Melania Trump urges parents to prepare their children for the growth of A.I. and argues the technology should be treated as if it were a child itself. First lady Melania Trump attends a meeting of the White House Task Force on Artificial Intelligence (AI) Education in the East Room at the White House in Washington, D.C., Sept. 4, 2025. FRONT AND CENTER: First lady Melania Trump hosted an artificial intelligence meeting with top industry leaders, including Google CEO Sundar Pichai Thursday, as she stressed the importance of managing AI's growth "responsibly." WORLD-CHANGING: If you were investing in the late 1990s, you'll remember the euphoria of the dot-com boom. Anything with a ".com" at the end of its name could raise millions in capital and see its stock price double or triple overnight.

It must be admitted that the reputation of artificial intelligence as a "panacea" is far ahead of it. Research, demonstrations, and publications in this field only reinforce this assumption. The topic has an almost magical attraction for many people. With all the great possibilities, however, we should don't get carried away and look at the issue more soberly and practically. When the government and some other institutions promised billions some time ago, the euphoria was great at first. Not much has remained of this euphoria (at least in Germany) and where / whether the billions will flow in their entirety, nobody knows exactly.

The 2019 Consumer Electronics Show featured all sorts of new and cool stuff, from big and beautiful televisions that roll up from a box to all sorts of voice-activated home comfort and security devices. Flipping switches, pushing buttons, and even typing inputs now all seem to be just a few years from oil lanterns and hanging clothes on a line. Oh, there were a few throwback items scattered about, such as old-timey phonographs that plug into your home theater via bluetooth, and apparently Pong is trying to make a high-tech comeback although I have my doubts as to whether anybody seriously missed it in the first place. But these exhibits were very few and very far between and, oh, and if you are curious then I'll advise that I didn't see any wireless 8-track players (don't forget the matchbook) or hints that Intellivision is about to make a high-tech comeback. There were also a lot of exhibits for something that couldn't be seen, because it simply doesn't exist in any hard physical sense, and can be gauged only by its uses.

At first blush, the aging pop star Billy Joel wouldn't seem to have much to tell us about automation and the future of work. His main contribution to forecasting was the dystopian "Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway)," a 1976 song that ends with the island of Manhattan being sunk at sea. (Spoiler: It's 2017 and the island of Manhattan is very much buoyant. However, in sifting through the constant barrage of headlines, reports, projections, and warnings about robots and automation, the hook of another Billy Joel song, "Summer, Highland Falls," comes to mind: "It's either sadness or euphoria." Those seem to be the polar reactions to the advent of the next wave of disruptive technology. Automation and artificial intelligence, we are told, have the capacity to replace all manner of jobs quite soon. And the result will likely be sadness on a massive scale for many workers.

Investors dropped 681 million into A.I.-centric startups in Silicon Valley last year. This year, the number will likely reach 1.2 billion. Five years ago, total A.I. investment spiked at roughly 150 million. This is how Silicon Valley works: When something new is hyped and seems to have investor trust, everybody jumps on the train without asking, "Where does this train go?" The truth is that artificial intelligence does not exist yet, and most companies claiming to have A.I. technology are arrogantly re-selling an old concept of machine learning -- a technology that was first introduced in 1959 but which truly started to take off in the 1990s.

Investors dropped 681 million into A.I.-centric startups in Silicon Valley last year. This year, the number will likely reach 1.2 billion. Five years ago, total A.I. investment spiked at roughly 150 million. This is how Silicon Valley works: When something new is hyped and seems to have investor trust, everybody jumps on the train without asking, "Where does this train go?" The truth is that artificial intelligence does not exist yet, and most companies claiming to have A.I. technology are arrogantly re-selling an old concept of machine learning -- a technology that was first introduced in 1959 but which truly started to take off in the 1990s.

Investors dropped 681 million into A.I.-centric startups in the Valley last year. This year the number would reach 1.2 billion. Five years ago total A.I. investment piked at roughly 150 million. This is how Silicon Valley works: when there is a new hype that seems to have investor trust everybody jumps on the train without asking any questions. No one asked: "Where does this train go?"