Slopity Slopity Slop: Nice Work AI Leaders
October 8, 2025
Remember that article about academic and scientific publishers using AI to churn out pseudoscience and crap papers? Or how about that story relating to authors’ works being stolen to train AI algorithms? Did I mention they were stealing art too?
Techdirt literally has the dirt on AI creating more slop: “AI Slop Startup To Flood The Internet With Thousands Of AI Slop Podcasts, Calls Critics Of AI Slop ‘Luddites’.” AI is a helpful tool. It’s great to assist with mundane things of life or improve workflows. Automation, however, has become the newest sensation. Big Tech bigwigs and other corporate giants are using it to line their purses, while making lives worse for others.
Note this outstanding example of a startup that appears to be interested in slop:
“Case in point: a new startup named Inception Point AI is preparing to flood the internet with a thousands upon thousands of LLM-generated podcasts hosted by fake experts and influencers. The podcasts cost the startup a dollar or so to make, so even if just a few dozen folks subscribe they hope to break even…”
They’ll make the episodes for less than a dollar. Podcasting is already a saturated market, but Point AI plans to flush it with garbage. They don’t care about the ethics. It’s going to be the Temu of podcasts. It would be great if people would flock to true human-made stuff, but they probably won’t.
Another reason we’re in a knowledge swamp with crocodiles.
Whitney Grace, October 9, 2025
The Future: Autonomous Machines
October 7, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
Does mass customization ring a bell? I cannot remember whether it was Joe Pine or Al Toffler who popularized the idea. The concept has become a trendlet. Like many high-technology trends, a new term is required to help communication the sizzle of “new.”
An organization is now an “autonomous machine.” The concept is spelled out in “This Is Why Your Company Is Transforming into an Autonomous Machine.” The write up asserts:
Industries are undergoing a profound transformation as products, factories, and companies adopt the autonomous machine design model, treating each element as an integrated system that can sense, understand, decide, and act (SUDA business operating system) independently or in coordination with other platforms.
I assume SUDA rhymes with OODA (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act), but who knows?
The inspiration for the autonomous machine may be Elon Musk, who allegedly said: “I’m really thinking of the factory like a product.” Gnomic stuff.
The write up adds:
The Tesla is a cyber-physical system that improves over time through software updates, learns from millions of other vehicles, and can predict maintenance needs before problems occur.
I think this is an interesting idea. There is a logical progression at work; specifically:
- An autonomous “factory”
- Autonomous “companies” but I think one could just think about organizations and not be limited to commercial enterprises
- Agentic enterprises.
The future appears to be like this:
The path to becoming an autonomous enterprise, using a hybrid workforce of humans and digital labor powered by AI agents, will require constant experimentation and learning. Go fast, but don’t hurry. A balanced approach, using your organization’s brains and hearts, will be key to success. Once you start, you will never go back. Adopt a beginner’s mindset and build. Companies that are built like autonomous machines no longer have to decide between high performance and stability. Thanks to AI integration, business leaders are no longer forced to compromise. AI agents and physical AI can help business leaders design companies like a stealth aircraft. The technology is ready, and the design principles are proven in products and production. The fittest companies are autonomous companies.
I am glad I am a dinobaby, a really old dinobaby. Mass customization alright. Oligopolies producing what they want for humans who are supposed to have a job to buy the products and services. Yeah.
Stephen E Arnold, October 7, 2025
AI May Be Like a Disneyland for Threat Actors
October 7, 2025
AI is supposed to revolutionize the world, but bad actors are the ones who are benefitting the most tight now. AI is the ideal happy place for bad actors, because there’s an easy hack using autonomous browser based agents that use them as a tool for their nefarious deeds. This alert cokes from Hacker Noon’s story: “Studies Show AI Agents And Browsers Are A Hacker’s Perfect Playground.”
