(https://opengameart.org/content/pixel-robot)
So first off, to no one’s surprise, I am not just a massive fan of old retro gaming but an engineer working in computers. I adopted AI a tad bit earlier than some, but for sure not a hipster amount, ChatGPT 3 level. It really took my favor and awe. The ability to skip stack overflow and get my code questions answered, and even some samples, or to find out how tall the Pyramid of Giza was…, fast forward to the present, where I use it for 90% of my job, and I even run my own local LLMs at home, learning AI skills, and contemplating having an OpenClaw butler.
But, in a recent set of news, I started to realize little by little that I was in a bubble much like the Crypto Bros or the Web3/NFT bros, whom I previously so unabashedly made fun of. I realized I was becoming a schill for the OpenAI and Claude’s of the world, and I had fallen for the Groupthink that AI was the next big thing, but I realized that many non-engineers, like my wife and my Gen Z kids accepted that they had to use Ai to “survive” but that none of them actually enjoyed the use of it. I started to do some research by listening to non-tech-bro podcasts and news, and realized that AI, for all its coverage, was not a “well-liked” technology.
I recently heard a VergeCast podcast that also covered this topic, and for them, and for the AI executives and VC firms, it is also a surprise that people did not like AI. What really surprised me was that it did not occur to me to compare it to the famous true innovations like “the open web,” “the smartphone,” and “streaming media,” etc.
The Open Web - people initially were wary of it and even fearful, but it quickly became evident that it was as important as the Invention of electricity, and people quickly adopted it, paid for it, but the most important part is they became enamored with the web and used it to make blogs, businesses, and to be "creative". Oh yeah, there was a bubble created by a bunch of greedy companies, and this bubble burst within 5-6 years, and all was good with the world. Most importantly, it made us humans more creative and connected to others to bring us closer together.
The Smartphone - people thought it was an expensive luxury show off, but having the open web, an instant camera, and your family on video chat became an instant sensation, It made us feel safe when walking/driving In unfamiliar places, allows us to speak languages we will never learn, allows us to carry and Instant camera that we can capture our baby’s first words. The smartphone further made us humans more creative and more connected to other cultures and each other.
(Note: I am strategically leaving social media off here because that was the greedy corporate side effect and its algorithm ways, and that also happened on the Open web, but It Is not the thing itself. Corporate greed is everywhere.)
Streaming media - people at first did not enjoy the pixel/Garbly mess of Flickr, early YouTube, RealPlayer, Shoutcast, but they quickly realized that sharing short videos, pictures, radio, and audio was a thing that made them feel happy. It brought us shows like "The Hot Ones", "Stranger Things", and those quirky Influencers that teach us or mind-numb us. Yet again, this technology made us humans more creative, understanding, and connected to others to bring us closer together.
AI and LLMs - we are now 3 years into this LLM chatbot experiment, where it has spread to many "normal" people and many, many users every day to Google search, to Spreadsheet, to Ingest data, and quickly find out the size of the Pyramid of Giza. But, besides us tech bros using it to parse massive data, to buy them the best lightbulbs, or to magically create the dream app they always wanted, I realized that if I step back and think, the non-tech/biz people only speak negatively, and or acknowledge it as a thing that we all have to use now to stay employed. This prompted me to find out if I was in a bubble
Here are some choice stats from the research I did on normal human reception to AI in 2026.
“The majority of registered voters, 57%, said they believe the risks of AI outweigh its benefits, compared with 34% who said the opposite.” (NBC News report)
“U.S. adults are generally pessimistic about AI’s effect on people’s ability to think creatively and form meaningful relationships: 53% say AI will worsen people’s ability to think creatively, compared with 16% who say it will improve this. An identical share (16%) says AI will make this skill neither better nor worse.” (Pew Research)
“AI will worsen rather than improve people’s ability to form meaningful relationships (50% vs. 5%)” (Pew Research)
“Gen Z adults are worried that using AI makes people lazier and less intelligent. Specifically, 79% of young adults expressed concern that AI makes people lazier, and 62% worried it makes people less smart.” (Harvard Business Review)
My suspicions of myself living in a bubble were confirmed to my satisfaction. I had led myself to believe that this AI revolution was for the good of mankind and the thing that consumers will love, but after reading non-tech news about AI and reading people’s perceptions, I have come to realize that this is just another utility that people have come to accept in their lives because giant tech companies and bubbles tech bros have been telling them, but as a consumer bubble they don’t love it, and in fact they hate the AI slop that is produced (search DLSS5 response).
We live in a world where we have AI reading other’s Ai composed docs and emails, and we each day have an arms race as to whose AI's model is better than others, but to what end? I don’t see sentiment changing, and we are a few years in now with this AI. This does not feel like the Open Web or the SmartPhone or Streaming Media, Tech execs keep trying to turn consumer opinion that with spending their $20 a month, their lives will become better. But, they don’t realize that the normal person does use Gemini and ChatGPT every day, not because they love it or want it, It Is because It Is what is being used to remain relevant in a dismal, quick world. But, now we come to the most important fact, like Satya Nadella (CEO of Microsoft) said recently, AI needs Social Permission to exist and to succeed. I claim that AI has failed the most Important feature of these other tech revolutions:
AI tech products have YET FAILED prove to be able to make us humans "truly" more creative, more understanding of other cultures, and do not even bring us closer and connected to each other. As long as it fails to do this, AI will continue to exist but will never be beloved like the other tech revolutions that came before it. I hope and pray that technology companies will figure this out at some point, and it can be another chapter in the betterment of humanity through technology.
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