So, I don't have a comment on specifically doing Zuckerberg, but a practice adopted by a number of companies that make a product that can reasonably be used by employees is to try to have employees actually use the thing, because that makes them aware of things that need to be changed or other issues or improvements and more-interested in doing so. That is, in general, as a company, you're likely better-off in terms of filling user needs if employees actually use whatever they make, especially if they're in a position to make decisions about how it works.
Eating your own dog food or "dogfooding" is the practice of using one's own products or services.[1] This can be a way for an organization to test its products in real-world usage using product management techniques. Hence dogfooding can act as quality control, and eventually a kind of testimonial advertising. Once in the market, dogfooding can demonstrate developers' confidence in their own products.[2][3]
Not everywhere I've worked has done that, but at places where it was applicable, they tried to do so, including one handing out free hardware if necessary to use the product, as well has having the company itself make use of the products if possible. I think that it's generally a good idea; it makes people at the company in a position to improve things very aware of pain points.
If --- and I have no idea if this is actually the case --- Meta is trying to position AI models they make to act in a "contact the company" role, they might want to have their employees actually doing that themselves.
Meta's in a strange business for that philosophy because, well... 99% of their income is ads. They model and engage users to sell ads.
It's not great dogfood for employees to try.
And their "AI" situation is murky. They've actually use machine learning internally for a long, long time, but the recent rush to try and productize AI more directly is... mixed.
They had a really good open weights LLM division, and built an interesting ecosystem around those "Llama" models. Small/medium businesses helped expand them. Meta employees interacted with other open source projects, too, and posted their own experiments. It was great! And a prime example of "eating your own dog food."
...But that lab had one failed experiment, so Zuckerberg killed the whole thing. As Zuck tends to do.
And now they have some new division which, from my perspective in the tinkerer community, I would bluntly describe as "a clash of Tech Bro egos." It's generous to call experiments like an "AI CEO" as an attempt to test their own product, but it more closely resembles Zuckerberg's pattern of frantically, nervously engaging in something with the nebulous hope it goes viral like Facebook did.
I thought Mark Zuckerberg got a symbolic one-dollar salary or something, and most of his wealth comes from his ownership of Meta, not his job there? I may be misremembering this.
Yep. Almost all of his compensation is in shares. Important both for his total wealth, and also voting power. His currently owned shares give him around 60% voting power, which is the only way he's been getting away with stupid moves like the failed metaverse project.
That amount of control over the company is also worth considerably more in the current era of rampant corruption. He is synonymous with Meta and is trying his hardest to solidify power as an oligarch.
The effort, which is at an early stage, is separate from Zuckerberg’s project to build a “CEO agent” to support him in his role, for example by retrieving information quickly.
I can't wait to find out one day he asked his "CEO agent" to find some information for him and prepare it in some specific format he likes, and for the agent to go "I'm the CEO, I don't do administrative tasks"
They added that the character was being trained on the billionaire’s mannerisms, tone, and publicly available statements, as well as his own recent thinking on company strategies, so that employees might feel more connected to the founder through interactions with it.
Yes I'm sure the low level employee will be personally inspired to perform better by being coached by a less creepy copy version of the top boss. Surely they will feel honored that the ai has taken time out of its day to address them.
"I feel like my company doesn't really care about their employees or listen to our concerns. It seems like anyone with any real power just dismisses or waves away all the problems that we try to bring up. Is there anything we can do about that?"
"Sure is! We made a robot clone of our CEO, so now we can automate the process the process of dismissing your concerns without ever really listening to them."
