Comment by minimaxir
2 months ago
The annoying thing about this drama is the predominant take has been "AI is bad" rather than "a startup using AI for intentionally net negative outcomes is bad".
Startups like these have been sending unsolicited emails like this since the 2010's, before char-rnns. Solely blaming AI for enabling that behavior implicitly gives the growth hacking shenanigans a pass.
I read Rob’s message as against the AI industry, triggered by this email - it is ‘AI is bad’.
This startup didn’t spend the trillions he’s referencing.
Correct. I'm more referring to the secondary discussions on HN/Bluesky which have trended the same lines as usual instead of highlighting the unique actions of Sage as Simon did.
A 501(c)(3) isn't a startup. The behavior is still bad, obviously.
And it gives them more eyes than they hoped for by “going nuclear.”