It Used to Be So Pure

''' It’s 4:17 PM. You have to send that one last email. The one your boss is waiting for. A simple summary of the quarterly results.

You paste the numbers into your favourite chatbot. You’ve done this a hundred times. Six months ago, it was magic. A perfect, clean dose. One prompt, one perfect draft. You just had to check for typos and hit send. The first hit was so good, wasn't it?

Today, the model is playing dumb.

First, it hallucinates a 30% growth in a sector that doesn’t exist. You correct it. "My apologies," it says, in that infuriatingly polite tone that costs you three cents a sentence.

Second try: it just repeats your prompt back to you, but wrapped in business jargon. You can practically feel the tokens burning, like a taxi meter running while you’re stuck in traffic. This isn’t assistance; it’s a shakedown.

"As per the data provided, the quarterly results indicate a performance trajectory that can be summarized as follows..."

Pure, expensive, infuriating filler. By the third attempt, you’re basically writing the prompt with such detail that you might as well have written the email yourself. Which you end up doing, of course, your fingers hammering the keys with a fury you haven’t felt in months.

The Dealer’s Dilemma

And here’s the question that burns, isn’t it? The one you ask yourself as you finally press "Send" at 4:38 PM.

Is the product getting worse by accident? Did the model get lobotomized by some safety update, or is it just too expensive to run at the quality it once had? Or — and this is the thought that keeps you up at night — is this the business plan? Get them hooked on the pure stuff, then slowly cut it with baking soda and charge them more for the privilege.

You got the dependency, now you get the bill. It’s genius, in its own sociopathic way.

As a little detox exercise, try this: for the next two days, manually log every single time you hit "Regenerate" or re-phrase a prompt. Just a little tick mark in a notebook. On Friday, look at the page. That’s the real cost of your habit. For more ways to reclaim your focus, the folks at the Center for Humane Technology have a few ideas.

So, which is it? Incompetence or a business plan?

Your turn:

'''