Miss Me? - Listen Bitch! Abuse Your Bot

Episode Date: May 5, 2025

Lily Allen and Miquita Oliver answer your questions about AI.Next week, we want to hear your questions about DANCING. Please send us a voice note on WhatsApp: [phone]. Or, if you like, send us an email: [e-mail] episode contains very strong language and adult themes. Credits: Producer: Flossie Barratt Technical Producer: Will Gibson Smith Assistant Producer: Caillin McDaid Production Coordinator: Hannah Bennett Executive Producers: Dino Sofos and Ellie Clifford Assistant Commissioner for BBC: Lorraine Okuefuna Commissioning Editor for BBC: Dylan Haskins Miss Me? is a Persephonica production for BBC Sounds

BBC Sounds music radio podcast. This episode of Miss Me contains some very strong language and some adult themes. Welcome to listen bitch. Welcome to listen bitch. welcome to Listen Bitch. Hello everyone, hello Lily. Hello everybody. Hello world. It's time to get cosy, really hunker down, really get into this. Let's really take this shit apart today.

We have no answers, no one does because today the theme is AI. AI. I to the A to the A to the I. Artificial intelligence and it's, you know, I don't even think it, did AI exist when we started? Miss me? Yes. Right. but it wasn't even close to where it is right now, like a year in. No, it's accelerating at an alarming rate or an exciting rate, depending on whichever way you perceive it. How about extraordinary rate?

Yes, it's an extraordinary rate. You have questions, we have no answers, let's go. Let's go. We have our first question. Up, please. Hi, Makita and Lily. It's Lauren from Australia. As everyone always says, love your pods so much.

It's just brilliant. Yeah, I'm just wondering how much you use AI in your day-to-day life. I've never used chat GPT, so thank you so much. Bye. All the way from Australia, Lill. All the way from Australia. Your second biggest territory, that's what they say in the music industry. Your second biggest territory. Territory. I don't think, I don't use it as much as

a lot of other people I know. Like I went out for dinner with somebody the other night and then we went to get ice cream afterwards and we were looking for an ice cream place and they got out a chat bot and asked it for the best ice cream afterwards and we were looking for an ice cream place and they got out a chat bot and asked it for the best ice cream place nearby and it told us and I was like, wow, I'm still like a Google Maps girl. I was gonna say, I just Google it. But yeah, people use it all the time.

I mean, like all the time. Yes. The times that I will use it will be like if I have to write something like to the girls school or something and I'll write things in my language and then I might chuck it into a chat bot and say, can you tidy this up

and make me sound like a grownup? You don't think you could do that on your own? No. Just managed to do this every week but can't write an email to a school. This is my worry that the things that we are capable of, we start to believe that we're not. And I think that's where my heart goes a little pitter patter. I guess it's just where you feel judged, isn't it? Like, you know, the kids school, the teachers

and people, I want them to think that like I'm a, you know, fully functioning, like responsible human being. And so I'd like that to be reflected in my, you know, electronic mail communications. And do you find that these emails still sound like you? Yeah, just a more efficient version. Yeah, you'd like to be. Silliman, my cousin, he, we've just got like a sort of business premium version to help with a lot of the kind of backbone administrative work that is part of building a business. And he says that he likes it because it's efficient and

it does a lot of the work for us. But it also butters him up all the time, which he totally loves. It'd be like, great question, Suleiman. Yeah, great thinking. You're on the right path. And I can see him getting all gassed by it. And I feel like that's when I feel like the world's eating its own hand or something. It's like you're feeding it the information. It's complimenting you back. It's quite a, maybe it's kind of conversation. Actually, that sounds like a kind of relationship I'd like to have. But it has divided the team. Me and Autumn don't like it at all and feel like it takes all the nuance out of everything.

That's where I've had problems with it. Just feels a little bit like summarized. Everything's a little too summarized for me and I'd like to. I know, it even summarizes my text messages now. Not even just emails. Not even just emails. I don't know how to turn it off. It's really irritating. No, you can't turn it off. I think that one's been a little invasive.

Suddenly all of our emails are summarized. No one asked for it. There's no way to turn it off. And now it's doing it to text. And it's like if Jessie texts me like, yeah, Keats, you're right. Love you. Call you in a bit. I don't need that summarized. I'm not an idiot. And I don't know where it will end. So yeah, that's how it exists in both of our lives. Lauren from Australia, thank you. That's how it exists in our lives. Let's keep this going. Let's have a second question on AI. Hey guys, it's Marianna from Melbourne in Australia. I love the show. Thank you so much

for spreading your word across the world all the way down here in Melbourne. I have a question or more, some thoughts, and interested to hear what you think as well. AI has kind of been inflicted upon us. We have had no international deliberation or consent from the population. What are the laws around AI, yet it's been enthrusted upon us and it's part of our everyday life, everything from searching up on Google

to using your favorite app. So just interested to hear your thoughts on this. It's a bit scary to me personally and would really be keen to hear what you think about it. Thanks a lot. See you. Well, they're sort of trying. I need AI to summarize her question again for me. What was it? It's about how does the lack of legislation look for AI and is that the scariest part of it that there are no laws around it?

