Comment by gruez
4 hours ago
>and fervently pushed by people over 55.
Source? I think you're conflating "pushed by CEOs" (which might lean on the older side) with "pushed by people over 55".
4 hours ago
>and fervently pushed by people over 55.
Source? I think you're conflating "pushed by CEOs" (which might lean on the older side) with "pushed by people over 55".
The article we're commenting on lists several examples of the dynamic and it aligns with my personal experience offline and online. There are also stats like these:
https://on.substack.com/p/the-substack-ai-report
"Publishers 45 and over were more likely to use AI than those under 45."
I can, of course, dig up more supporting data, but that is not as important to me as making sense of what I'm actually seeing.
https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2025/09/17/views-of-ais-...
"Younger Americans are generally more likely than older Americans to think the increased use of AI will worsen human abilities."
>"Publishers 45 and over were more likely to use AI than those under 45."
There's probably some skew here where old people in general aren't typically on substack, and therefore of the old people who are on substack, they're more "on the cutting edge" than younger publishers, which don't have such skew.
>"Younger Americans are generally more likely than older Americans to think the increased use of AI will worsen human abilities."
Right but what about actual usage? Young believe social media is bad for them, but nonetheless use it.
I dunno I'm on some forums with normal older people and they're much more likely to post AI content from YouTube or paste "I asked AI" quotes from chatgpt or even post their own "prompted GAI illustrations" as one guy put it.
Every time there is push back from younger posters followed by a bit of a generational faceoff.
I think boomers are still inclined to see technology as exciting space-race stuff. As a millennial I remember when the Internet was good but that also feels like a distant memory.
For younger people technology has been dark patterns and skinner boxes and increasingly imposed on them against their will from COVID tela-learning to AI mandates.
>I dunno I'm on some forums with normal older people and they're much more likely to post AI content from YouTube or paste "I asked AI" quotes from chatgpt or even post their own "prompted GAI illustrations" as one guy put it.
No, old people just don't bother hiding it, even though they use it less.
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/06/25/34-of-us-...
That's a chart for "ever used", not "amount of use".
CEOs are hired by boards. Boards are hired by shareholders. Most publicly-traded American companies have their shares held by pension and retirement funds. Pension and retirement funds exist to send money to people over 55.
I'm sure VPs are sweating bullets over the instructions they will receive during the part of the shareholder's call where mutual fund managers dial their members and hold the phones up to each other.
By that definition anything that happens in politics or corporate america is "fervently pushed by people over 55", because that's the group with the most political and economic power. AI push? Boomers. Datacenter backlash? Boomers. ESG push? Boomers. ESG backlash? Boomers.
Yes, as an oldster I’m constantly on the phone with mutual fund managers expressing my desire for CEOs to push more AI. :eyeroll:
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to conspiring with my fellow seniors to keep house prices up in my local area.