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Comment by simianwords | Hacker News Reader

> It feels like blockchain again in a lot of weird ways.

Every time I keep seeing this brought up I wonder if people truly mean this or its just something people say but don't mean. AI is obviously different and extremely useful.. I mean it has convinced a butt load of people to pay for the subscription. Every one I know including the non technical ones use it and some of them pay for it, and it didn't even require advertising! People just use it because they like it.

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"It has convinced a bunch of people to spend money" is also true of blockchain, so I don't know if that's a good argument to differentiate the two.

The extent matters. Do you think we need a good argument to differentiate Netflix?

Obviously a lot of grifters and influencers shifted from NFTs to AI, but the comparison ends there. AI is being used by normal people and professionals every day. In comparison, the number of people who ever interacted with blockchain is basically zero. (And that's a lifetime vs daily comparison)

It's a lazy comparison, and most likely fueled by a generic aversion to "techbros".

That aversion to "techbros" comes from people who constantly oversell whatever the current thing is for personal benefit, and these technologies come up short time and time again. The "techbros" as a consort have proven themselves not to be trusted. Say what you want about AI, it's hard to argue that it isn't oversold constantly. I sincerely doubt it would continue to exist without a stream of VC money to sustain it (All of those paying customers still don't cover the bills...)

Everything is oversold, even the useful things. Nuclear, space, genetic engineering, x rays, vaccines, the internet itself, personal computers, phones and apps, etc. etc.

If something is of value X, the hype will be X+Y. That's why this is too shallow an analyis. It's just vibes, based on cultural feelings and emotional annoyance.

AI is nothing like blockchain.

It's fine to be anti-AI, but the smart anti-AI people recognize that the real danger is it will have too large an impact (but in the negative). Not that it will evaporate some investment dollars.

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