Well, I think it looks really good for AI for anyone else. It's not good. Yeah, but they are working on legislation around it. Yeah, but good luck with that. It's the Wild West out there. I feel like Metta are in trouble, aren't they? Because they were using this resource, this sort of library, I can't remember what the name of it is, where it's got, you know, millions of books, basically. And the AI is using the millions of books in order to help people, you know, write things. But none of the authors have said books gave their permission for their works to be added to this library. And,, and it's an artapist take. And I think the same thing is happening in music and poetry and, you know, art as well. I mean, I think it's happening everywhere. Yeah. But you know, look at Spotify, like tech companies

do not care about artists and creativity. Or at least they don't care about artists being paid. Yeah, I think it's more that. I think they'd be stupid to not believe that they, like, somewhere like Spotify needs an artist and it needs an artist to be creative and make music and have output. But I don't think they give a shit about what they get after that. Yay! I love Spotify though. I moved banks and all my subscriptions were made very apparent to me.

And I was like, my God, I actually couldn't live without Spotify. But that's for subscriptions. We're in AI. Let's have another question, please. Hi, Lily and Makita. This is Alex from Toronto. I work in investment banking and it's been incredible, but also really frightening how quickly in the last year, ChatGBT has become like an everyday office tool.

So I use it for things like building whole PowerPoint presentations based on content I've fed it. I've had it summarize really complex economic reports into a two-host style podcast so I can listen to it on the train and also have it make more sense. Sometimes even have it rewrite my emails to sound more masculine when I want to come off a bit more assertive in my communication.

So it's really clear to me that AI isn't going anywhere. And in order to stay up to date in the workplace, I need to use it and I need to actually use it well. So I'm taking an online course in prompt engineering to learn how to better utilize different generative AI tools. So in that spirit, I asked ChatGPT to give me a question to ask you on the topic of AI that would guarantee my question would get picked for the podcast. So this is what it gave me. If an AI started a podcast about your life based on your texts, emails, voice notes and DMs, would you listen out of curiosity or sue for emotional damages? Thanks. Bye.

Thank you. If an AI started a podcast that was based on what? Like just personal shit. Texts, DMs. Oh my God. I would, I would, I would sue immediately. I'd have to get an injunction put out on it. But wait, so we're not, we're not hosting it. They're just taking all our information

and using that for content for the podcast. Yeah. Well, I guess they would form, they'd be forming and exposing, you know, the inner workings of your life in the way in which that you communicate with varying numbers of people. Yeah, like absolutely not. This is what I mean. This is quite a fucked up question. And I just feel like AI is quite a fucked up soul. Like, why would you ever now? It's like, why would you ever think of doing something so awful to someone? and I just feel like AI is quite a fucked up soul. Like, why would you ever, now it's like,

why would you ever think of doing something so awful to someone, like all their personal information and using it in that way? Well, it's funny that it said that because it's basically a hypocrite, isn't it? Because it does use people's personal information and uses it in that way. Yeah, it's actually, that question's mocking all of way. Yeah. It's actually that question is mocking all of us. Yeah. Because if AI is being fed right by said person using it they're like it's just like us

because it's like a human being but more efficient. Right. But it's like well as we know human beings do really dark terrible fucked up things. So if everyone has access to this then that person may be feeding this machine, really dark shit, and then the AI becomes this like powerful beast of really bad information

that it's soaked up from the bad person using it. This is my worry, because we're not all good people. I mean, like, who I work with is now using it for relationship advice. Wow. How's that going for her? And she said it's working really well because she doesn't, this is the thing, she feels like she doesn't trust her first instincts that often and she needs something else to be like, no, this is better.

And it's like, really, should we not be trusting our instincts and our gut? I feel like that's quite fundamental stuff. Especially where relationships are concerned. Very much so. Let's have another question for this week's Listen Bitch. The theme is AI. Hey, hey, my name is Alice.

I'm from Leeds living in Thailand and I work as a therapist for children. I am finding AI scary. I have ADHD and I am really addicted to using or hyper fixated to using chatchee BT at the minute, especially when I was moving to a new country. I needed validating from my heartbreak and the breakup that I was going through as well. It really like validated everything that I was feeling. I sometimes felt like a bit of a burden speaking to my friends about it. I really struggled to open up and it's given me a way of being able to speak. However, now I've realised that I don't want to do that anymore and

I've actually, me and my actual therapist have said that I need to go on a huge detox from doing this and depending on AI. So my question is, how do you feel about AI bots being a form of therapy and a therapy tool, especially for children and young people now as well? I think it is becoming a huge concern and a huge dependent and I just wanted your opinion on it, especially for children, young people now as well. I think it is becoming a huge concern and a huge dependent. And I just wanted your opinion on it, especially Lily, with you having children as well. I've never even thought about this. I mean, it's an extension of what we were just talking about with relationship advice, but I've never thought about how kids might use it.

Do your kids have access to it? No, they don't. They haven't. They don't have access to it, to any chat bot yet. But you know, it's only a matter of time. I don't, I don't know. I mean, I guess like, you know, validating one's feelings is can only be a good thing. But yeah, I'd rather that they, you know, relied on their peers and and their, you know, family members and this their real human support network. Yeah. I feel like that's going to be healthier in the long run or not.

Maybe I'm not the best person for them to come to for advice. Maybe the chatbot would have better advice than me. I don't know. But I feel like advice is not black and white like that. Good advice, bad advice. I think it's all about how you look for things to help you and heal you. This lady was talking about going through some heartbreak and, you know, like some good old fashion therapy did me wonders, but also like not culture,

but like books and film and music. Those things have healed me, guided me, taught me shit throughout my whole life. Like I think Otis Redding, can't remember which album, but what album just like but those things have healed me, guided me, taught me shit throughout my whole life. I think Otis Redding, can't remember which album, but what album just got me through my heartbreak of Jasper. I remember it so vividly. And I think it's really important to let things nourish you and not just give you advice.

I think one needs to be nourished and have discovery and learn to be curious again. Worried it might take all curiosity out of the world and you know how much I banged on about how important that is, listen to some Aretha Franklin. You'll learn so much more, honestly. I think I've learned so much more from the things that nourish me in that way. Try that instead. Try a little bit of music and culture.

If you are on a detox and you and your therapist have decided this is what you should do, then it's nice that she's in therapy as well. It's quite a lot. We're going to take a break at this point. I think it's much needed. And so we are having a time out. Yeah, I can't talk about this anymore. I need a minute. Welcome back. We're still here. We're still talking about things. I can talk about AI again. I just needed a little break. I

can't wait to talk a little bit more about AI. All right, let's have another question. Hi, Lillian Makita. My name is Rachel. I'm from London. My question for you is, if it wasn't affecting people's financial livelihoods, what jobs would you be happy with AI doing? I like when people sound like they've really prepared their question. They wanted to say it well. Thank you. Hmm. What would I be happy with it doing? Happy with what role in my life or in the world? It's funny because I think that, you know, we're now heading into a place where it's

like, you know, white collar jobs that are being threatened. So sort of like there's like illegal AI, lots is happening in the legal AI market. And so and same in like accounting. And you know, so those kind of like, and, and medicine, and you know, those traditional, like aspirational jobs, right, those are going to be sort of threatened by AI. And I remember in COVID, when everything was completely shut down, shut down, how much I sort of like valued teachers and cleaners and bin men and those jobs I don't really want to be affected by AI. No, definitely not. I mean we were talking about the bin men the other day and that really would be like if there was some sort of machine coming to pick up your bins every day. I can't imagine the hundreds and thousands of people that would be out of work.

When I was like homeschooling my kids, I was like, teachers deserve to be paid a million pounds a year. It should actually be the highest paid profession in the world. Really? Completely. And the younger the kids are, the more they should be paid. I was like, this is insane. I can't believe we treat people in society

the way that we do. Like, they're people that fucking like, deliver shit, you know? No, big time. I see people be quite rude to the people that deliver their things, like quite dismissive. And it's like, this is like keeping everything ticking, this shit's keeping your life ticking. How much do you rely on Amazon? I know I do. I'd also like AI to just really stay out there, really,

really take a step back out of the creative industries when it comes to writers and there's something about, I don't know, I suppose I thought when AI started rising that it would have quite a bureaucratic, administrative role in our lives. And actually the way it's affecting productions when it comes to, even just the things, as I said, the things that I'm developing and people wanting to use

