Explain Yourself.

I'm going to guess that over the last ten years, ten trillion dollars has been spent on advertising and public relations selling things life crypto, NFTs, big data, various legal drugs, electric vehicles, quantum computing and, mostly AI.

A quick read from Google Ngram (which plots the prevalence of a given word or phrase from a body of publications) indicates that I'm not "smoking something." It seems today every third word is AI-adjacent. (The data reflected above stops at 2022.

The graph's curves are probably, in fact, steeper.)

In any event, though trillions have been spent promoting the latest and greatest, and billions of people seem to be enjoying the techno-Kool-Aid, I'd guess that the worm will turn for many of these so-called advances because no one has taken the time or made the effort to show normal people how they work.

The investment in AI in the US may reach 2-percent of GDP this year--up from 1/10th of a percent in 2022. That's a 1900-percent increase. Before I sink an economy, I'd like to know why. If only because:

The term "railway bust" in England around 1880 is most closely associated with the aftermath of the Railway Mania, a speculative frenzy that peaked in the mid-1840s and collapsed shortly thereafter. The mania led to the authorization of numerous railway projects, resulting in the construction of approximately 6,220 miles of track between 1844 and 1846. However, the speculative bubble burst causing investment to stop almost overnight. This collapse left many companies without funding and investors, including many middle-class families who had invested their life savings, with no return on their investments.

In all my decades working for technology companies, I've never been told or have been able to find any information about the efficacy and efficiency of virtually any modern-day technology.

This IBM ad from 58 years ago tells me the following:

"In 1953 it cost $1.17 to get a business letter from one businessman's head to another businessman's hands. 

Today it costs $2.49. 112.8% more. Per letter. 

In 1955 a secretary to handle those communications cost $4,539 in salary and overhead. Today it's $6,396... 

Between 1960 and 1965, the number of professional, technical and managerial people creating paperwork increased 22% over the number of people to do it... 

...Used systematically throughout an office, these two pieces of IBM equipment alone have increased people's productivity by 50%. 

Today, as I said above, literally trillions are spent telling us adjectivally about the splendors of this, that or the other thing. I've yet to see anyone anywhere (at a time when we get hundreds of always-on, always-cloying, always-annoying messages a day) or any AI say, "In a recent survey of one-thousand office workers, a staggering 82% said they were able to research problems more thoroughly and arrive at the right answer 41% more often and over 36% faster.) 

Or even using sports as an example, I've never read, "During the 2025 season, the Sandusky Dodgers used AI exclusively to call pitches. Their team ERA decreased from 3.44 to 3.17, wins increased by 22% and overall ticket and concession sales increased by 66%."

Is information of this ilk not obtainable? Do we not ask the questions? Or is all of this tech a sham with no measurable results other than FOMO?

 

If I were selling EZ-Pass or even, by application RFID technology, I could use the photos above and write, "RFID saved the average commuter 200 minutes of commuting time a week--that translates to 166 fewer hours of commuting a year. The reduction in emissions was equivalent to taking 1853 cars completely off the road."

Back when I was coming of age, Esquire magazine, ran an occasional feature called 'actual size.' I suppose the column was based on this 1966 ad by DDB written by an ex-boss, Ron Rosenfeld. It was interactive 30 years before the word was invented.

There wasn't a reader on earth that didn't compare themselves accordingly.

 

Likewise, I would think these ads would still be effective today. Letting you show yourself why something works better.

I can't believe humanity has changed so much that we think seeing is no longer believing.

I think what's changed is an industry enamored with stunts and trends and self-congratulation more than evidence, argument, empathy and conviction.