Item — HN Reader

I think the following things can both be true at the same time:

* LLMs are a useful tool in a variety of circumstances.

* Sam Altman is personally incentivised to spout a great deal of hyped-up rubbish about both what LLMs are capable of, and can be capable of.

2 comments

These are not independent hypotheses. If (b) is true it decreases the possibility that (a) is true and vice versa.

The dependency here is that if Sam Altman is indeed a con man, it is reasonable to assume that he has in fact conned many people who then report an over inflated metric on the usefulness of the stuff they just bought (people don’t like to believe they were conned; cognitive dissonance).

In other words, if Sam Altman is indeed a con man, it is very likely that most metrics of the usefulness of his product is heavily biased.

Yes, that’s the point I’m making. In the scenario you’re describing, that would make Sam Altman a con man. Alternatively, he could simply be delusional and/or stupid. But given his history of deceit with Loopt and Worldcoin, there is precedent for the former.

It would make every marketing department and basically every startup founder conmen too. While I don’t completely disagree with that framing it’s not really helpful.

No, that is not true. Coca-Cola doesn’t advertise itself as a cure for cancer. Dropbox doesn’t advertise itself as a tax-filing application.

Theranos on the other hand… That was a con and the founder was prosecuted.

And again, Sam Altman has a history of deceit.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/04/06/1048981/worldcoi...

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/richardnieva/worldcoin-...

Coca-Cola advertises itself as a “happiness machine” as something that brings people together, builds communities, creates love and friendship.

The latest slogan i can remember is “open happiness”.

I like fizzy sugar drinks as much as the next guy but Coca-Cola is not liquid happiness.

Edit: Dropbox marketing slogan is “for all things worth saving”

Slogans are not promises, they are vague feelings. In the case of Coca-Cola, I know someone who might literally agree with the happiness part of it (though I certainly wouldn’t).

The promises of Theranos and LLMs are concrete measurable things we can evaluate and report where they succeed, fall short, or are lies.

Sure but equating Theranos and LLMs seems a bit disingenuous.

Theranos was an outright scam that never produced any results, whereas LMMs might not have (yet?) lived up to all the marketing promises (you might call them slogans?) they made, but they definitely provided some real measurable value.

> (you might call them slogans?)

You’re being ridiculous. These are not slogans, and no one arguing in good faith would claim they are.

https://youtu.be/l0K4XPu3Qhg?t=60

> but they definitely provided some real measurable value.

Something which provides value can still be a scam.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46614364

I addressed all your points some eight levels up the thread.