The robots are innocent. So far anyway. AI has no more say in its existence than humans do in ours (none of us asked to be born). But now that it’s here, it has amazing potential for bettering the human experience. It also has amazing potential for harm. And, It all comes down to how humans are using it, which is the real problem I have with AI: watching people run rampant, forgetting – or not implementing at all – the guardrails to ensure ethical and responsible use.

Now, as some readers know, there’s a corporate side to my career (where my focus has been all this time) and talking smack on corporate use of AI isn’t a good career move in a culture that’s racing to embrace it. So, I’m not here to screech about how people are using it.

I’m not going to talk about how much water data centers suck away, or AI’s negative impact on our changing climate, because there are better qualified, more knowledgeable people doing it. Forbes already talked about how AI Is Accelerating the Loss of Our Scarcest Natural Resource: Water and NPR talked about Why the true water footprint of AI is so elusive.

Tragic death isn’t blog fodder, so I’ll let another NPR journalist tell you about AI assisted suicide.

I’m not going to harp on how  AI slop content spreads propaganda like wildfire. Again, NPR provides examples, but also, everyone is talking about it. Hopefully, a child shall lead us in the discussion. Ask any young’un what slop content is, and you’ll find out just how much better they are at spotting it than the grown folks running the show.

Hell, I’m not even going to talk about what the cartoon I drew suggests: AI stealing our dreams. I’ll just introduce you to Tilly Norwood or take you to a robot sporting event. Even the tech bros building the stuff, racing to innovate without thought, are saying So Long to Tech’s Dream Job (which, admittedly, inspires a little schadenfreude, but I’m definitely not going to talk about that).

What I am here to do is make you a promise.

Now, you know I’m not using Gen AI because if I were, I’d probably post more often. It’d be soulless trash, but there’d be more of it. Thing is, I’m not about slinging soulless trash. So, should I ever pay this site the attention it deserves, it will always be me (or a human partner) creating the content. And should I ever get to that fantasy point of success where this space somehow becomes a wonderfully prolific site makin’ money and payin’ bills like a whole damn business, I’ll be paying human creators to contribute.

I will NEVER use robots as an excuse to exploit fellow human beings. And honestly, I wouldn’t do that to the robots, either. I’d hoped that humanity would have evolved into something better before we went ahead creating something in our image, but alas! Much like Mary Shelley’s classic horror story, the creation isn’t the monster; the creator is.

That’s it. Just a quick and simple promise before I disappear again for *mumble, mumble* months.