When will AI advertise itself right out of existence?

It’s been less than a year and the AI tools are pretty impressive. We’ve gone from nothing to research assistants to digital artists. And in that same amount of time, Google, Microsoft, and Facebook have eroded and ruined the experience.

People are already concerned over AI bias and presenting information with a certain slant, but the new problem is the advertising it’s vomiting out. AI isn’t about collecting and disseminating information, it’s a new technology vehicle to serve up ads-ads disguised as information.

It’s not about presenting information to help answer a question, or make connections people didn’t see before, it’s about selling products based on your queries. Every question and research topic will flood us with yet more ads.

• You wanted a block of code explained, clearly you need this course.
• You asked for advice? Here is some information from a website that deals in exactly that.
• You want to know about this topic? Well, here is an excerpt from a book that just came out. You clearly need to buy it.

We’re already suspicious of the information AI presents. Were did that answer come from? What is the source? Where is the reference material? Who is the real author?

Soon it will be, who paid to show me this answer that aligns with their ad?

We’re already at the point where AI responses are driven by advertisers. The results are tweaked on the fly to present a relevant ad. An ad blocker may remove the ad itself, but the content is already manipulated. Now that the answer is out of context of the ad, it’s harder to see the bias.

Let me make this decision based off totally bogus and forged information that meets some advertisers criteria.

We’re also at the point where we can’t afford to not see the ads. Streaming companies are raising rates and putting in more ads. Instead of paying to not see ads, it’s merely paying to see less. We’re worse off when it comes to ads than we’ve ever been. People keep cutting off and leaving services only to pay more for less content and more ads. We’re paying for more tracking and more invasion of privacy.

It’s bad enough we can’t perform a search without seeing ads and getting misdirected to sites that have paid to lure us in. What’s supposed to be an amazing research tool, mentoring assistant, tutor, and even conversation companion, has turned into a greasy salesman who will say anything to make a sale.

Unfortunately, AI barely runs on a desktop, so we’re beholden to large server farms for AI information, and that’s the golden ticket.

With all the lawsuits flying around and billions in lost revenue because people intentionally block ads and tracking, you would think AI would be a lesson learned.

We don’t need to be afraid of AI, we need to be afraid of the usual suspects that have been smearing ads into our faces for the past decade.