On the dangers of Hype

(I originally wrote this in late 2024. Nothing has changed.)

There are some tremendous use cases for GenAI.

There are also numerous misapplications of the GenAI tech.

Taking top honors for Illustrating the latter painfully this week (Dec 2024), we have:

Apple

• Misreported facts attributed to the BBC courtesy of Apple AI

Shortly after this debacle, Apple withdrew the software from the market and put their much vaunted AI plans on hold. Since then we have reports of internal org changes and mostly silence on future AI plans.

This is the condition known in unpretentious circles as: “Licking their wounds.”

Stanford professor

• Hallucinations courtesy of GenAI

Hype and pressure can lead to bad outcomes - even from those who should know better.

Let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water here, but the ongoing appeals for better judgment on how to apply GenAI need to be heeded.