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Comment by embik | Hacker News Reader

Why do tech companies keep using dystopian stories as manuals? The flirty tone, the voice being awfully similar to the lead actress of Her.

Next we are getting Ex Machina?

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Don't Create the Torment Nexus [0]

[0] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/torment-nexus

Immanetizing the eschaton

I'm not sure, but my guess is everyone's got a slightly different "uncanny valley" function.

So for me, this voice had no impact — sure I noticed it seemed a bit "flirty", but that's not a thing that engages me in any way as it feels equally fake when a human does it, and if anything I pattern-matched to the Pierson's Puppeteers in Ringworld; the original Alexa advert was moderately creepy, but I could see they were trying to mimic the computer in Star Trek; but one example I do have of being disturbed by a product advert was the use of a cheerful up-beat soundtrack for "The Robot Dog With A Flamethrower | Thermonator": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rj9JSkSpRlM

I don't recall Her being a dystopian movie

I suppose it depends on your own perspective. For my part, a world in which people "date" algorithms instead of other human beings certainly seems pretty dystopian.

True. But in the story, the algorithms are better humans than the humans, so it wasn't actually a bad thing.

I could probably buy a realistic sex doll that looks better than the girls that would date me but I’d rather hump the real thing.

HEH... ok? I'm not sure that's relevant. The question is - does a human developing a relationship with a post-human sentience make the story automatically dystopian?

Seems to be you'd have to be pretty prejudiced against AI to say "yes".

And then when the algorithm transcended everyone realized that they knew how to love and could simply love the people around them. About the most utopian AI story I’ve ever seen.

Heh, arguably we already date algorithms and break up with real people. It's the disconnect between the two that people are sad about... the matching algos and profiles set impossible standards for regular people.

I’m glad I met my wife before dating apps were a thing. Though I have to ask, why can’t you just meet someone the “normal” way without an app doing it for you?

I'm in a similar position to you, but from singler friends, I've heard two reasons. Firstly, all the other single people are on the apps. Secondly, some are concerned about being seen as a creep when flirting or approaching the "normal" way. Thus, online dating is the new normal, and the old-fashioned talking in person is less common.

I think that when algorithms become as sophisticated as what's shown in Her, we have to come to regard them as people, which means they have rights to do with themselves as they please, including getting romantically involved with humans.

More frightening is Ex Machina, which shows what happens when such an AI isn't regarded as a person by its creator, and sees fit to take personhood for itself.

Movie was actually polyamorous advocacy cloaked as sci fi

All your comment revealed is you view the world through other people's lenses.

I don’t fully recall the ending but doesn’t the AI grow past the guy and “break up” with him, leaving him devastated at the end?

A bit sounds like the Replika AI drama from the last year. </SPOILER>

"Devastated" isn't the word I'd use, and a breakup does not a dystopia make.

I agree with you on a personal level, though again I’m sure if I CTRL+F replika subreddit I’d find many people describing their emotions with similar words.

Anyway, let’s say he was negatively affected by that relationship, IIRC.

Reminds me a bit of this: https://www.uniladtech.com/news/ai/man-married-hologram-no-l... , up to you if you find people developing strong feelings to inanimate objects that can’t care less, dystopic or not.

It's obviously dystopian to be in love with something that doesn't care about you at all. That is not, at all, what Her depicted. Sam clearly felt for Arthur deeply. Breaking up because their life paths were incompatible doesn't mean she didn't feel anything for him.

That made me happy, for once seeing AI getting what it deserves and dating other AI on its own level instead of being forced to "date down" mere humans. It was a story of emancipation for me.

Not devastated, happy to have loved and ready to love again.

It was pretty subtle dystopian. On surface it was a feel good movie about that guy becoming happy. But there were a few scenes were it was happening to a lot of people. Everyone with a cell phone basically was falling in love with it, and totally controlled by their love.

It was left a little in doubt whether the AI really did reach 'enlightenment' and beam itself to the stars, or the company/government shut it down because society was collapsing.

> or the company/government shut it down because society was collapsing.

I do not see how you could interpret the ending of Her this way.

Guess all good movies leave a lot open to interpretation, but difficult to do it and be good.

Like that "Rebel Moon" on Netflix was how to NOT do it, with tons of stupid exposition spelling out stupid details that didn't make any sense.

Versus "American Sniper" that was so evenly portraying all sides, that Right leaning people thought it was a liberal movie, and Left leaning people thought it was Right Wing propaganda. It was all so well done you could read into it a lot of your own feelings.

So "Her" was about the danger of technology. And at the end there were some scenes that you could read into how a lot of people were falling for this phone app and things were going downhill. But, it wasn't clear cut, the movie is really good at splitting the difference on how the app was also making people be happy, and was helping them.

Well, she was on Ghost in the Shell as well... proper dystopia.

I am fascinated by this split in interpretation of the movie. It seems clearly dystopian to me, and I was surprised to learn (here on HN) that there were a lot of people who didn't see it that way at all.

I have no insight to draw from this, I'm just fascinated by it.

For me anyway, "dystopian" media is one that conjures a world that is significantly worse than ours in some way. I did not get that from the movie. The movie did not portray the AI as being a malevolent or even a negative presence in the main man's life.

At its core, Her was a beautifully-shot love story between two flawed beings, nothing more.

To me it was dystopian in all the ways a good Black Mirror episode is, a future where humans are falling in love with LLMs is not a utopian outcome

Wasn't the main guy's job writing personal letters to his clients' friends and lovers? It seemed like a world where no one was connecting with each other anymore.

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