Posts in category 'ai'

  • Strava Lost The Plot

    6 min read

    Strava began rolling out a new beta feature where an LLM provides commentary on training activities, and in doing so provided a perfect example of how tech companies both cannot resist climbing aboard this latest bandwagon while having no idea how to make it useful beyond replacing their own jobs.

    #cycling #technology #prodmgmt #ai

    If you’re not aware, Strava is a social media platform disguised as a fitness tracking application. For years they’ve carved out a nice little niche for themselves in the space, first by offering some truly unique and value-added features like their heat map and route planner, which uses real user data to find routes where people cycle, run, and so forth, and second, by incorporating a number of social features to allow athletes to interact, whether it’s liking each other’s activities, commenting, organizing group events, and so forth. Notably, quite a few professional athletes use the platform, including legendary riders like Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogačar, which allows fans to follow their activities and so forth.

    Strava opts for a freemium model, with a number of key features included in a paid tier, and as I’ve become more serious about cycling, I’ve found those paid features to be worth the price. As part of those packages, they include things like additional analytics, which provide various statistics about activities, a route planner with automated route suggestions based on their heatmap data, and leaderboards which, I have to admit, I kinda enjoy as they gamify community-defined segments for sprints, climbs, and so forth.

    All of these features do one of two things: connect athletes to each other, or give athletes access to data, either about themselves or supplied by the community, that they can use to enhance their activities.

    Unfortunately, recently it seems Strava has caught a nasty cold that is infecting companies the world over: AI. And in doing so I’m afraid Strava is demonstrating why tech companies ultimately fail to understand basic concepts like trust and empathy.

    By the way, just a brief interlude: if you want to disable this mis-feature (for now), in the app you have to pick “Show More” on one of the AI generated callouts, select “Give Feedback”, and from there you can leave the beta. Given how difficult that option is to find, I’m comfortable calling this a dark pattern.

    Alright, let’s get back to it, shall we?

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  • A Fictional Me By ChatGPT #1

    3 min read

    Fake biography #1 about me, written by ChatGPT. Or: How nothing is real anymore.

    #ai #funny #technology

    So out of sheer amusement, I’ve decided to periodically post fake biographies about myself written by ChatGPT.

    This biography was written based on the following prompt:

    Write an approximately 500 word biography for Brett Kosinski in the first person perspective that includes a brief work history as well as interesting personal details. In case you are not aware, Brett Kosinski had a career as a Software Developer before transitioning to Product Management 10 years ago. He is based out of Edmonton Alberta, Canada.

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