Comments on: I Have Seen the Future, and It Is Automated http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/ bly.com direct marketing blog Thu, 08 Jan 2009 11:55:28 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.3.1 By: Gary (aka fool4jesus) http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673351 Gary (aka fool4jesus) Tue, 01 Apr 2008 21:00:06 +0000 http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673351 <i>Is it possible that the criteria for “good” on it might actually serve to keep people in therapy longer?</i> I think very nearly. I zoomed in on the same thing. I am a volunteer peer counselor (meaning I do volunteer counseling but have no sheepskin) and I recall in training one of the common counseling styles they talked about was the Rogerian method where you primarily just echo back what the patient is saying. Afterward you can give your view but with no implication that one is "right" and other is "wrong" - and honestly I question how much of that is actually done in practice. So, one can see how they could automate that type of function. When I was in high school, I wrote a program kind of like that. User: I am not happy. My program: So you are not happy. User: I hate my life. My program: I hear you saying that you hate your life. And so forth... Is it possible that the criteria for “good” on it might actually serve to keep people in therapy longer?

I think very nearly. I zoomed in on the same thing. I am a volunteer peer counselor (meaning I do volunteer counseling but have no sheepskin) and I recall in training one of the common counseling styles they talked about was the Rogerian method where you primarily just echo back what the patient is saying. Afterward you can give your view but with no implication that one is “right” and other is “wrong” - and honestly I question how much of that is actually done in practice.

So, one can see how they could automate that type of function. When I was in high school, I wrote a program kind of like that.

User: I am not happy.
My program: So you are not happy.
User: I hate my life.
My program: I hear you saying that you hate your life.

And so forth…

]]> By: Michael http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673319 Michael Thu, 27 Mar 2008 20:32:26 +0000 http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673319 Resistance is futile. Resistance is futile.

]]> By: Brandon W http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673303 Brandon W Tue, 25 Mar 2008 15:31:14 +0000 http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673303 Pardon the missed typos above. My eyes are falling out of my head from looking at a computer screen too much. Pardon the missed typos above. My eyes are falling out of my head from looking at a computer screen too much.

]]> By: Brandon W http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673302 Brandon W Tue, 25 Mar 2008 15:25:06 +0000 http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673302 Max Kalehoff, vice president of marketing for Clickable, argued on his blog just the other day that automation is going to cut into the advertising industry. See http://tinyurl.com/2o4zvx The idea that a computer would really understand the complexity of human behavior is preposterous. If computers could quantify human behavior then economic forecasts would always be accurate; and we now how inaccurate they usually are. BusinessWeek Senior Writer Stephen Baker addresses some of this in his upcoming book "The Numerati". The fact is, advertising is a social science not mathematics. No computer will ever manage all the intricate variables (and their interaction) of a single human mind, much less an entire market full of them. I'm not even worried about advertising being outsourced to India or China - they just can not understand out culture well enough to create good advertising (and vice versa, us for their culture). Computers will never even do /that/ well. On a side note, I'm personally completely annoyed with the push to self-service. It's an excuse to push operational costs off onto the customers under the guise of convenience. Max Kalehoff, vice president of marketing for Clickable, argued on his blog just the other day that automation is going to cut into the advertising industry. See http://tinyurl.com/2o4zvx

The idea that a computer would really understand the complexity of human behavior is preposterous. If computers could quantify human behavior then economic forecasts would always be accurate; and we now how inaccurate they usually are. BusinessWeek Senior Writer Stephen Baker addresses some of this in his upcoming book “The Numerati”.

The fact is, advertising is a social science not mathematics. No computer will ever manage all the intricate variables (and their interaction) of a single human mind, much less an entire market full of them. I’m not even worried about advertising being outsourced to India or China - they just can not understand out culture well enough to create good advertising (and vice versa, us for their culture). Computers will never even do /that/ well.

On a side note, I’m personally completely annoyed with the push to self-service. It’s an excuse to push operational costs off onto the customers under the guise of convenience.

]]> By: Bill Perry http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673300 Bill Perry Tue, 25 Mar 2008 13:57:42 +0000 http://bly.com/blog/general/i-have-seen-the-future-and-it-is-automated/#comment-673300 Bob, Thing thing about the psychotherapist thing really got me thinking. What kind of "High Marks" are these people giving the thing? I think the purpose of a GOOD psychotherapy is to get the patient/client/customer healed as fast as possible. Many therapists, though, see patients for anywhere from months to upwards of 20+ years!!! Is it possible that the criteria for "good" on it might actually serve to keep people in therapy longer? And, if this is the case, is it also possible that some of these other things might actually serve to make life harder in the long run? I think you might have hit the nail with that question in your post. Bob,
Thing thing about the psychotherapist thing really got me thinking. What kind of “High Marks” are these people giving the thing?

I think the purpose of a GOOD psychotherapy is to get the patient/client/customer healed as fast as possible. Many therapists, though, see patients for anywhere from months to upwards of 20+ years!!!

Is it possible that the criteria for “good” on it might actually serve to keep people in therapy longer?

And, if this is the case, is it also possible that some of these other things might actually serve to make life harder in the long run? I think you might have hit the nail with that question in your post.

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