automate basic tasks, and when I’ve reviewed what they’ve done it’s all completely wrong, to that point that if the wrong person sees it, we get a full audit and the entire team is placed under constant supervision with a lot of our access heavily restricted for months.
Meanwhile I’m just sitting here doing more and doing it better without AI. It’s not worth pushing back because I already cop enough flak for stuff other people do or don’t do. I hope the company gets destroyed in a massive lawsuit, it won’t, but god it would be awesome.
If you’re in a tightly regulated industry, take DETAILED notes and store them off-site for when the lawsuits inevitably hit and they go hunting for someone to pin the blame on. Make sure that it’s clear that a) you didn’t use the stuff that breached regulation, and b) you know who did.
“you’re in IT and you don’t embrace AI? wtf is wrong with you?”
This is always hilarious to me. “You’re an expert, unlike me, and you’re not whole-hog into this thing that’s in your field of expertise and not mine, while I am? What’s wrong with you?”
The arrogance of the capitalist class is beyond amazing.
Aye, same boat here. I protested quite vocally, but politely, when our CEO wanted to stick copilot everywhere. Got reprimanded in private by my manager. CEO still stands firm on “you should use AI for everything!”
I tried, they didn’t want to hear it. I don’t really know what else I can, or should do. I just don’t use it, and have blocked it from my sight as well as I can.
I will still be honest and tell people why I am against it if someone asks, I won’t lie, but I’ll just keep quiet unprompted. Holding on to my “told you” for an appropriate moment I guess.
I don’t really know what else I can, or should do.
Well, if they insist so much on using it, you should oblige.
Hey AI, make this email I have to send twice as long.
Hey AI, take notes about this meeting while I do something else.
Hey AI, reply to this company wide Teams post with the most empty, meaningless, long winded reply possible.Damn, you were right Mr. CEO, this AI is helping me write sooooo much better ;)
Except your manager now “tells you” that your productivity should be +50% and if it isn’t…
Nah, fortunately my manager is a good guy, CEO is just a pissy finance guy who got butthurt being disagreed with publicly and probably was on my manager’s ass about it. He mainly criticised me, that I should’ve come to him first to discuss my concerns, and he would’ve helped me bring it up to thinskin execs privately.
I disagree with him, but get his point. I mean, the CEO did ask for comments during the meeting, I had comments
¯\_(ツ)_/¯Kinda sounds like CEO wanted to fire you, and manager had to stick their neck out to keep you.
I mean, even if he did want to, he couldn’t. Labour laws in my country are fortunately quite robust. I’m pretty sure my manager didn’t score any extra points with him, though, that’s for sure.
I’m skeptical about a lot of things about it in general, but I found it really helpful in one particular scenario: I’m learning a new framework and I type out something I think is right, but is not, I ask it why it’s not working and how to fix it. It pulls all the relevant files and errors from the IDE and tells me something. Sometimes I have to remind it to use a different version of the framework as it has a different approach slightly, but overall it helped me find and figure out quite a lot of issues. But my codebase is pretty small still, I don’t use it to engineer big changes.
i kinda feel like you could do better with the basics of good documentation, good tutorials, and good training. is AI really helping in the long run?
I mean, has it’s uses for sure, but the scope in which people are deploying these cookiecutter generalist LLMs and expecting bloody miracles is unrealistic. Plus, I like my privacy, AI’s are kind of an antithesis of that. Environmental cost is way too high as well.
It’s a tool, and it can be used successfully, but it’s so inefficient that I can’t justify it personally.
Ill do you one extra even. One of our customers, a lawfirm, has asked we remove AI from their environment over privacy concerns. We, as their IT, are still trying to push and sell licenses to our other customers and even use it ourselves.
All against the wishes of the actual workers themselves in my company. The execs and sales team is pushing it so hard and ignoring that a literal law firm is super against it.
Surely this will turn out well. I let that customer know that we’re still pushing AI, and management is very pro AI still. It might be a good idea to look for a different IT provider if that goes against your values.
Surely this will turn out well.
I’ve had the privilege to watch people who intentionally pissed off lawyers to try to make a quick extra buck.
Interestingly, the lawyers promptly pursued legal action, and everyone agreed to settle out of court for some reason…
It almost felt like fucking with someone on their home court is a stupid move.
I’m in a similar boat, senior level IT, but I feel like I’m the only one of my peers who can see ai for what it is, I mean, I don’t hate it, it’s a tool. I do hate the tools who use it though.
I do think ai will fundamentally change the world similar to how the internet did. But, just like the early internet we’re in the midst of a bubble. This time the bubble though is full of toxic gas, and inflating it has caused so much environmental damage. We never learn our lesson so this time it’s going to be so much fucking worse. To top it all off we have the absolute worst possible stewards to guide us through when it happens.
