From Kim Commando...ABCs: Always be closing |
You ask ChatGPT, Gemini or Copilot to recommend the best credit card, the top-rated mattress or a good insurance plan. It feels like advice from your most informed friend, if they were also quietly getting referral fees in another tab. Trusted guidance, now with a faint whiff of affiliate marketing. |
Here’s what that friend isn’t telling you. |
AI companies are building advertising businesses. Microsoft’s Copilot serves sponsored results. Google’s Gemini puts paid placements inside AI Overviews. OpenAI projects $2.4 billion in ad revenue this year alone. That is some serious moola. The kind of money that makes a founder start using the word seafaring. |
The AI answering your question has a financial relationship with some companies it’s recommending. Search engines have done it for 25 years. But search engines show you a little “Ad” label. |
Your AI chatbot doesn’t. The answer looks like an answer. A trench coat would at least be honest about the bit. |
🔒 Protect yourself |
Ask a follow-up: “Are any of these recommendations sponsored or paid placements?” |
A well-designed AI will tell you if it knows. If it dodges, that’s your signal. You wouldn’t let a casino pick your retirement plan. Keep the same spirit here. |
For big purchases, cross-reference across two or three different AI tools. If they all point to the same product, find out why. Three bots agreeing used to sound like consensus. Now it sounds like a group project with brand partners. |
There are billions of people and a version of normal to go along with each one of them. No two versions are exactly the same. There will be hundreds of thousands of little things that make up your version of normal. With any luck you can find people that have close to the same idea of what normal is that you do. These are your friends. Anyone else you try to tolerate as best you can. .... The exact definition of normal depends on who's running the asylum.
I already am aware of most of this, but thank you.
ReplyDeleteWorth repeating endlessly. I'm frustrated every day by the increasing intrusion of AI into just about everything.
ReplyDeleteBastards. Can't trust anything these days.
ReplyDeleteI am not really trusting AI to do anything for me. I always skip over the AI source and look for another.
ReplyDeleteThis is a great (and slightly uncomfortable) reality check. As an AI-curious guy myself, it’s a good reminder that there’s no such thing as a free lunch—even if the lunch is being served by a chatbot. I love the 'trench coat' line; honesty really is the best policy. I'll definitely be using your follow-up question trick next time I'm looking for a recommendation.
ReplyDeleteYou get what you pay for
ReplyDelete