certain parts of AI to tidy things up or summarize things. And I swear to God, nuance is going to be lost in storytelling. And then we really are fucked because ideas, mistakes in ideas are important, just as important. You know, it's important to like be messy in work and discover things and let things grow into other things. I don't know, I just, when it comes into the world of creation and ideas, I think we're in quite a lot of trouble if it doesn't take a step back. I hear you dog. Right, okay, next question. Hi, Lillian Makita. So to get down with the new format, my name is Meryl. I am in the Netherlands trying to get back home to London still, but currently I am working in a European

truck manufacturer and I'm the marketing manager over there. How do you guys deal or like grapple with the feelings around using AI because it's so convenient and can be practical. But also there is this environmental impact because of the physical side of how AI works and the amount of servers and data warehouses and processes and things that are needed. So, morally, how tough does it get for you guys? Because for me, sometimes I want to use it, but then, you know, it's impacting the environment and I don't know, it's a tough thing to kind of deal with individually. So, just curious what both of your takes are on that and views are on that. Okay, love the podcast.

Bye. Bye. It would be nice if AI was used to sort of monitor that stuff and tell us really what's going on around the world, environmentally. So we could really get into the nitty gritty of how to solve things. I'm sure it can.

Yeah, but is it? Not unless you ask it. Not unless you ask it to. Think if we try to use it, I'm gonna definitely try and use it in a positive way over the next few weeks and see what comes of it But I think that would be a really positive way. Like if we feel like it's damaging something Let's ask it how how it can help us solve that it has all the answers. Yes. Do you worry about it morally?

Yeah, I mean, I think that there are like environmental issues around it I read an article the other day that said that it wastes a whole load of energy because people are talking to it and saying things like please and thank you when they don't need to because obviously it's not a person with feelings. But it's like, just even that is incredibly wasteful. What just the length of time and the that people are spending because they're in such like heavy dialogue? No, I just think that like it takes like energy for the for the AI to process every piece of information that it's getting. So even including words like please and thank you,

which are unnecessary because it doesn't care whether you're saying please or thank you to it. And so it but it still has to process that as information. So therefore it's it's waste. It's wasteful. Yeah, but it will be that will that as information. So therefore, it's waste. It's wasteful. Yeah, but it will be that will only get worse because that whole please and thank you thing is what I'm talking about with Suleiman. He feels like this is his buddy. And he doesn't just want to ask you a question. It's not just Google. They have a relationship and he wants he's gonna kill me. He wants he wants it to like him more and fit like for it to

be a relationship with depth, I think. Okay, well that's crazy and he should stop now. He said he'd never ask any fashion advice though. I was like, yeah, could we stop there? But I heard that people can also be quite mean to them, which is truly fucked up. But it might be a good place for people to like, expel their shit. Like I'd rather be really mean to some bot than like my mother a lot of the time like my like comes out the wrong place. Abuse your bot. Okay that's interesting. Just to get it out there so I'm not like doing it to nanny or doing it to you.

Be like one second before we speak I just need to really go tell this bot what piece of shit. I just need to go and tell this bot to go fuck itself. No, because in therapy, sometimes I'm just like angry and I want to like scream and it's like, she doesn't deserve that. She's been helping me for years. And I don't have like, sometimes I'm like,

where's my place to do this? Maybe it's here. Maybe it's here. Maybe it's here with a bot. Wait, oh my God, this is so fucked up. So the information that the chat bot will give to you isn't correct or it's not as good. No, isn't as good. Whatever that may mean.

So you're not getting like premium feedback if you're rude to your bot. So if I go tell it's a piece of shit and then I ask you for some financial advice for next week. Yeah, you wouldn't want to do that. Okay, so that's interesting the fact that you have to be nice to it. So creepy. So creepy. I'm gonna start using it in a positive way. I'm going to take all my moral views away from it. And I'm going to give everyone an update on how AI has positively

affected my life or not. We should have it designed the show next week, the meaty drop. So let's have it asked, you know, we'll get it to do, you know, five subject matters for us to talk about. And the listen bitch theme? and the listen bitch theme and the listen bitch theme Okay Okay. Yeah, I think that would be easy because you know what someone said to me the other day they were like Oh, you know you could just ask AI to like make a podcast that sounded like Lily Allen and Makita Oliver talking about da da da da da and I was like But I don't even know how I'm gonna do my job every week

So why the fuck would that know what I'm going to say? I'd really like to. Okay, so first step, we'll just do this. We'll ask it what it thinks we should discuss in next week's meaty drop. Can you ask it now? No, I'm going to do it closer to the time because something might have happened in the world that it thinks that we should talk about. Okay, very good idea.