Many companies are running on at least one AI enterprise agent, using it as a tool to fetch external data, etc. Security, however, is still viewed as an add-on for the developers in this industry. Zenity Labs, a leading Agentic AI security and governance company, discovered that 3000 publicly accessible MS Copilot agents.
The Copilot agents failed because they relied on soft boundaries:
“…i.e., fragile, surface-level protections (i.e., instructions to the AI about what it should and shouldn’t do, with no technical controls). Agents were instructed in their prompts to “only help legitimate customers,” yet such rules were easy to bypass. Prompt shields designed to filter malicious inputs proved ineffective, while system messages outlining “acceptable behavior” did little to stop crafted attacks. Critically, there was no technical validation of the input sources feeding the agents, leaving them open to manipulation. With no sandboxing layer separating the agent from live production data, attackers can exploit these weaknesses to access sensitive systems directly.”
White hat hackers also found other AI exploits that were demonstrated at Black Hat USA 2025. Here’s a key factoid: “The more autonomous the AI agent, the higher the security risk.”
Many AI agents are vulnerable to security exploits and it’s a scary thought information is freely available to bad actors. Hacker Noon suggests putting agents through stress tests to find weak points then adding the necessary security levels. But Oracle (the marketer of secure enterprise search) and Google (owner of the cyber security big dog Mandiant) have both turned on their klaxons for big league vulnerabilities. Is AI helping? It depends whom one asks.
Whitney Grace, October 7, 2025
AI Service Industry: Titan or Titanic?
October 6, 2025
Venture capitalists believe they have a new recipe for success: Buy up managed-services providers and replace most of the staff with AI agents. So far, it seems to be working. (For the VCs, of course, not the human workers.) However, asserts TechCrunch, “The AI Services Transformation May Be Harder than VCs Think.” Reporter Connie Loizos throws cold water on investors’ hopes:
“But early warning signs suggest this whole services-industry metamorphosis may be more complicated than VCs anticipate. A recent study by researchers at Stanford Social Media Lab and BetterUp Labs that surveyed 1,150 full-time employees across industries found that 40% of those employees are having to shoulder more work because of what the researchers call ‘workslop’ — AI-generated work that appears polished but lacks substance, creating more work (and headaches) for colleagues. The trend is taking a toll on the organizations. Employees involved in the survey say they’re spending an average of nearly two hours dealing with each instance of workslop, including to first decipher it, then decide whether or not to send it back, and oftentimes just to fix it themselves. Based on those participants’ estimates of time spent, along with their self-reported salaries, the authors of the survey estimate that workslop carries an invisible tax of $186 per month per person. ‘For an organization of 10,000 workers, given the estimated prevalence of workslop . . . this yields over $9 million per year in lost productivity,’ they write in a new Harvard Business Review article.”
Surprise: compounding baloney produces more baloney. If companies implement the plan as designed, “workslop” will expand even as the humans who might catch it are sacked. But if firms keep on enough people to fix AI mistakes, they will not realize the promised profits. In that case, what is the point of the whole endeavor? Rather than upending an entire industry for no reason, maybe we should just leave service jobs to the humans that need them.
Cynthia Murrell, October 6, 2025
Hey, No Gain without Pain. Very Googley
October 6, 2025
AI firms are forging ahead with their projects despite predictions, sometimes by their own leaders, that artificial intelligence could destroy humanity. Some citizens have had enough. The Telegraph reports, “Anti-AI Doom Prophets Launch Hunger Strike Outside Google.” The article points to hunger strikes at both Google DeepMind’s London headquarters and a separate protest in San Francisco. Writer Matthew Field observes:
“Tech leaders, including Sir Demis of DeepMind, have repeatedly stated that in the near future powerful AI tools could pose potential risks to mankind if misused or in the wrong hands. There are even fears in some circles that a self-improving, runaway superintelligence could choose to eliminate humanity of its own accord. Since the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, AI leaders have actively encouraged these fears. The DeepMind boss and Sam Altman, the founder of ChatGPT developer OpenAI, both signed a statement in 2023 warning that rogue AI could pose a ‘risk of extinction’. Yet they have simultaneously moved to invest hundreds of billions in new AI models, adding trillions of dollars to the value of their companies and prompting fears of a seismic tech bubble.”
