You can’t take humans out of the chain of responsibility
By now everyone is familiar with the caveats every AI company trots out like Surgeon General’s warnings on tobacco products. AI can make mistakes, so you need to double check. Great sales pitch. Better liability protection. Some lawyers obviously dreamed that up, but it appears there’s a chance they might need to dream again.
According to an article in Ars Technica, a German court has ruled that Google is liable for false statements in AI Overviews. Given how Google is reinventing Search and itself this might turn into a problem, and not just for Google.
Google tried the usual arguments to shield itself from liability for false statements in AI Overviews, such as arguing that most users understand that AI outputs aren’t always accurate and must be verified.
But the court found that, unlike traditional search engines that merely present lists of links to third-party statements, Google’s tool made “independent, new, and substantive statements” based on its own misinterpretation of links on the Internet.
That’s a problem, the court said, because while publishers may have been able to sue to stop third parties from publishing defamatory statements appearing in Google search results, only Google can correct the underlying algorithm and outputs displayed in AI Overviews.
The bottom line it seems to me is if an AI Overview or other result summary hallucinates something false and perhaps defamatory, someone somewhere, meaning a human someone(s), can held responsible.
I’m sure appeals are already being worked on for this preliminary ruling. So the story will continue to unfold.
As far as U.S. users might be concerned we’re already seeing other countries treating technology issues very differently in the European Union and elsewhere than on our own shores. Things are very different here in the land where bribery no longer masquerades as politics. Nevertheless, it’s a pretty strong statement that bears some attention regardless of where you live and where you search the Internet from.
Thanks for reading. You can subscribe to this blog if you care to.You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
One day perhaps we’ll move beyond AI cliché demos.
My nephew occasionally takes a look at this blog and gives me feedback on what I think and write. Actually, he mostly gives me shit. He certainly does when I write about Artificial Intelligence. He often asks why I’m so “down” on AI. At least we agree on politics.
I keep reminding him that I’m not “down” on the technology per se. I’d love to see the press release announcing AI led to a a cure for cancer. Who wouldn’t? I’m down on the way it continues to be sold to us and the ramifications that brings on so many levels, while still feeling like it’s not what the sellers keep promising. (I also remind him to read what I write more carefully, but he’s probably using some AI to summarize what I write.)
In truth, that’s the essence of my skeptical reaction to what we know as AI at the moment. There’s a lot going on, but how it’s being sold to most consumers still feels like it will ultimately be no more, no less than just another tool we use on a computer, after exacting high costs to do so, and dumbing down the general learning curve in the bargain.
Take for example the demos we constantly see about what AI can do when each company rolls out its latest version. As demos they all look slick as far as party and trip planning go.
(Coding is another case entirely. I’m not talking about that here, simply because I don’t have the expertise to do so. I’m strictly speaking of the sell to consumers.)
Even Apple fell back on these examples that have become clichés in this year’s WWDC 2026 announcement. Those clichés define the market companies think are ripe for the come on and then the plucking. I’m guessing they also define the current limitations of the technology. Or at least the limitations companies don’t want to risk pushing beyond in a live demo.
Here’s the AI Siri demo I wish Apple had shown us yesterday.
If you watched Apple’s keynote presentation you might remember this slide.
Maybe not. It flew by pretty quickly. It’s a word cloud of all of the other non Siri AI improvements Apple is bringing to its various operating systems this year.
Yes, the print is that tiny and crammed together. To call it unreadable is accurate. For those who didn’t watch the demo, the length of time it was on our screens was equally tiny, certainly compared to all the travel time each presenter took to walk on and hit their mark prior to speaking. To be honest, the slide’s quick and unreadable inclusion felt insulting given the long list of improvements it’s touting.
(To my knowledge no such list appears yet in Apple’s Newsroom or on its website heralding the other announcements. If I’m wrong, point me to it and I’ll link to it here. I’m sure it won’t be long before one of the sites that covers Apple distills it down and publishes it. Probably using AI.)
