What are your AI Preferences?

Every Friday night we invite guests for Shabbat dinner. Whenever I pass on the details to an invitee, I'm careful to always ask: Do you have any dietary requirements?

We cater for all sorts in our house, because all sorts are welcome. Gluten free, dairy free, nut free, egg free, vegan, tone down the spice, we've catered it all. We don't ask why a guest has their particular requirements. Maybe it's health related, maybe ethical, maybe just distaste. It doesn't make a difference.

We should apply the same "dietary requirements" lens in product design, when it comes to the inclusion of AI features.

Please, let me turn AI off! You don't need to know why. Maybe it's mental health related, maybe ethical, maybe just distaste. It doesn't make a difference.

If you work in product design, or are software ajacent in any capacity, chances are you're living in an AI bubble. The rest of the world doesn't really like AI as much as you might think it does. Look at this poll which shows that Gen Z believes the AI risks outweight the benefits. Or this poll which rates AI's popularity as 26% positive, 46% negative. Or this poll where 80% of participants express concern about AI, and 62% of participants are simply not interested in the subject.

If you care about your users, you'll ask them the question: What are your AI preferences?

What are your AI preferences? Are you a cAIrnivore – the more AI the better (you simply can't comprehend how people prefer to go without)? Maybe you're Gen Free, happy for AI to understand and classify, but not generate images or text. You might be Tool Intolerant, happy for a service to use it's own internal AI, but not share it with external tools or data stores. Or perhaps you're an AI Vegan, and want it turned off entirely.

My apologies for stretching the analogy to it's breaking point. I'm sure you get the idea: Give your users some control about how and when they encounter AI. It's just polite.

Oh, by the way, if you happen to be in the area, reach out. We'd love to invite you for Shabbat dinner.