- Isn't this just how the tech world has functioned for the last few decades? Silicon Valley had a great scene about this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzAdXyPYKQo
- >Like when CEOs openly salivate at the prospect of firing all workers and replacing them with AI.
I saw a series of ads in a train station the other day for some company claiming to offer "AI employees" that had slogans like "our employees never complain about overtime", "our employees don't ask about vacations", etc. and was just shocked at the brazenness of it.
- This article might help:
https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/03/27/1113782/scam-com...
These scam centers are run by criminal organizations and staffed by basically slaves. They're often tricked into coming, many from outside the country the center is located in, by false promises of legitimate employment, only to wind up imprisoned in the compound where they're forced to conduct scam operations under threat of beatings, torture, even death. It's a pretty horrible state of affairs.
- Progressive disclosure? If you know your audience, you probably know what most people want, and then the usual next step up for that "one extra thing". You could start with the ultra-simple basic thing, then have an option to enable the "next step feature". If needed you could have progressive options up to the full version.
- I think it’s the opposite: people with lots of technical knowledge and little legal knowledge (but who believe the former grants them mastery of the latter) trying to create “one weird trick” workarounds to avoid legal responsibility, not understanding that the law doesn’t work that way.
- His response is absurd. This is no different than having a human associate draft a document for a partner and then the partner shrugging their shoulders when it's riddled with errors because they didn't bother to check it themselves. You're responsible for what goes out in your name as an attorney representing a client. That's literally your job. What AI can help with is precisely this first level of drafting, but that's why it's even more important to have a human supervising and checking the process.
- As you say, it's obvious to pretty much anyone who's ever worked a day in their life but, at the same time, culturally we pretend otherwise. Guys like Musk or Bloomberg talk about working 90 hour weeks and sleeping under their desks. We still want the cultural myth of hard work = success, whatever the reality is, because this allows those who've achieved economic gain to feel better about themselves.
- > isn't suitable for any sane, good-faith actor
I think this is the parent’s point: this is the POV of the rich and powerful who lead the organization. They can’t imagine someone in a different position seeing these franchises as a way to secure good (or at least decent), long-term, stable employment.
- >Remote has allowed us to adopt meeting policies that would never exist in-person: giant, long, back-to-back sessions with no purpose, plan or opportunity to pee.
Oh, if only that had been true, but pointless, aimless meetings have been a plague forever. Maybe less so the no-peeing.
But "no agenda, no attenda" only works if you're in a position to refuse. Often attending meetings is seen as part of the job, either formally or in the managers' eyes, so ignoring them without good reason isn't allowed without repercussions.
It could simply be that spending time with your boss makes them know and like you more, and people tend to reward people they know and like, making up some post hoc rationalization about performance or whatever to justify it.
No one wants to think of themselves like this, though, so they would never admit, even to themselves, that this is what's going on, but I suspect for most people it's the actual reality.