Robert Birming

The internet ruined everything

A client told me that he used to have a business sending out paper booklets with coupons and offers to various companies.

"But then" he said, "the Internet came along and ruined everything”.

And now we have the AI era. You can pretty much divide the responses into two groups:

But the fact remains that it's here, and it's not going away - nor should it.

It's still early days for AI and things will change, just like they did with file sharing and streaming services. Some changes will be "good" and some will be "bad", depending on whether you're a praiser or panicker.

At the end of the day, it's not AI, file sharing, or the invention of the phone that's the problem. It's people's fear of change. That's the fundamental problem with so many things in our society.

And yet, we live in a world that's constantly changing. We wouldn't be here if it weren't for the universal magic of change and adaptation. It's always been like this and always will be...

The Greek philosopher Heraclitus recognized this a few thousand years ago:

The only constant in life is change.