I won't rehash the arguments around "AI" that others are best placed to make.

My main issue is AI as a term is basically a marketing one to convince people that these tools do something they don't and its causing real harm. Its redirecting resources and attention onto a very narrow subset of tools replacing other less intensive tools. There are significant impacts to these tools (during an existential crisis around our use and consumption of energy). There are some really good targeted uses of machine learning techniques but they are being drowned out by a hype train that is determined to make the general public think that we have or are near Data from Star Trek.

Addtionally, as others have said the current state of "AI" has a very anti FOSS ethos. With big firms using and misusing their monopolies to steal, borrow and coopt data that isn't theirs to build something that contains that's data but is their copyright. Some of this data is intensely personal and sensitive and the original intent behind the sharing is not for training a model which may in certain circumstances spit out that data verbatim.

Lastly, since you use the term Luddite. Its worth actually engaging with what that movement was about. Whilst its pitched now as generic anti-technology backlash in fact it was a movement of people who saw what the priorities and choices in the new technology meant for them: the people that didn't own the technology and would get worse living and work conditions as a result. As it turned out they were almost exactly correct in thier predictions. They are indeed worth thinking about as allegory for the moment we find ourselves in. How do ordinary people want this technology to change our lives? Who do we want to control it? Given its implications for our climate needs can we afford to use it now, if so for what purposes?

Personally, I can't wait for the hype train to pop (or maybe depart?) so we can get back to rational discussions about the best uses of machine learning (and computing in general) for the betterment of all rather than the enrichment of a few.

yeah i see that too. it seems like mostly a reactionary viewpoint. the reaction is understandable to a point since a lot of the “AI” features are half baked and forced on the user. to that point i don’t think GNOME etc should be scrambling to add copies of these features.

what i would love to see is more engagement around additional pieces of software that are supplemental. for example, i would love if i could install a daemon that indexes my notes and allows me to do semantic search. or something similar with my images.

the problems with AI features aren't within the tech itself but in the surrounding politics. it’s become commonplace for “responsible” AI companies like OpenAI to not even produce papers around their tech (product announcement blogs that are vaguely scientific don’t count), much less source code, weights, and details on training data. and even when Meta releases their weights, they don’t specify their datasets. the rat race to see who can make a decent product with this amazing tech has made the whole industry a bunch of pearl clutching FOMO based tweakers. that sparks a comparison to blockchain, which is fair from the perspective of someone who hasn’t studied the tech or simply hasn’t seen a product that is relevant to them. but even those people will look at something fantastical like ChatGPT as if it’s pedestrian or unimpressive because when i asked it to write an implementation of the HTTP spec in the style of Fetty Wap it didn’t run perfectly the first time.

I dont think the community is generally against AI, there's plenty of FOSS projects. They just don't like cashgrabs, enshittification and sending personal data to someone else's computer.

I agree. However, I think it is related to Capitalism and all the sociopathic corporations out there. It's almost impossible to think that anything good will come from the Blue Church controlling even more tech. Capitalism have always used any opportunity to enslave/extort people - that continues with AI under their control.

However, I was also disappointed when I found out how negative 'my' crowd were. I wanted to create an open source lowend AGI to secure poor people a descent life without being attacked by Capitalism every day/hour/second, create abundance, communities, production and and in general help build a social sub society in the midst of the insane blue church and their propagandized believers.

It is perfectly doable to fight the Capitalist religion with homegrown AI based on what we know and have today. But nobody can do it alone, and if there's no-one willing to fight the f*ckers with AI, then it takes time..

I definitely intend to build a revolution-AGI to kill off the Capitalist religion and save exploited poor people. No matter what happens, there will be at least one AGI that are trained on revolution, anti-capitalism and building something much better than this effing blue nightmare. The worlds first aggressive 'Commie-bot' ha! 😍

Dammed impressive. How evil AI is managing to post defending itself.

I for one will be happy to bow to our new AI overlord.

I'd call it realistic, not concerning.

I don't like AI because it's literally not AI. I know damn well that it is just a data scraping tool that throws a bunch of 'probably right' sentences or images into a proverbial blender and spits out an answer that has no actual comprehension or consistency behind it. It takes only an incredibly basic knowledge of computers and brains to know that we cannot make an actual intelligent program using the Von Neumann style of computer.

I have absolutely no interest in technology being sold to me based on a lie. And if we're not calling this out for the lie it is, then it's going to just keep getting pushed by people trying to make money off the concept at the stock market.

One of the main things that turns people off when the topic of "AI" comes up is the absolutely ridiculous level of hype it gets. For instance, people claiming that current LLMs are a revolution comparable to the invention of the printing press, and that they have such immense potential that if you don't cram them into every product you can all your software will soon be obsolete.

Using an Al-less desktop may be akin to hand copying books after the printing press revolution.

Or perhaps not.

There is no ethical computing under capitalism. https://youtu.be/AaU6tI2pb3M

Luddites were not as opposed to new technology as you say it here. They were mainly concerned about what technology would do to whom.

A helpful history right here: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/brian-merchant/blood-in-the-machine/9780316487740/?lens=little-brown

AI is massively wasting power that we need for electrifying transportation and more useful things.

There are many things more useful than AI, for example good internet search engines.

AI can be useful for dedicated things like being trained on relevant tutorials and documentation to help with Linux.

Gnome and other desktops need to start working on integrating FOSS AI models so that we don't become obsolete.

I don't get it. How Linux destops would become obsolete if they don't have native AI toolsets on DEs? It's not like they have a 80% market share. People who run them as daily drivers are still niche, and most don't even know Linux exists. Most ppl grown up with Microsoft and Apple shoving ads down their throat, using them in schools first hand, and that's all they know and taught. If I need AI, I will find ways to intergrate to my workflow, not by the dev thinks I need it.

And if you really need something like MS's Recall, here is a FOSS version of it.

Reminder that we don't even have AI yet, just learning machine models, which are not the same thing despite wide misuse of the term AI.