Stubsack: weekly thread for sneers not worth an entire post, week ending 3rd November 2024
Stubsack: weekly thread for sneers not worth an entire post, week ending 3rd November 2024
Need to let loose a primal scream without collecting footnotes first? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid: Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful you’ll near-instantly regret.
Any awful.systems sub may be subsneered in this subthread, techtakes or no.
If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cut’n’paste it into its own post — there’s no quota for posting and the bar really isn’t that high.
The post Xitter web has spawned soo many “esoteric” right wing freaks, but there’s no appropriate sneer-space for them. I’m talking redscare-ish, reality challenged “culture critics” who write about everything but understand nothing. I’m talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. They’re inescapable at this point, yet I don’t see them mocked (as much as they should be)
Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldn’t be surgeons because they didn’t believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I can’t escape them, I would love to sneer at them.
(Semi-obligatory thanks to @dgerard for starting this)
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NASB, I had a jarring experience this morning watching Patrick Boyle's latest video "Big Tech is Going Nuclear!" (not gonna link it) where 5 mins in he introduces the sponsor and it's an AI presentation slide generator, which he said he used for the images in his video. This after he mentioned the data on generating one image using the same amount of energy as charging a smartphone. The thing is he seems careful to not mention that it is a gen ai product–he never says AI–rather a piece of software that helps making presentations.
It kinda made me panic stop the video, like an instant "well, done with you" - not sure if he continued to make a joke of it or anything. I mean, I'm sure (I hope) he was given a lot of money for the spot, but damn! Just when I thought I had a foundational understanding of people
The thing is he seems careful to not mention that it is a gen ai product–he never says AI–rather a piece of software that helps making presentations.
The term "AI" damages sales when used in advertising - whatever script Boyle got was definitely written by people who knew that fact.
I also predicted something like this would happen (though within a very specific context) a while ago - seems my prediction's coming true.
Ok, but are you suggesting he was duped?
The guy seems shrewd enough to know publicly supporting anything AI will shred his reputation - I suspect he might have been duped.
Yeah, I get what you're saying but I'd really have to stretch my benefit-of-the-doubt muscles to consider someone who makes such well-researched videos wouldn't go to the website before he reads the url out on his video and see that on the homepage, above the fold, in big letters, it says "Powered by AI"
maybe reach out and ask? might be interesting to see the answer
(if you care to, anyway)
It's definitely the prudent option but I'm over mental capacity and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't sharing this just for the upvotes. I couldn't see any mentions of the sponsor in the comments, so I guess the audience, at least, were duped. I already have a string of unanswered questions on ecosia's greenwashing social posts, though
yep, I getcha.
sorry if my reply sounded rude. I didn't mean it to be. I just saw it again and it sounds dismissive.
And this puts the bit from the other video with the referral links into context. It's not a joke, he actually expects to be making money off of people :(. I found the vagueness in the ad jarring too. There's this thing called sponsorblock, a database of timestamps for videos that skips useless stuff. The downside is you don't find out if the guy that you're watching is a shill.