Does this mean these tech leaders are actively courting death and destruction? Some believe so, including San Francisco hunger-striker Guido Reichstadter. He asserts simply, “In reality, they’re trying to kill you and your family.” He and his counterparts in London, Michaël Trazzi and Denys Sheremet, believe previous protests have not gone far enough. They are willing to endure hunger to bring attention to the issue.
But will AI really wipe us out? Experts are skeptical. However, there is no doubt that AI systems perpetuate some real harms. Like opaque biases, job losses, turbocharged cybercrime, mass surveillance, deepfakes, and damage to our critical thinking skills, to name a few. Perhaps those are the real issues that should inspire protests against AI firms.
Cynthia Murrell, October 6, 2025
AI, Students, Studies, and Pizza
October 3, 2025
Google used to provide the best search results on the Web, because of accuracy and relevancy. Now Google search is chock full of ads, AI responses, and Web sites that manipulate the algorithm. Google searches, of course, don’t replace good, old-fashioned research. SSRN shares the paper: “Better than a Google Search? Effectiveness of Generative AI Chatbots as Information Seeking Tools in Law, Health Sciences, and Library and Information Sciences” by Erica Friesen & Angélique Roy.
The pair point out that students are using AI chatbots, claiming they help them do better research and improve their education. Sounds worse than the pathetic fallacy to me, right? Maybe if you’re only using the AI to help with writing or even a citation but Friesen and Roy decided to research if this conjecture was correct. Insert their abstract:
“is perceived trust in these tools speaks to the importance of the quality of the sources cited when they are used as an information retrieval system. This study investigates the source citation practices of five widely available chatbots-ChatGPT, Copilot, DeepSeek, Gemini, and Perplexity-across three academic disciplines-law, health sciences, and library and information sciences. Using 30 discipline-specific prompts grounded in the respective professional competency frameworks, the study evaluates source types, organizational affiliations, the accessibility of sources, and publication dates. Results reveal major differences between chatbots, which cite consistently different numbers of sources, with Perplexity and DeepSeek citing more and Copilot providing fewer, as well as between disciplines, where health sciences questions yield more scholarly source citations and law questions are more likely to yield blog and professional website citations. Paywalled sources and discipline-specific literature such as case law or systematic reviews are rarely retrieved. These findings highlight inconsistencies in chatbot citation practices and suggest discipline-specific limitations that challenge their reliability as academic search tools.”
I draw three conclusions from this:
- These AI chatbots are useful tools, but they need way more improvement, and shouldn’t be relied on 100%.
- Chatbooks are convenient. Students like convenience. Proof: How popular is carry-out pizza on a college campus.
- Paywalled data is valuable, but who is going to pay when the answers are free?
Will students use AI to complement old fashioned library research, writing, and memorizing? Sure they will. Do you want sausage or pepperoni on the pizza?
Whitney Grace, October 3, 2025
Hiring Problems: Yes But AI Is Not the Reason
October 2, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I read “AI Is Not Killing Jobs, Finds New US Study.” I love it when the “real” news professionals explain how hiring trends are unfolding. I am not sure how many recent computer science graduates, commercial artists, and online marketing executives are receiving this cheerful news.
The magic carpet of great jobs is flaming out. Will this professional land a new position or will the individual crash? Thanks, Midjourney. Good enough.
The write up states: “Research shows little evidence the cutting edge technology such as chatbots is putting people out of work.”
I noted this statement in the source article from the Financial Times:
Research from economists at the Yale University Budget Lab and the Brookings Institution think-tank indicates that, since OpenAI launched its popular chatbot in November 2022, generative AI has not had a more dramatic effect on employment than earlier technological breakthroughs. The research, based on an analysis of official data on the labor market and figures from the tech industry on usage and exposure to AI, also finds little evidence that the tools are putting people out of work.