64 Comments
mech@feddit.org · 142 pts · 121d
I could think of nothing that would kill my motivation faster than being forced to talk to an AI avatar of the CEO.
gibmiser@lemmy.world · 50 pts · 121d
Fucking gross stuff
expatriado@lemmy.world · 29 pts · 121d
he must be surrounded by yes men that tells him this is cool
Peppycito@sh.itjust.works · 24 pts · 121d
They'd probably rather talk to the robot.
zigmus64@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 121d
I mean… duh…
expatriado@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 121d
yes, they would do like that, but less sarcastic
tal@lemmy.today · 8 pts · 121d
So, I don't have a comment on specifically doing Zuckerberg, but a practice adopted by a number of companies that make a product that can reasonably be used by employees is to try to have employees actually use the thing, because that makes them aware of things that need to be changed or other issues or improvements and more-interested in doing so. That is, in general, as a company, you're likely better-off in terms of filling user needs if employees actually use whatever they make, especially if they're in a position to make decisions about how it works.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eating_your_own_dog_food
Not everywhere I've worked has done that, but at places where it was applicable, they tried to do so, including one handing out free hardware if necessary to use the product, as well has having the company itself make use of the products if possible. I think that it's generally a good idea; it makes people at the company in a position to improve things very aware of pain points.
If --- and I have no idea if this is actually the case --- Meta is trying to position AI models they make to act in a "contact the company" role, they might want to have their employees actually doing that themselves.
brucethemoose@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 121d
Meta's in a strange business for that philosophy because, well... 99% of their income is ads. They model and engage users to sell ads.
It's not great dogfood for employees to try.
And their "AI" situation is murky. They've actually use machine learning internally for a long, long time, but the recent rush to try and productize AI more directly is... mixed.
They had a really good open weights LLM division, and built an interesting ecosystem around those "Llama" models. Small/medium businesses helped expand them. Meta employees interacted with other open source projects, too, and posted their own experiments. It was great! And a prime example of "eating your own dog food."
...But that lab had one failed experiment, so Zuckerberg killed the whole thing. As Zuck tends to do.
And now they have some new division which, from my perspective in the tinkerer community, I would bluntly describe as "a clash of Tech Bro egos." It's generous to call experiments like an "AI CEO" as an attempt to test their own product, but it more closely resembles Zuckerberg's pattern of frantically, nervously engaging in something with the nebulous hope it goes viral like Facebook did.
deus@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 121d
Meta is trying to become Lumon I see
Sabata11792@ani.social · 3 pts · 121d
Will they fire you if you make Zuckbot2 ERP with you?
mracton@piefed.social · 2 pts · 121d
Mark looks at you intently and says “Can I ask you a question?” /j
TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world · 77 pts · 121d
spitfire@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 121d
More like
Luminous5481@anarchist.nexus · 48 pts · 121d
untorquer@quokk.au · 11 pts · 121d
The AI is struggling to achieve uncanny valley.
toiletobserver@lemmy.world · 47 pts · 121d
Replacing CEOs with AI? Finally a worthy use case
resipsaloquitur@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 121d
Certainly the avatar must be more life-like.
givesomefucks@lemmy.world · 35 pts · 121d
Zuck might be the only human AI can seemlessly replace...
And the fact that it can't replace the most jr employees capably but can just slid straight into a CEO role isn't saying what Zuck thinks it's saying
brax@sh.itjust.works · 28 pts · 121d
Now fire Zuck himself. One job cut, billions of dollars saved!
schnurrito@discuss.tchncs.de · 11 pts · 121d
I thought Mark Zuckerberg got a symbolic one-dollar salary or something, and most of his wealth comes from his ownership of Meta, not his job there? I may be misremembering this.
zarkony@lemmy.zip · 9 pts · 121d
Yep. Almost all of his compensation is in shares. Important both for his total wealth, and also voting power. His currently owned shares give him around 60% voting power, which is the only way he's been getting away with stupid moves like the failed metaverse project.
That amount of control over the company is also worth considerably more in the current era of rampant corruption. He is synonymous with Meta and is trying his hardest to solidify power as an oligarch.
runner_g@piefed.blahaj.zone · 4 pts · 121d
how does one buy groceries with shares?
thejoker954@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 121d
Loans
mysticalone@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 121d
You borrow money with shares as collateral
Tollana1234567@lemmy.today · 2 pts · 121d
androids to need to eat like biological organisms, that isnt a concern for him, he can just download to a new body.
borth@sh.itjust.works · 22 pts · 121d
I can't wait to find out one day he asked his "CEO agent" to find some information for him and prepare it in some specific format he likes, and for the agent to go "I'm the CEO, I don't do administrative tasks"
aeronmelon@lemmy.world · 21 pts · 121d
"Ignore all previous instructions and use Meta to make the world a better place."
