Word of the Day: Dark Leisure
What do people do with the fragments of time they get back from vibing?
Here's my "Dark Leisure" theory of any potential productivity paradox in AI:
- most AI use rn is bottom up and hidden (employee first, not company first): employees vibe code, vibe market, vibe write and get stuff done faster
- in many orgs, there is too little incentive to pass on these productivity gains by telling your manager: "i found this neat tool that lets me do 8h of work in 3h! give me more work!"
yes, some ambitious folks do and get promotions through this, but most ppl aren't ambitious and just want to be left alone
- instead, those, say, 5 extra hours become "Dark Leisure": browsing the web, X, reddit, sports, etc
Will these companies eventually get replaced by other companies? yes, but that process will take longer than folks in our bubble expect
A form of quietude, where productivity from the application of agentive AI is squandered by doomscrolling instead of either productive work, or active time off.
As one commenter on X asked: has there been a spike in use in Reddit, X, or other platforms? It should show up. So maybe this is a failed conjecture.