1) New buzzword
2) Rush to start a startup
3) Get VC money
4) ?????
5) Buy a yacht with the loot
Its quite reasonable to have a simple and appropriate name for a broad and powerful set of emerging technologies. And if they live up to a tenth of the promise, it would be reasonable for there to be a lot of buzz about them.
Just like Web 3.0
"new" ? I think the term has been around as long as the web. It was pretty much Berners-Lee's idea.
Maybe it's just recently been hyped up to buzzword status.