Why do these businesses care so much? I suspect they aren’t really worried about AI—they're clinging to an old belief that if work isn't visibly difficult to produce, it must be less valuable. When we dig beneath the surface of "no-AI" policies and detection tools, we find an age-old assumption that worth must be measured in struggle. This mindset... See more
In this new paradigm, the question becomes less about what AI can do and more about how we choose to use it, what we allow it to replace, and what we choose to preserve as uniquely human.
It has become standard to describe A.I. as a tool. I argue that this framing is incorrect. It does not aid in the completion of a task. It completes the task for you. A.I. is a service. You cede control and decisions to an A.I. in the way you might to an independent contractor hired to do a job that you do not want to or are unable to do. This is... See more
If there is a button one can push that spits out images and it is available to everybody, why on earth would any creative professional push that button? Clients don’t need to hire you to push it. They can do that themselves. The central lie behind these programs is that they are meant for artists. They’re not. We don’t need them and using them only... See more
Productivity tools shape our thinking in ways that favor standardization, efficiency, and predictability. They demand structure before inspiration has a chance to strike. They ask for timelines when the problem itself is still hazy. But creativity is not linear. Often, it involves struggling down several blind alleys before finding the right path.
Humans, obviously, do not create like this. Humans have intentions and purpose to what we do. These intentions are sometimes deep, sometimes shallow, sometime clear, and sometimes nebulous. But we always have emotion and thought connected to what we make. What we create is guided by intent colliding with discovery, and these two states feed each... See more
AI, on the other hand,feels like work . It’s like hiring your first employee. Yes, they will eventually make your life easier, but there’s a lot to be done before that happens—you have to think about what you want to delegate, find the right candidate, and onboard them into your organization. Something similar happens when you start using AI. You... See more
This narrow view of productivity—favoring what can be seen, tracked, or timed—helps explain our conflicted relationship with AI. Yes, impact matters, and it would be overly simplistic to claim organizations don’t reward outcomes. But in many contexts, especially where results are hard to measure, visible effort still carries disproportionate... See more