I’ll Be Saying No to Setapp’s New AI Subscription Tiers

Though I concede AI can be helpful for language learning

Illustration drawn by the Author, in the Concepts app on her iPad

All words and pictures human made—no AI input. Not a paid Medium subscriber? Click here to read for free.

The Mac-only subscription service, Setapp, has a new subscription structure.

It launches on February 28th, 2024, and will offer two tiers: AI Enthusiast, with 100 credits, and AI Expert, with 200 credits. For reference, 10 credits get you about 18 messages with GPT-3.5 Turbo, or 6 messages with GPT-4. Credits reset each billing cycle. Pricing structure yet to be announced.

Now, the announcement email from Setapp began like this:

We agree with everyone: GenAI tools give humans superpowers.

The first part grated on me because I don’t like being thrown into a bucket with the AI acolytes, but even if the last part is true, there are some superpowers I’m happy to leave alone!

Artificial Intelligence. According the Dictionary app on my phone, the word ‘artificial’ means, in part, something made or produced by human beings rather than occurring naturally. Oh, the irony!

We need to more closely define what “made or produced by human beings”…