AI and Instant Soup
I love metaphors for thinking about and discussing complex topics. I have been thinking about the issues in the UX sector with my pencil/scrivener/author metaphor. I find AI as plastic as a great metaphor for current AI usage.
My friend Eren Çamlıkaya used erasing time as a metaphor for AI:
The internet was revolutionary because it erased geography or “space” as a barrier to knowledge. Anyone, anywhere, can access the same information. AI now erases “time” as a barrier. What once took years of experience is now achievable by juniors almost instantly through intelligent collaboration with LLMs and automation. Leveling experience will then bring the entire workforce on the table for companies to pick from. Who do you think the winners will be? (LinkedIn post)
I found myself nodding, with half agreement and a twitching eye. My eye twitched because the type of time erasure he speaks about reminded me of how instant soups "save" time in the kitchen.
Hence, this is my comparison of AI with instant soup.
Instant soup looks like it cuts down meal time, but an instant tomato soup is not a tomato soup. It is a mixture that looks like, flows like, and in some cases, tastes like tomato soup. Instant soup companies pay a lot of money to make people believe that this is the future of cooking and we are about to experience a culinary revolution that humankind have never seen before.
A lot of instant soups are mispackaged. You buy a package of cream of mushroom, but in addition to mushroom, you find two slivers of anchovies in the package. You buy a halal tarhana soup, but it comes with two tiny bits of bacon. Those who know what halal is gets rightfully mad about this. Instant soup companies write reports about how the buyers can do some work to reduce the likelihood that their purchases are actually what they purchase. People don't buy into this. Then, instant soup companies write articles that offer mathematical proof that instant soups may contain other things that no one could anticipate. Just to be sure, they write on the packages: "Instant soup may include other ingredients. Always check before you eat." In doing that, they relieve themselves of the responsibility to ship the right thing.
These companies actually have safety teams that should be taking care of these issues. Some teams actually find the bacon in the halal tarhana soup. But the product team decides to ship it anyway. Some companies hire starving employees in conflict zones in Africa, feed them whatever comes out of their production line, and if one of these employees gets sick, they realize that there is a problem.
Instant soup isn't providing any nutrition, and instant soup companies know this. So they hire nutritionists, not to enhance the nutritional value of the product, but to lead PR campaigns to argue that instant soup is part of a balanced diet.