(UPDATE: Right after hitting publish, I noticed that John Gruber linked to this post on the Oneberri Blog listing all of those improvements.)
What if Mike Rockwell, the Apple Executive who did the Siri AI demos, had asked Siri AI to take that slide, and present the info into a bulleted list in Apple Notes, and then prepare a PDF for distribution? In the post keynote tech talk he and other Apple execs participated in, he could have followed that up by asking Siri AI to distribute the PDF to the other Apple execs on stage. Essentially it would have demonstrated the same Siri AI capability to gather info across native Apple apps, using context, in the same way the clichéd party planning demos do.
It certainly would have been more impressive than the usual clichés.
Perhaps AI Siri and the apps needed to do that work aren’t ready for such a challenge just yet. Things are still in beta after all. Perhaps it’s just too risky to stray outside of what’s made these kinds of demos a laughable cliché. Perhaps we’ll get there someday. Who knows?
Meanwhile I’ll remain “down” on AI the way my nephew likes to give me shit about my AI skepticism. I hope one day this technology might indeed lead to a cure for cancer. I also hope my nephew keeps reading this blog. It might help him learn to think for himself more often. 😉
Thanks for reading. You can subscribe to this blog if you care to.You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
“An acre of performance is worth a whole land of promise.”
You know what a litany is. It’s a series of prayers with predictable responses, learned, ingrained, and repeated without much thought. Call it “call and response.” As we finally arrive at the beginning of Apple’s WWDC 2026 today, the call has been summarized down to Apple needs a Siri that works.
But how the hell do you respond to that?
Siri was once a surprising computer gimmick, before Apple got its hand on it in 2010. Siri has been surprisingly bad at most things ever since. Sure you can set a timer, or a reminder, occasionally play the right play list and a few other things. If that were the extent of the promise the jokes wouldn’t be funny. But the promises were always more. They never lived up to the personal assistant aspirations. It’s still largely a gimmick. One too easily made fun of.
Amazon’s Alexa and Google’s Assistant, (now Gemini) have taken bigger steps forward than Siri, but also continue to fall down and scrape their knees. Chatbots have come along and for some have replaced the need for someone to talk to. But each of those efforts still yield mistakes and failures. You know the way, humans do.
So do pleas for a “Siri that works” mean something that will always work? I doubt it. I think the expectation is that these chatbot like companions will continue to fail. Again, the way humans do. But you can’t sell that.
Does it mean a “Siri that works” does something new? I doubt that also. The entire promise of computer assistants, chatbots and artificial intelligence is to do things we already do more efficiently. In fact, that’s the history of computing. When spreadsheets replaced pencils, green eyeshades, and then calculators we were on to something.
We haven’t yet figured out a way to help us communicate better in person, much less in front of a screen or into a microphone. A “working Siri” (or any other chatbot) isn’t going to help us with that. They may teach us a new way to communicate to set that reminder, but the respondents failure makes us all feel like we’re wrong. Until we just stop talking.
I’m not sure how you reconcile doing things more efficiently with the failure rate. One that seems all but guaranteed by the “mistakes will happen” caveats that prove lawyers always earn their keep. Frankly, I don’t ever see a “fire and forget it” guarantee in what remains of my lifetime. Maybe someday.
Word is that whatever Apple rolls out as “a working Siri” will roll out with a beta label attached to it. That’s a good preemptive legal response, but a sad commentary on the state of things. We expect things to go wrong in betas. Talk about setting a low bar. Even a necessary one.
Speaking of the history of computing, when it comes to mobile computing we’ve gone through at least one cycle where the focus shifted away from keeping us addicted to our phones, to an entire wave of ways to help us escape the tyranny of the small screens, put them down and enjoy more of life without them. Call me crazy, but the rush to chatting away to smartphones, AirPods, pendants, pucks, cars, etc… seems contradictory to solving our tech addictions. Out with the old trend, in with the rerun.
