Part of me feels the fact that EVERYONE is saying that there’s a huge AI bubble makes me wonder if there’s actually a possibility there isn’t an AI bubble. Because I was around for the dot com and GFC bubbles and no one (not really) saw those coming. Also, China is pretty much doing everything right these days, and they seem to believe in AI too.
And I’m not against AI in any and all forms. Like, I think there’s huge potential in translating foreign languages. I think it would be cool if people could talk in their native languages but have AI translate things perfectly - which I understand is something AI can do. There are some simple functions in my job (like searching through and summarizing things from our very massive list of policies). But even thinking about the absolute best case scenarios for AI, I can see how the current expectations are even close to what the reality can be.
So what is the argument that we’re not in a bubble, even if we don’t actually believe it?
I don’t think its going to pop into some huge financial crash but it will deflate eventually. Probably when there’s some new shiny tech to invest in. Then all the attempts to cram AI into everything will pass but there will still be slop generators and there still will be AI companies like Anthropic entrenched in the economy.
Keep in mind that the real players in this field are using the investments to justify building real computer hardware infrastructure that will be very relevant after the AI bubble deflates.