4 ms·

LLMs might be a bit of a special case, but branding these other things as "tech" is basically part of the hype game -- to vicariously exploit the aura of benefi

LLMs might be a bit of a special case, but branding these other things as "tech" is basically part of the hype game -- to vicariously exploit the aura of beneficence around "tech". That said, take a look at the Gartner hype cycle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gartner_hype_cycle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gartner_hype_cycle The same game has been playing out across varying contexts over a long time. This is nothing specific to "tech" -- "tech" just happens to be a brand with positive connotations, for today. For a deeper take on the dynamics of the evolution of a new social trend, see https://meaningness.com/geeks-mops-sociopaths https://meaningness.com/geeks-mops-sociopaths Once tech became "cool", the scene would inevitably expand beyond the "geeks" to attract people would would want to exploit it selfishly.

alex-moon 4y ago
Yes this would be my answer as well. The phenomenon OP is referring to is "hype" and it has existed for as long as money has existed. Specifically, once leverage (debt financing of investment) gets involved, you enter what we now call the "Minsky moment", after Hyman Minsky's financial instability hypothesis (FIH), specifically the third phase, what Minsky called the Ponzi phase, after famed scam artist Carlo Ponzi. The first recorded example of a Minsky moment is the so-called Tulip Mania of the 1630s. ETA: OP specifically mentions "tech" - so the first appearance of consumer tech is in the 1920s (cars, radios, etc.), a decade which was, in fact, characterised by Ponzi-esque overleveraged speculative investing. In reality, this wasn't investing only in tech specifically, but a massive spike in consumer tech purchasing was one of the key signals for investors at the time. This ended with the now very famous Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression.

alex-moon 4y ago

Yes this would be my answer as well. The phenomenon OP is referring to is "hype" and it has existed for as long as money has existed. Specifically, once leverage (debt financing of investment) gets involved, you enter what we now call the "Minsky moment", after Hyman Minsky's financial instability hypothesis (FIH), specifically the third phase, what Minsky called the Ponzi phase, after famed scam artist Carlo Ponzi. The first recorded example of a Minsky moment is the so-called Tulip Mania of the 1630s. ETA: OP specifically mentions "tech" - so the first appearance of consumer tech is in the 1920s (cars, radios, etc.), a decade which was, in fact, characterised by Ponzi-esque overleveraged speculative investing. In reality, this wasn't investing only in tech specifically, but a massive spike in consumer tech purchasing was one of the key signals for investors at the time. This ended with the now very famous Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression.