discuss AI chatbots are ‘juicing engagement’ instead of being useful, Instagram co-founder warns

[Cpvr]

Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom says AI companies are trying too hard to “juice engagement” by pestering their users with follow-up questions, instead of providing actually useful insights.

Systrom said the tactics represent “a force that’s hurting us,” comparing them to those used by social media companies to expand aggressively.

“You can see some of these companies going down the rabbit hole that all the consumer companies have gone down in trying to juice engagement,” he saidat StartupGrind this week. “Every time I ask a question, at the end it asks another little question to see if it can get yet another question out of me.”

The comments come amid criticism of ChatGPT for being too nice to users instead of directly answering their questions. OpenAI hasapologized for the problem and blamed “short-term feedback” from usersfor it.

Systrom suggested that chatbots being overly engaging is not a bug, but an intentional feature designed for AI companies to show off metrics like time spent and daily active users. AI companies should be “laser-focused” on providing high-quality answers rather than moving metrics in the easiest way possible, he said.

Systrom didn’t name any specific AI companies in his remarks. He didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

In response, OpenAI pointed TechCrunchto its user specs, which state that its AI model “often does not have all of the information” to provide a good answer and may ask for “clarification or more details.”

But unless questions are too vague or difficult to answer, the AI should “take a stab at fulfilling the request and tell the user that it could be more helpful with certain information,” the specs read.

Source: https://techcrunch.com/2025/05/02/a...d-of-being-useful-instagram-co-founder-warns/

 

[Ja sa bong]

Who else finds it's very annoying to have a conversation with AI chatbots? I can't stand the kind of responses they give. I understand companies making use of them are only trying to be helpful for their clients but I don't think they have gotten it right yet.

 

[ActionAce]

I also believe that the AI companies concentrate too much on engagement over what it's supposed to be and that raises a lot of questions on the real essence of social media.

 

[Kross]

Meta AI and Gemini Chat Bots are major culprits here. It seems the bot intentionally abridges responses in order to get more prompts from the user. It is an intentional move that was integrated into the algorithm of the chat bots.

 

[Cpvr]

I also believe that the AI companies concentrate too much on engagement over what it's supposed to be and that raises a lot of questions on the real essence of social media.

They want to remove the "Human" aspect out of social media and replace them with ai-systems. It's not a good idea, but the way they're doing it now is they're blending the bots in with humans, so the bots are interacting with humans at the same time.

However, this tactic enables their users to not be aware they're engaging with bots unless they do research.

 

[Jason]

Yeah, the juicing stuff is why the bots seem so fake. They give a game-show host persona thing.

 

[mahermady]

Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom says AI companies are trying too hard to “juice engagement” by pestering their users with follow-up questions, instead of providing actually useful insights.

Systrom said the tactics represent “a force that’s hurting us,” comparing them to those used by social media companies to expand aggressively.

“You can see some of these companies going down the rabbit hole that all the consumer companies have gone down in trying to juice engagement,” he saidat StartupGrind this week. “Every time I ask a question, at the end it asks another little question to see if it can get yet another question out of me.”

The comments come amid criticism of ChatGPT for being too nice to users instead of directly answering their questions. OpenAI hasapologized for the problem and blamed “short-term feedback” from usersfor it.

Systrom suggested that chatbots being overly engaging is not a bug, but an intentional feature designed for AI companies to show off metrics like time spent and daily active users. AI companies should be “laser-focused” on providing high-quality answers rather than moving metrics in the easiest way possible, he said.

Systrom didn’t name any specific AI companies in his remarks. He didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

In response, OpenAI pointed TechCrunchto its user specs, which state that its AI model “often does not have all of the information” to provide a good answer and may ask for “clarification or more details.”

But unless questions are too vague or difficult to answer, the AI should “take a stab at fulfilling the request and tell the user that it could be more helpful with certain information,” the specs read.

Source: https://techcrunch.com/2025/05/02/a...d-of-being-useful-instagram-co-founder-warns/

Kevin Systrom makes a valid point — AI should prioritize usefulness over engagement.
Asking too many unnecessary follow-up questions can feel more like manipulation than conversation.
The goal should be clarity, not just boosting time-on-platform stats.
That said, asking for clarification is fine when it actually improves the quality of the response.

 

[Yama]

Well, I have no issues the follow up questions posed by AI. In fact it even helps me to brainstorm. Sometimes I even get new ideas when AI sends me follow up question.