In 2024, every SaaS vendor added an "AI" button. Click it, and the software will write your project update, summarize your meeting notes, or generate a list of subtasks.
On the surface, this looks like a productivity miracle. Writing a weekly status report used to take 30 minutes; now it takes 30 seconds. But if we look closer at the systemic effect of these features, a different picture emerges.
We are entering an era of Information Inflation. Because it is now effortless to produce content, our project management tools are being flooded with "synthetic text"—long, perfectly grammatically correct paragraphs that contain very little actual insight.
The Cost of Cheap Content
In economics, when the supply of money increases without a corresponding increase in value, you get inflation. The same is true for information.
Before AI, writing a project update required effort. This friction was a feature, not a bug. It forced the writer to think: "What is actually important here?" They had to filter, synthesize, and prioritize. The resulting 50-word update was high-signal because it was distilled by a human brain.
Now, a user clicks "Generate Update." The AI scans 50 tickets and produces a 500-word summary. It is comprehensive, accurate, and completely unreadable. It lists everything that happened, but fails to highlight what matters.
The result? Your team stops reading updates. The "Signal-to-Noise Ratio" of your project management tool collapses. You have saved the writer 10 minutes, but you have cost the 10 readers 5 minutes each in scanning time—or worse, caused them to miss a critical risk buried in paragraph four.
Generation vs. Synthesis
This doesn't mean AI is useless. It means we are using it for the wrong thing.
- Generation (Bad Use Case): Asking AI to create more text. "Write a description for this task." "Expand this bullet point." This adds noise.
- Synthesis (Good Use Case): Asking AI to reduce text. "Summarize these 50 comments into 3 bullet points." "What are the top 2 risks mentioned in this thread?" This adds clarity.
When evaluating project management software, be wary of features that promise to "write for you." Instead, look for features that promise to "read for you."
The "Slop" Factor
We are already seeing the rise of "AI Slop" in project documentation—generic, filler text that sounds professional but means nothing.
The "Generator" Trap
- • "Auto-write descriptions"
- • "Expand text" buttons
- • AI-generated subtasks (often irrelevant)
- • Result: Information Inflation
The "Synthesizer" Advantage
- • "Summarize thread"
- • "Extract action items"
- • "Find conflicting dates"
- • Result: Attention Conservation
The most valuable resource in your organization is not computing power; it is human attention. Any tool that generates more text than it consumes is an attack on that resource.
For a broader look at how software features often distract from core work, see our analysis on The Complexity Tax.
Key Takeaways for Decision Makers
- 1Friction is a filter. Don't celebrate the removal of writing effort unless you have a plan to manage the resulting flood of reading effort.
- 2Buy "Readers," not "Writers." Prioritize AI features that summarize, filter, and extract over those that generate, expand, and create.
- 3Ban the "AI Button" for critical updates. Enforce a culture where high-stakes communication must be human-written to ensure accountability.