Artificial intelligence is losing hype

Gently raise these issues with a technologist and they will look at you with a mixture of disappointment and pity. Haven’t you heard of the “hype cycle”? This is a term popularised by Gartner, a research firm—and one that is common knowledge in the Valley. After an initial period of irrational euphoria and overinvestment, hot new technologies enter the “trough of disillusionment”, the argument goes, where sentiment sours. Everyone starts to worry that adoption of the technology is proceeding too slowly, while profits are hard to come by. However, as night follows day, the tech makes a comeback. Investment that had accompanied the wave of euphoria enables a huge build-out of infrastructure, in turn pushing the technology towards mainstream adoption. Is the hype cycle a useful guide to the world’s ai future?