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What could have been

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Re: What could have been

#21

Post by simonw »

ipsin wrote: post #12

I wonder about the world where, instead of investing in AI, everyone invested in API . Like, surfacing APIs, fostering interoperability... I don't want an AI agent, but I might be interested in an agent operating with fixed rules, and with a limited set of capabilities. Instead we're trying to train systems to move a mouse in a browser and praying it doesn't accidentally send 60 pairs of shoes to a random address in…

LLMs offer the single biggest advance in interoperability I've ever seen.

We don't need to figure out the one true perfect design for standardized APIs for a given domain any more.

Instead, we need to build APIs with just enough documentation (and/or one or two illustrative examples) that an LLM can help spit out the glue code needed to hook them together.

Re: What could have been

#22

Post by emp17344 »

ninetyninenine wrote: post #4

I disagree. The hype is wearing people down and making it think it's a waste of time but LLMs just came out a couple years back and even the trendline from the past decade (pre-LLMs) is up up up. The amount of interest to explore this opportunity is worth it. The bubble is worth it. I don't think it's lost years, and even if it is, the technology is compelling enough to make the gamble worth it. The fatigue of readin…

Of course fairly quick progress was made - a truly astounding amount of money was poured into this industry in a short timeframe. The thing is, now it’s clear that AI isn’t really valuable enough to justify investment on the same scale anymore.

Re: What could have been

#23

Post by nicoburns »

simonw wrote: post #6

This raises an interesting question. The amount of money that's been spent on AI related investments over the past 2-5 years really has been astonishing - like single digit percentage points of GDP astonishing. I think it's clear to at there are productivity boosts to be had from applying this technology to fields like programming. If you completely disagree with that statement I have a hunch that nothing could convi…

Green energy, including generation, but also storage, transmission, ev chargers, smart grid technology, etc would be the obvious thing to invest in that I would expect to have a much higher payoff.

Re: What could have been

#24

Post by jh00ker »

>What could have been if instead of spending so much energy and resources on developing “AI features” we focused on making our existing technology better?

I think we'd still be talking about Web 3.0 DeFi.

Re: What could have been

#25

Post by justonceokay »

user3939382 wrote: post #19

I've been watching this my whole life. UML, SOA, Mongo, cloud, blockchain, now LLMs, probably 10 others in between. When tools are new there's a collective mania between VCs, execs, and engineers that this tool unlike literally every other one doesn't have trade offs that make it only an appropriate choice in some situations. Sometimes the trade offs aren't discoverable in the nascent stage, a lot of it is monkey-see…

Wait until the kids find out about LAMP

Re: What could have been

#26

Post by busterarm »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #20
epistasis wrote: post #8

While I'm somewhat sympathetic to this view, there's another angle here too. The largesse of investment on a vague idea means that lots of other ideas get funding, incidentally. Every VC pitch is about some ground-breaking tech or unassailable moat that will be built around a massive SAM; in reality early traction is all about solving that annoying and stupid problem your customers hate doing but that you can do for…

> Every VC pitch is about some ground-breaking tech or unassailable moat that will be built around a massive SAM A surface-to-air missile? As funny as that would be, maybe you should define your terms before you try to use them.

[flagged]

Re: What could have been

#27

Post by 1oooqooq »

simonw wrote: post #6

This raises an interesting question. The amount of money that's been spent on AI related investments over the past 2-5 years really has been astonishing - like single digit percentage points of GDP astonishing. I think it's clear to at there are productivity boosts to be had from applying this technology to fields like programming. If you completely disagree with that statement I have a hunch that nothing could convi…

railways only lost investor money because everyone was investing in a national Monopoly, so the when we did get the Monopoly everyone else lost everything. sounds like a skill problem. plenty of value was created and remain in use for decades, completely different from Slop today.

Re: What could have been

#29

Post by wnc3141 »

user3939382 wrote: post #19

I've been watching this my whole life. UML, SOA, Mongo, cloud, blockchain, now LLMs, probably 10 others in between. When tools are new there's a collective mania between VCs, execs, and engineers that this tool unlike literally every other one doesn't have trade offs that make it only an appropriate choice in some situations. Sometimes the trade offs aren't discoverable in the nascent stage, a lot of it is monkey-see…

you forgot IoT

Re: What could have been

#30

Post by busterarm »

nicoburns wrote: post #23
simonw wrote: post #6

This raises an interesting question. The amount of money that's been spent on AI related investments over the past 2-5 years really has been astonishing - like single digit percentage points of GDP astonishing. I think it's clear to at there are productivity boosts to be had from applying this technology to fields like programming. If you completely disagree with that statement I have a hunch that nothing could convi…

Green energy, including generation, but also storage, transmission, ev chargers, smart grid technology, etc would be the obvious thing to invest in that I would expect to have a much higher payoff.

Are they really? Is this one of those "just because people say so" beliefs?

The countries adopting these the most are declining economies. It's places that are looking for something to do after there's no more oil left to drill up and export.

You know where fossil fuel use is booming? Emerging (e.g., growing) economies. Future scarcity of such resources will only make them more valuable and more profitable.

Yes, this is a dim view on the world, but until those alternatives are fundamentally more attractive than petrochemicals, these efforts will always be charity/subsidy.

If you're expecting that to be the area of strong and safe returns on investment, I've got some dodgy property to sell you.

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