AI Is the Helpful, Annoying Friend
I used to think of AI as a distant sci‑fi plot twist. Now I think of it as that friend who shows up with tools and a weird amount of confidence.
The first time it saved me was boring and beautiful. I was stuck halfway through an essay. A quick prompt gave me an outline and three ways to get unstuck. That nudge was exactly what Every.to’s guide to writing with AI recommends: use it to summarize, reframe, and break creative logjams.
A few months later I taught 100 people to code with AI. Watching folks reach that first little thrill of making something work was the point. AI didn’t replace learning. It accelerated the loop between idea and play. I still remember one student’s grin when a buggy script ran for the first time. You can read about that batch in this piece on teaching with AI.
Then there’s the sheer speed. A demo I read created a whole video game environment in 40 milliseconds. Forty. Milliseconds. It’s not magic. It’s math and clever engineering. But it feels like magic when you’re watching a world assemble itself in the time it takes to blink. See the transcript here: this AI makes a video game world in 40 milliseconds.
So what is AI actually great at? Short answer: the boring, the repetitive, and the fuzzy.
- Summaries and reframes. Ask it to compress a long piece into a paragraph. It will. (Useful when you’re lazy or pressed.) See writing with AI.
- Prototyping fast. Want a game map or a UI sketch? AI will give you a first pass in seconds. See the 40ms demo above.
- Reflecting vibes. Need a tone check or a “sound like X” draft? Researchers use it to get “vibes” of text or people; it’s a surprisingly good mirror. I liked reading about that here: how an AI researcher uses ChatGPT and Notion AI.
But it’s not a substitute for judgement. It hands you a power drill, not the blueprint of your house. You still pick the screws.
My rule: use AI for the heavy lifting, keep the taste test for myself. I let it rough‑draft and iterate quickly. Then I edit, add weirdness, and make the choices no algorithm can. That’s where the work stays mine.
If you let AI be a tool and not a podium, it becomes quietly brilliant. It’s great at getting you moving. It’s terrible at deciding whether you should move at all.
Takeaway: treat AI like an annoying genius friend who brings the snacks and the drills. Say thanks, keep control, and build something you’d be proud to wear to a party.
