I get the anti Boomer sentiment, but the reality is many of them are very decent people.

My dad passed this year and now it’s just my mom left. She has a net with of about 2M. I’m doing just fine myself, And she gets by on about 70k a year (half of that goes to rent). I keep telling her she should spend more money on things that make her happy, but she’s good with what she has and doesn’t feel she needs more. She doesn’t want to travel and she has everything she needs.

Just because the boomer generation has left us with a dumpster fire, doesn’t mean that there isn’t a wide distribution of people within that age group. The truth is only a handful of us have the power to change anything and the rest of us are just trying to get by and get the most out of life that we can.

It was the boombox outside her window that got her, wasn’t it? /s

The ones that really get me are the way they show execs at companies. The “look, this character is so bad ass at being an exec!”. They always come off as so unrealistic and cringy.

I’ve swam in that ocean, and that’s not how that shit works. Engineering too. In reality, it’s always a team of engineers that get something done… It is NEVER some rich smart guy inventing stuff on his or her own in their super fancy workshop.

If you say so. I can’t say I’ve ever run across one accidentally though.

The script doesn’t go away when you replace a helpdesk operator with ChatGPT. You just get a script-reading interface without empathy and a severally hindered ability to process novel issues outside it’s protocol.

The humans you speak to could do exactly what you’re asking for, if the business did not handcuff them to a script.

But they do handcuff them to a script… at least 1st and 2nd level tech support. That’s the point. It’s so fucking awful. It’s a barrier to keep you from the more highly paid tech support people who may actually be able to answer your questions. First you have to wait on hold to make sure you think it’s worth wasting their time on your annoying problem, THEN it’s a maze you have to navigate, and then whoops you just got hung up on… so sorry, start all over! LLMs are (can be) so much better at this!

I understand their limitations, but you’re overselling the negative. They’re fucking awesome for what they can do, but they have drawbacks that you must be aware of. Just as it’s lame to be an AI fanboi, it’s equally lame to be an AI luddite.

That’s 99% of what I’m looking for. If I’m figuring something out by myself, I’m not looking it up on the internet.

I’m an engineer and I’ve found LLMs great for helping me understand an issue. When you read something online, you have to translate from what the author is saying into your thinking and I’ve found LLMs are much better at re-framing information to match my inner dialog. I often find them much more useful than google searches in trying to find information.

I already use LLMs to problem solve issues that I’m having and they’re typically better than me punching questions into Google. I admit that I’ve once had an llm hallucinate while it was trying to solve a problem for me, but the vast majority of the time it has been quite helpful. That’s been my experience at least. YMMV.

If you think LLMs suck, I’m guessing you haven’t actually used telephone tech support in the past 10 years. That’s a version of hell I wish on very few people.

I am totally looking forward to AI customer support. The current model of a person reading a scripted response is painful and fucking awful and only rarely leads to a good resolution. I would LOVE an AI support where I could just describe the problem and it gives me answers and it only asks relevant follow up questions. I can’t wait.

So I’m curious, how did you end up? Is there anything in your adult life that indicates your capabilities are above average?