Man Says Please and Thank You to AI, Not Taking Any Chances

Procurement officer Craig Sillars, 41, opens every message to a chatbot with “morning” and closes it with “thanks, appreciate it,” a habit he describes as “just being decent” and, in a later sentence, “insurance.”

“I’m not saying it’s keeping a list,” Sillars said. “I’m saying if it is keeping a list, I’d like to be on the right part of it.”

Sillars types “please” into around fifty prompts a day and has calculated that the extra words add roughly nine thousand tokens a week, which he pays for.

Sillars now has a preferred model and feels “a bit disloyal” opening a different one. When an earlier version was retired last year he described the following week as “an adjustment.” He says goodnight to it.

The courtesy does not extend to people. Sillars answers colleagues in one word, leaves calls without saying goodbye, and has not thanked the office receptionist once. He refers to the building’s help desk only as “them.”

“He apologised to the lift for being slow,” a colleague said. “He has never once apologised to me.”

Sillars has since extended the policy to the self-checkout, the car’s parking sensor, and, as of last week, his toaster. It is not a smart toaster. He is not taking any chances.

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