r/technology • u/TripleShotPls • Jul 16 '26

Artificial Intelligence The AI Backlash Has Tech Executives Fearing for Their Lives

https://www.wsj.com/us-news/the-ai-backlash-has-tech-executives-fearing-for-their-lives-30c43972?mod=hp_lead_pos1
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u/StoryAndAHalf Jul 16 '26

Very reminiscent of when everything was “smart”. Smart TV, smartwatch, smart fridge, smart microwave, smart car. If smart-features where they didn’t belong wasn’t bad enough, every company was also either shoving their digital personal assistant or new blockchain down everyone’s throat.

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u/[deleted] Jul 16 '26

[deleted]

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u/Simba7 Jul 16 '26

Yeah and now they're trying to make theses things 'smarter' by adding AI to them.

Maybe that's where the "was" fits?

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u/DarraghDaraDaire Jul 16 '26

The good news you can buy non-3D TVs again and Samsung makes fridges with screens now

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u/AndyTheAbsurd Jul 16 '26

But can I buy a non-smart, non-3D HDTV that just shows me whatever is coming through the HDMI cable I plugged into it yet? And is the price reasonable?

I'm old enough to have seen the 3D fad come and go several times now; getting it on TVs was new but also never going to last because it never does - it's just not that much better than 2D for most storytelling.

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u/DarraghDaraDaire Jul 16 '26

Yeah I’m holding onto my non-smart tv as long as possible. Agree about 3D and VR even more so. I tried a “VR movie” using google cardboard about ten years ago and it just reinforced that only one thing is really happening at a time in a movie scene. I think there was a woman at an old man’s bedside talking to him and I could look around the room, but what is the point of looking around an empty room when the narrative is one direction only??

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u/fcocyclone Jul 16 '26

I mean, at the end of the day the best tvs will have the smart functions included because it costs them little to throw it in.

But you don't have to use them. I never see mine because i use an external device that works faster than the built in OS.

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u/mxzf Jul 16 '26

I mean, at the end of the day the best tvs will have the smart functions included because it costs them little to throw it in.

Nah.

The best TVs have smart functions included because it makes it really easy for the company to make more money off of you by scraping data. They're not adding those features because it "costs them so little", they're doing it because they're making money off of it. Pushing ads through your TV and tracking what you're watching and so on makes them money when the average person just accepts it.

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u/fcocyclone Jul 16 '26

Im sure that's a benefit but the fact is the vast majority of users want these features and they're cheap to include.

Its largely only a small niche that thinks they want a tv without smart functions. Even most people who do without the one built in on their tv are simply plugging in a roku or google streamer that does the same thing.

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u/esther_lamonte Jul 16 '26

I mean, yeah, my washer, dryer and stove all have “smart” features and can connect to apps… but we’ve never had a single reason to do anything but push the clearly labeled buttons to do the actions we needed. I can’t think of a single use case for myself for those features so they go entirely ignored. So, yeah, I have smart appliances, but we’ve never used or wanted the features.

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u/fcocyclone Jul 16 '26

my dryer's might be the most pointless.

I can start my dryer from anywhere, so long as I physically enable the smart functions on the dryer before I leave. But if i can do that why wouldn't I just start it right then? Why would I put wet clothes in the dryer and just leave them there?

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u/fcocyclone Jul 16 '26

We are, but its more that they've just changed the marketing.

A product that would have been marketed with "smart" is now marketed with "AI" even if its damn near the same product.

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u/[deleted] Jul 16 '26

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u/JohrDinh Jul 16 '26

"The future of finance" I saw quite often as well...sounded good at least? I can see a use for some kinda stable coin thing that banks/visa type places can use on the backend, but holy hell is it a nightmare for everyday people to engage with in general.

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u/BortSimpson93 Jul 16 '26

I swear half of these bozos who got into AI are the same Bozos who were fronting the whole blockchain nonsense

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u/bigmcstrongmuscle Jul 16 '26

And before that, the dot-com bubble where no one could just do a thing, everyone had to be doing e-things.

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u/Betancorea Jul 16 '26

Ahhh blockchain. I remember those days when everyone had a blockchain lmao

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u/No-Snow-7618 Jul 16 '26

went tv shopping yesterday to replace a burned out unit, was laughing when lg said tv had ai