104 - Friction

Hi everyone,

I had to get this one out even though the idea isn't fully formed. So forgive me if it sounds incomplete.

This non-stop talk of AI is doing my head in. I'm tired, bored, and maybe wrong.

It feels like everywhere I look, I am, we are, being sold a New Frictionless World.

Before, where effort was required, we now have Artificial Intelligence.

Those annoying hours spent doing something are about to be given back to you by a very powerful AI.

Rejoice!

What will you do with all your new free time, human?

By now, you have probably seen the clip of the AI Music Production CEO explaining in a podcast interview, how hard music production was. And now, with his software, you just...get songs! 

This radicalised me. I hate what this man thinks he stands for. I hate that he thinks he understands how things like music are made.

I don't even know how music is made, but I know (I think) that it is a deeply human experience.

Nowadays I DJ. I play music for friends. I make mixes. I know that the songs I've searched for and discovered myself in record stores and online, occupy a difference place in my my brain than the ones I've just been given by friends. The ones I did no work to acquire.

There is meaning and value in the work.

But now, Spotify are doing 'Smart' shuffle. Where they choose songs for me. My relationship to those songs is so different to songs I have discovered myself.

So I am trying to make an argument here that Friction in achieving something makes an important difference to the outcome.

I find it hard to explain why, but I do feel this deeply.

I saw an add the other day on Twitter that said, "Need a logo, click here for a perfect logo in 10 seconds."

And I ask, is that the kind of world anyone wants to live in?

The answer is that for some people, it is.

And it always has been. But the tools weren't available to enable it. Now we're starting to get them.

The ad below was also from Twitter, not the same but you get the idea.

If you've ever set type by hand, you probably understand how much of a step change the word processor was for that industry. Is placing letters individually a good kind of friction? Is there art in that. Or is that more like a mechanical task?

Last week, Open AI CEO Sam Altman shared what he thought was an incredible piece of fiction.

Some people had other ideas.

...

The thing I've been thinking a lot about is 'where do we want friction?'

New pandemic? Need a vaccine? Have the choice between 10 years and 1? You want 1 right? And AI helped us do that.

The line is blurry, but it does exist.

There seems to be places where we want AI to help remove friction and places where we don't. 

Figuring out which is which is probably both an art and a science problem. And that probably requires both kinds of people.

And right now, it feels like there is only one of them in the room.

What do you think?

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Music & Mixes

Raina Simone is a rapper and producer from Harlem. I don't remember how I found her music (ig?) but I think her album, 'Old Soul New Conscience' was my favourite or last year. It's so complete end-to-end that it reminds me of College Dropout. Spotify Link, Instagram

My buddy George (Hysteric) went to SE Asia and recoded a mix in Bangkok. Trivia: people say he has the largest collection of italo-disco in the world... Soundcloud

Tony Touch did a really fun set at Aime Leon Dore in NY. Just vibes. Youtube

I'm not a big-tech defender, but I often hear people complaining that Spotify are ripping artists off, and while that might be true on some level, the reality is that it's a much more complicated story. The labels take a lot. I think Spotify do a good job of breaking down where the money goes. Link 

Do you remember the SF vc backed juice machine where you bought a pouch of juice and then the machine pushed the juice into a glass for you? I kinda love that this happened and was funded. Just tells you how stupid some of the money is over there. Anyway, a Youtuber did an incredible tear down of the machine and holy $$$hit. Link 

I'm so glad someone wrote this... 

"Keinemusik is not alone in this. They are simply one of the most successful examples of dance music’s transformation from a space of energy and resistance into a sleek, consumable product. They are the sound of Berghain’s door policy being discussed at a Dubai rooftop party." Link

These dudes raised heaps of money. I hate it. Link

Aunty Ramadan Cyber Aesthetic
I love this. Link

A crazy deep dive into the naming systems and patterns used by beauty companies and what they reveal. Link

I am, I have to admit, an Adam Tooze Fan Boi. He is an historian with a focus on economics at Columbia. His weekly podcasts and newsletters keep me sane.

Today's newsletter suggests, we shouldn't try to intellectualise and make sense of what Trump 2.0 is doing. And honestly, trying not too feels like a breath of fresh air.

We avoid facing the conclusion that the vision of a Mar-a-Lago Accord may have more in common with grift, a protection racket or a facelift pandering to the ignorant vanity of an old man than with economic policy as we have hitherto known it. Faced with Trump, the risk is that conventional realism is a form of escapism." Link