May 25, 2025

Oversimplifying AI

This post is a thought exercise. I am not sure what you will get out of reading it but if you wish to see me think out loud, go ahead and read this. It will only waste 3 mins of your time.

TL;DR of what I blather on for the next 6 paragraphs: AI is a writing and coding tool. The agentic AI tools will help us automate workflows.

At the end of the day, isn’t AI just useful for generating text and code? Let me try again by dropping ‘just’ this time. AI is a powerful way to generate text and code. Hmm..maybe it is a powerful way to help with writing and coding. Now let me step back a little bit. If AI is a writing and coding tool, on a high level of course, then it shows how important words are for knowledge work. Words help us think, communicate and remix ideas. Then AI is a great leap forward for some knowledge work. So back to my oversimplified definition - AI is a writing and coding tool that helps with knowledge work. Now let me replace AI with LLM because not all AI is generative. LLMs are a tool for knowledge work that helps with writing and coding.

Why define AI in an over-simplistic way?

Tech companies claim that this is the most valuable thing that ever happened to humans. This is the biggest thing to happen in tech in a while, especially after a steady drip of iterative progress with technology over the last 5 to 7 years. But this time it is different from smartphones or the rise of the internet itself. This time, the latest technology is being shoved into our faces first while the tech is still baking. In other words, the train tracks are being laid as the train choo-choos forward.

An oversimplified definition can help create a product that is accessible to everyone using a computer. Today, AI is described in grand technical terms like tokens, models, modality and context windows. However, the average user should not have to care or train models by pressing thumbs (ew!). Computers are meant to be simple and abstract for everyday use. Somehow, we have made things more complicated with all the model talk.

If we look at an over-simplified definition - a writing and coding tool, the worries and what-ifs feel less plausible. People are smart. At the same time, greedy bajillionaires will mistake AI for humans in the short-term. Writers will write and coders will code. Artists will create art and Musicians will make music. What will change is how many people use AI tools to make something that only some talented people could. However, that will make some jobs less relevant. I have seen UX writing jobs vanish in the last two years. Mediocrity will probably be less tolerable in the future if AI is the denominator for good knowledge work. Who knows?!

Words are important, words from real people even more

LLMs become useful because of words uttered or written by real people. Everything is a remix and it can’t be more true than in the context of LLMs. AI needs tons of real and interesting information to serve content to the users who interface with it. I don’t know what impact this will have on the internet, but as I see it now, AI does not make sharing original written content or publishing videos obsolete. It makes it more remix-able and consumable if anything.

The slop!

There is a lot of slop out there right now. AI this, AI that. The slop that makes me cringe the most is image generation and video generation. I know there is some value to this but just because there is some value to an idea does not mean it is a good idea.

Agentic AI

If generating slop is not the innovation we should be excited for, then what should we be excited for? AI or any automatic machine needs to be able to do things. I am a big Shortcuts user on Apple Platforms. The new wave of conversational AI makes me hopeful that automation for workflows will become more accessible. Generally, the automation / agentic application of AI excites me more than the generative applications.

Is AI useful then?

Most of these questions are for me more than the half-a-dozen people who read this blog. Hello, if you are still reading this. I got distracted. Is AI useful then? - It is, but it is not the most profound thing ever like CEOs would make you believe. That was when we got washing machines and refrigerators and whatever else helps you live life easily. The AI we are all talking about right now is not that kind of doctor. AI is helpful in the context of knowledge work and we have a lot of simplification to do. AI is not everything and it is probably more helpful to go touch some grass or grab a drink with a friend.

–– Written using ChatGPT

HA! JUST KIDDING!!

Bye.