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Comment by jonathaneunice

To each their own, I guess. If I find out that yarn works was a type of textile mill and spinning factory, I then read on about other parts of the textile industry in New England. Maybe how it relates to the progress of steam engines vs. hydro power, or its place in the Industrial Revolution overall. It gives me an on-ramp to understand one thing and branch out to others. I don't know what AI models or agents you're using, but they must be weak sauce. Mine give me sharp and specific answers, at least 2-5 references per question, and I can branch out to that lovingly curated blog, to Wikipedia, to local historical societies and their curated collections. Et cetera.

I end up reading more sources and exploring more things. If you want to dismiss that as "trivia," or dismiss the topics I want to know about, okay. But it's important to me. You could equally deride search engines as wanton seas of advertising, and tell me I need to head to a library and its paper-based card catalog, the only true and proper way to do research. :shrug:

It's true there are a lot of weak models out there. I tend to use the frontier models, and they are great research assistants IME.

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