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1 month ago
1
I’m going to be blunt here: we were sold a vision of AI as the great creative accelerator. Instead? Most of you are using it as a glorified autocomplete for the same tired nonsense you’ve been churning out for years.
You know exactly what I’m talking about. The people who cluttered your inbox with those cringe-worthy mail merge emails a decade ago: “Dear [FIRST_NAME], I noticed [COMPANY] is in the [INDUSTRY] space...”- they’re still at it. They’ve just upgraded their weapon of choice from Mail Merge to ChatGPT. Different tool, same uninspired result.
Pretty much every cold email I get goes like this:
“Hi Navaneeth,
I just wanted to say how impressed I am with ToolJet’s innovative approach to building AI-powered internal tools—it’s truly a game changer for businesses looking to streamline their processes!
<the same old pitch of booking more demos, improving HR efficiency, your SEO s*cks, can I send a free report, my boss saw you on LinkedIn, hire remote devs, etc, etc>”
You’re getting pitched constantly now & and I’d bet money that nine out of ten of those emails sound like they were written by the same person. Because, functionally, they were - fed through the same AI, prompted with the same lazy thinking, reusing the same patterns.
“We’re revolutionizing the way businesses approach [generic problem]...”
“I noticed your background in [your industry] and thought you’d be interested in how we’re leveraging AI to...”
“Our cutting-edge platform democratizes [buzzword] for [target audience]...”
It’s like Mad Libs for the business development crowd. The grammar’s better now, sure. The sentences flow nicely. But the substance? Just as hollow as it’s always been. You haven’t become more thoughtful communicators - you’ve just automated your mediocrity at scale.
And here’s the thing that kills me: AI models learn from existing content. Feed them generic marketing drivel, and guess what comes back? More generic marketing drivel. It’s a feedback loop of blandness, and too many of you are happily participating.
It’s not just email. Have you actually looked at the web lately? I mean really looked?
Every startup landing page is now a variation on the same theme. Hero section with some vague promise about “disrupting” or “transforming” something. Three icons listing generic benefits that could apply to literally any product. A completely forgettable call-to-action button.
The layouts are competent. The copy is grammatically correct. And it’s all profoundly, spectacularly forgettable.
Here’s what’s happening: the same folks who never bothered to customize their WordPress themes are now letting AI design their entire web presence. They think they’re being innovative. They’re not. They’re just outsourcing their thinking to a pattern-matching algorithm that’s pulling from the same pool of mediocre examples everyone else is using.
When everyone uses the same tools with the same prompts and the same lack of critical thinking, you don’t get a thousand unique voices. You get a thousand variations of the exact same voice. And that voice is boring as hell.
Let me be clear: I’m not anti-AI. Far from it. AI is a remarkable tool; one of the most powerful we’ve ever created. But like any tool, it amplifies what you bring to it.
Bring creativity, nuance, and genuine insight? AI can help you scale that.
Bring lazy thinking and a template-driven mindset? Well, congratulations - you’ve just turbocharged your ability to produce forgettable content.
The companies that are winning right now - the ones actually cutting through the noise - they’re not treating AI as a replacement for thinking. They’re using it as a starting point, then injecting their own perspective, their own voice, their own humanity into what comes out.
They understand something fundamental that too many people are missing: AI is a tool, not a strategy.
If your content was boring before AI, it’s still boring now. You’re just producing more of it, faster. If you couldn’t be bothered to personalize your outreach before, you’re definitely not doing it now - you’re just hitting “generate” and moving on.
The tool changed. Your approach didn’t. And it shows.
We’re drowning in content that’s technically proficient but utterly soulless. Emails that read fine but connect with no one. Websites that look professional but communicate nothing distinctive. It’s all just noise - polished, AI-powered noise.
Here’s what I need you to understand: in a world where everyone has access to the same AI tools, authenticity is your only competitive advantage. Not better prompts. Not more sophisticated models. Your actual perspective. Your unique insights. The things only you can bring to the conversation.
Stop treating AI like a shortcut to avoid the hard work of original thinking. Use it to enhance your ideas, not replace them. Take what it generates and make it actually yours - add the details, the perspective, the voice that no algorithm can replicate.
Because right now? Your content sounds exactly like everyone else’s. Your emails get deleted without being read. Your website gets a five-second glance before people move on. Not because AI is bad, but because you’re using it badly.
The technology changed. The game didn’t. And if you can’t be bothered to bring something genuine to the table, no amount of AI sophistication is going to save you from being ignored.
We’ve all heard this song before. Time to write something new.
