As I think more and more about the financial musical chairs unfolding in the tech industry, I’m beginning to realize the insignificance of the role of AI. To prove this, I’d like to propose the following thought experiment:

Imagine that AI services all go dark tomorrow morning. Traffic to AI companies like OpenAI and Anthropic goes to zero and they immediately stop making money. Now here’s my question: would this pose any problem for the AI trade at large?

I think that the answer is that it clearly won’t. Investors would be able to continue dumping money into AI startups, the startups would be able to continue paying their hardware fees (whether it be hardware that they buy or lease), big tech would be able to continue building data centers, etc. In other words, the music wouldn’t have to stop.

It seems, then, that the success of AI is completely irrelevant. It’s not even a part of the equation. The “bubble” can and will likely continue to inflate irrespective of the absence of a viable business model. Who gives a shit if 95% of GenAI initiatives fail? As long as the money keeps flowing, you don’t even need any AI products or services.

The mere fact that society can orchestrate a scheme such as this one is an incredible feat of financial engineering. We’ve reached a point where businesses can generate trillions of dollars in economic activity without the need for viable products or services.