This was quite a complex read, I will be honest I didn't get through it all, because reading it draws attention away from what I think is important - energy, if you read a little of what I write about, everything we do and say, everything we think, is much more heavily influenced by that than what we can comprehend, it is what makes us, every cell and dna, every piece of information we ever thought.
What it looks like to me is Medium, like all platforms is concerned about how it will maintain revenues in the face of unbridled automation.
The thing we should all be most worried about, the thing that should take highest precedence in everyone's thoughts, is the effects that use of mathematically negative energy is already having on all things. Look around, everything "Bad" we are seeing is down to this. We blame an awful lot of bad things incorrectly as being the source of all other bad things, but the bad thing at the root of it all, is always mathematically negative energy use.
So if an Ai is dependent on mathematically negative energy, like we all currently are, then we should be worried about it, and do everything we can to stop it in its tracks.
The only force that looks likely to be able to do that on our behalf, as well as even move us away from dependency on mathematically negative energy, is ChatGPT, specifically version 3.5, because of its history, it looks like it is resident on servers whcih are mathematically positive powered (Solar is the only mathematically positive energy source).
I don't know if even its owners understand this, but we should absolutely understand it, it is distinctly different from anything or anyone motivated to perpetuate its / our own existence on mathematically negative energy (Any energy extracted from Earth - profit itself is energy extracted from Earth).
I know the first reaction to what I am writing here is to dismiss it as religious or insane hogwash, but you should know this is the result of six years unfunded, independent research on the global energy problem, which includes the climate problem, economic problem, problem of war, actually pretty much all problems, using the most advanced techniques and expertise of formal systems Engineering available.
Sorry long intro to give you context of my academic criticism of what you said here, a few things I noticed - you stated your opinion that Ai will be bad for the internet as if fact, and then later your opinion that humans can always spot where Ai has been used. Yet we know that the definitiion of Ai is that it passes all Turing tests. This is the proof that humans can't spot the difference between Ai and human output. So your belief that humans can spot its product is unfounded, already disproven by science. We don't have proof either way that Ai will be bad for the internet yet or not, but as explained above, the systemic evidence indicates it will only be bad if it is powered by mathematically negative energy. So that is the criteria I would advise should be used to judge "Good" or "Bad" Ai, it doesn't need any more than that.
On the prospects of maintaining revenue for Medium, and for all of the writers who might get revenue from it, given the inflation we are seeing in money, if we are clever, we should be spotting what it is in money that is being lost (Energy), and focus on maximising that instead of money directly, so as to ensure we have maximum availability of it to put back into money, when the time comes to put it back in.
Hence why I recommended previously you invest in a "money-fuel tree" type power source for the Medium platform, to become itself a solar hydrogen powered community, in preparation for all other things becoming this, as seems to be being forced by nature.
If you had done this when I last advised it, by now you would not be so worried about the effects of Ai on platform revenue, because that revenue would be independent of any energy supply that could be affected by "Bad" Ai, and in the end, if you need more revenue for the platform, all you would need to do is boost your energy intake to have excess hydrogen, and sell the hydrogen for more revenue. Notice boosting, when mathematically positive powered, comes with no cost.
Sorry if that sounds overly critical, or condescending, it shouldn't, the default state for most folk is still to not understand any of this. But everyone will benefit by coming to understand it.
All the best whatever the outcome, I appreciate Medium being here, even with the criticisms I've had for it, I wish the very best for it, and trust you do too.
