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Majority of CEOs Alarmed as AI Delivers No Financial Returns
(futurism.com)
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this post was submitted on 21 Jan 2026
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These are the people in charge of the economy.
"Falling behind" is such a bullshit phrase.
FOMO for CEOs
In this context or period?
Specifically this context. Like "falling behind in school," I get. There are grades. Some people do better while some fall behind. It's a scaler value with a good end and a bad end.
But the AI bros are co-opting the phrase and presupposing that ALL OF TECHNOLOGY is on a linear scale where the good end is more AI shit and the bad end is less AI shit. They're using a scaler when they should be using a vector.
I've mentioned it before on here, but my cousin is taking an AI class in college. He tried to convince my business-owner uncle to let him create an agent for his company's website so he won't "fall behind."
My uncle owns a gas station.
Haha, alright — I totally understand what you mean. Yet another phrase co-opted by those that would rather spend their time seeming intelligent rather than being intelligent.
While it's felt so keenly now, it has always been a part of tech. Some amazing stuff comes out, and thus everything most be amazing and you can't afford to miss out.
In practice, if the tech is truly that great, then you can catch up real quick after waiting to understand if it is great. But everyone FOMOs constantly.
I think it's different this time around. Tech pundits might write "If Apple doesn't have a VR/AR product in the next six months, they're falling behind," but this is the first time in my memory that it's been tech companies staring down consumers and small businesses and saying "If you don't adapt to this technology, you will lose your job."
Send that cousin to trade school so he can telll your uncle to install EV chargers so he won’t fall behind.
I think that definition of "falling behind" is exactly the FOMO that the tech giants want to sell to all the other companies.
I think the FOMO of the tech CEOs is the same as it ever was. Money. In this case it's "What if the magic thing that makes AI dominate the economy happens and I am not leading the pack at just that moment? I might not become one of the first trillionaires! 😭"
It's the "sunk cost fallacy". They've already invested so much, that turning back now means a total loss...when success "might be" just around the corner, if they only invest a little more. In for a penny, in for a pound.
Not just sunk cost, they see all this apparent press, writers, business leaders saying they have fantastic results, so obviously they most be doing something wrong.
I have seen it over and over again in tech. People are told that everyone else in the world is doing great with some tech and everyone is so afraid they are "not getting" something they won't say anything or else they will pretend they also "get it" and it is awesome.
Not even things that have marketing spend behind it, some programming paradigm or whatever. Marketing spend makes it worse, but all by ourselves everyone seems to be afraid to somehow be seen as a clueless Luddite at any second.
It's really weird when you attend some talk where the guy talks up sonething or another and then in more casual private conversation basically admits straight up that he actually doesn't see the benefit, but feels like he has to dance the dance.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor's_New_Clothes
It's crazy how being a "leader" in tech just means latching on to the whatever the latest trend is while kissing maximum ass.
Almost none of these tech companies have their own vision anymore, they just mindlessly copy whatever FAANG or the current trendy startup does.
Just dealt with this forward deployed engineer bullshit created by Palantir. My company spent six months "exploring" this concept that makes absolutely no sense for us because we already have an established product with thousands of customers... And it took them that long to figure this out. But hey Palantir did it and they're the trendy guys right now, so we should try it too so we can also be cool.
Not related to AI but we're in fully brainwashed mode on that too.
When toxic positivity infects the minds of the people making decisions that affect everyone...
The mentality of the gambler. There's a lot of people out there who have this addiction and just aren't fortunate enough to have lucked into becoming a CEO. That's how you know it's a lottery, and being born into riches is a shortcut.
A common phrase of mine is, "the truth is, there is no bus driver at the wheel".
I thought it was Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves driving this thing!
Truly the only group of people worthy of marching us into the sea.
the sea will come to them very soon.