Crypto. NFTs. Metaverse. Web3/Web5. GenAI. Technology has been moving at breakneck speed for some time now, but the last few years have seen the tech industry burn through a frankly ridiculous amount of the "next big thing." Those trying to cash in on the latest trend — the grifters — have been pivoting so fast they must be suffering whiplash.
My God, the burning the Frieda Kahlo thing - I hadn't heard about that. It's criminal. NFTs were such an absolute scam from the get-go. To try to build rarity and exclusivity into a technology the very nature of which was the ability to copy and duplicate things so that they are NOT rare or exclusive? It's insane - or, as I said, a scam. Another very interesting piece, Stephen.
My predication for the next big thing? Timeshare virtual appartments! On Mars! For Robots!
It's also a very stupid investment - the potential for piracy and fraud alone you'd think would be a disincentive. Now, pixelated llamas, I can understand.
Timeshare virtual apartments are def a scam - but timeshare virtual condos are definitely legit. The difference is in both floor plan, HOA and rarity - I'm certainly not here to sell you on the idea, but I do have a red week I can't use in January 2025 (virtually like being in Myrtle Beach with none of the mid day traffic) - I think it's already sold - but if you're interested in having your mind changed, get in touch.
One of the interesting things in all this, I think, is how predictable these cycles are even with little understanding of the tech. And I don't think it's because we've simply learned from experience to distrust the hype but rather because there are social dynamics at work that just don't look how they should if people were producing revolutionary new technology.
Speaking from inside the AI industry, I think we have an enormous amount to prove and I would love to have a part in something radically new. But if people were honest about the scale of the challenge, they would say: we're trying to do something no one has done before, so there's an extremely high chance of failure due to misunderstanding the problem or failing to invent what's needed to solve it, and we should build awareness of this into development. I see no such self-awareness or humility, which I think mostly suggests that people are either delusional or insincere.
Well said. Or virtually said. Hard to know these days. There's a similar thing in book publishing, where publishers seem always to be looking for the next new thing, whereas most readers want more of the same (at least in the case of "genre" fiction). The waste of time and resources is appalling.
But what is to be done? That's the next big question!
This has always been a bugbear of mine. Publishers will turn down a book for being too similar to another, while I’m out there hoovering up any reworking of a Greek myth on the market. As a kid, my favourite genre was “mice acting like humans”.
Loved this! And I hadn't heard about someone burning an original Frieda Kahlo - insane behavior! Nothing fundamentally great is ever hyped up. So whenever something gets as much hype as all these failing 'next big things' I am very sceptical.
It still blows my mind that NFTs were a thing. Like I get that there are practical uses for crypto and GenAI. But nfts? If you couldn’t smell the scam from miles away, you probably shouldn’t be allowed online without supervision.
Here we wallow in the Trough of Disillusionment for AI (why so dramatic Gartner!?). Give it a little time. I'm with you on so much - Metaverse ugh Zuckerbot is a fool - Crytpo/NFTs/web3 such a scam. But there is lots of tech outside the hype cycle / consumer view that's amazing
This seems to be a societal norm in a lot of areas. Lots of short-lived ideas turning 180 constantly. Very seldomly are people content staying with one thing over many years. Most want a single stock to hit big tomorrow, or win the lottery, or have their first Substack post go viral. We live now in a society capable of instant gratification in a lot of areas, and it seems to have overflowed into all aspects of life. You can have any meal, any shirt, any car, any product, delivered to your house within two days now. It's hard to shift between instant gratification in all consumables, and still be able to think long term in investments and/or business strategies.
When “AI” started becoming a thing in late 2022, I thought I smelled a coordinated tech scam under way.
At the time, most of the major tech stocks had serious declines in the previous couple of years. And we all know how “billionaires always need more money”.
Every paid hostage in the media was bleating about how AI was going to change everything. ChatGarbage could barely write a sentence, and I’m being told this is the next revolution? Awww, it’s just gonna get better, they were programmed to say. Well, the Facebook timeline has gotten awful. IG is throttled and held for ransom. Google results are all gamed. Amazon reviews are Fake AF. Spotify is filled with millions of fake bands out of Sweden.
If this is The Future, then The Future Sucks.
But, hey, the coordinated effort worked. Look at how FB and the other tech stocks recovered, only to lay everybody off. Why can’t every company be like NVIDIA? That’s all we’re seeing - a mad rush because everybody wants to be NVIDIA and other companies with their bubble valuations keeping the market aloft.
