What job in our world is less lucrative than being a parent? A Hollywood internship? Volunteering at a soup kitchen? Professional writer? Parenting is the only job you have to pay money to do. Lots of money. Lodging, clothes, food, school, Pokémon cards – it really adds up. And it’s getting worse. According to the tech industry, I have to strap my drooling offspring to a computer in order to ensure the baby’s survival.

Parents are being offered life-altering advancements in artificial intelligence that purport to make this taxing endeavor a tiny bit easier. OpenAI is suggesting its latest products can make child-rearing more efficient: its boss, Sam Altman, suggests generating a podcast about your kid’s life that you can listen to in the morning on the way to school. How entertaining would a podcast “that talks about one kid’s soccer game that afternoon, one kid’s upcoming birthday, some news, etc” actually be? “Jimmy needs to work on his dribbling.” Great. I think he knows already. He’s not going to be the next Messi, so how about we switch back to music?

Presumably, this idea renders the need for conversation moot. The computer already knows everything about our lives and has now regurgitated it into digital........

© The Guardian