Why Normal People Aren't Using AI Agents

23 pointsposted 9 hours ago
by elo2000
(wired.com)

8 Comments

expedited123

4 hours ago

Personally, I don't use them because I feel they're: unsustainable (burn through too many tokens), over-complicated, have privacy/security problems and creating an unhealthy reliance on them to do basic stuff.

AngryData

6 hours ago

Why would most people use them? What do they offer other than dubious facts that they have to check 95% of the time to not get screwed by something important that it got wrong and in the past would have taken a 5 second google search before the top 50 results became a copy-pasted AI answer?

AI may be good for coding, but it is still crap for many generalized topics beyond a 5th grader's questions. The answers are way too simplified and lack the details needed to rely upon it and contains tons of useless filler. Nobody is going to spend a bunch of money just to ask an AI questions that might be given wrong answers and spews out 75% filler that wastes their time.

Go start asking AI about the Ph level needed for different plants. You can get multiple different ranges depending on how you ask the question for the same plant, with repeated generic plant growing info that is not helpful for anyone that already gardens or has grown a plant.

illusive4080

5 hours ago

Part of the problem is there’s so much garbage on the internet that an LLM can consume in search of the answer. As humans, we look into source quality: we can tell it by reputation of the website, how carefully crafted that site is, what qualifications the author has, and much more. There are many subtle tells on the internet that indicate source quality to humans, that AI cannot pick up on.

I experienced this first hand this week while searching for a specification on how much oil my car holds. AI gave me different answers multiple times. I manually searched, found an official manufacturer page, and got the proper information. Had I listened to the AI the first time, I would’ve severely underfilled my car.

fathermarz

5 hours ago

I think that now we are starting to see the hype go bye-bye and the real use cases are starting to emerge. However, the systems that come out must be constructed with care aligned with our world has been constructed (reality) and not how the AI Labs believe it should be (theory).

J37T3R

3 hours ago

While I wait for someone to post a non-paywalled version, what's the real overlap of things the average joe wants automated, things an agent can reliably do, and isn't seen as a bit too creepy? I think it's pretty small, and certainly a lot smaller than Silicon Valley thinks. That's still before things like cost, general AI aversion, and the technical confidence to get an agent set up.

Tanoc

32 minutes ago

Interconnectivity managers and smarthome managers are about it. People don't want something that can alter things unbidden and unrestricted. But them being able to automatically set up, for example, your phone's Bluetooth connection to a rental car would be appealing to a lot of people. Or being able to adjust the thermostat or start the coffee maker or whatever according to preference of whoever's in the house.

marginalia_nu

3 hours ago

I think it could be argued there's a use case for agents to function as a personal secretary, planning, emailing, news briefs, task reminders, those kinds of things.

Probably hasn't taken off because what this solves isn't much of a problem for people without executive dysfunction. Most people simply don't need a secretary, and the tasks you might delegate are often pretty important things that must be done correctly (e.g. you don't want to invite your ex to your wedding, or your boss to your family dinner).