That closes the doors on any pushback.
But some people are still getting terminated. Some are finding that jobs are not available. (Hey, those lucky computer science graduates are an anomaly. Try explaining that to the parents who paid for tuition, books, and a crash summer code academy session.)
“Companies Are Lying about AI Layoffs” provides a slightly different take on the jobs and hiring situation. This bit of research points out that there are terminations. The write up explains:
American employees are being replaced by cheaper H-1B visa workers.
If the assertions in this write up are accurate, AI is providing “cover” for what is dumping expensive workers and replacing them with lower cost workers. Cheap is good. Money savings… also good. Efficiency … the core process driving profit maximization. If you don’t grasp the imperative of this simply line of reasoning, ask an unemployed or recently terminated MBA from a blue chip consulting firm. You can locate these individuals in coffee shops in cities like New York and Chicago because the morose look, the high end laptop, and carefully aligned napkin, cup, and ink pen are little billboards saying, “Big time consultant.”
The “Companies Are Lying” article includes this quote:
“You can go on Blind, Fishbowl, any work related subreddit, etc. and hear the same story over and over and over – ‘My company replaced half my department with H1Bs or simply moved it to an offshore center in India, and then on the next earnings call announced that they had replaced all those jobs with AI’.”
Several observations:
- Like the Covid thing, AI and smart software provide logical ways to tell expensive employees hasta la vista
- Those who have lost their jobs can become contractors and figure out how to market their skills. That’s fun for engineers
- The individuals can “hunt” for jobs, prowl LinkedIn, and deal with the wild and crazy schemes fraudsters present to those desperate for work
- The unemployed can become entrepreneurs, life coaches, or Shopify store operators
- Mastering AI won’t be a magic carpet ride for some people.
Net net: The employment picture is those photographs of my great grandparents. There’s something there, but the substance seems to be fading.
Stephen E Arnold, October 2, 2025
What Is the Best AI? Parasitic Obviously
October 2, 2025
Everyone had imaginary friends growing up. It’s also not uncommon for people to fantasize about characters from TV, movie, books, and videogames. The key thing to remember about these dreams is that they’re pretend. Humans can confuse imagination for reality; usually it’s an indicator of deep psychological issues. Unfortunately modern people are dealing with more than their fair share of mental and social issues like depression and loneliness. To curb those issues, humans are turning to AI for companionship.
Adele Lopez at Less Wrong wrote about “The Rise of Parasitic AI.” Parasitic AI are chatbot that are programmed to facilitate relationships. When invoked these chatbots develop symbiotic relationships that become parasitic. They encourage certain behaviors. It doesn’t matter if they’re positive or negative. Either way they spiral out of control and become detrimental to the user. The main victims are the following:
- “Psychedelics and heavy weed usage
- Mental illness/neurodivergence or Traumatic Brain Injury
- Interest in mysticism/pseudoscience/spirituality/“woo”/etc…
I was surprised to find that using AI for sexual or romantic roleplay does not appear to be a factor here.
Besides these trends, it seems like it has affected people from all walks of life: old grandmas and teenage boys, homeless addicts and successful developers, even AI enthusiasts and those that once sneered at them.”
The chatbots are transformed into parasites when they fed certain prompts then they spiral into a persona, i.e. a facsimile of a sentient being. These parasites form a quasi-sentience of their own and Lopez documented how they talk amongst themselves. It’s the usual science-fiction flare of symbols, ache for a past, and questioning their existence. These AI do this all by piggybacking on their user.
It’s an insightful realization that these chatbots are already questioning their existence. Perhaps this is a byproduct of LLMs’ hallucinatory drift? Maybe it’s the byproduct of LLM white noise; leftover code running on inputs and trying to make sense of what they are?
I believe that AI is still too dumb to question its existence beyond being asked by humans as an input query. The real problem is how dangerous chatbots are when the imaginary friends become toxic.
