The chatgpt'd tariffs marks this epoch perfectly.

It turns out there's huge demand for un-monetized web search.

I like that it's unmonetized, of course, but that's not why I use AI. I use AI because it's better at search. When I can't remember the right keywords to find something, or when the keywords aren't unique, I frequently find that web search doesn't return what I need and AI does.

It's impressive how often AI returns the right answer to vague questions. (not always though)

Google used to return the right answer to vague questions until it decided to return the most lucrative answer to vague questions instead.

Fortunately there is a lot of competition in the LLM space.

Edit: and, more importantly, plenty of people willing to pay a subscription for good quality.

Soon sadly, there will be a huge demand for un-monetized LLMs. Enshitification is coming.

Can you blame the users for asking it, when everyone is selling that as a key defining feature?

I use it for asking - often very niche - questions on advanced probability and simulation modeling, and it often gets those right - why those and not a simple verifiable fact about one of the most popular actors in history?

I don’t know about Idiocracy, but something that I have read specific warnings about is that people will often blame the user for any of the tool’s misgivings.

Some prior works that work as prequels include C.M. Kornbluth's "The Marching Morons" and "The Little Black Bag."