• AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml
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    7 days ago

    Huh I read a dystopian short story about AI micro-managing workers, constantly telling them what to do next to optimize productivity. It ends with near “perfect” dystopian wealth concentration. While in another part of the world they used AI to create a utopia.

    Oh it was called Manna by Marshall Brain

    The gradual takeover of jobs by AI (starting with fast food), The warehousing of the unemployed in state-controlled facilities, A techno-utopian alternative (Australia) where AI liberates rather than enslaves.

    • Silinde@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      Wow, I remember finding that story 20-odd years ago but could never remember the title or author. Pretty good short story IIRC, and more relevant than ever, it’s themes have been on my mind on and off quite a bit these past few years.

      • AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml
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        3 days ago

        I couldn’t remember it either. I described it to deepseek in order to find it. Ironically it mistakenly thought

        the short story you’re thinking of is almost certainly “Nanny” by Cory Doctorow. It’s part of his collection Radicalized (published in 2019)".

        If you find it, let me know. I think I might have been conned by deepseek.

        spoiler

        Why the Mix-Up?

        • Both works critique technology-driven capitalism, but Doctorow’s focus is distinct:

          • Radicalized targets corporate control via IoT devices, insurance cruelty, and policing 612.

          • Manna explores algorithmic worker management leading to dystopian/utopian outcomes.

        • I incorrectly merged these narratives due to overlapping themes of technological oppression. My apologies for the oversight.

  • ssillyssadass@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    I actually think an AI would do a better job at running corporations than a human would. Even if it’s just an LLM. And I don’t mean in a pro-corpo way.

    • sheogorath@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      I have this sneaking suspicion that the company I work for is already ran by an LLM. The CEO is obviously using ChatGPT for everything.

    • Wolf@lemmy.today
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      5 days ago

      My cousin was fired from his job. The manager told him that AI had determined that he was to be fired, and that it was out of his hands. Either that was a true statement or it was a convenient excuse. Kind of scary either way.

  • MojoMcJojo@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    This is what I told my bosses when AI first showed up and they called a meeting to discussed how to leverage it.

    It’s not going to replace me, it’s going to replace you.

    • pticrix@lemmy.ca
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      7 days ago

      Delamain has shown me more loyalty and care than 99% of NC. I’m on board.

      • Alaik@lemmy.zip
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        7 days ago

        I mean honestly… delamain was honest. Which absolutely was better than 99% of night city. You get shot? Yeah he won’t take you to the hospital if his client paid him to take you to location z, but you knew that before getting in.

        You get the creds for the primo package yourself though? You got it made choom.

  • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
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    7 days ago

    Plot twist: board replaces the whole exec layer with CEO AI, keeps the difference, gives nothing to the employees, line goes up, employees now threatened both at the top and the bottom of the ladder, work-work!

    • Evil_Incarnate@sopuli.xyz
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      7 days ago

      When manual workers were replaced by robots, they were told to “retrain and reskill” to get new jobs.

      Perhaps these CEO’s can retrain to be plumbers, there’s good money there.

  • scott@lemmy.org
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    7 days ago

    Or you could fire your boss and form a worker cooperative run on consensus based decision making. Worker cooperatives succeed more than “traditional” businesses and have higher pay for their workers[1], despite being at a systemic disadvantage for seed capital. You don’t need an ai to boss you around, you and your coworkers can make collective decisions without any boss to speak of.


    1. https://www.thenews.coop/worker-co-op-sector-continues-to-grow-in-the-usa/ ↩︎

    • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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      7 days ago

      I’ve often thought that worker cooperative call centres should be a thing. The people who manage call centres barely understand the contract because inevitably they higher management from outside of the company, since no one on the phones could possibly be management material.

      It would probably make quite a lot of money because one of the biggest complaints that companies have about their third party call centres is inefficiencies. Even if the bosses wanted to fix the inefficiencies they can’t because they don’t understand the contract at a base enough level. In a workers cooperative that wouldn’t be an issue since the workers would understand the contract.

      Unfortunately it probably would face the issue that all new starts in the industry make, in that most businesses are locked into multi-year contracts with their call centre providers and can’t just swap to a new provider whenever they want. So you’d have to time its startup very precisely as a big company came to the end of its contract, or you’d probably have to get some clients on board before you even started.

      • AHamSandwich@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        This is a very good idea. I worked call centers in the US when I was younger and they all suffered from terrible, abusive management.

      • scott@lemmy.org
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        7 days ago

        Why don’t you start it? I have experience in cooperative development and could help provide some guidance on getting started (for free of course; DM me if you like)

      • nullroot@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        Some of those inefficiencies are by design though, especially for any department that might pay out to the customer for the company’s mistakes. You would make a well reviewed call center that big companies don’t want to hire because they’ll actually do the job.

    • ToastedRavioli@midwest.social
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      7 days ago

      Most people work for terrible bosses, but AI in its current state would only be better than a terrible boss honestly. A good boss isnt some asshole bossing people around. A good boss is someone who knows how to lead people and get the most out of each constituent part of the team, while also helping each person theyre leading be the best they can be. A good boss is someone who has empathy, but can also be firm when appropriate, and knows how to read people well. A good boss is someone who can successfully plan work in such a way that it is most successful while simultaneously putting the least strain on each member of the team as is possible.

      The problem with bosses isnt the concept of bosses. The problem is that there are 10x as many managerial roles as there are people competent and selfless enough to actually do the shit in the previous paragraph. Leadership is a position of service, not self servitude, but 9/10 people use leadership in self interest and, unsurprisingly, fail in the end. They want the check and they want to be the boss so they can put work on others. A truly successful boss can never be someone like that, because no one respects working for someone who asks them to do work that they themselves would never do (unless talking about highly specialized work where few are competent).

      No one wants to work the weekend for a manager who always takes it off. Nobody wants to know that they know more about how to do their job than their boss does. All of that kind of stuff eats away at people until they go work for someone else.

      I think an AI boss would obviously be better than a bad boss. But it cant replace working for someone that you highly respect and that helps you be the best you can be, which is something that often motivates people to continue working in the same job. AI would be such a neutral force that it couldnt really do that part of the job. And obviously it cant read people

    • Valmond@lemmy.world
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      5 days ago

      I wonder if that’s an enough efficient system, I’d love it to be, and it’s maybe more efficient than the “C-suite” system just because of the cost savings not having C people salaries.

      Worth a try.

      I’m up, C/C++ senior dev :-)

    • Nephalis@discuss.tchncs.de
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      7 days ago

      Are there any articles about examples? I only know about aftermath.site but ha e no clue if it is sccessful or not.

    • Kowowow@lemmy.ca
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      7 days ago

      I do wonder about just using an ai ceo as a sock puppet to seem more inviting to a ceo heavy world would be worth it, like they get really popular you could replace the model with new that takes notes of everything then relays it back to a co op board

      • Kühlschrank@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        It’s my fervent prayer that AI ends up enabling smaller teams of enthusiastic individuals to actually be able to compete against megalithic corpos. I can absolutely imagine an AI contributing high level guidance to such a team for them to consider and ideate/iterate on before they adapt. It actually seems to me like one of the more plausible activities for an AI agent.

          • Kühlschrank@lemmy.world
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            7 days ago

            It would sure be an interesting experiment! In my experience the chatbots are really good at providing a starting point for things. One almost always has to go take that and decide what needs improving and what can be acted upon, of course, and the team would still need to strategize for how to handle that oversight with an AI CEO.

  • Voytrekk@sopuli.xyz
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    7 days ago

    It would be the largest cost cutting measure, but the ruling class won’t allow it.