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Comment by timewizard | Hacker News Reader

It's an algorithm. Why are we calling it "AI?"

Did they literally ask a machine "visually dub subtitles into this movie file for me please" and get a result? No? They didn't use AI then. They used a purpose built model in a purpose built tool to perform a single algorithmic function. how that algorithm works or what technologies it's similar to are not relevant.

/curmudgeon

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We've had things we call "AI" since the 1950s. We only had text prompting as an interaction mode since ChatGPT came out in 2022. Why is prompting your test for whether something is "AI" or not?

> We've had things we call "AI" since the 1950s. We only had text prompting as an interaction mode since ChatGPT came out in 2022.

This is not even close to true. SHRDLU would be one prominent example.

> Why is prompting your test for whether something is "AI" or not?

What does the initialism AI stand for?

TIL about SHRDLU. But regardless, when you say "AI" in 2025, it means something broader than that. The root of the tree may look like trying to pass the Turing test, but many of the leaves don't.

Call it what you want, but there are lots of video processing tools out now with a technology lineage which includes generative/FM/LLM/NN DNA. Not sure about this one, but I know for sure of others.

> It's an algorithm. Why are we calling it "AI?"

And inference isnt? Explain your reasoning pls.

AI is just a marketing term for software at this point. It's become essentially meaningless.

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