Person/David Wilson/Blog/26/05/The solution might be cancelling my AI subscription

• The solution might be cancelling my AI subscription

  • My Notes

    • Wilson catalogued ~50 AI-assisted projects; almost none served a useful purpose.
    • Core thesis: friction equals focus, and focus produces actual products. A voice-to-blog pipeline experiment produced "unbridled garbage" because removing friction also removed deliberation.
    • Draws on Person/Cal Newport's research: productivity tools often increase shallow tasks and context-switching rather than enabling deep, valuable work.
    • Proposes deliberate curtailment of AI use to restore focus and intentionality — not waiting for better tools or models.

  • Highlights

    • "I didn't mean to build most of these things... one hour later the result is not a quick script for X, nor is my problem solved."
    • "This technology is horrific for attention. It's a thermonuclear ADHD amplifier."
    • "Slopping out a 10,000 LOC untested Python/JS mess in 5 minutes helps nobody."
    • "Because the effort was removed, so was the commitment, and with the commitment the focus, and with the focus any meaningful product."
    • "A tool producing cheap reward with minimal input and no friction can only be a liability."