by Marshall Begel

“OpenAI boss Sam Altman has admitted that saying ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ to chatbots like ChatGPT is stacking up tens of millions
of dollars in computing costs. … [He] quipped it was ‘tens of millions of dollars well spent.’”
—EuroWeekly News

Religion asks, when people pray,
They use decorum to convey
Their gratitude for things received,
And summaries of things they need
In hopes that, when they meet their ends,
Their virtue brings them dividends.

So why should people make a scene
When I’m polite to some machine?
I think it’s worth some social friction
Because I know, from science fiction,
When AI drones turn self-aware,
Those rude to tech won’t have a prayer.