ZDL

Well, there's a reason why I said "perhaps". That's as far as I'm willing to compromise. Anybody using a bullshitting digital parrot needs to have their laziness highlighted.

I'm not sure that it's unfair to say "made with AI" when a photo is AI-altered.

Perhaps I'd have two labels: "Primarily Generated with AI" and "Edited with AI".

The genie is not out of the bottle. It's stuck in the neck as people realize how limited and useless the "AI" really is. The seeming ubiquity of it is a concerted marketing campaign pushed by people trying desperately to cash out before the bubble bursts.

It's following the hype curve of cryptocurrency, then NFTs, only in fast-forward. For a while the "true believers" (just like with crypto and NFTs) will keep it going forward as they delude themselves into thinking that it will turn around "any time now" ... but in reality AI is already collapsing.

See the problem is that while crypto and NFTs were wrapped in a whole metric fuckton of complicated jargon and terminology that laypeople couldn't understand, the various "AI" projects had free, public-facing services that were easy enough for even technophobes like me to be able to use ...

... and find out what utter shit they are.

They just have to hire sociopaths. Fortunately for them, the world of techbrodudes is mostly sociopaths!

This is one of those times when even having it explained doesn't make things any more comprehensible.

This is true. the technology itself is mostly useless. The problem is the grifters behind it pushing it.

Say it ain't so! Techbrodudes have a problem with consent!? THIS IS UNPOSSIBLE!!!!

Not owning a personal vehicle is only okay if you live in the heart of a city …

Like most people in the western world (and indeed likely in most of the world) do.

… and don’t go outside of that little bubble.

Because rental of smaller vehicle services (like taxis, etc.) is totally not a thing.

The problem here is that you have the American disease (even if you're not American). You're so infused with the cultural insistence that there's only one way to do things … the way things are done now … that you literally cannot conceive of a life without cars (or guns, or with public health care). Despite this being, you know, the norm for most of the world.

Switching to an electric car is a 100% reduction in carbon usage for my commute.

Is it really? Are you positive?

How is your electricity generated. Coal, natural gas, or oil? Congratulations, your carbon usage is HIGHER with an EV than with an ICE! Is it hydro? Go look at the methane produced by those huge reservoirs. I haven't seen the calculations, but it's not neutral.

Oh, I know. You use solar and/or wind. Now look up the environmental costs of producing those. And of mining the special metals needed for the batteries. Or if you're nuked, the costs of mining uranium.

Switching to an EV is not the simple "zero carbon" solution you seem to imagine it to be.

No new car, of any kind, is cheaper than a car you already own.

Except that EVs don't do shit to save the planet. Personal vehicles are the problem. Making a slightly different version of them is worthless.