Why the AI economy is like a bad dating app — drowning in decks, pilot purgatory — and it's playing out like the dotcom bubble, except worse
Amy Webb was on her long Sunday bike ride, the one she takes when she’s not training for a race, when the thought arrived fully formed. As she posted on LinkedIn recently: every CEO she talks to is buying abundance, and none are budgeting for the cost of abundance. And she talks to CEOs every day for a living.
TL;DR
- CEOs are buying AI abundance without budgeting for its true costs, leading to expensive ongoing expenses.
- Companies are stuck in 'pilot purgatory' with numerous generative AI pilots that do not scale.
- Information overload from AI-generated content is causing decision paralysis among executives.
- AI implementation is cheaper to start but its costs compound significantly, creating a 'shockingly uncomfortable' situation.
- Webb predicts a potential economic reckoning as early as next year due to missed AI targets.
- The current AI situation differs from the dotcom bubble, with unique costs and a potential for economy-wide 'weird decisions' or 'AI hallucinations'.