Well, why don't you go drown yourself right now in the river?
I wanted to respond.
Instead, I said something along the lines of humans needing time to process ideas and that just seeing words on the screen does little to generate actual knowledge.
Needless to say, I'm not seeing that person again.
I'm just sooo over hearing this.
More of the people telling me: oh you'll be replaced by an AI agent.
Oh, you're a writer? Good luck hun. Everyone just uses genAI now.
You're telling me to read a whole book? Or even a blog? Are you crazy? Who has time for that? Just give me a TL;DR.
I mean, yeah, sure, says the person with a 10-hour phone screen time a day. I mean, who has time for that?!
Do you ever see other people not through the lens of a smartphone camera or halfway distracted, or how does that work?
...
Anyway, back to the AI summary talk.
Long before everyone rebranded bots to agents and made videos about how creative pursuits could be automated with genAI to make you a millionaire selling mugs on Etsy...
There was a time that a startup came up with Blinkist. It was humans making the summaries of books.
I tried it.
I never got a hang of it.
It's nice to revisit ideas, I assume.
But isn't it also nice to just pull the book out of your shelf, or to have to make an effort scraping your own memory for traces of the concepts?
If you're anything like me, you'll find it deeply satisfying when you can remember exactly which book to go to for a certain idea.
I reckon they won't be doing that well now that everyone can make their custom summaries anyway.
...
I also recall a tweet about some tool that would break down classics into super simple language.
Look, if you do that for accesibility sake, sure. A simpler version of Midsummernight dream for kids? Love it.
This one didn't quite seem like that though considering how much was lost in the process.
Let me make some summaries up:
Guy climbs on mountain, stays there for a while, comes down a changed man.
Angry snobby white man takes a bunch of drugs and gets high.
One woman decides to not have babies, her friend however gives birth to one.
The first one you wouldn't even know if we're talking Zarathustra or Buddha.
To me often what the people who have this "oh just read the summaries" mindset tend to also have, is a view that stuff needs to be convenient, quickly available, and ideally of some economic value or entertainment value.
They want only the information. And maybe some quotes to post in their insta stories. Maybe if you asked them whether they want to be plugged into the pleasure machine, they'd say yes.
This forgets completely that the process we go through to understand, to empathize, to reflect on the world created by the author contributes to how fulfilling literature can be.
Difficulty is not always the enemy. Having to put in effort is not a bug. It's often feature.
Reading a book isn't like watching documentaries on Netflix.
Apparently those are nowadays optimized to be second-screen anyway. Meaning, supposed to be watched by people distracted by their phone. Wtf is this.
Actually reading a whole book or even just a blog requires active participation.
If you do it as watching Netflix, you're not doing yourself any favors.
Reading forces you to focus. It requests that you accept the previous paragraphs as true before proceeding.
"Mindless, distracted reading is just like walking through a beautiful landscape blindfolded"
Herman Hesse
Considering how many people walk eyes focused on the screen through beautiful landscapes, seeking picture spots to enhance their brand value... maybe it's no wonder people don't want to actually read a whole thing.
Doesn't square with a distracted mind seeking the next shot of quick dopamine.
Or just craving convenience. Hey I love comfort too.
Not that much that I'd give up on reading some of the beautiful literature in its original versions, which will have me confused, struggling, and then... touch, move, and at times live forever in my head - mingling with my experiences, helping me make sense of the world.
...
If I was talking about music, no one would tell me to just listen to the AI summary.
As I was walking toward the drug store, my playlist decided to hit me with Brahms OP 118 Intermezzo and I started crying.
This is what undiluted art does to us at its best. It triggers something deep within.
Isn't great writing the same?
If you take out all of the prose, all of what makes the writers' voice, what are you left with?
Are you just trying to get rid of the human?
And what do you gain?
Is it really an opinion to have so proudly?
Isn't that exactly what causes writers like Ted Chaing to call genAI a fundamentally de-humanizing technology?
"...a book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us."
Kafka
Thanks for reading. 💚
I just needed a rant. It's been one too many in those days coming with this opinion and telling me how I was such an "art teacher" (in a rather judgmental way) for holding such views.
Didn't Robin Williams teach us better?
"We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion."
John Keating - The Dead Poets Society
Anyway.
Read some book, or poems, essays, short stories, plays... anything written by a real human.
Kids books are another source of insight and delight.
Mr Fox likes books is one of my absolute favorites.
And manga.
Read some of those. They're not just for kids.
They might teach you more about what happens when we put blind trust into tech to judge humans than any of those AI summaries ever can.
blinkist might be one of the worst things we've ever created. it has legit replaced reading for some people i know now. it's such a shame too because reading is one of the great pleasures of life.
"To me often what the people who have this "oh just read the summaries" mindset tend to also have, is a view that stuff needs to be convenient, quickly available, and ideally of some economic value or entertainment value. They want only the information. And maybe some quotes to post in their insta stories. Maybe if you asked them whether they want to be plugged into the pleasure machine, they'd say yes." https://paragraph.xyz/@cryptonao/why-dont-you-just-read-the-ai-summary
If we were playing golf, this would be our last hole. But since it's Paragraph Picks, this is the 18th edition with many more to go! Here are a few hand-selected pieces of writing over the past week or so.
