There’s So Much AI Crap
There's so much AI crap floating around at the moment. Sigh.
As some of you know, I co-host The Monkey Patching Podcast with Murilo. Tiny independent thing; we talk data and AI and whatever else fell out of our brains that week.
Lately, the fastest-growing part of the whole project isn't listeners (well, it kind of is also, we almost crossed 2,500 subscribers on YouTube, not bragging at all here). It's pitches. Every week, almost every day, new messages from agencies trying to land guest spots for their clients — founders, "visionaries", book authors, you name it. On a good day it’s kind of flattering. "Oh wow, people apparently see this as a stage now."
And then you actually read the messages.
It’s all the same weirdly polished mush. One fake-personal line about some recent episode. One sentence that sounds like it was just copy-pasted from a transcript. Another paragraphs about how they were nodding along to our episode. You can almost hear the prompt:
"ChatGPT, write an email pitching my client as a guest. Pretend we actually listened to their podcast. Scan the transcript of the latest episode and sprinkle in some details."
This is just one example. The same thing shows up in job applications, LinkedIn outreach, conference speaker pitches, sales emails, exchanges between founders and investors… AI-boosted copy‑pasted sincerity everywhere.
None of this is new, by the way. The advice is still solid: prepare well when you set out to build a new professional connection. And honestly, I really appreciate it when it's obvious someone has done the work. I've tried to hold myself to that standard plenty of times too.
The weird thing with this new wave of AI‑generated outreach is that people still tick the "make sure you prepare" box, but it has the exact opposite effect on the person they're trying to impress. Instead of, "oh nice, they actually put in some effort" or, at worst, "they could have prepared a bit better, but it's still a decent pitch", you end up with, "wait… you couldn’t even be bothered to spend ten real minutes on this? I’m not even worth that?"
To be clear: I’m not anti‑AI at all. Use it to prep. Have it summarize that podcast episode before you write. Have it help you outline your questions, tighten your bio, sanity‑check your CV. That’s all fine.
But at some point you do have to show up yourself.
AI is a tool. Building relationships is still on you.