In November 2022, I took on a writing assignment that, looking back, may have had a bigger impact on my life than any other: interview ChatGPT . It was the first day that OpenAI’s tool was available to the public, and my goal was to try to make sense of the tech — and then help readers make sense of it — by asking it questions about itself.

The conversation turned out to be, well, a bit boring. More than half of the AI’s answers started with “As a large language model …,” and its responses tended to downplay AI’s potential for disruption. No, I didn’t need to worry that it would take my job (“As a large language model, I am not capable of taking on the role of a writer …”). And while ChatGPT conceded that AI could lead to more low-quality content online, it told me it was too soon to make any accurate predictions about its effect on the internet or search results.

I didn’t know it at the time, but that interaction kickstarted in earnest the development of my AI worldview.…