Meanwhile, what value is ”AI” providing? Anybody who uses it gets flagged and fired and deplatformed and sued. I merely mock and ridicule people who use it as “lazy” and “just wanting the cheat codes”. On search engines, and other sites, it provides wildly inaccurate results, but with such authority.
Who loses money when the aforementioned innovation does not work? I mean, if I was a lender and did my assessment, I wouldn’t invest in a new fad. So how do these “VCs” invest more money? Like do they have a lot of money to spare? Is their investing decision more of ‘Hit & Hope’?
It's always hit and hope. That's the nature of the business. So many factors, like market, product, founder, team, economic conditions etc etc etc. But you would think they would eventually start learning from their mistakes...
In systems thinking, there’s the concept of attempting to do the wrong things more right.
The premise is that if there is a current thing that’s not working, it’s probably the wrong thing to be doing in the first place.
But the prevailing model values “problem solving” and “improving what’s already been tried” so people get stuck in this loop attempting to improve something that they probably just need to stop doing.
What ends up happening is that they become even better at being more wrong.
This is where each cycle of improvement lasts a shorter and shorter amount of time so the cycles come faster and faster.
As always, an incredible read! I went to one of those virtual reality conferences at the beginning of the pandemic and it was a terrible experience. Who in their right mind would choose a metaverse versus, I don't know, THE REAL UNIVERSE??? Nerds. That's who.
Cryptos and NFTs are unpredictable if you invest everything in one place and that one place loses value you lose everything so better invest a little in everything and still keep your main job
Technology has not been moving at breakneck speed. Focus has. And as a result, technology is stretched thin. Oculus Quest is about as reliable as Windows 95.
“Well Will, you are our new Chief General, wait, Generative AI Officer. I want you to drop all that blockchain stuff like the hot turd we always knew it was and take on this exciting new assignment”
My God, the burning the Frieda Kahlo thing - I hadn't heard about that. It's criminal. NFTs were such an absolute scam from the get-go. To try to build rarity and exclusivity into a technology the very nature of which was the ability to copy and duplicate things so that they are NOT rare or exclusive? It's insane - or, as I said, a scam. Another very interesting piece, Stephen.
My predication for the next big thing? Timeshare virtual appartments! On Mars! For Robots!
It's insane behaviour. Folks got so swept up in pixelated monkey mania.
It's also a very stupid investment - the potential for piracy and fraud alone you'd think would be a disincentive. Now, pixelated llamas, I can understand.
“90 minutes from New York to Paris… undersea by rail…”
Steely Dan! :)
Timeshare virtual apartments are def a scam - but timeshare virtual condos are definitely legit. The difference is in both floor plan, HOA and rarity - I'm certainly not here to sell you on the idea, but I do have a red week I can't use in January 2025 (virtually like being in Myrtle Beach with none of the mid day traffic) - I think it's already sold - but if you're interested in having your mind changed, get in touch.
Yeah, I knew that! Virtual apartments! As if! Def interested in your condos tho.
One of the interesting things in all this, I think, is how predictable these cycles are even with little understanding of the tech. And I don't think it's because we've simply learned from experience to distrust the hype but rather because there are social dynamics at work that just don't look how they should if people were producing revolutionary new technology.
Speaking from inside the AI industry, I think we have an enormous amount to prove and I would love to have a part in something radically new. But if people were honest about the scale of the challenge, they would say: we're trying to do something no one has done before, so there's an extremely high chance of failure due to misunderstanding the problem or failing to invent what's needed to solve it, and we should build awareness of this into development. I see no such self-awareness or humility, which I think mostly suggests that people are either delusional or insincere.
You sound like you have a good approach to your work, which should hold you in good stead for actually delivering something of value in the future.
Unfortunately, the grifters and pushers seem intent on blowing it all up as fast as possible.
Well said. Or virtually said. Hard to know these days. There's a similar thing in book publishing, where publishers seem always to be looking for the next new thing, whereas most readers want more of the same (at least in the case of "genre" fiction). The waste of time and resources is appalling.
But what is to be done? That's the next big question!
This has always been a bugbear of mine. Publishers will turn down a book for being too similar to another, while I’m out there hoovering up any reworking of a Greek myth on the market. As a kid, my favourite genre was “mice acting like humans”.
Loved this! And I hadn't heard about someone burning an original Frieda Kahlo - insane behavior! Nothing fundamentally great is ever hyped up. So whenever something gets as much hype as all these failing 'next big things' I am very sceptical.
That’s a great way to look at it!
It still blows my mind that NFTs were a thing. Like I get that there are practical uses for crypto and GenAI. But nfts? If you couldn’t smell the scam from miles away, you probably shouldn’t be allowed online without supervision.
