The term “AI” has been used for decades to refer to a broad spectrum of things, often times including algorithms that had nothing to do with machine learning or inference.
Technically, what most of us have a problem with isn’t “AI” as a whole, but just LLMs and how companies are trying to replace people with them. I agree that people should be specific, as there’s a lot of practical application for machine learning and AI that has nothing to do with LLMs.
But you’re not going to get anywhere by trying to change the words people use for these things. We saw a similar thing happen with “smart” home automation devices, and before that it was people complaining about “smartphones” not being actually “smart”. But both of those terms are still in common use.
I don’t think you’ll convince anyone by trying to police the terminology for technical accuracy. The focus should be on the specific problems and harmful effects of how the technology is being used
How often does this come up for you? I rarely even call customer support lines or interact with web page bots, much less encounter AI responses