There are new technologies that don’t go anywhere and then there are new technologies that are useful. Built into your post is the assumption that AI is a new technology that is useful because of the comparison to innovative startups that have benefited from the early adoption of useful new technologies.

However, there are startups that have bet on the wrong technologies and perished, which is not addressed. This is survivorship bias. So if we’re going to have a serious discussion, we need to talk about both sides before anybody should get convinced about being bullish on it.