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points by gb2d_hn 4 days ago | 0 comments

Why would I buy a potato when I could grow one myself. Why do I give a busker money when I could play the real track on spotify. Why do we give anyone any money? Why don't we just do everything ourselves?

[–] petterroea 4 days ago

That's not really how it works, because in all your examples there is a pretty reasonable amount of work being put in that you are paying for.

Many AI projects are just a few prompts away, and very little labor intensive - you are mostly just delegating.

A much more accurate example would be "Why would I pay your son to mow my grass when i can get mine to do it"

[–] andybak 4 days ago

So do it. Everything AI assisted I've made has involved a ton of work. The only difference AI has made is that I've increased the level of my ambition and avoided a ton of things that were previously blockers.

[–] erfgh 3 days ago

I think whether it requires a lot of work is not the most important factor. The important factor is how easy it is to replace it. If it was made with AI I expect it to be easily copiable with AI. Therefore it doesn't make much sense to spend a lot, if any, money on it.

[–] FeepingCreature 3 days ago

There is no problem and no contradiction between your views.

If you want it, and you think it's easy to replace, try to reproduce it with AI.

If you find that it is harder than you thought, then go back and pay for the original.

[–] cman1444 3 days ago

It is surely much easier to replace a potato than to recreate this. Yet we still pay for potatoes.

[–] slopinthebag 3 days ago

no it's not. for one, potatoes take months to grow. secondly, they require land that many of us don't have.

generating an ai image of a potato is a better comparison.

[–] cman1444 3 days ago

Yes it is. I can go to the grocery store and buy one in 10 minutes from where I am now. And it would cost me very little to do so.

That's the analogous equivalent of spending the tokens to use AI to make this project.

The analogous equivalent of growing a potato yourself over months would be creating this website without AI.

[–] dewey 4 days ago

> Many AI projects are just a few prompts away

"Just a few prompts" is the new "can do that in a weekend". In reality it still takes a while to build everything, think about what features you want to have and how to prioritize them, how to build a good UX / UI, set up payment providers etc.

[–] hansonkd 3 days ago

Not saying you are wrong, but I just wanted to share that if you build the software for yourself, a lot of requirements just vanish. like you dont need payment providers or support multiple users, etc.

[–] gambiting 3 days ago

Well, then do it! If it's so simple and so offensive to you that you might actually copy this project and publish it for free, then PLEASE do it - I'll happily download your copy for free. Just make sure you fit it within an hour.

[–] donohoe 3 days ago

  "Why do I give a busker money when I could play the real track on spotify."

It is more like "Why do I give money to someone playing a track on Spotify when I could play that track on Spotify."

[–] malikNF 3 days ago

Thats a DJ

[–] well_ackshually 4 days ago

>Why would I buy a potato when I could grow one myself.

Because growing fruits is hard.

>Why do I give a busker money when I could play the real track on spotify.

Because playing music is hard.

This project is just "I handed https://arnismc.com/ to Claude and it generated maps from the open data that the Swiss government puts out for free. Oh and also I'm charging you for the slop"

[–] FrustratedMonky 3 days ago

AI generated web sites don't magically appear out of the ether.

Just like someone had to grow the potato.

Someone had to 'use' the AI to 'do something'.

The AI just cut out some steps, -> Just Like the Plow did.

[–] rfgplk 4 days ago

> This project is just "I handed https://arnismc.com/ to Claude and it generated maps from the open data that the Swiss government puts out for free. Oh and also I'm charging you for the slop"

Why does this matter? I see the AI detractors still can't cope with the fact that you're allowed to charge for AI generated work. You have to be insane or severely demented to try doing something like this by hand.

As a follow up I just went and looked at the arnismc project since I haven't heard of it. At least it's written in Rust, which is respectable but it's only ~200k loc of Rust? And most of it is also 100% LLM generated by the looks of it?

[–] fzeroracer 3 days ago

> Why does this matter? I see the AI detractors still can't cope with the fact that you're allowed to charge for AI generated work.

It's interesting that you immediately call them an AI detractor because they refuse to pay for something that's low effort. You're not entitled to someone's money and people certainly aren't required to pay for something if they think they can just make it themselves. You're complaining about a bed of your own making, where you want to act like it requires a lot of effort while people replicate it effortlessly.

[–] bluebarbet 3 days ago

This is a silly debate you're both having. Money is not real, and a price is whatever a buyer is willing to pay. Emotions are best spent elsewhere.

[–] cman1444 3 days ago

It's not just their refusal to pay for something that's low-effort. It's the fact that they are criticizing the creator for charging anyone at all.

You're not entitled to dictate what someone else charges for their product, no matter how easy it is to make.

[–] fzeroracer 3 days ago

I'm sorry, I didn't realize we're on a forum where you're not allowed to criticize how people price things. My mistake, I'll be sure to tell other people to censor their posts ahead of time.

[–] cman1444 3 days ago

Of course you're allowed to criticize.

Likewise, others are free to criticize your criticism.

My point is it's silly to be upset about others charging for products that are easily vibe coded. If it's that easy to make, and they are charging too much, then someone else (it could even be you!) will come along and undercut them.

[–] slopinthebag 3 days ago

you're allowed to criticize. criticism is not dictation.

[–] cman1444 3 days ago

Right. My point with that comment was to mirror fezoracer's comment that "you are not entitled to someone else's money and people aren't required to pay for something they can make themselves"

Both are strawman arguments, so my mistake on mine.

[–] slopinthebag 3 days ago

"ai detractors" and it's people saying they won't pay for something they could build themselves using ai...

[–] well_ackshually 3 days ago

Because if you're a talentless hack, you could have least have the decency to not charge for open data (that Swiss taxpayers have already paid for). There is nothing original, creative, new to this project.

[–] rfgplk 3 days ago

So Google shouldn't charge for API access to maps either according to you. It's all open data

[–] well_ackshually 3 days ago

Google Maps is absolutely not open data lmao. A single read of their terms of services threatens you about twenty times about the consequences of copying, caching or looking the wrong way at their tiles, metadata, map styles, reverse geocoders and any other service.

[–] IncreasePosts 3 days ago

They aren't charging for open data. They transformed the data, using AI.