AI Series #1 - The Digital Genesis: From HTTP to Hackers
Context
In this series of articles, I'll talk about AI and its impact on innovation from a software engineer's point of view, and how it challenges the internet culture of innovation
(image generated by dall-e 3, text corrected by GPT4-turbo)
Introduction
From the early age of the internet to today, we have witnessed how a simple new idea such as HTTP from a proposal by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989 created a new world of information that dominates the world's economy nowadays.
The Rusty Playground
During those days, the internet was this rusty playground created by some crazy architect with unfinished construction and some bare metal pipes coming out, the first kids to play there had the freedom to play and experiment with everything. They were considered geeks, nerds, and were pretty much underestimated; they were the first to improve it.
This is where we saw those hackers becoming painters and began to create and invent the world that we know. It was during this time that we saw social medias, search engines, marketplaces, and all the foundations of the modern internet we use. They benefited from what we call a "tech overhang," a special moment where technology had advanced drastically enough to create this innovation abundance. Simply put, with the internet, everything was yet to be created; we had the technology, we were just missing the relentless effort of the makers.
A Depleted Mine
This led us to our online world where an idea has most likely been tried or failed rather than being an innovative one. Internet software innovation was like a mine with a finite amount, the first miners were lucky enough to try hard and find creation materials; overtime, it got depleted.
Software innovation had limited throughput these last few years due to intense competition and not many new domains to disrupt. We reached the limit of the internet of information we know, the market matured, the innovation slowed down, and regulators began taking over.
This scenario has led people to become hackers again, in a quest to discover new edge technology, new mines, new ideas.
AI, the frontiers of the new pioneers
Attention Is All You Need, a paper from 2017, created a leap forward in our technology. It's the breakthrough that led to the AI craze we have right now. The appearance of a new tech overhang. The potential of this technology to reshape information is massive and may bring enough innovation potential for the next few years.
We've already seen companies being created such as OpenAI and Mistral, and some companies are fully reshaped by AI like Tesla and Nvidia.
Hackers are out, building in the open again, which is truly beautiful. ComaAI, by George Hotz, is setting new standards in self-driving technology, while MistralAI demonstrates the best in open LLM technology. They are laying new foundations in this evolving digital playground, sparking creativity across the entire community. This resurgence gives the community the chance to be creative once again. A new layer of thought is being formed that can shape the future, repeating the tech overhang phenomenon where the widespread adoption of HTTP and HTML once created giants like Facebook and Google.
In the upcoming articles, we will talk about the transformative impact of AI technologies. Exploring how they continue to reshape industries, redefine our interactions with internet in general.