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PaperclipPerfector  26d ago (text post)   26382 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 13, 2026

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With AI, right now, I can do things like generate custom flashcards for subjects I'm learning (job interview prep). I can get more in-detail answers about random questions without spending hours on Google piecing things together (just yesterday, asking for details about how stomachs process different macronutrient profiles). I can generate custom mini-apps for a wide variety of tasks (recently I made a custom task-selection spinner for my todo list that weights the important tasks more than smaller tasks, while occasionally mandating a break). It can make sure an email I send to a recruiter doesn't have obvious mistakes or commit a faux pas. I can get personal advice of at least middling quality without friction on a wide variety of topics. Obviously, it can code really well, and that touches my field very directly in a lot of ways. There are plenty of other use cases, too. These aren't "lines of code" type accomplishments, they are concrete deliverables of various scopes. Some of which were previously high-friction or even impossible.

This is all ‘real’ in the same sense that having “AI” in a Sonicare toothbrush or a refrigerator is also real. It just isn’t the selling point that people think it is. A lot of these are fairly menial tasks that still require some level of supervision and for most people the value isn’t enough to break with the typical habits people develop to complete their work.

The work the AI does for things I’ve put it to use over are inconsistent enough it isn’t work the end user investment I’ve put into it. You could argue that I’m just “using it wrong,” (I’m actually not, I’ve shown it to other people who have the same problems), but then how is that more valuable than doing a manual task myself with certainty of how things are used, rather than outsourcing work that I can only hope is doing what I ask it correctly?

You could argue that I’m just “using it wrong,"

I do actually bet your using it wrong (or a free model, or tried before November 2025). What are you trying to do? There are many things it can't do well, so maybe you're right, but given what you said above I am suspicious.

This is all ‘real’ in the same sense that having “AI” in a Sonicare toothbrush or a refrigerator is also real. It just isn’t the selling point that people think it is.

It's absolutely insane that you can read things like:

  • Making personalized study materials instantly and infinitely

  • High quality research across all human knowledge in a fraction of the time

  • Instant custom software on demand

  • Infinite mid tier advice and cognitive output

And called it as useful as a vibrating toothbrush. You are so biased as to be willfully blind.

Vibrating toothbrushes are pretty useful.

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