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this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2026
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Fuck AI
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A place for all those who loathe AI to discuss things, post articles, and ridicule the AI hype. Proud supporter of working people. And proud booer of SXSW 2024.
AI, in this case, refers to LLMs, GPT technology, and anything listed as "AI" meant to increase market valuations.
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Y'all - This post is actually a full level more sinister and all about shareholder value than it seems.
There is a huge difference between the paid versions of LLMs and the unpaid/free tier. I've heard some estimations of about a year lag time.
Why is this about shareholder value? Because these companies only tell you about the pie in the sky good stuff that the corporate level paid versions are doing.
Case in point, I've had 2 really excellent times troubleshooting issues with Claude, just like @paranoia@feddit.dk which only worked because it was the paid version. One was trying to re-format and re-use an external SSD in container to use as a bootable Win 11 drive. The paid version managed to troubleshoot the issue, which was an MBR label for the boot sector. Didn't even take long, maybe 20 minutes on a side quest. Similarly, paid Claude helped me get a home network up and running in minutes.
I've tried unpaid Claude for even rudimentary troubleshooting, and it throws boilerplate "have you tried turning off and then on again?" level troubleshooting that might only help grandmas and dipshits. Useless. Which is the point. "Oh, hey, you want the thing that isn't soft in the head? Pay us $20.
There's some problems with this take of "the unpaid level is about a year behind".
This is absolutely idiotic marketing. "Here, try our free service to see what you're getting. Oh, it's absolute shit, completely useless, and in fact damaging? Give us money!" The whole point of free trials is to show off your strengths. If your free trial is a piece of shit, it's not going to convert into paid subscriptions.
If we use this logic, well, let's rewind a year. The current free level is the same as what the pro level was a year ago. A year ago they were selling their pro levels as the greatest things since sliced bread. As "Ph. D. equivalent assistants" in fact. And here we are a year later, so the public level should be at the "Ph. D. equivalent assistants" that were advertised a year ago. And they're basically Ph. D. assistants with a diploma from a mill, wearing clown shoes. So ... colour me suspicious of claims that the commercial grades are any better.
Now for point 1, I wouldn't put it past the techbroaidudes to be absolute shit at marketing. A lot of their marketing, in fact, seems like it was dreamed up by an LLMbecile. But point 2 is a harder one to counter. They were saying the same thing a year ago that they're saying now, and the free tier now is supposed to be what the paid tier was a year ago. This doesn't add up.