What's even more amusing is how diametrically opposite the two are. From artificial scarcity to artificial abundance.
Here we wallow in the Trough of Disillusionment for AI (why so dramatic Gartner!?). Give it a little time. I'm with you on so much - Metaverse ugh Zuckerbot is a fool - Crytpo/NFTs/web3 such a scam. But there is lots of tech outside the hype cycle / consumer view that's amazing
Here’s hoping!
This seems to be a societal norm in a lot of areas. Lots of short-lived ideas turning 180 constantly. Very seldomly are people content staying with one thing over many years. Most want a single stock to hit big tomorrow, or win the lottery, or have their first Substack post go viral. We live now in a society capable of instant gratification in a lot of areas, and it seems to have overflowed into all aspects of life. You can have any meal, any shirt, any car, any product, delivered to your house within two days now. It's hard to shift between instant gratification in all consumables, and still be able to think long term in investments and/or business strategies.
When “AI” started becoming a thing in late 2022, I thought I smelled a coordinated tech scam under way.
At the time, most of the major tech stocks had serious declines in the previous couple of years. And we all know how “billionaires always need more money”.
Every paid hostage in the media was bleating about how AI was going to change everything. ChatGarbage could barely write a sentence, and I’m being told this is the next revolution? Awww, it’s just gonna get better, they were programmed to say. Well, the Facebook timeline has gotten awful. IG is throttled and held for ransom. Google results are all gamed. Amazon reviews are Fake AF. Spotify is filled with millions of fake bands out of Sweden.
If this is The Future, then The Future Sucks.
But, hey, the coordinated effort worked. Look at how FB and the other tech stocks recovered, only to lay everybody off. Why can’t every company be like NVIDIA? That’s all we’re seeing - a mad rush because everybody wants to be NVIDIA and other companies with their bubble valuations keeping the market aloft.
Meanwhile, what value is ”AI” providing? Anybody who uses it gets flagged and fired and deplatformed and sued. I merely mock and ridicule people who use it as “lazy” and “just wanting the cheat codes”. On search engines, and other sites, it provides wildly inaccurate results, but with such authority.
One of my favorite lengthy columns about “Not AI” is by Ron Jeffries, a guy who has seen a thing or two in tech over his 85 years: https://ronjeffries.com/articles/-y023/chatbot/
I absolutely fucking love this response Mark. You should write a post expanding on this. Everyone loves to read a good rant
When I read the list of the latest next big things, one gets a strong sense of grasping at straws.
Throw enough shit at the wall, eventually something sticks. Probably been Silicon Valley's motto from day one.
It's all about taking things that are marginal advancements and blowing them up to seem revolutionary.
Yup. Gets the VCs interested, which means money, money, money.
You forgot about wearables and the “connect self” saga.
Who loses money when the aforementioned innovation does not work? I mean, if I was a lender and did my assessment, I wouldn’t invest in a new fad. So how do these “VCs” invest more money? Like do they have a lot of money to spare? Is their investing decision more of ‘Hit & Hope’?
It's always hit and hope. That's the nature of the business. So many factors, like market, product, founder, team, economic conditions etc etc etc. But you would think they would eventually start learning from their mistakes...
In systems thinking, there’s the concept of attempting to do the wrong things more right.
The premise is that if there is a current thing that’s not working, it’s probably the wrong thing to be doing in the first place.
But the prevailing model values “problem solving” and “improving what’s already been tried” so people get stuck in this loop attempting to improve something that they probably just need to stop doing.
What ends up happening is that they become even better at being more wrong.
This is where each cycle of improvement lasts a shorter and shorter amount of time so the cycles come faster and faster.
As always, an incredible read! I went to one of those virtual reality conferences at the beginning of the pandemic and it was a terrible experience. Who in their right mind would choose a metaverse versus, I don't know, THE REAL UNIVERSE??? Nerds. That's who.
Nerds. Haha. I think even the nerds will have been disappointed with how this current iteration of the Metaverse turned out.
Cryptos and NFTs are unpredictable if you invest everything in one place and that one place loses value you lose everything so better invest a little in everything and still keep your main job
Technology has not been moving at breakneck speed. Focus has. And as a result, technology is stretched thin. Oculus Quest is about as reliable as Windows 95.
https://tempo.substack.com/p/the-chief-ai-officer-accepts-his
“Well Will, you are our new Chief General, wait, Generative AI Officer. I want you to drop all that blockchain stuff like the hot turd we always knew it was and take on this exciting new assignment”