One in eight people globally use an AI app, not just something that happens to include an ai feature like Google search, on a regular basis.
There are definitely still going to be pockets totally not touching it, and that will probably continue for a long time, but its very much soaking into global society.
None of that means you should be using it, just pointing out that your immediate social group may not be an accurate reflection of reality.
Like as a counter anecdote - my gran has used it - and i feel like when old people get to a tech its approaching ubiquity, Facebook being the primary example I have in mind.
I’m told it’s useful for things that aren’t searching for things on the internet or performing groundbreaking theoretical mathematics research. I’m starting to think my interests are too boring for it to really touch anything other than coding, which as I’ve said elsewhere I have ceded and am now exiting the field I am in.
Its no different from any other tool really, you don’t pick it up and immediately master it, you learn what it is and isn’t good at and ideas come over time as you go about your life and you wonder if problems that might previously not have been worth even trying to solve could be worth throwing at this new tool.
I used it to get a overview of the most popular tracks in a specific genre in a specific city 20 years ago by pulling set list data from various places on the internet the other day. Incredible results.
Trivial but very useful to me, as someone who spends a lot of time looking for new music.
I would love it if the UX was just a bit better. I don’t like that the primary interaction is natural language personally. It would be cool if LLM interaction was through a DSL like a LISP. Would make the experience somewhat more appealing and, in my case at least, a bit more user friendly
One in eight people globally use an AI app, not just something that happens to include an ai feature like Google search, on a regular basis.
There are definitely still going to be pockets totally not touching it, and that will probably continue for a long time, but its very much soaking into global society.
https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2026-global-overview-report
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Use_of_artificial_intelligence_by_individuals
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/corporate-responsibility/topics/ai-economy-institute/reports/global-ai-diffusion-report/
None of that means you should be using it, just pointing out that your immediate social group may not be an accurate reflection of reality.
Like as a counter anecdote - my gran has used it - and i feel like when old people get to a tech its approaching ubiquity, Facebook being the primary example I have in mind.
Probably, which is depressing.
I’m told it’s useful for things that aren’t searching for things on the internet or performing groundbreaking theoretical mathematics research. I’m starting to think my interests are too boring for it to really touch anything other than coding, which as I’ve said elsewhere I have ceded and am now exiting the field I am in.
Its no different from any other tool really, you don’t pick it up and immediately master it, you learn what it is and isn’t good at and ideas come over time as you go about your life and you wonder if problems that might previously not have been worth even trying to solve could be worth throwing at this new tool.
I used it to get a overview of the most popular tracks in a specific genre in a specific city 20 years ago by pulling set list data from various places on the internet the other day. Incredible results.
Trivial but very useful to me, as someone who spends a lot of time looking for new music.
I would love it if the UX was just a bit better. I don’t like that the primary interaction is natural language personally. It would be cool if LLM interaction was through a DSL like a LISP. Would make the experience somewhat more appealing and, in my case at least, a bit more user friendly