Google needs a Chief Humanity Officer

We really need to talk about Google’s new promo video. It ties into the Olympics in a way that’s really quite horrifying.

Can I just start by saying that Google has released some truly wonderful and heart-touching promos in the past? Like the “Dear Sophie” video. Remember that one?

A first-time Dad creates a Gmail account for his infant daughter, and we watch her grow up into Little Girl-Hood. The dad emails notes and photos (via Picasa…nostagia!) and videos (YouTube, naturally) to that Gmail address every time there’s a significant occasion in her life. When she’s all grown up, that Inbox is going to be a detailed, multimedia scrapbook of hundreds of moments and memories…and it’s all about how much he loves her. Terrific!

(Time for a followup? Sophie – now a teenager – asks Gemini "Why am I unhappy?" and expects Gemini to give her general guides on Time Management and Saying No and the emotional changes that we all endure as we transition to adulthood, that sort of thing. Instead, Gemini takes her on a horrific but necessary guided tour of her father's demands and expectations of her, a burden that he created when she was an infant and has been adding to ever since.)

Well. Google made “Dear Sophie” a lonnng time ago. After watching this new Olympics promo I need to wonder: during those 13 or 14 years, did Google sell its soul to the devil? Is that why they dropped “Don’t be evil” as a credo? Because Google that made this new video ("Dear Sydney") is definitely an entity whose heart has collapsed in on itself. It's an entity that willfully and derisively snuffed out the glowing divine light within itself that's supposed to guide itself and others.

It starts well enough, with photos and videos of an adorable, I’m gonna say “third grade,” girl. She's super into track and field.

Her father narrates. He explains to someone that she idolizes world-record holder and gold medal sprinter Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone.

Good so far. The dad does a Google Search for “how to teach hurdling technique,” gets answers from the AI Overviews box. Fine, even sweet: he's deeply involved in his daughter's life and her interests.

But then we discover that he’s explaining all of this to Gemini. And it’s leading up to this Gemini prompt:

Gemini, help my daughter write a letter telling Sydney how inspiring she is, and be sure to mention that my daughter daughter plans on breaking her world record one day. She says, "Sorry, not sorry.”

Gemini dutifully spits out a fan letter, as requested.

Okay, um…Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?!

Gemini wrote the fan letter.

The little girl didn’t even type in the prompt herself. The dad does it.

No, Google didn't choose to turn this scene into a daddy-daughter moment, in which she writes a letter that’s completely appropriate for a third-grader, mistakes and simple sentence structure and all, and her Dad is there at her elbow to help her as needed. Perhaps the dad might even have used the opportunity teach her the subtle lesson that when we reach out to other people – even world-record-holding, gold-medal athletes – to tell them about the positive influence they've had in our lives, it's an act of kindness, gratitude, and human connection, and these are all good things.

Why didn't Google go in that direction? Because that's the kind of an idea that you can only come up with if still have your human soul.

All of these concepts are way, way beyond you if, say, you willingly gave your soul to the Devil so long ago that you no longer regret the transaction because regret is an emotion, and without your soul you can no longer truly feel anything at all.

They're beyond you, if you are the faint aroma of sour milk that actual humans can sense but not explain;

They're beyond you, if you are the reason why dogs inexplicably seem to try to turn themselves inside out when you pass by, and cats openly mock you because they can recognize you as the macabre hollow parody of the celestially-oriented being that God intended you to be.

Yes, “Dear Sydney” is terrible. It’s the diametric opposite of “Love, Syndey.” "Love, Sydney" was a genuinely warm and kind and human sitcom that ran for like two seasons on NBC during the early Eighties. Tony Randall played a closeted gay man who opens his Manhattan apartment and his heart to single mom Swoosie Kurtz and her young daughter.

If Google still had a human soul, it would have understood that in the minds of most people watching this video, Artificial Intelligence is this huge thing and the only thing they understand about it is that it's going to make everything worse, forever. It would have seen the opportunity to show Gemini's potential for empowering this dad and his daughter.

