The Purpose Isn’t What It Does

Tim Bray argues against the popular management maxim "the purpose of a system is what it does" (POSIWID), calling it rhetorically weak for understanding why harmful systems exist. He contrasts examples of what he sees as true purposes (GenAI enriching the wealthy, Grok/X promoting fascism) versus commonly misattributed purposes (the internet enabling revenge porn, cars causing climate change), arguing that purposes are plural and often tied to enriching someone, and that clearer rhetoric is needed to fight harmful systems.

Source: https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/202x/2026/09/24/The-Purpose-Isnt-What-It-Does. 8 Sync News only summarizes and links out; content copyright belongs to the authors and original sources.