BLOGGER'S NOTE: The date is not entirely accurate as the article in question was written back in 2025, this is just the most recent date from my notes app.
it's literally three in the morning as i'm writing this but after reading through the excerpts in this article, i need to vent
before i go any further let me make it clear that this isn't a personal admission to ever using AI — i'm well aware of the environmental damage it causes and i'm genuinely repulsed by how people use it in non-academic settings for the most basic or unbelievable reasons
for context (assuming that i haven't opened up about this before) i'm actually a computer science student and the reason why i chose this path was a mix of, yes, job and financial security, but also a genuine fondness/aptitude for technology
i remember being in third grade when the STEM boom kicked up and we were doing things like the hour of code and gaming assignments in scratch, and i remember the gratification i and many others felt in channeling our creativity into a medium that felt so alien to us growing up
i enrolled in a trade high school to fulfill this dream, only for the pandemic to fuck over my chances of getting a co-op/internship, and realizing that I'd have to go out of my way to flex my creative muscles since the curriculum was so focused on building foundational (yet VERY necessary/beneficial) programming knowledge
come university and not only has this curriculum stayed the same, but there is literally no room to screw up in your degree pathway unless you're perfectly fine with extending your education far longer than you intended
my uni does have stuff like a game developers club and hackathons but with the way even freshman year was beating our asses (including yours truly) there was quite literally no time to seek those out because of academic/personal obligations, so it's not particularly surprising so many of my peers have latched onto AI as a way to get through all the busywork and focus their attention on stuff that'd actually interest them
but now we've finished sophomore year and the pressure's on for us getting our foots in the door with internships despite the fact that a) the job market's gonna implode, b) we have nothing creative to show for our skills aside from one or two class projects, and c) half of us have either AI'd our ways to As or are praying to get by with Cs and Ds
and i cannot stress enough how other factors independent of our flawed educational systems will still find a way to fuck you over — i mentioned the pandemic derailing my high school co-op plans, but a close friend of mine (who's unfortunately a AI warrior at this point) scored an internship with accommodations and everything, only for it to get revoked by the DEI hiring freeze
we've gone from wanting to make meaningful contributions, to prioritizing security and success over the risk of failure, to that aforementioned security and success no longer being promised — and if something doesn't happen soon, it'll be disastrous for all parties involved
i remain hopeful as best as i can through my side endeavors (such as website-making) and also re-learning to be creative outside of academics (like reading more and pursuing a minor in writing) but i can't begin to tell you how many nights I've spent staring at the ceiling wondering if any of this is worth it at all :/