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AMERICANALMANAC (Alan Benson) - Deerfield Beach pizza owner rejects AI after bots seize Instagram and stonewall recovery Sun Oct 4 17:25:29 2026

A Deerfield Beach pizza shop drew nearly 110,000 TikTok views by swearing off artificial intelligence, after an AI profile hijacked its Instagram and Meta answered only with more bots. Munchy Su runs the family-owned Munchy’s Pizza, a mom-and-pop spot in Deerfield Beach known for creative, over-the-top pizza and wing creations. Last month the shop’s social […] The post Deerfield Beach pizza owner rejects AI after bots seize Instagram and stonewall recovery appeared first on American Almanac .

A Deerfield Beach pizza shop drew nearly 110,000 TikTok views by swearing off artificial intelligence, after an AI profile hijacked its Instagram and Meta answered only with more bots. Munchy Su runs the family-owned Munchy’s Pizza, a mom-and-pop spot in Deerfield Beach known for creative, over-the-top pizza and wing creations. Last month the shop’s social media posts declaring it would not use AI reached tens of thousands of people, with one TikTok collecting more than 25,000 likes and nearly 110,000 views along with a wave of comments backing the stance. CBS News Miami reported that Su’s vow grew out of a simple belief: machines should not replace people. The same coverage described how that view hardened after the shop’s own bruising run-in with automated systems. Su has been in the food business since he was a child and opened his own place after high school in 1991. He has called the restaurant a dream come true. He is not interested in handing any of that work to a computer. "I feel like I will never, as long as I'm alive, have a computer take over a human being's job," Su said. Instagram hack left the shop talking only to machines A few years ago the shop’s original Instagram page, which had more than 30,000 followers, was hacked by what Su described as an AI profile. The business had already spent thousands of dollars promoting the account. Getting it back proved another lesson in automation. Su said the shop spent three months trying to reach Meta. Every reply came from AI. No human ever responded. "We spent thousands and thousands of dollars promoting the account. We tried to get in contact with Meta for three months. Every time they would answer, it was AI. No human ever got back to us," he said. That experience sits behind the shop’s public refusal to use AI. Online commenters largely sided with him. For a small business that built its following the hard way, the message was straightforward: real people make the pies, take the orders, and answer the phone. Owner sees jobs at risk while a business dean sees net gains Su believes AI jeopardizes jobs. University of Miami Business School Dean Paul Pavlou offered a different macro view in the same reporting. "At the macro level, we expect more jobs to be created by AI," Pavlou said. He pointed to hospitality as one of the larger workforces least likely to see heavy displacement anytime soon, because the work is hands-on and requires people to deliver service. His prediction for Miami-area industries was limited change in the near term and a net increase in jobs overall. "Hospitality is probably one of the largest workforces that will probably not be affected tremendously by AI; at least in the foreseeable future, those are more manual jobs, so you need human beings to provide services. My prediction is that we probably won't see major changes in the industries in Miami, but likely more jobs that will be created," Pavlou said. He also flagged two standing risks: systems that go rogue and bad actors who put the technology to harmful use. He expects AI to settle into everyday life either way. Broader figures cited in the coverage cut both ways. The World Economic Forum has said AI integration has already created 1.3 million jobs globally. McKinsey & Company has estimated that 11 million people will need to switch occupations by 2035 because of AI. Su’s kitchen is not a white paper. It is a counter, an oven, and a payroll that depends on people showing up. Small shops still answer to customers, not algorithms Munchy’s built its name on over-the-top pies and wings, not on chatbots or automated order flows. Su started the work as a kid and has kept at it for more than three decades. When the shop’s Instagram vanished into an AI profile and Meta’s help line turned out to be more AI, the owner drew a line he says he will not cross while he is alive. The viral TikTok did not invent the anxiety around machines and work. It simply put a local pizza maker’s choice in front of tens of thousands of viewers who recognized the stakes. One shop in Deerfield Beach is not going to settle the national argument over AI and employment. It can still decide that a human being takes the order and a human being makes the pie. Customers who want a real person on the other end of the counter just got a clear signal from one Florida kitchen: the machines can wait. The post Deerfield Beach pizza owner rejects AI after bots seize Instagram and stonewall recovery appeared first on American Almanac .