Disclaimer: I don't want to sound like I'm criticizing any commenters personally because this is not my intention, and I apologize in advance if I still fail to express myself properly.

When I see some of the comments criticizing the AI storyline in the book, it makes me sad. Definitely not all comments on this topic make me sad - there are plenty of interesting discussions to have and different feelings to share. The parts that do make me sad are those that use wording like "AI propaganda" and hold this against the book (sometimes in a snarky way). In my eyes, this is an unfair criticism.

Don't get me wrong, I really do understand feeling some type of way reading about something called "AI" in general or about a person falling in love with AI - in 2026. I have these feelings too. When I read some Jenks/Lovey scenes, I do think to myself "well, sure reads different from this period of time, doesn't it". So I don't want to call anyone out because these feelings are valid.

However. I refuse to let those rich jerks who run those "AI" companies ruin my enjoyment of the book that is all about what those people are trying to destroy (interpersonal connections, diversity, acceptance, etc). They took a term that was a staple of the sci-fi genre for many decades and used it as a marketing tool for something almost entirely different. Artificial Intelligence from most sci-fi stories (including this one) has very little to do with what is plaguing our existence right now. And I don't think it's productive to throw decades of literature away because some rich jerks now "tainted" a term or something. This would be playing into their hand. They put a lot of effort to tie the concept of their useless chatbots in people's minds to something these people have been reading or watching movies/shows about for a very long time. They (the rich jerks) are doing propaganda. A book that was written over a decade ago is not propaganda for a product that didn't exist back then.

Let's resist tech billionaire propaganda. Lovey is not chat gpt. None of the books written before the past 3-4 years are trying to sell us those chatbots. Let's express our feelings about the current situation and how books remind us of it in a way that's respectful to the books' characters, authors, intentions, and stories.