To me, the most disheartening thing about AI is how quickly we're sliding into the slop culture. It's insidious: no one wants AI to ruin their hobby, but most people see it as a cool superpower that the technology allows them to imitate other people's skills - "see, I couldn't draw and now I can". The net effect is that everything is getting ensloppified, even in the absence of economic incentives. Yeah, that includes Mastodon: I see AI-generated memes and blog posts every day. And the usual reaction is "what does it matter, it's a funny meme", but maybe it kinda does?