Sticker shock

If you ever wanted proof that “AI” is a marketing term, not a technical one, all you need to do is look at all the applications sprouting up with “AI-Powered” or “Featuring AI” badges on them while still doing exactly what they’ve always done.

You spell-checker has become an “intelligent writing assistant”, your CRM is now “agentic” because it crawls LinkedIn, your desk chair will probably have an “AI-assisted posture correction” knob any day now.

This term is meaningless, which makes it useful for the people profiting from it. A word that sounds like the future can be sold as down-payment on said imaginary future.

The only question needing an answer is: does the software do the job or doesn’t it? That the output originated in a giant probabilistic word machine or a four-line function written 10 years ago is a matter for the engineers (and the electricity bill), not for the person who just wants their invoice to print correctly.

The same goes for all the “X used AI to do Z” stories we see everywhere. No-one’s ever written a “Local man repairs laptop with screwdriver” story because we all get that the screwdriver is not the story. The story is the laptop, and whether it now works or not.

If the screwdriver was being sold by a company with a two-trillion-dollar valuation and a desperate need to justify it, the headline would definitely be different, though.

Look at the tool, not the packaging. Does it do the job? And are you paying extra for the AI sticker on the box?

Colin