[cabirum]

The keyword is "hype". It seems like any new "thing", no matter how useless, will get its hype cycle rolling.

Crypto, NFT, Blockchain, AR, Metaverse, -- from the top of my head -- now AI. The point of hype is to attract investment. Big Corps must be driven by the fear of missing out on yet another world changing shiny new thing.

[ctoth]

Is your assertion that because there have been other hyped things in the past, that nothing which is spoken of positively will ever actually be useful? Because you're gonna miss some pretty big stuff with those sort of glasses on. You know what else was hyped? Most everything you use today. Sometimes people use something and are absolutely blown away by it and are excited to talk about it. Not everything is 100% fake yet, I promise.

[macNchz]

I think there is a degree of fatigue from the stream of breathless "this is going to change the world, if you disagree you're wrong or don't understand, and if you don't participate you'll wind up poor" takes. We're barely one year out from nearly identical language around NFTs and "web3".

IMO these AI technologies have obviously more tangible utility than some of the other hyped things on the list, however a lot remains to be seen about where they go.