Don’t Burst Your Bubble

In our last post, we shared a comment from a trade publication about the possibility of an AI bubble comparable to the dot-com bubble of the early 2000s. Because it intrigued us and didn’t coincide with our gut reaction, we decided to find out what others thought. Here’s what we found.

According to The Next Web, IntuitionLabs, and other sites and publications, the likelihood of an AI bubble bursting like the dot-com bubble is 20 to 40 percent over the next one to three years. Most of the reasons given are market projections and financial estimations (valuations). We’re not so sure.

We’ll go out on a limb to suggest the people working with AI, at least in the insurance industry, aren’t doing it for market projections or AI-company valuations. They’re working with AI to improve their processes, to make their operations more efficient, to make it easier to do business with them, to save people time, to satisfy their policyholders’ expectations, to save their policyholders money, and to improve their policyholders’ experiences as customers.

What Do You Count?

Economists and market-hawks describe the dot-com bust as a classic bubble correction. Prices detached from reality due to hype (there’s an understatement) and easy money (or the temporary appearance of it). Some of its lessons focus on profitability and sustainable growth. And some may apply to later tech cycles. But not all.

Two points by way of illustration:

We heard a comment in an interview once. A gentleman who was the CEO of a very successful company was asked why there was nothing on the company’s website about financial performance, market share, profits, et al. He was asked why the content of the company’s site had to do with the company’s people. The man said, “We learned a long time ago you become what you count.”
In a LinkedIn post about AI (which stands, after all, for artificial intelligence), someone wrote in the comments, “There is no intelligence without consciousness.”

People use AI. Markets do not. People have the consciousness to apply AI, to make judgments (not rote, mechanical, programmed output that passes for decisions). AI does not. People have the ability to mitigate consequences. AI does not.

This is Not Frankenstein

The abiding lesson of Frankenstein is that, like Victor, we all have to live with the monsters we create. Given the fact that we (people) created the dot-com bubble, considering its monstrous consequences, and since we do have consciousnesses and memories, we’ve likely learned enough not to let those consequences be repeated.

So, how about this? Count your people. And count on them to use their intelligence for greater goods than market projections and valuations.

The benefits we gain may very well be our own.