Why AI Alternatives Matter
AI is prone to problems affecting its output: hallucinations, incompleteness, inconsistency, and bias. AI usage is costly, and the popular free services might require expensive paid plans or downgrade to sponsored light versions at any time.
Don't Hit Submit!
Source: image created by OpenAI using Mistral's Le Chat mascot
Ethical issues aside, lazily using AI too often and too early won't make you a better coder or more creative. And AI companies don't only take your money, they're also after your data – and your time!
Techniques like Rubber Duck Debugging (internal dialog development, preparing questions and anticipating answers without actually asking anyone) are alternatives to AI for coding and creativity.
Don't Ask Suggestive Questions
If your question implies a certain answer, asking only makes sense for falsification. AI (and other people) will hopefully tell you when you're completely wrong. Only that AI often doesn't. Current models are trained for flattery and verbosity.
What a waste of time!
Don't Ask Why
Ask open questions, and always prefer to ask "how", not "why".
Stay Skeptical
Don't believe anything without factful proof or a recent, reputable, relevant source.
GEO, the AI-agent-targeting variant of search engine optimization, has already succeeded in gaslighting AI and poisoning its answers with fake sources biased towards commercial results. AI seems much more gullible than real people.
Principle of Least Power
Remember the rule of least power: don't rent a truck when you need a minivan. Don't use AI when you need autocomplete, web search, or a tutorial!
I sketched a pyramid of thinking, creativity, and information retrieval again. As you can guess, AI assistants are "on top" as the most costly exception, while the broad basis should be traditional groundwork. Here's a cute AI-slop adaptation:
Source: Hand-Crafted Creative Counter-Culture against Toxic Digitization
In practice, it's more complicated. What's "AI" and what isn't?
I'm happy with AI ...
I'm happy about "autocomplete on steroids", but I still don't trust agents to refactor a legacy codebase in 2026.
I'm happy with AI-assisted image editing, but I'm tired of all the sloppy stuff taking the place of crafted screenshot collages or authentic photography.
List of Popular AI Providers (2026)
Focusing on privacy and local-first pragmatism, Ecosia and Mistral's Le Chat lead my top ten, although and because I'm aware that they might not be the smartest top-notch vanguards. But they don't have to. No need to let Americans or Chinese know what I'm working on, or what I'm going to tell my doctor, when modest models are smart enough.
- 127.0.0.1 (as local as it gets)
- Ecosia (AI and search engine) 🇩🇪
- Le Chat (IA) 🇫🇷 🐱
- Claude 🇺🇸
- ...
That's my subjective top three, not counting number zero, as I haven't set that up yet.
This list is subject to change, and yours will surely differ.
So, who am I?
I'm developing, designing and optimizing websites and (web) apps.
I have been doing this since 1997.
You can call me old.
What I'm not: I'm neither naive nor nostalgic, ...
... no luddite, no AI-denier, but ...
Do I sound like a grumpy patriot yelling at the sky?
Image generated by OpenAI, probably inspired by Albert Uderzo
What is it that I'm really angry about?
Enshittification
Pragmatism and capitalist logic make most companies eventually deteriorate their products on purpose until they are only slightly better than the second-best alternative, or just good enough not to lose all of their loyal customers and brand reputation.
Taking the cliché further, while Europe often stands in its own way and stalls its administration in bureaucracy, China floods the world market with cheap plastic fashion, networking electronics, and surprisingly successful AI models (not in my top ten).
America, or more specifically, the United States, somehow still manage to defend their position as leading exporters of "premium" hardware, software, and culture. However, the premium becomes hollow because of the aforementioned enshittification.
You might say I'm just jealous of the Californian tech broligarchs. I mean, didn't Elon help popularize electric mobility? Isn't he the one who provides Starlink to Ukraine? Yes, he is. And a dictator built our motorways. Just saying.
Long ago, Google dropped their former "don't be evil" motto.
Honestly, I often get the impression that "be evil" is what drives current tech stakeholders. And that's very bad. Are we human or are we lemmings actively creating a dystopian future?
You might say, I'm just too old to understand, that I'm just pessimistic because I'm too stupid to prompt. You might say my perfectionism is just another nerdy hobby.
Subjective List of Unpopular AI and Search Providers
- ChatGPT by OpenAI (see #quitgpt why)
- Gemini / Google AI mode (see #degoogle)
- Copilot / Microsoft Bing AI
- Perplexity (just another hallucinating American)
- Meta AI (just so that they will get mentioned, too)
- Grok (capable, but most unethical)
In practice, I still use them. It's hard not to, when there is no major relevant search engine index yet besides Google and Microsoft's Bing, which are used by Ecosia and other alternative meta-search engines.
Hypocrites we are?
As Giorgi Kobaidze pointed out in AI Psychosis Is No Longer Fiction, "people worry about AI taking their place, while at the same time actively using it in ways that make it easier for it to do so."
I'm using AI nearly every day. I even use it to generate cartoons and illustrations eventually, after having claimed so many times why that's wrong for so many reasons.
I'm using AI nearly every day as it has already become ubiquitous and seemingly without a practical alternative. Google search results are often so bad and irrelevant, and prepended with sponsored results, while the AI answer, currently on top of everything just seems too promising to ignore.
I'd prefer providers prioritized more classical products, fixed bugs and improved editors and search results. I mean, sometimes they still do. VS Code, GIMP, and Linux on Desktop prove past progress every day. Maybe AI is an important step towards more progress.
I only hope that we, as humans, and we, as developers, can prevent stakeholders from shaping the future towards their own unethical goals thanks to the new tools they already control too much.
Constructive Criticism
After all, my series is called "constructive criticism" and maybe I shouldn't be so negative. Then again, someone must have their say and point out flaws and fallacies.
Further reading: see links in the text above.
