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"Hype," to me, has always and only had a negative connotation that roughly described it as an empty promise, and nothing more. Be it words on a page or some fro
by 0xEF 3y ago
"Hype," to me, has always and only had a negative connotation that roughly described it as an empty promise, and nothing more. Be it words on a page or some frontman on uppers jumping around in front of an audience, hype is always absent of any concrete proof that what is claimed is also true.
The Mechanical Turk (not the Amazon one) turned out to be a guy in a box. Yet, the mythos that presumably surrounded it was only possible because it was also designed to fool casual examiners. So, even if we argue that the tech demonstration at Conference X shows the product living up to the hype, there is a solid chance it is still an illusion designed to get us to buy in. So, from where I stand, hype is an empty promise intended to deceive.
In the spirit of the original question, I find myself much more curious about how other people define hype.
- rich_sasha 3y agoTo me, hype means great hopes of revolutionizing, or at least materially changing the rules of the game. As opposed to a marginal improvement. We're debating how AI will sweep away whole professions, put people out of jobs and increase inequality. It's totally possible. But I wonder how other things fared in the past, where we thought they will definitely change the world. In other words, is such "hype" a meaningful signal. You can call it something else, essentially it comes down to great expectation of revolutionary impact.
- 0xEF 3y agoI guess I have trouble seeing it from a profit perspective. I understand where you are coming from for sure, and rather like your position to be honest, but I am, perhaps, too jaded to accept it. I'm not sure we're in the era of great thinkers doing great things for humanity anymore, which makes any hype feel like a salesman making a pitch. Admittedly, it is depressing.