Gimmicks work. They help sell devices and feed trends. Think pet rocks. We’re already seeing talk of children’s toys with AI voice assistants and reactions against them. At least this time around the reactions are coming more quickly.
I’m guessing it’s not long before we see a pet rock product that contains an AI powered voice assistant. We can always use another paperweight.
Thanks for reading. You can subscribe to this blog if you care to.You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
The art of dancing on the line that separates and defines humanity
It was a good week for reading good writing. It’s a better week for sharing what popped up. A variety of topics, spanning art and the making and selling of it, technology — which these days is more about the selling than the tech — the humanity, or lack thereof, behind it all, and…well to continue a list would sell it all short. Here’s hoping you enjoy the links shared in today’s Sunday Morning Reading as much as I enjoy sharing them. Yia Mas!
Om Malik wrote one of the best things I’ve read in quite some time. We Are Living In Pinocchio’s World is about lying. It’s about AI. It’s about a pen. But it’s about so much more.
Cory Doctorow’sRefining Humanity takes on our propensity for explanation, personhood for machines, and that line we seem to want to dance with defining just what makes us human in the midst of it all.
At what cost art? Natasha MH wonders and writes about it in Sold At A Premium. At what cost, anything?
Mike Masnick thinks it’s not about whether technology is inherently good or bad, liberating or oppressive. You could argue the same could be said about most aspects of human endeavor. But then that’s the point. Tech is just another in a long line. Check out Enshittification, Despotification, And The Open Internet.
“The only conviction worth having is the kind you could lose tomorrow and survive it.” JA Westenberg warns us not to take a pill, regardless of color in Be Thou Not Pilled.
To close, click through the popover on John Gruber’s post This Is A Dickover, and give the post a read. You know what a Dickover is. Now you have a name for it.
Thanks for reading. Feel free to subscribe if you want. It’s free.If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. If you’d like more click on the Sunday Morning Reading link in the category column to check out what’s been shared on Sunday’s past. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. This site does not use affilate links.
The days when the costs of technology decreasing over time have passed.
I’ve been writing a small bit about the segmentation I see coming in how we currently think of computing. Yes, it’s about Artificial Intelligence, and yes, it’s about money. There’s no question that we’re already seeing price increases due to chip shortages, but I’m thinking that’s just the beginning of what will make Apple’s reputation of shipping too expensive computers, prior to the MacBook Neo, seem like a memory.
There’s no question that the cost associated with Artificial Intelligence is driving this and will continue to do so. The question is how much? Note that in the latest announcements from Google, Microsoft, and Nvidia heralding what’s coming that price tags weren’t revealed. Quite frankly from the way I’m reading the tea leaves scattered among the press releases, most of these companies are skittish because they don’t even know how high the cost curve is going to bend. Or they’re afraid of the sticker shock once they do find the courage to announce them.
The way I see it, the next period of time is going to be one where if you can afford the steeper prices of hardware and AI services, you’ll be able to play on that level. Those that can’t, and may not even need to, will be gradually left behind. Although for many that won’t prove to be that much of a problem given their needs. Initially.
Tell me honestly, what has any AI company promised, prior to this coming age of agents, that most computers can’t already do? Heck, even some of the promises agents can supposedly deliver don’t seem to offer that much more, unless you’re a software developer or in math sciences.
That said, operating systems and software are all being geared up along with consumer hardware to make the expensive side of the equation be the standard.
Already we’re seeing moves away from AI robots doing their work in the various clouds. Companies are prepping local AI models to be installed on devices. Those local models are going to require memory and processing power that’s going to further drive up the hardware costs while possibly reducing the token tax. Gaming hardware is about to become really expensive. Back in the cloud, eventually we’re all going to be paying for search. Probably sooner, rather than later, if you want decent results.
Speaking of taxes. Governments are starting to sniff around with their divining rods, sensing new money reservoirs to be tapped, while watching water resources stretched thin. There’s obviously a thirst. If, when, and where that happens will just add costs to be passed down the line.
Take a look at this quote from Microsoft’s Satya Nadella:
“There are really two stories people can tell about this moment. One is that technology concentrates power, reduces human agency, and leaves to society to absorb the consequences. The other is that we use this next wave to unlock opportunity for developers, scientists, enterprises, and every community. And our job is to make the second story true.”
On the surface it sounds like there’s opportunity for what’s coming to be all inclusive. Clever. Beneath that surface I think Nadella is hinting that unless your computing needs are in fields of endeavor that will require AI to be competitive, you’re at the tail end of that second story and will probably be on the outside looking in while absorbing the consequences. There’s really only one story.
As I mentioned earlier, there are plenty of users who don’t need the latest and greatest hardware and will probably be just fine without. For a time. Unless the big players create operating systems and hardware that segment out some of what will only become compute heavy advances, consumers will eventually find today’s tasks more challenging and less secure as existing hardware slows down and future security updates are released on slower schedules.
Of course that also leaves an opening.
Perhaps companies that offer hardware and services that don’t push whatever current AI envelope is being pushed, might find a willing market. You could argue that Apple’s MacBook Neo, and Dell and others’ recent announcements to counter that somewhat surprising move, might presage this. Without lower entry price points, who knows, a lot of users might just return back to the days of envelopes and snail mail.
That’s probably too extreme a reaction, but we’ve seen similar reactions to technology in the past, some quite recent, once the gee whiz factor has worn off like the letters on cheap keyboards on even expensive computers. Think touch screen displays instead of buttons and dials in cars. Think home automation. Think the Metaverse. Think talking appliances. Think cars and machinery that require maintenance contracts. Think 3D TVs.
Those that love to dabble and explore frontiers and have the money to do so will always seek the next adventure. Go for it. Those who just want to send a birthday greeting, create a holiday card, share a calendar, proofread a document, or search for a local merchant don’t want a hustle or a hassle, or the increased expense that’s obviously coming.
For the moment, the days when the costs of technology decreasing over time have passed.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
Those who follow this blog have probably read a Sunday Morning Reading column or two. In that column I link to what I believe to be good writing on important topics that interest me. In the most recent Sunday Morning Reading column I got snookered and posted a link to a piece that is fake, as is the entire Internet publication that posted it.
Now let’s get this straight there’s plenty of blame to go around. I should have checked further into the story prior to linking to it. But as I said in an update to the post, it was a feel good story, and caught my eye at a time when I, and just about everyone else is desperate for any story that offers a ray of hope.
So that’s on me. Apologies to all those who come here.
But there’s also plenty of blame to be pointed at AllChronology.com, the owner of the site Chronology. I’m not linking to them here. The site is easy enough to find. I left the original link up in the original post as a reference, along with an update acknowledging my error.
That website is filled with stories, that I can only assume are AI generated. If you search for the authors of articles (most listed as distinguished) you won’t find the handful I searched for. That handful is enough to let me know that the guiding hand behind this site is connected to a body of rubbish.
So, yes. I’m pissed off. At myself, and at whoever the humans (one can only make the assumption that there is a human presence in their somewhere) are behind this publication. It would be one thing if there were ads on the site. I don’t see any, so I assume it’s just data harvesting in some way or the other. I don’t get the point. Frankly, I don’t think there is one. The logic behind this bastardized effort makes no sense.
The bottom line is we’re living in a world where you can’t trust anything, or anyone. That sucks. I care. I hope you do too. I would hope those who come here trust what I write about and link to and I’m sorry I led you astray on this one.
Time to do better.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
Bottom lines are where everything sinks to eventually
Money talks. Bullshit walks. Bubbles pop, and the world just keeps on burning while the big wheels just keep on turning. Pick a vibe. Pick a cliché. Pick a metaphor. Pick and mangle a song lyric. Just don’t try to pick a winner in the big AI race when it comes to dollars and cents. Or sense. The racers are running in circles, burning the planet and dollars trying to figure out how to keep things on a track no one has figured out quite yet.
Hint: It’s a circle, jerks.
From the beginning the hype about Artificial Intelligence has felt like it’s all about the vibes. So many vibes. I define “the beginning” as when OpenAI took the wraps off of ChatGPT and kick started the race. Maybe they should have just done a Kickstarter.
Those were heady days. I remember everyone thinking ChatGPT would replace Google. Now we’re at the point where Google is trying to replace itself.
Today, chatbots are replacing human connections, and all sorts of crustaceans are being installed on computers, causing some havoc in the hardware markets along the way. Things have now progressed to a point that folks are vibe coding up a storm, now that it seems more doable. And it’s interesting to see and hear some who were initially skeptical about the broad scope of AI now embracing it. For what it’s worth, the current vibe feels to me like AI is heading into its GUI phase of computing, only you need a keyboard or a microphone instead of a mouse to get around on a screen or without one.
And yet, when it comes to the money game, the vibe feels like the math behind all those 0’s and 1’s might not add up.
Corporations are starting to scale back usage now that the bills are coming in. Microsoft and other tech companies are pulling plugs, in most cases for third party access among the employees they haven’t let go. At the same time there’s whispers that AI costs are beginning to exceed the costs of human employees. Corporations are starting to adjust because the beans they are counting don’t look like they will add up and no one has vibe coded an accounting app yet to project when, of if they will.
Consumers are looking at that $20 month subscription cost and backing off while trying to choose which, if any, of the constantly updating models that still promise inaccuracy will give them the best monthly bang for a double sawbuck. To make the math sting even more, Google, OpenAI, Claude, etc… are tossing around $100 a month (and higher) plans for the latest and supposedly best features that make $20 a month feel like a poor man’s vibe.
There’s a technology intersection that has always been on the roadmap for computing technology since the dawn of the personal computer. To an extent, enterprise computing always subsidized consumer technology. The vibes I’m sensing hint that roadmap may be changing, and it won’t just affect the costs of using AI, computer memory, and chip production. It potentially may filter into every facet of life from medical bills, to insurance premiums, to any wholesale or retail concern that might employ AI. Don’t think for a minute that any company is going to simply eat the rising costs of AI usage, or cut back prices should using it somehow actually produce savings from cutting employees.
Call me when you hear the first company touting that they are cutting costs due to AI. Trust me, I won’t be waiting by the phone.
If a vibe has a bottom line, here’s how I see this one. We’re heading into a moment where what we think of as computing and the Internet is going to run on two diverging tracks. It’s becoming obvious that whether someone is running any of the AI robots on their own device or somewhere on the Internet that the costs are more than anyone could have predicted, or thought might become sustainable.
The $20 a month marker was a big hint early on. We were all used to the Internet come on of getting in free, being swamped with ads, and then having to eventually subscribe so our data could be collected. That $20 a month heralded a change, but only at the point of entry.
Given that we all know that advertising is coming to AI, we’re escaping the orbit that we’ve been in for quite some time that most of the Internet was free but required a level of tolerance for advertising. I’m guessing that those who can only afford the $20 a month price tag with ads will think back on the ways we’ve complained about the streaming entertainment services and their ad proliferation as quaint by comparison.
The Circle
That $20 entry fee will rise. So will the more expensive options. I’m actually surprised we haven’t see that already. The fact that AI has to continually train itself to remain relevant means it’s going to continue to need new computing cycles to consume whatever is generated in the future, whether by humans or robots. I don’t think you can build enough data centers on the surface of this planet, under the sea, or in space to afford the churn and burn. That’s the circle. In the end it’s a real estate play that yields only cul-de-sacs.
Take a look at this article from Simon Willison. Unlike my pessimistic vibe on this, Willison seems to think Anthropic and OpenAI have found their product-market fit. He’s spending $200 a month ($100 to each) and considers that a bargain since his usage of the two generated $2,180 change in token use for a month. That math certianly adds up as a good deal in the current moment. Until you consider that at some point the difference between what he’s paying and what he’s using is going to have to be put on somebody’s balance sheet in some way. These companies can’t run at a loss forever.
It’s a good piece by Willison that informs quite a bit on this discussion and worth your time, because I think that’s what the discussion is going to inevitably come down to. Set aside all of the debates about accuracy, copyright, and environmental issues. Set aside the rising consumer backlash. Bottom lines are where everything sinks to eventually.
I admire and am grateful for folks like Willison, Federico Viticci, and others who are exploring this frontier and think we should be paying attention to their efforts and learn from them. Viticci has crafted a few interesting bits of software of late and spent some coin in doing so. I’m enjoying reading about his efforts.
I may be wrong, but it feels like we might be headed to a point that to use some software in the future we’re going to need one of these ever changing and increasingly expensive AI engines on our computers to run some of the software that will be generated in the future. That will certainly come with a price tag. If, (actually in my opinion when) that happens, it will become another border defined by costs, dividing users between those who can afford the entry fee, and those who can’t.
It will also affect far more than our computing lives.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
It’s obviously apparent that there’s an increasing sense of antagonism building around many of the issues associated with Artificial Intelligence. Data Center protests seem to be getting the most attention. The one thing you can say, is about AI is that it attracts detractors. Couple that up with the Trump administration’s policies to police speech and actions that they find unfavorable and it sounds like the interesting times we live in are about to become more interesting.
More than 1,000 pages of unpublished reports from the Department of Homeland Security, FBI, and fusion centers obtained by WIRED show a national shift taking place to surveil this new and worryingly broad category of people and activities deemed an emerging threat.
I encourage you to read the report. Not only do those of us who have major concerns about Artificial intelligence have all of the implications of the technology push to worry about, but apparently we may have to worry about expressing those concerns.
The chaotic atmosphere that may result from emergent AI technology in the next five years may fuel large-scale protests that devolve into civil unrest and anti-tech violent extremist activity, especially in large urban areas such as New York City.
On the one hand you can say that the backlash might be having the desired and necessary effect. On the other, it looks like concerned CEOs are calling in their chits after stuffing money into the pockets of the Trump administration.
Quite a protection racket. In the end, my guess is no one will be protected from any of this.
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
Wandering through the Internet, disregarding along the way
We live in interesting times. I’m spending a lot of my time being interested in watching my grandkids develop, and watching everything around how I thought they might grow up change. In my opinion, change not necessarily for the better. They won’t know what things changed from necessarily, unless they choose to look into it. That assumes they’ll be able to do so the way we can now. I have my doubts about that. Regardless, that’s tomorrow. Here are some links to share in this edition of Sunday Morning Reading.
Terry Godier says the Internet is dying. I’m not sure if it’s dying, morphing, collapsing in on itself, or just in the midst of growing pains, but I take the point. Check out The Boring Internet. (That’s a link to the text version. There’s also an animated version here. Quite nicely done.
JA Westenberg believes Nobody Is Destined For Greatness. I happen to agree. Shakespeare gave his greatest comic villain, Malvolio, lines about being born great. I wish I could label our current day villains as comic. Perhaps one day.
Derek Sivers reminds us that Geography Is Four-Dimensional. How true. There’s a reason Shakespeare more often than not capitalized the word “Time.”
Stories about religion occasionally get shared here. Mostly they are stories about how it’s really not religion, but a cover for grift and abuse. This is one of those. He Remade The Southern Baptist Convention In His Image. Then Came The Abuse Allegations by Robert Downen chronicles yet another of those tales we seem to hear far too frequently these days.
