The way I see it, LLMs are a direct attack on friction designed into human processes.
- Filing a lawsuit
- Applying to a university
- Tailoring a cover-letter for a job application
- Writing to a local government body to complain about street lighting
- Writing a homework essay as part of a class at school
Things like this have always, supposedly, been available to everyone - but preparing those documents and jumping through the necessary hoops has been hard enough that the flow of applications has stayed at a manageable level.
LLMs destroy that balance. The volume of applications goes through the roof. Now we have to redesign all of these decades- or centuries- old human processes, without any warning that we would have to do so.
This is an interesting thought, but perhaps AI is an extension of the general case of the internet itself. Among the examples that come to mind:
1. buying/scalping concert/event tickets: in the past it would have been unrealistic to scalp tickets for faraway venues
2. fraud/identity verification: now anyone can apply for an account in your name anywhere as long as they enough personal information about you without a human confirming you are who you say
3. public shaming/harassment: any moment of yours in public now has a non-zero risk of going public throughout the world
4. spread of conspiracy theories/propaganda: now all the village idiots can find each other
It’s not just the volume, but also the quality of that increased volume, I don’t have the data but would bet it’s actually very time consuming to review that 40% increase (because the content will look plausible and confident but will likely have mistake). I cannot imagine being the poor folks having to process all that
Though that friction is paid in human lifespan, unlike a deposit fee that cannot be recovered if your request is found have merit. Additionally the other side often is not incentivized to minimize the friction.
So ideally these processes would be less wasteful in the first place, it's just unfortunate that this is forced by unilateral action instead of being arrived at cooperatively.
This, after decades of phone trees, mail-in rebates, specialist pre-approvals, and other processes specifically designed to create friction for typical people when interacting with large companies and organizations.
I have no moral judgment here, but it seems like a classic pendulum. Part of the demand for AI is coming because our systems are intentionally friction-filled.
- Filing a lawsuit
- Applying to a university
- Tailoring a cover-letter for a job application
- Writing to a local government body to complain about street lighting
- Writing a homework essay as part of a class at school
Things like this have always, supposedly, been available to everyone - but preparing those documents and jumping through the necessary hoops has been hard enough that the flow of applications has stayed at a manageable level.
LLMs destroy that balance. The volume of applications goes through the roof. Now we have to redesign all of these decades- or centuries- old human processes, without any warning that we would have to do so.
1. buying/scalping concert/event tickets: in the past it would have been unrealistic to scalp tickets for faraway venues
2. fraud/identity verification: now anyone can apply for an account in your name anywhere as long as they enough personal information about you without a human confirming you are who you say
3. public shaming/harassment: any moment of yours in public now has a non-zero risk of going public throughout the world
4. spread of conspiracy theories/propaganda: now all the village idiots can find each other
I have no moral judgment here, but it seems like a classic pendulum. Part of the demand for AI is coming because our systems are intentionally friction-filled.