The PR Guy Who Says the AI Boom Is a Bust

Channels with Peter Kafka

The AI story is changing fast. A few months ago, it was all promise and inevitability. Now even AI boosters are asking if the numbers make sense.

Ed Zitron got there early. He runs a PR firm for a living, which means he’s supposed to help people sell their stories. But he’s become best known for tearing tech’s biggest stories apart. And he’s been pushing at the economics behind the AI boom, via his newsletter and podcast, for some time.

We talk about how he built a career out of skepticism, why the media keeps falling for big tech’s favorite stories, and what happens if the AI party ends early.

(And yes: I wrote the paragraphs above with an assist from ChatGPT — mostly so I can imagine Zitron fuming when he reads this.)

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