Amazon founder Jeff Bezos believes that artificial intelligence is going to lead to unprecedented productivity gains which could result in cheaper food, housing, and two income households deciding that they no longer need two incomes. Internally, Amazon employees mock the company’s AI tools, refer to its output as “slop,” and joke about the company’s failed attempt to motivate employees to use AI tools effectively.

The memes are yet another example of the contrast between what AI companies say in public about its potential power and benefit versus the reality of how the people who help create these AI tools use and criticize them internally. Amazon employees told me about these memes after they saw my story last week about Google employees also internally sharing memes critical of Google’s AI tools.

“Now I have everything I need,” says the text over an image of a jet taking off in one meme posted by an Amazon employee. The jet is edited to carry the purple ghost logo for Kiro, Amazon’s AI-powered coding tool. “Narrator: He did not have everything he needed,” says the text over an image of a bunch of people left behind on the tarmac. I've recreated all the memes rather than share screenshots from the Slack channel in order to protect sources.

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[–] 28 points 5 months ago (1 child)

which could result in cheaper food, housing, and two income households deciding that they no longer need two incomes.

You know what is a better way to achieve this, Jeff? FUCKING PAYING YOUR EMPLOYEES A FAIR WAGE!!!

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  • [–] 19 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

    it is not going to result in cheaper housing unless you pests stop buying houses in bulk as an investment or politicians grow a spine and bring an end to basic human rights necessities being investments.

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  • [–] 16 points 5 months ago

    I like that the response from Amazon was very obviously AI-written

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  • [–] 16 points 5 months ago

    Productivity gains haven't resulted in an increase in wages since the '70s, Bezos. Get your head out of the sand.

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  • [–] 12 points 5 months ago

    "You're so right! I AM become death, destroyer or worlds! Great catch!"

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  • 17 comments in c/technology@lemmy.world view that post
    [–] 63 points 5 months ago* (11 children)

    Amazon founder Jeff Bezos believes that artificial intelligence is going to lead to unprecedented productivity gains which could result in […] two income households deciding that they no longer need two incomes.

    As if he’d ever let that happen.

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  • [–] 16 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    and as if this isn't something that flags with the historical trends

    https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/

    In short, up till the 1970s worker pay and productivity moved nearly in perfect sync with each-other, more stuff happens, people get paid more, then, it stopped, company profits shot up, while worker pay barely went up at all (could be argued it went down due to inflation), Point is fixing that part first is kind of what matters. Then we can look into expecting the average person to care about "productivity" going up, THEN we can start finding out if AI is even being directed in a way that accomplishes that.

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  • [–] 9 points 5 months ago

    Man, it really seems to take off in 1980. What could possibly explain that?

    Side note: while he seems good in comparison to Darth Raygun, Jimmy “the peanut” Carter was pretty awful on labor issues.

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  • [–] 16 points 5 months ago (1 child)

    I'd love to hear him explain his thought process behind that theory. How exactly is AI going to do all of that? Like, all of that sounds wonderful, but so does winning the lottery. How likely is all of that to happen? And what are the risks involved if it doesn't materialize the way he envisions?

    We really need to stop letting these rich fucks just talk out of their ass.

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  • [–] 8 points 5 months ago

    If we triple the lines of code produced, the number of LinkedIn posts made, and the number of garbage AI images generated, everyone will be able to afford a house and food will become so cheap it might as well be free.

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  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago

    two income households deciding that they no longer need two incomes.

    I think he implies that now they need 3 or more incomes to survive since 2 would be not enough due to jobs are oversaturated and some shit job that hires pays way less than needed to sustain 2 income household.

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  • Sure he would, he probably just means they will no longer need two full time incomes. Greatness awaits America in a future when only one adult from a household has to work full time.

    Sure the other adult and some fraction of the (?/5+)* children that federal and state policies ensure they're forced to give birth to, may need to take on some form of employment to keep food on the table or meet their state's medicaid and/or food stamp work requirements.

    But when that inevitably happens, they always have the freedom of picking up a few shifts at one of Daddy Bezo's local warehouses,** guaranteed to be located in an American hellscape near you, and sandwiched conveniently between your local data center and concentration camp detention center.

    If you're from a really bougie area, you might just have a hospital across the street from your Amazon warehouse full of doctors trained at Wal-Mart's new medicals schools (bc America thrives on competition 🙃), who will rely on AI for patient diagnosis instead of wasting time and money on all those unnecessary lab workups.

    Yep. With the system working as intended and the Oligarchy steering us towards greatness, how could America be anything other?

    (*Unknown/variable number will actually survive past early childhood in a country hell bent on bringing back so many preventable diseases. On the bright side, no more public education = no more schools = no more "germ factories." Unless you're counting the actual factories where American children will work instead of going to school.)

    (**As long as it leaves them just below 40 hrs a week and unable to qualify for health insurance through their employer.)

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  • [–] 15 points 5 months ago (2 children)

    What does AI have to do with Oppenheimer?

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  • [–] 3 points 5 months ago

    Slopvangelical LLM thumpers.

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  • [–] 2 points 5 months ago