I've been watching the AI debate get louder and louder lately.

And I'm not gonna lie.

Some of this shit is hilarious to me. 😂

Every time somebody posts themselves using AI, here come the comments:

“AI is ruining creativity.”

“That's cheating.”

“I hate this.”

“Do it yourself.”

“AI is going to destroy everything.”

Meanwhile I'm sitting there smirking because a lot of the loudest people saying this shit have never actually built anything from scratch.

Never built a website.

Never launched a product.

Never designed a brand.

Never tried to take some random ass idea in their head and turn it into something people can actually use.

But somehow they've become experts on what tools builders should and shouldn't use.

Okay. 😂

And the funniest part?

We've seen this movie before.

Y'all Hated the Internet Too

Go back far enough and people thought the internet was some weird little fad.

Why would people shop online?

Why would anybody talk to strangers through a computer?

Why would businesses need websites?

Why would anybody read news online?

Well…

How'd that work out? 😂

The internet didn't disappear.

It became infrastructure.

And then the same cycle started again.

Then Came Social Media

Remember when social media was basically treated like:

“Who the hell cares what you're doing all day?”

Now?

Entire businesses are built on it.

Careers are built on it.

Advertising runs through it.

Music gets discovered through it.

Products blow up through it.

People literally build audiences worth millions of dollars through it.

Hell, I've personally understood the value of building and scaling social audiences since I was a kid.

So imagine telling me social media was just some useless little trend.

You would've lost me a long fucking time ago. 😂

Digital Cameras Were “Ruining Photography”

This one is especially funny when you look back.

Digital photography comes along and suddenly the conversation becomes:

“That's not real photography.”

Film is authentic.

Digital is fake.

Real photographers use film.

Then digital cameras kept getting better.

And better.

And better.

Guess what professional photographers overwhelmingly use today?

Exactly. 😂

Did photography disappear?

No.

The tool changed.

The photographer still needs an eye.

You still need composition.

Lighting.

Timing.

Taste.

Creativity.

The technology just changed what was possible and how quickly you could do it.

Sound familiar yet?

Photoshop Was “Cheating” Too

This might be my favorite comparison to AI.

People absolutely complained about digital editing.

Photoshop made things fake.

Photoshop was cheating.

Photoshop meant you weren't doing “real” photography or design.

Fast-forward.

Now knowing Photoshop is literally considered a professional skill. 😂

Nobody looks at a graphic designer's résumé and goes:

“WAIT… YOU USED PHOTOSHOP??? 😡”

No shit.

It's a tool.

And having Photoshop doesn't magically make you a great designer either.

Give two people the exact same software and you're going to get two VERY different results.

Why?

Because the tool isn't the talent.

Digital Art Got the Same Bullshit

When artists started creating on computers and tablets, people questioned whether that was “real art” too.

The computer was doing too much.

Undo buttons were cheating.

Digital brushes weren't real brushes.

Whatever.

Meanwhile digital illustration became an entire professional industry.

Again:

The medium changed. Creativity didn't disappear.

And Y'all REALLY Hated Auto-Tune 😂

Man.

Auto-Tune might be the funniest example.

People acted like Auto-Tune was going to completely destroy music.

“That's not real singing!”

“Artists don't have talent anymore!”

“The computer is doing everything!”

And yet here we are decades later.

Auto-Tune didn't disappear.

Artists actually started using the technology creatively and turned the effect itself into part of certain sounds and genres.

You can hate the sound.

That's completely fair.

But pretending everybody was eventually going to collectively throw the technology away?

Yeah aight. 😂

Streaming Was Supposed to Be Weird Too

People had DVDs.

Cable worked.

Why would anybody want their entertainment delivered entirely over the internet?

Then Netflix happened.

YouTube exploded.

Streaming platforms multiplied.

And suddenly everybody's grandma knows what “Netflix” means.

Technology changes behavior.

Then eventually the behavior becomes so normal that we forget people ever questioned it.

Now It's AI's Turn

And that's why I laugh at some of the AI conversation.

Not because there aren't legitimate criticisms.

There absolutely are.

Copyright questions.

Jobs changing.

Low-quality AI spam.

People using AI to pretend they have expertise they don't actually have.

There are real conversations worth having.

But:

“I don't like AI, therefore AI is going away.”

😂😂😂

Bro.

Be serious.

We're already past that conversation.

The question isn't whether AI tools will exist.

The interesting question is how good they're going to become and how people will use them.

AI Doesn't Automatically Give You Taste

This is something I think people who don't build often misunderstand.

Give somebody AI.

Okay.

Now what?

What are they building?

Who's it for?

What's the business model?

What's the visual direction?

What features matter?

What's unnecessary?

How should it feel?

How are people going to discover it?

How are you going to monetize it?

What happens when the first idea doesn't work?

AI can help you execute.

It can accelerate certain parts of the process tremendously.

But you still need to think.

I've seen AI-generated websites that look incredible.

I've also seen AI-generated websites that look like complete dog shit. 😂

Same technology.

Different person directing it.

That's not much different from giving everybody Photoshop.

Everybody suddenly has Photoshop.

Cool.

Everybody still isn't a designer.

Builders Look at Tools Differently

This is probably where my perspective comes from.

When you're actually building things, you don't look at a new tool and immediately think:

“How can I preserve the difficulty of doing this the old way?”

I think:

“What can I build with this?”

Can I prototype faster?

Can I test more ideas?

Can I automate something annoying?

Can I build something I previously would've needed three people to accomplish?

Can I take an idea from my head to something functional faster?

Can I use the time I saved to focus on something more important?

That's what interests me.

I'm not emotionally attached to struggling just because struggling used to be required. 😂

(Yes, I made that giant on purpose. No, my caps lock isn't stuck. Deal with it. 😂)

And No, This Doesn't Mean “AI Everything”

Here's where nuance matters.

Just because I believe AI is here to stay doesn't mean I think every fucking thing needs AI shoved into it.

Sometimes doing something manually produces a better result.

Sometimes traditional photography wins.

Sometimes handcrafted design wins.

Sometimes custom development wins.

Sometimes human writing wins.

Sometimes AI dramatically accelerates the process.

Use the right tool for the job.

That's always been my philosophy.

Technology should expand what I can create, not dictate what I create.

I Know How This Movie Usually Ends

That's why watching people absolutely lose their minds over AI doesn't bother me.

I've seen this pattern too many times.

Digital cameras.

Photoshop.

Digital art.

Auto-Tune.

Social media.

Streaming.

The internet itself.

Different technology.

Same conversation:

“This is ruining everything.”

Then eventually everybody calms the fuck down, the technology improves, society figures out where it's useful and where it isn't, and the tool becomes normal.

So when I see somebody confidently declaring that AI is just going to disappear because people online are mad about it…

I'm smirking.

Not because every criticism is wrong.

Not because AI can magically replace talent.

And definitely not because every AI-generated thing is good.

I'm smirking because history has shown us what usually happens when a genuinely useful technology makes people uncomfortable.

People complain.

Builders experiment.

The technology improves.

The useful parts stick around.

And eventually?

Half the people who swore they'd never touch it end up using it anyway. 😂

So yeah.

Keep arguing.

I'm gonna go see what I can build with it.