For another take involving religion, check out Neil Steinberg’sBeing Formed By Christians Does Not A Christian Make. He quotes Thomas Jefferson’s “It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” I’m not sure we can say either of those things any more.
There was a bit of a funny fracas after Google’s all in on AI announcements this week at its annual I/O conference. Apparently for a short time after Google announced big changes to Search, you could not Google the word “disregard” and expect the usual quick definition. Google quickly fixed that. The root of the problem? “Disregard” is an AI command that you have to put in a prompt to keep the AI demons from you know, making a mistake. Check out Russell Brandom’s quick story, You Can No Longer Google the Word ‘Disregard.’
Speaking of Artificial Intelligence, the talk is all about agents. (Actually that’s been the talk for a while, the volume is just increasing.) Hayden Field thinks If Google Can’t Make AI Agents Useful, Maybe No One Can. FWIW, I think Hayden is spot on.
In an article The Economist credits as anonymous, someone thinks Vladimir Putin Is Losing His Grip On Russia. Perhaps that’s true. I don’t know about you, but I’m as tired of hearing about autocratic oligarchs losing their grip as I am about hearing all of the promises about generative AI and autonomous driving being just around the corner.
If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. If you’d like more click on the Sunday Morning Reading link in the category column to check out what’s been shared on Sunday’s past. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. This site does not use affilate links.
Oh, ye brave intrepid adventurers trodding through the frontier, trod on. Carve your way into uncharted territory, knowing not what lies beyond the bend. The rest of us will wait. I’m guessing the rest of us are going to be quite content doing so.
News popped today that OpenAI wants users of ChatGPT to provide access to their bank accounts and other financial data.
Read that again.
The chatbot that’s famous for telling us it might make a mistake, and delivering on that promise, wants users to turn over access to their banking accounts to help them better understand their finances.
The article from The Verge I saw pop across my feeds begins its lede with “Your trust in AI is about to be put to the test.” It could have just as easily said, “OpenAI is looking for suckers.”
I’m not going to get into the whys and wherefores of the tech behind this. The article linked above gives you some of that info. TechCrunch has another if you care to look. There does seem to be a list of well known financial institutions that are willing to let there customers connect to the service including Schwab, Fidelity, Chase, Robinhood, American Express, and Capital One. Apparently there are over 12,000.
Quoting from the TechCrunch article:
With the new financial tool integration, users can get detailed answers to questions such as “I feel like I’ve been spending more recently. Has anything changed?” or “Help me build a plan to be ready to buy a house in my area in the next 5 years.”
Tell me you didn’t read that and immediately think that the minute a user enters that prompt they will immediately start receiving offers from those 12,000 financial institutions. That’s where this is headed. And as far as the history of the Internet is concerned, AI or not, that’s what it’s all turned into.
The reality is that just like with the health data that OpenAI also wants, whether users turn this type of info over or not, the data is going to be delivered to some data center at some point. Don’t think the three credit bureaus aren’t just waiting for the right offer to turn over your data, much the same way insurance companies are with your health data. Users donating their data will just provide another point of triangulation, and a more direct access to their inboxes.
If you ask me, this is just another exercise taking advantage of human curiosity and gullibility and turning that into more vectors to sell, sell, sell.
If those willing to head out into this new frontier of finance are willing to take that gamble, I say go for it. Let us know what you find.
My hunch it won’t be anything new.
(Image from OpenAI)
You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.I can also be found on social media under my name as above. This site does not use affilate links.
Siri was once a surprising computer gimmick, before Apple got its hand on it in 2010. Siri has been surprisingly bad at most things ever since. Sure you can set a timer, or a reminder, occasionally play the right play list and a few other things. If that were the extent of the promise the jokes wouldn’t be funny. But the promises were always more. They never lived up to the personal assistant aspirations. It’s still largely a gimmick. One too easily made fun of. 
