Post #1831354

All the legal and regulatory uncertainties make it very hard to talk about the financial viability of chatbots. What do you do if your $20 billion model is shut down forever by court order after it counsels the wrong person into suicide? Piper can overlook this because she is a hack with patrons - to my knowledge, she has never been paid to write by anyone outside the EA world. If she were a working writer who had to deal with chatbots driving up the cost of her website, creating knockoffs of her novels, and competing for editing gigs (let alone someone whose friend had a mental crisis after talking too long with friend computer) she might sound different. Zitron's populist, conspiratorial tone reminds me of independent investigative reporters from the 1990s and 2000s who also had to find and keep paying readers. Piper just has to persuade one patron at a time that she has propaganda value.