Should we have one last question in this on AI dev episode. Hi, it's Ewan here. I'm a financial advisor. That's my job. My thoughts are on AI. Are we fortunate in the current generation that we're in, regardless of age, that we're probably able to spot AI? And what I mean by that is we can spot when it is AI, what's generated by AI, how it's written, how it's seen, we can kind of see the flaw in it. We can kind of almost say it's not human. My concern or my thoughts are, are the future generation going to be in tune with this as AI is going to obviously offer a lot more content information?

Will future generations be able to distinguish as we are having not had AI when they will be growing up with AI? And is that a scary thought? Of course they won't be able to distinguish it. Of course not. Like 23 year olds, they don't remember a world without Instagram.

And they don't really, there's like the past and then there's the modern day, which they're modern day and they're modern reality, which is all Instagram. But interestingly, a lot of them aren't on Instagram, not a lot of them, a household that I know, none of them are on Instagram, not even in a, I'm not on Instagram, they're just not into it

and they don't want it in their lives anymore. So there might be a world where the next generation gets sick of it and give it up because they've had it for so long. That would be good. Yeah, that would be good. They could maybe be our new leaders. We're trying to tell everyone to drop it now.

Might have to wait for Ethel and Marnie to tell people to drop it. Maybe that's who they'll listen to. Talking about images that you might see on certain social media outlets or whatever that are generated by AI. My kids are very good at spotting AI generated images. Yeah, but do you know what Phoebe was saying that isn't good though? Like nearly all, like 90% of children's books now, the illustration is like digital and AI. it's like don't you remember the difference between like Quentin Blake

and Janet and Alan Alberg? Like that was important. You're preaching to the converted but you know this our grandparents were grappling with the same thing with like hip-hop or you know whatever else the world evolves. Yeah the world evolves what I'm saying is something that's really, that really is damaging to lose, I think, is that individualism throughout something like as simple as illustration and that kind of like feeling that Quentin Blake has like held the pen for one of his like scraggly rolled-doll drawings. And you almost feel the personality of Quentin Blake within that kind of sketch. You know, I still have fantasies about food

from Janet and Alan Alba books, and they would always depict like country, bucolic scenes with fruit and farms and people and cats and animals. And I would really, I would feel like I was lacking a lot in my childhood if everything just looked like the same digital thing. I find it very upsetting.

And if there's nothing else out on the market, then you'd be quite stuck. So that's the place we don't wanna get to. Don't wanna get stuck. No, thank you. No, thank you. Well, Lil, I've had quite enough of you. We had a whole weekend celebrating you.

And now we've done Listen, bitch. I'm gonna need a little break Okay It's gonna take a few days off you right coming up. Oh wait. We need it to choose our lesson bitch Oh, yeah, come on then AI okay And this is this is us trying to use AI in a more positive way with a more gung-ho attitude like let's work together What is the theme for next week's Listen, Bitch? One second. Tell us what you're saying actually, because this is quite important in the process

because I've never spoken to it myself. No, I don't want to. OK, it's between you and your little chat bot. It's not really... Couldn't quite do it. Couldn't quite do it, could it? OK, yeah, it doesn't... It can't do it. It failed.

That's an AI fail. Like that's been noted. It is a fail. It doesn't listen to Listen Bitch, that's for sure. Does it not? No. Yeah, go on. What does it say? I said it needs to be more specific, a more specific subject matter, like cars or breasts or periods or kindness and then it said okay here we go one listen bitch the politics of breasts two kindness isn't weakness three periods are punk rock four driving while female i hate it can we stop five your friends aren't your competition i see that some of these are actually kind of good for like meaty drop, but you just, I'm so happy that we created something in the world that that fucker doesn't understand. Well, I think that my prompts probably just weren't good enough. But anyway, you carry

on. Don't blame yourself. Don't blame yourself. The theme for next week's and Bitch from Makita Oliver's Mind is... Dancing! Woo! You know, dance did dance. Woo-hoo! Okay, woo! And so you can send your dancing questions or, you know, thoughts, musings, what have you, to 08000 304090.

That is 08000 30 40 90. That is 08000 30 40 90. Dancing musings this way, please. See you next week. Bye bye, people. Bye bye, Lilly. Bye. Thanks for listening to Miss Me with Lilly Allen and Makita Oliver.

This is a Persephoneca production for BBC Sounds. Do you ever feel like you're the only one navigating life's ups and downs? Well, guess what? You're not alone. It's Anna Richardson here and my podcast, It Can't Just Be Me, helps you realise that you're not the only one. Join me as I sit down with incredible celebrity guests and experts to dive into life's biggest topics and covering their very own It Can't Just Be Me moments. Expect revelations, honest anecdotes and a few laughs about the challenges and obstacles

that life throws at us. Listen on BBC Sounds.