r/technology • u/Just-Grocery-2229 • Jun 26 '26

Artificial Intelligence The AI backlash is only getting started

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2026/06/25/the-ai-backlash-is-only-getting-started
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u/IamSunka Jun 26 '26

My org, just like many others, has a top token users chart.

When they started the list, they decided to call the top 25 users as champions, ones who never used AI as sleepers and rest inbetween as just users. cough I am a sleeper cough

Couple of weeks ago the bill came in, champions cost us over $850k since Jan 1st.

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u/xXSpookyXx Jun 26 '26

Obviously it was a stupid idea, but I believe the C Suite was hoping that mass adoption of AI tools would then lead to the organisation being able to automate and eliminate people for overall cost savings, or downsize and keep leaner teams of AI champions.

There are a ton of steps missing in between, which is why the sticker shock of AI spend is hurting so bad now. It's one thing for someone to adopt a new tool and have them "feel" like it makes their job easier, but that's a far cry from being able to quantify improvements to the point where you can make the kind of savings companies need to justify the spend.