I was reading Casey Newton’s latest newsletter last night and got the feeling he had almost landed on a very big point.
Every time I feel like progress in artificial intelligence is beginning to slow, a week like this one hits — and suddenly, it's all I can do to keep up.
He goes on to discuss OpenAI’s announcement this week that the company is acquiring Jony Ive’s one-year-old startup, IO, for $6.5 billion in stock. OpenAI has just signaled that it is going to start making hardware, and has recruited the world’s most famous hardware designer to lead the effort.
But there’s another way to interpret that opening line. OpenAI runs an incredibly effective comms operation. They are engaged in a communications campaign. And the purpose of the campaign is that whenever it starts to feel like progress in AI is slowing down, there needs to be another announcement or product demo that makes it feel like the future is fast-arriving.
Or, put another way, the reason OpenAI just spent $6.5 billion in stock to bring Jony Ive on board was that it was beginning to feel like progress in AI was slowing down, and they had to keep priming the pump.
For OpenAI to stay in operation and keep building the next generation of its product line, it needs constant infusions of investor cash. It needs the big money. Sovereign wealth fund money. Softbank money. And that means it has to feel like the future.
The result is that everything becomes speculative finance. Sam Altman HAS to keep stoking the futurity vibes. That’s a material necessity, whether you’re an OpenAI critic or a booster. He needs the money spigot to keep flowing, which means maintaining investor confidence, which means keeping up the cadence of exciting-sounding news.
Maybe with enough money, time, and talent, OpenAI manages to build the next generation of computing. Or maybe OpenAI is a hype-bubble that eventually collapses like a dying star. Either way, the necessary precondition is that the company maintains the aura of futurity until it either gets there or runs out of public confidence — Fake it till ya make it, but as a trillion-dollar business plan.
It’s a rotten game. We have been playing it for far too long. The stakes have gotten way out of hand.
The least we can do is name it for what it is.