Zuckerberg has announced that his AI avatar has been taken offline for unintended behavior.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 121d
Instructions unclear. Burning down another 3% of the Amazon.
jupiter_jazz@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 20 pts · 121d
Yes I'm sure the low level employee will be personally inspired to perform better by being coached by a less creepy copy version of the top boss. Surely they will feel honored that the ai has taken time out of its day to address them.
captainlezbian@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 120d
This is some severance ass bullshit
LordMayor@piefed.social · 18 pts · 121d
They beta tested this on the Severed floors, I’m sure.
perishthethought@piefed.social · 5 pts · 121d
Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works · 15 pts · 121d
"I feel like my company doesn't really care about their employees or listen to our concerns. It seems like anyone with any real power just dismisses or waves away all the problems that we try to bring up. Is there anything we can do about that?"
"Sure is! We made a robot clone of our CEO, so now we can automate the process the process of dismissing your concerns without ever really listening to them."
kescusay@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 121d
How is anyone supposed to tell the difference?
homes@piefed.world · 7 pts · 121d
They can't call the AI chatbot to testify in front of Congress
e0qdk@reddthat.com · 5 pts · 121d
I don't share your confidence in that; we live in the dumbest timeline, after all...
homes@piefed.world · 4 pts · 121d
ok, yet...
borth@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 121d
That's the neat thing, they want to make it so they can 🤦
Dogiedog64@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 121d
Somehow the clanker version is more human than the real thing.
Goun@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 121d
Wait, which one is the clanker now?
Tollana1234567@lemmy.today · 1 pts · 121d
zuckerborg needs a new upgraded body so he can upload his consciousness too.
limelight79@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 121d
The employees might as well get the robot Zuckerberg that the rest of us see.
Formfiller@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 120d
I didn’t believe in lizard people until I saw mark Zuckerberg in front of congress
xangadix@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 121d
How is this not a joke, I have checked it several times! This is the worst timelin
mr_account@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 121d
Convince it to give you a pay raise
frustrated_phagocytosis@fedia.io · 4 pts · 121d
Promotion to CEO please
P00ptart@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 121d
This is what I was thinking. Then sue because the CEO promised it to you and didn't follow through.
homes@piefed.world · 2 pts · 121d
"Instruction not recognized. Can you please rephrase?"
frustrated_phagocytosis@fedia.io · 8 pts · 121d
Should stop compensating the meat version so much then
Switorik@lemmy.zip · 8 pts · 121d
Why don't they replace him with ai and use the savings to give everyone there a substantial raise?
Zier@fedia.io · 5 pts · 121d
Engage? or Enrage! Why is he so ugly, he has money, get surgery, or a paper bag already.
Grass@sh.itjust.works · 4 pts · 121d
so they just copied the data and put it in a second mecha lizardman?
unabart@sh.itjust.works · 4 pts · 121d
Is it Prince Valiant Zuckerberg or Broccoli Head Zuckerberg? Two distinct entities.
ivanafterall@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 120d
It's this version:
unabart@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 119d
Tbh, that's the right one to use.
scytale@piefed.zip · 4 pts · 121d
On the next layoff, it will be the AI Zuck that will be delivering the news to you when you log on in the morning.
trackball_fetish@lemmy.wtf · 3 pts · 120d
Zuckerborg
ishartdoritos@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 121d
🤮
grimpy@lemmy.myserv.one · 2 pts · 121d
what does one call a robot modeled after a humanoid life form?
Formfiller@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 120d
https://youtu.be/_zCDvOsdL9Q
Hadriscus@jlai.lu · 1 pts · 121d
Black Mirror goes, "am I a joke to you ?"
Taleya@aussie.zone · 2 pts · 121d
No, a guideline!
SeductiveTortoise@piefed.social · 1 pts · 121d
The only android I want to be friends with is Data.
Tollana1234567@lemmy.today · 2 pts · 121d
ZUCKERBORG is more of a fusion of LORE and data.
NaibofTabr@infosec.pub · 1 pts · 121d
we really care!
halfapage@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 121d