When will the AI butler be here?
When will the AI butler be here?
This is the Three Data Point Thursday, making your business smarter with data & AI.
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Let’s dive in!
Big data was big years ago, but that faded away… until it reappeared maturely. Until the Googles of this world basically owned complete markets thanks to their use of big data - we don’t really call it big data anymore.
ChatGPT, generative AI, and LLMs are here and hot now. So, at what point when will those reappear in a mature form? One that captures 100% of markets, one that basically puts itself into all of our hands?
When will we finally have our AI butlers, the ones that feel totally natural, that fit into our lives like an iPhone fits into our pockets today?
Let’s ask Marc Andreessen and Tim Urban…
When???
In 15 years, that’s when. In 2038, we will look back and say, “Wait, it’s only been 15 years?”
"It took just 15 years from the first GUI to the iPhone" - Marc Andreesen (In an interview with Lex Friedman)
Windows 3.0, the first good graphical user interface for the computer, came out in 1993. Mosaic was the first graphical web browser in 1992/93.
Since then, both computer adoption and internet adoption across the globe just gone bananas.
Technology shrank in size, and in 2007, we were presented with the first iPhone, just 15 years later - the mini-computer that gave all of us around the globe easy internet access, the ability to move money everywhere, the power to learn anything, inside a GUI that perfectly fits our lives.
So the question becomes, when will ChatGPT, the LLMs of this world, or basically our AI butler be at this stage? there is no good reason not to say: In 15 years.
ChatGPT in 2023 was where the computer was with Windows 2.0; it looks like ChatGPT 3 & 4 are our new Windows 3.0, propelling all of us forward.
Both are driven by roughly similar underlying forces (exponential growth of the technology driven by Moores Law).
So I forecast that in 15 years, by the time my daughter turns 18, we will have everyday AI capabilities in everyone’s hand, and I mean everyone on the planet (mostly).
But are we sure this is true? Of course not, but if we take Tim Urban’s perspective, we should realize we genuinely live in astonishing times.
“Just the fact that we’re going to witness, in our lifetimes, one of the great leaps for all of life. This isn’t normal.” (Tim Urban in discussion with Tim Ferriss)
Tim Urban likes to point out that if we imagine human history as a big book with 700 pages, it’s an incredibly boring book until about page 699 (which basically is the last 2,000 years of our history). So…. we’re born at the bottom of page 700 - how could page 701 not be incredible?
What you should remember
There are two things you should take away from this.
It is likely our world will change in incredible ways over our lifetimes
We’re still at the beginning of the AI revolution. So I suggest you grab whatever part of this rocket you can catch, and hold on tight!
No, it’s not too late to create another AI start-up, it’s the right time to do so!
It’s all going down in about 15 years. ;)
Here are some special goodies for my readers
👉 The Data-Heavy Product Idea Checklist - Got a new product idea for a data-heavy product? Then, use this 26-point checklist to see whether it’s good!
The Practical Alternative Data Brief - The exec. Summary on (our perspective on) alternative data - filled with exercises to play around with.
The Alt Data Inspiration List - Dozens of ideas on alternative data sources to get you inspired!