That is to say, we're in the dot-com boom, circa 2000. Many companies will go bust. It may take years before we see this era's Facebook (now Meta), Twitter (now X), or TikTok emerge. "People are reluctant to imagine what could be the future in 10 years, because no one wants to look foolish," says Alison Smith, head of generative AI at Booz Allen Hamilton, a technology consulting firm. "But I think it's going to be something wildly beyond our expectations."

Major drugmakers are using artificial intelligence to find patients for clinical trials quickly, or to reduce the number of people needed to test medicines, both accelerating drug development and potentially saving millions of dollars. Human studies are the most expensive and time-consuming part of drug development as it can take years to recruit patients and trial new medicines in a process that can cost over a billion dollars from the discovery of a drug to the finishing line. Pharmaceutical companies have been experimenting with AI for years, hoping machines can discover the next blockbuster drug. A few compounds picked by AI are now in development, but those bets will take years to play out.

In hindsight, ChatGPT may come to be seen as the greatest publicity stunt in AI history, an intoxicating glimpse at a future that may actually take years to realize--kind of like a 2012-vintage driverless car demo, but this time with a foretaste of an ethical guardrail that will take years to perfect. What ChatGPT delivered, in spades, that its predecessors like Microsoft Tay (released March 23, 2016, withdrawn March 24 for toxic behavior) and Meta's Galactica (released November 16, 2022, withdrawn November 18) could not, was an illusion--a sense that the problem of toxic spew was finally coming under control. ChatGPT rarely says anything overtly racist. Simple requests for anti-semitism and outright lies are often rebuffed. Indeed, at times it can seem so politically correct that the right wing has become enraged.

It's not new that the emerging artificial intelligence technology aims to take over the writing space. High-end and intermediate writers have expressed cynical views and even fears over the AI writing software introduction. According to them, the concept behind the creation is to help lessen the workload of writers. In the meantime, the number of AIs has surpassed expectations. From small companies to big names in tech, AIs are attempting to become the next big thing for content marketing.

Sudhir Jha, senior vice president and head of Mastercard's Brighterion unit, told Karen Webster in the most recent On the Agenda discussion that artificial intelligence (AI) can strengthen credit and risk management and broaden its value well beyond simply improving day-to-day operations. But to get there, enterprises need a bit of guidance. "What used to be cutting-edge technology five years ago is no longer cutting edge," he said, and enterprises that try to keep up with the rapid changes in data science and analysis on their own can be quickly overwhelmed. The enterprise that starts with regression and pattern analysis solutions might scale rapidly and find benefit from neural networks. For banks, acquirers and healthcare payments executives, he said, using vendors' AI-based solutions help to avoid undue losses from fraud, the abuse and misallocation of funds and poor underwriting decisions.

The new approach, replacing stringent protections that currently bar practically all home-delivery options, goes into effect in two months, but some requirements are likely to take years to implement. The detailed regulations, which total more than 700 pages and parts of which had been in the works since the Obama administration, also aim to address concerns related to law enforcement, national security and privacy protection. "They get us closer to the day when we will more routinely see drone operations such as the delivery of packages," FAA chief Steve Dickson said in a written statement accompanying the rules. Mr. Dickson has told colleagues he intends to stay on under the Biden administration, according to people involved in the conversations, to fill out the remainder of his five-year term ending in 2024. The rules are unlikely to be affected by other personnel changes.

The internet of things (IoT) has huge potential. According to one forecast, there will be a trillion connected computers in the world by 2035, built into everything from cars to toasters. Collectively, such IoT devices, which record, monitor and communicate data, herald what some call the "second phase of the internet". Companies at the forefront of IoT are set to be the winners of the future. But we have yet to see what industries and uses will benefit the most.

Nvidia's $40 billion acquisition of Arm is a hugely significant deal for the tech world, with implications that will take years to unravel spanning many areas of the sector. But if you listened to the press babble coming from the two companies over the last 24 hours, you'd think there was only one factor driving the purchase: artificial intelligence. "AI is the most powerful technology force of our time. It's the automation of automation, where software writes software," Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told journalists during a press call this morning. "Together, [Nvidia and Arm are] going to create the world's premier computing company for the age of AI." On the same call moments later, Arm CEO Simon Segars repeated these sentiments.

Amid much fanfare, Canada's Big 3 telecom companies introduced fifth-generation networks in major cities earlier this year and a few smartphones with 5G capabilities are now available for sale. Yet after years of promises about next-generation wireless powering self-driving cars and robotic surgery, it's still unclear exactly what the newly launched networks are currently able to do. The short answer, experts say, is that it will take years to understand the true potential of 5G. Catherine Rosenberg, who holds the Canada Research Chair in the Future Internet and the Cisco Research Chair in 5G Systems at the University of Waterloo, says there are a lot of misconceptions. "Everybody's positioning themselves for marketing reasons, trying to say they are occupying the space of 5G, but full-fledged 5G is not for tomorrow," Rosenberg says.

With an unavoidable recession in the cards, what can we expect in the coming months? How quickly can markets, societies and small businesses recover? The past decade was successful overall, showcasing phenomenal four-times S&P growth and close to seven-times Nasdaq growth. After crashing in March 2009, both rose in the face of adversity by mid-February 2020. But that all changed by March 2020.