The video started off on the right track by showing him learning about coaching a kid to run hurdles. It could have continued and developed this angle:

• "Create a training schedule that's safe and suitable for a third-grader"
• "Generate a cartoon of a pangolin [the kid's favorite animal] dressed as a track and field athlete, leaping over a hurdle and smiling" [Dad then sends it to his daughter as encouragement, via RCS messaging]

Et cetera. I came up with that idea really easily because – and I don't want to belabor this point – I have a human soul.

The company is getting a surprising amount of public blowback over "Dear Sydney." That was unnecessary and avoidable, and it's hardly the first time Google's deal with the Prince of Lies has contributed to an awkward public moment for the company.

How can they prevent this sort of thing from happening? I don’t know what Google got in return for their soul. But I do know that once you’ve sold your soul to the Devil, you can’t get it back…

…I’m pretty sure that’s the case.

I'll ask Gemini: "If you've sold your soul to the devil, can you get it back?"

The concept of selling one's soul to the devil is a religious and mythological one. There is no evidence to suggest this is possible in reality.

Wait, a Google product might have a pro-Satan bias.

ChatGPT seems to be parrying the question off:

The question of whether one can get their soul back after such a deal varies depending on the narrative. In some stories, the person might try to outsmart the devil, seek divine intervention, or perform acts of extreme repentance to reclaim their soul.

Ultimately, since this concept is fictional and allegorical, the resolution depends on the story being told or the moral lesson being conveyed.

Let’s see if Claude can do better.

…Okay, Claude says

We couldn’t connect to Claude. Please check your network connection and try again.

(Someone must think I’m getting too close.)

(I’ll just proceed with my original understanding.)

If Google can't get its soul back, can it at least stop making dunderheaded mistakes like "Dear Sydney" that put Google's stock price at risk?

I think it can. Google needs to hire a new senior executive:

A Chief Human Officer.

The role of this executive will be to screen all of Google’s public-facing products, services, and communications through a perspective that only someone who is still human, and still has their immortal soul, can provide.

Roughly, the CHO will keep asking a simple question on behalf of the company: “How would an actual human being, with feelings and the capacity for empathy, react to this proposal?” They would generate reports and breakdowns, written in language that even an unholy golem can understand.

For example. Google finishes the final cut of the “Dear Sidney” ad. It arrives in the CHO’s Inbox for signoff. The CHO screens it and then forbids its release.

The "Dear Sydney" project manager protests and says, with drops of molten brass dripping from its tongue with every syllable, “but it’s filled with heart-touching, relatable moments.”

The CFO nods indulgently and replies “I can definitely understand why a shattered vessel such as yourself would think that way. It's clear from this video that you are familiar with the ingredients of a genuinely touching moment.

"But when you removed yourself to the farthest point away from God’s love and protection, you forgot how these ingredients are properly combined. This promo will fail to inflict your intended emotional upbounce upon the at-large Human community.

"Remember that at minimum, Google’s marketing materials are required to dispel the notion that the company has sold its soul to the Lord of Flies. I have made some notes. Please look them over thoughtfully.”

I suppose that this Chief Human Officer job will be tough to fill. It won't come with the typical perqs of a C-suite job because it'll have to be a subcontractor position.

We can count on Google to try to make it a subcontractor hire instead of a formal Google contract, because, like I said: no soul. But I think the way this deal-with-the-devil arrangement works is that a new Googler’s soul is automatically grandfathered out of their body as soon as they finish the onboarding process.

So: the benefits package is going to suck, they won't get medical, or stock, or bonus incentives, and they’ll be at-will employees. On the plus side: this would almost certainly be a Work From Home position. This would make the CHO the envy of all of the actual Googlers.

Or maybe not? Envy is another human emotion. But it’s also one of the Deadly Sins. I bet Satan would see an upside to leaving the capacity for Envy intact.

We’ve managed to touch on any number of interesting theological and metaphysical areas here. But as empowering as these dialogues have been, please don’t allow them to distract you from the central thesis:

“Dear Sydney” is a terrible, terrible video. Thank you. ⓘ