When I decided to create artificial intelligence clones of my editors, my intentions were pure: I just wanted them to think I was good at my job. AI assistants are suddenly everywhere in the workplace, and I reasoned that the bots could help me navigate a new workplace and better understand my editors.

But Brian Barrett, my actual manager, was less than enthused. He told me, “Genuinely my nightmare, but will do it for the blog.” It took less than 24 hours for Brian to realize just how much he would regret that decision.

The AI picked up on one key theme: his “‘Yes, and …’ Leadership Style.” It was passable at helping me pick headlines to pitch, but it wasn’t great at coming up with ideas for future articles. Its responses were also grating. It had picked up on a few Brian-isms—a love for parentheticals, for one—but they were negated by AI hallmarks like bolded subheadings and bulleted lists.

Eventually, I moved on to Sophie Bot, my former coworker at Business Insider. It was immediately clear that Sophie Bot was pretty good at being Sophie. It addressed me as “big dog.” When I asked for help, it responded in a series of short, lower-case messages. When I told Sophie Bot that it had hallucinated the existence of an executive, it said, “i am going to FUCKING DIE.”

By this point, I was beginning to enjoy my chats with the editor bots. But the real question is, are we really that replaceable?