@skinnylatte From Reddit:

To be fair, Strava is getting a lot of press out of it. So while it doesn’t provide its USERS with any real benefit, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t benefit Strava…

That explains 99% of AI features companies add. They are not very needed and sometimes unrelated but it gives them free PR (and even hate PR still gets their products into the headlines)

@skinnylatte looking at you Notion

@skinnylatte the worst bit about this is the C-level buyers, the ones who sign the contracts... they seem to collectively be under the delusion that if you don't have an AI feature, that you're producing a shitty and less forward thinking product.

quite literally companies lose deals if they don't have AI.

AI is added by companies just to enable them to sell to others.

it's so crappy, every company adding AI knows it's shit, the users know it's shit, and yet you can't sell the product if you don't have AI.

@skinnylatte I just got a survey for Amazon Rufus.
My response was blunt
Short version:
Why!
Switch it off!

@skinnylatte Product Management is the customer's enemy.

@skinnylatte you're missing the CFO dangling a paycheck in front of the PM, and the unmet need is giving the AI feature a piggy back.
I probably should just have prompted Midjourney and replied with that!

@skinnylatte Companies don't serve their users, companies serve their owners. Actual customers and users are just incidental, and frankly a bit of an inconvenience.

@skinnylatte I would say that depends on the way success is measured at those companies. If your metric for success is „I shipped x improvements this [period]“ you will do what is best for you (and your bonus): ship what is easy and capitalize on hype

@skinnylatte 👍 My first idea was: The boss has to have 3 hands, one for transfering the profit to the Caiman Islands ... 😁