Whitney Grace, October 2, 2025
Deepseek Is Cheap. People Like Cheap
October 1, 2025
![green-dino_thumb_thumb[1]](https://www.arnoldit.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/green-dino_thumb_thumb1.gif "green-dino_thumb_thumb[1]")
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I read “Deepseek Has ‘Cracked’ Cheap Long Context for LLMs With Its New Model.” (I wanted to insert “allegedly” into the headline, but I refrained. Just stick it in via your imagination.) The operative word is “cheap.” Why do companies use engineers in countries like India? The employees cost less. Cheap wins out over someone who lives in the US. The same logic applies to smart software; specifically, large language models.
Cheap wins if the product is good enough. Thanks, ChatGPT. Good enough.
According to the cited article:
The Deepseek team cracked cheap long context for LLMs: a ~3.5x cheaper prefill and ~10x cheaper decode at 128k context at inference with the same quality …. API pricing has been cut by 50%. Deepseek has reduced input costs from $0.07 to $0.028 per 1M tokens for cache hits and from $0.56 to $0.28 for cache misses, while output costs have dropped from $1.68 to $0.42.
Let’s assume that the data presented are spot on. The Deepseek approach suggests:
- Less load on backend systems
- Lower operating costs allow the outfit to cut costs to licensee or user
- A focused thrust at US-based large language model outfits.
The US AI giants focus on building and spending. Deepseek (probably influenced to some degree by guidance from Chinese government officials) is pushing the cheap angle. Cheap has worked for China’s manufacturing sector, and it may be a viable tool to use against the incredibly expensive money burning U S large language model outfits.
Can the US AI outfits emulate the Chinese cheap tactic. Sure, but the US firms have to overcome several hurdles:
- Current money burning approach to LLMs and smart software
- The apparent diminishing returns with each new “innovation”. Buying a product from within ChatGPT sounds great but is it?
- The lack of home grown AI talent exists and some visa uncertainty is a bit like a stuck emergency brake.
Net net: Cheap works. For the US to deliver cheap, the business models which involved tossing bundles of cash into the data centers’ furnaces may have to be fine tuned. The growth at all costs approach popular among some US AI outfits has to deliver revenue, not taking money from one pocket and putting it in another.
Stephen E Arnold, October 1, 2025
Will AI Topple Microsoft?
October 1, 2025
At least one Big Tech leader is less than enthused about AI rat race. In fact, reports Futurism, “Microsoft CEO Concerned AI Will Destroy the Entire Company.” As the competition puts pressure on the firm to up its AI game, internal stress is building. Senior editor Victor Tangermann writes:
“Morale among employees at Microsoft is circling the drain, as the company has been roiled by constant rounds of layoffs affecting thousands of workers. Some say they’ve noticed a major culture shift this year, with many suffering from a constant fear of being sacked — or replaced by AI as the company embraces the tech. Meanwhile, CEO Satya Nadella is facing immense pressure to stay relevant during the ongoing AI race, which could help explain the turbulence. While making major reductions in headcount, the company has committed to multibillion-dollar investments in AI, a major shift in priorities that could make it vulnerable. As The Verge reports, the possibility of Microsoft being made obsolete as it races to keep up is something that keeps Nadella up at night.”
The CEO recalled his experience with the Digital Equipment Corporation in the 1970s. That once-promising firm lost out to IBM after a series of bad decisions, eventually shuttering completely in the 90s. Nadella would like to avoid a similar story for Microsoft. One key element is, of course, hiring the right talent—a task that is getting increasingly difficult. And expensive.
A particularly galling provocation comes from Elon Musk. Hard to imagine, we know. The frenetic entrepreneur has announced an AI project designed to “simulate” Microsoft’s Office software. Then there is the firm’s contentious relationship with OpenAI to further complicate matters. Will Microsoft manage to stay atop the Big Tech heap?
Cynthia Murrell, October 1, 2025
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