Most of us can be quite easily distracted. “Squirrel!” springs to mind for any lovers of the film UP.
We shouldn’t beat ourselves up over it; we are just naturally responding to something, anything, that is more exciting than what we are doing at this precise moment. What, however, if what we are doing just now is vital, regardless of being tedious?
I do not believe I am alone with the feeling that all the techy nerdy guys have ‘left the building’, just a couple of empty cans of Red Bull and Wotsit packets inert beside sleeping laptops, while they are enthralled and absorbed with AI and all its exponential potential (have I just invented a useless meme there?).
Yes, we, the common folk, are excited and a bit scared of AI. Yes, we are mainly using it in our daily lives, but hang on, why is my email behaving oddly, why won’t this page load, why are there bugs in my software and WHY WON’T THIS DAMN THING PRINT??
I would be amazed if you guys out there have not also felt that cracks are beginning to appear in the foundations of our base technology. AI is being prioritised over all else, and so God help you if you have such a mundane problem as Outlook not syncing properly. What the tech giants are trying to do is amazing (if somewhat cavalier), but the existing platforms are not getting nearly enough love. What use is a monumentally intelligent LLM if you cannot apply it with a standard Office suite application?
I get it that focus and love for AI is not the sole problem here, we are putting way more strain on the data centres and even the software engineers, but come on Microsoft et al, hive off a group to actually concentrate on those areas that our interrupting our workflow, our contribution to GDP, and ultimately your customers who you want to fall in love with the sparkly disco-ball you are building (aka The Death Star).