Please read till the end. I promise its worth it if you care at all about this platform or the people using it. This is gonna be really sad if no one sees this because this news is truly insane and needs to be known. I was looking through scratch and found the open jobs section. I was just messing around looking at the job application form and whatnot. What I found was mind-blowing to me. I did some research and found this next paragraph I'm going to show you to have been announced in April, however, I don't think its common knowledge to people on scratch. I'd like to share a portion of a paragraph that I found on scratches open job section. I think it will speak for itself. "As we approach our 20th anniversary in 2027, Scratch is entering a new era. We are launching Scratch 4.0, integrating creative AI, and building a new and sustainable operating model for the organization that will include a mix of philanthropic and earned revenue. At a time when artificial intelligence is transforming education, Scratch is defining what creative, human-centered learning can look like. Scratch is more than a platform. It’s a global movement." Sorry, WHAT? Scratch. The creative website that's (mostly) good-natured is planning to integrate AI into this LEARNING ENVIORNMENT. Now, AI for learning might be okay.. at college levels. The majority of the people on here are elementary schoolers or middle schoolers in age. AI should not be introduced into a learning environment for young kids. I learned a really good metaphor for AI in teaching; If I give you a hammer, and tell you to build a house, hiring someone to build that house doesn't mean you can now build one, you've learned nothing. The same applies to AI. If you are given the task to write an essay, and you use AI, you have learnt absolutely nothing. The LEARNING PROCESS is how people grow and retain information to be used later. I see this more and more often in high school and what grade do those kids get? F's and D's. Now on to scratch. Exposing young kids to AI in the time where they are learning the most is a terrible idea. Why? Because it will hinder and cripple their learning. It will cause them to use AI far too much, not develop any skills, and learn nothing from this educational platform. Adding AI into scratch will also encourage them to use AI further. Please. Scratch, do not use AI at all in this platform. Period. I do not trust the Scratch Team to apply AI into this platform safely in a way that kids continue to learn and not become over reliant on it. As for the end statement in that quote, calling scratch a 'global movement' and allying themselves to AI is a dangerous action. AI is not good and I fail to see how so many people are convinced its a good thing currently. Hypothetically, if it is restrained to the right point it can push our world to be better. But currently? it strips away creativity and is known to most people in creative communities to be an absolute plague. Scratch literally said in the quote, "Scratch is defining what creative, human-centered learning can look like." How can they say that while planning to integrate AI into this platform, potentially harming thousands of kids future by making them over reliant on AI. Now, I have nothing against the hypothetical, safe use of AI in our world, its the people using it too much and glorifying it that I don't trust. AI has already proven to be too much for our world to handle. I know that the majority of jobs out there are now using AI to function. And that's fine. But kids should be developing their learning in school, not becoming over reliant on AI to struggle in the workforce later. Now, 2027, the estimated year for Scratch's 4.0 does seem a long ways off, I know, but time flies quickly. I think that people on scratch should know about this as soon as possible if they don't already. Please, help spread the news of this decision made by Scratch in whatever way you can. Remix it, I don't care. If you disagree with me, that's fine, but seeing the impact the overreliance of AI myself, year after year in school, I can't see adding AI to scratch to end in any way except disaster. Thank you for listening. My goal is simply to make people aware of this issue. Just reading through this is enough.
