AI: Bubble, Revolution, or Mass Hallucination?

Is AI genuinely the next industrial revolution, or are we watching another dot-com-style J curve flatten in real time? From NVIDIA’s outsized role in the market to why most companies still can’t point to productivity gains, Jaime Peters and Cindy Goodwin-Sak dig into the numbers, the psychology, and the leadership practices that actually move AI from pilot to payoff. We compare today’s AI moment to two past bubbles, the dot-com era’s “Napster moment” and the 2008 housing slowdown, to explain why flattening, not falling, often breaks a boom. And we ask the tough question every CFO is already thinking: who’s going to foot the $5 trillion AI infrastructure bill if enterprise adoption plateaus? What you’ll hear: * The market vs. the office: Why consumer enthusiasm (hello, ChatGPT) isn’t the same as enterprise deployment* The data reality check: Adoption stats from recent surveys and why the curve may be stalling* The money math: $5T in expected AI spend and the annual revenue required to make it pencil out* Productivity or pipe dream: What it would actually take for AI to deliver broad 5–10% productivity gains* Lessons from past bubbles: How “flattening” broke the dot-com and housing booms, and what that signals for AI* Leadership playbook: Practical steps to turn AI from novelty to value (create time to experiment, share use cases, lead by example, reward progress)* Strategy for incumbents: Why most companies should expect evolution, not revolution, while still carving out a focused lane for real product/service disruption Who should listen: * Executives and investors trying to read the AI tea leaves * Operators and team leads under pressure to “do AI” and show results * Anyone curious about what’s signal vs. noise in the AI economy Hot Take:Is AI a bubble or a revolution? Yes. It can be both, and your results will depend less on GPUs and more on leaders who know how to turn experimentation into measurable outcomes.Listen now: Seriously, What Could They Be Thinking?, hosted by Jaime Peters and Cindy Goodwin-Sak. Keep your spreadsheets handy and your coffee strong. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit whatcouldtheybethinking.substack.com