@fercaggiano reflects on the journey of artists entering the NFT space, highlighting the motivations, challenges, and evolving trends in the digital art world, including the shift toward lower-priced or free editions, and the need for education and innovation to sustain the NFT art ecosystem. "Now, the latest trend is free (or nearly free) editions… Why? For validation? Exposure? The hope that something will go viral and become profitable?" https://paragraph.xyz/@fercaggiano/nft-art-market-review
@naomiii critiques the growing trend of using summaries and dismissing the richness of original texts, emphasizing the importance of effort in understanding and appreciating art, whether it’s literature or music. "Difficulty is not always the enemy. Having to put in effort is not a bug. It’s often a feature." https://paragraph.xyz/@cryptonao/why-dont-you-just-read-the-ai-summary
@epr reflects on the challenges Warpcast faces in attracting and retaining visual artists, as well as potential solutions like creating separate artist-focused experiences within the Farcaster ecosystem. "The platform has the potential to be a great space for digital artists, but the current focus on tech-driven conversations means these creative possibilities are often overlooked or lost in the noise." https://ericprhodes.blog/builders-paradise-or-artists-dilemma
Thanks for the highlight! 🥰 100 $degen
great recs! 25 $degen
well-done venting from @naomiii ‼️ read more in order to write more, and not just summaries. https://paragraph.xyz/@cryptonao/why-dont-you-just-read-the-ai-summary
Thank you Riley 💓
Needed to rant a little after one too many people asked me this recently about my book reading habit. I mean, maybe they should consider watching AI summaries of their TikTok Feed...
tldr tldr tldr
4527 $degen
> This forgets completely that the process we go through to understand, to empathize, to reflect on the world created by the author contributes to how fulfilling literature can be. > Difficulty is not always the enemy. Having to put in effort is not a bug. It's often feature. Thanks for writing this. I loved the whole piece, but these two quotes really resonated with me. It feels like perfect timing. They’re def coming for music too, nothing’s safe at this point. I totally agree with you that AI is a tool, not a replacement for everything. But you know how tech people are, if we leave it up to them, they’ll have us downloading books straight to our brains, just like Neo learned kung fu in The Matrix
Ah yes I already saw some video speculating that Spotify is using generative AI to make a bunch of songs, put into playlists of all of the same, make them popular as background music. That aside, I find it just so outrageous that this small slice of people - if you go by numbers - is supposed to have so much say about all the rest of us. When their biggest motif isn't human thriving but simple money and power at best. If it was they'd do much more on figuring out how ai could supplement education settings, without replacing teachers - just adding to the experience by customizing for certain kids' weaknesses and strengths. I don't think an AI mentor will ever replace a real passionate human teacher entirely.
I completely agree with you. It honestly feels like we’re living through an episode of “Silicon Valley Knows Best” I’m all for technological advancement, but I’m not naive, these things come with risks. Right now, it feels like they’re prioritizing innovation and fierce competition. It’s an arms race. What could go wrong right? Silicon Valley loves to talk about how life is improving for everyone, but they never seem to emphasize the growing gap between the rich and the poor. It feels like AI will only make that worse. And it’s not just me saying this, even people like Geoffrey Hinton are raising concerns
A rant is good for the soul every now and then, I'm sure of it. The preacher's and the choir's. (Heartily enjoying the way articles now show inline on desktop.)
yo you got an ai summary of that???
Bookmarked for tomorrow morning with my coffee
Loved this - and yes - the "difficulty is a feature not a bug" resonates. I suspect we're in one of those pendulum shifts where AI grokkable constructs are delivering an advantage for people in some kind of "social" way - but it's a dangerous move. It's been my experience that the world is getting more complex, not less - core ideas remain the same but the level of complexity that technology has created around them makes them harder to work with. If we're training ourselves to only understand distillable ideas we're going to lose out to people who understand the nuance of more complex ideas. All that to say - thanks for the rant - the writing and that Schubert's D.956 has the same effect on me as the Brahms!
Aaah a fellow Schubert enjoyer. I'm big fan of his uncompleted symphony, and some of his Liederzyklen.
Bookmarked so I can read and then respond after time's done with basting it.
Well, I read your piece, the comments, and some other casts too. Thanks for writing Social Media? Not in my now truncated experience. I deal with it as Attention mining on steroids. One of my fav words (and this began in Germany, I heard?) is "smombie" - smartphone zombie haha. The infestation is spreading World War Z style. A.I.? Try Machine Learning. Notice that it's machine learning and not machine yearning. Machines cannot yearn. The difference is significant. I definitely noticed the yearning in your rant! Well done.
Aww thank you so much. Smombie, yeah, that sounds familiar haha Definitely, it's the thing that many similar critical people tend to point out that A.I does not actually care. It can use the same words a human would to express such feelings, but there's a huge difference. I'm just not sure people can differentiate considering how much of our own messages is happening through the same screen interface.
Balancing the accessibility of summary content with the richness of true literature generates important debates. The piece by @naomiii highlights how material engagement encourages deeper understanding, arguing that convenience shouldn’t compromise the profound connection we make with a writer’s voice and intention.