A Near Hit…or a Miss?

Can artificial intelligence ever really take over design and communication?

David Langton
5 min readDec 15, 2021
How can we make A.I. work for us?

Will algorithms rule the world? How much of our human work will be replaced by artificial intelligence? Artificial intelligence gets close to being real — sometimes too close — but it never really completes the task.

George Carlin had a joke where he examined the expression, “near-miss,” and said, “Shouldn’t that be a ‘near-hit?’” Carlin explains, that since it didn’t actually hit the target, it was a “miss,” not a “near-miss.” That’s how artificial intelligence and the digital revolution are acting in our lives. Close, but no cigar. Here are a few examples where the “uncanny valley” gets close, but not quite close enough. It’s the details and nuances that A.I. doesn’t get right that makes our role in design and communication even more critical.

Amazon recommended me to myself.

My most recent recommendation from Amazon was to buy a book I really care about, but that’s because I wrote it! It’s…

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David Langton
David Langton

Written by David Langton

Founder of New York branding design firm Langton Creative Group, co-author of Visual Marketing, and adjunct professor at Hostos College/CUNY.