Follow me, I bite

Hey!

We protect and we roam

Hey!

A world of our own

Hey!

Ghost Sailors, they say?

Hey!

Men born to slay

You convinced me it could be

As easy as 1 2 3

Didn’t look great, but who could see

With wool over my eyes, shame on me

He tightly held my hand up high

Said my voice sounded just like sighs

So we stood against a blood red wave

if you don't know, there's a very popular 3d printing model out there called "benchy". this is used for benchmarking your 3d printer because it's a difficult print and will help test it out.

this is so widely used that people make their own little versions of it, remixing the 3d model to make benchy look cooler and stuff. however, a new company owns the benchy license. they are sending copyright takedowns to all those who wrongfully uploaded the benchy model.

of course, this is pissing off the 3d printing community greatly. everyone loved benchy and have used it for years. so someone on reddit decided to make a new model that is designed as a 3d printing stress test. one that works a lot like benchy, and people are freely able to edit it as they please. you know what they called it?

for any address to twitter you can replace the “x.com” with “nitter.net” and you will be able to browse as if you have an account. Lifesaver.

This reminds me of a story...

In the social media boom of the 2010s, I was a social media professional (a new career thanks to this very tumblr account and a short-lived career because I like my mental health).

Back then, it was obvious what platforms companies needed to be on: Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, etc. Becase that’s where their customers and potential customers were.

Then, there came a rumbling through the profession. Our colleagues were told we had to be on Google+, it was going tro be the new king social platform.

A lot of social media pros got their companies or clients to jump in with both feet. Some of us, however, took a beat and asked a simple question: “Who told you Google+ was necessary?"

We asked this because it felt like the reverse process of what had come before. Previous platforms grew into something first. No one could have predicted what a cultural juggernaut Tumblr became, the result of a sense of community among the users that formed organically and was fostered by the staff. Twitter started as a place where people dropped clever one-line jokes and became the largest and most critical breaking news outlet in thr world (RIP Twitter).

But, in the case of Google+, no one seemed to be rushing to the platform. The user base was nearly non-existant. Yet, the buzz that it would be the next big thing was loud and, for that reason, many comapnies started official accounts and shifted a part of their social strategy to the platform. But still, if the numbers weren’t there, who was saying this?

The source of this new push to join Google+, it turned out, inevitably led back to Google. Yes, upper level Google staff had been telling tech bros, investors, and tastemakers Google+ was the future of social media. That trickled down to us plebes, the ones who would dutifully fulfill the prophecy.

Needless to say, it wasn’t the future of social media. It was a trainwreck that saw its few actual users spend 3-5 seconds per day on the platform compared to the hours per day people spent on Facebook.

Now, the “buyer’s remorse” over AI we’re seeing from all of these corporations feels very similar. It’s not users saying we need AI in every goddamn fucking thing, it’s AI companies. They're pushing a product tech overlords claim is the solution to a host of non-existant problems. And the comapnies got in line.

The difference this time is two-fold: Us plebes and commoners are fighting back and the companies that bought in are losing money. (At least a Google+ account was free.)

But, the truly shocking revelation is how fucking gullible these big CEOs are. They were told by AI salesmen that their already successful product will only continue to succeed if they bake in AI.

And what happened? One super fun example is how Google touted themselves as the best search engine in the world. Now, the first result on any search is an AI summary, followed with this warning in very small print:

That seems like a pretty clear admission that Google is not a reliable search engine any more.

So, I guess the moral of this story is: If you want to sell something for millions of dollars that no one needs, talk to a CEO.