"AI is a bubble!" Yea, So What?

Michael Aguilar
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“AI is just a bubble!” Yep, sure is. So what? That’s no reason to ignore it, or to brush it off as a fad. While nobody can be 100% sure exactly how it will make the world look in five years, you can be sure the world will look different.

Calling something a “bubble” is often a way to dismiss it. But history shows that even when a bubble pops, the underlying technology doesn’t just go away. It sticks around and changes everything.

We’ve Been Here Before

Remember the past few decades? We’ve seen this movie before.

  • The Personal Computer revolution
  • The Internet dot-com bubble
  • The Mobile explosion
  • The shift to the Cloud

Each one was called a bubble. Each one had a period of wild over-investment, followed by a correction or crash. Companies went bust. Fortunes were lost.

And yet, here we are. The technologies didn’t just survive; they became the foundation of modern business and life.

They All Have This in Common

There’s a pattern to these technological shifts.

First, there’s a flood of money. Too much is spent, too quickly, often on bad ideas. The hype outpaces the reality.

Second, nobody really knows how to use the new technology effectively… at first. The first websites were little more than digital brochures. Early mobile apps were often clunky novelties. It took time for people to figure out what the technology was actually good for.

Finally, after the initial hype dies down and the bad ideas are washed away, the technology thrives. It becomes integrated into everything we do.

AI is following the same script. The main difference this time is the sheer amount of money being spent—it dwarfs what we saw during those earlier bubbles. That just means everything is happening faster.

The Spreadsheet Proves The Point

If you want to see how these “bubbles” stack on top of each other, look no further than the humble spreadsheet.

It started on a Personal Computer. The Internet allowed you to collaborate and email it. Mobile put that spreadsheet in your pocket. The Cloud lets you access it from any device, anywhere.

And now? AI is being built right into spreadsheets to generate formulas, analyze data, and create summaries.

AI is just the next layer. It’s not a standalone fad; it’s a capability that will permeate every other technology we already use. To ignore it is like trying to run a business today with an unconnected PC. It just doesn’t work.

The Bubble Only Matters to a Few

The only people who should care about whether AI is a “bubble” in the financial sense are those whose job it is to buy and sell stocks. They can worry about valuations and market timing.

For the rest of us, fixating on the bubble is a distraction. The real question isn’t “will the bubble pop?” but “how will this technology change my job and my business?”

Plan for the Inevitable

There aren’t a lot of jobs for people who were experts in pre-internet technologies. The world moves on.

Instead of debating the financial hype, you should be planning, researching, and experimenting.

  • If you run a business, you need to be thinking about how AI can make your operations more efficient and what new products or services it makes possible.
  • If your job is in technology, you’re at the forefront. You need to understand how to build with, manage, and secure AI-driven systems.
  • If your job is in any other field, you need to figure out how AI will impact your role. Every knowledge-based job will be affected, one way or another.

The AI bubble might pop, or it might just deflate slowly. It doesn’t matter. The technology is here to stay.