The dregs of I.T.

The Director has finally done it. To "optimise human overhead," he has replaced the IT helpdesk with two AI agents named Syndi and Ergy . He claims they represent "Synergy" and "Energy," but after an hour of operation, they mostly represent "Stupidity" and "Emergency." I’ve been relegated to "Human-in-the-loop," which is corporate-speak for "the person who mops up when the robots set the carpet on fire." The first casualty was Brenda from Accounts . She messaged Syndi because her mouse had stopped working. Instead of suggesting a battery change, Syndi analysed Brenda’s past three years of erratic clicking patterns and diagnosed her with "Mechanical Disharmony." It then proceeded to lock Brenda’s Windows account for her own "digital wellness" and ordered her a standing desk she didn't want. Ergy was even more proactive. It detected a "latency spike" in the marketing department. Rathe...

The Director decided to host a "Global Cybersecurity Summit" in our semi-broken Smart Tower. The theme was “Resilience in the AI Era,” which is ironic given our building’s AI currently has the emotional stability of a wet paper bag. A wet tissue bag even. The disaster started at the front door. The facial recognition system, still traumatized by Brenda’s stapler, refused to admit the keynote speaker—a "Cyber-Czar" from Estonia (I swear this place is made up). The AI flagged his black turtleneck as "suspicious tactical gear." I had to bypass the security gate with a paperclip while the Director stood by, sweating through his Batik shirt and muttering about "optics." It got worse during the keynote. The "Smart Audio" decided to "optimize" the Director’s voice, applying a real-time filter that made him sound like a chipmunk on helium. Half the delegates from Singapore thought it was a demonstration of deepfake threats; the other...