Professor G's Unfiltered Take: Is Big Tech's AI Obsession Just a Grand Illusion?

Ah, Scott Galloway. You know him, don't you? The self-proclaimed 'Professor G' – never shy, always opinionated, and quite frankly, often spot on, even if his delivery is, well, unapologetically direct. For once, he's turned his laser focus, his almost surgical skepticism, onto the biggest tech buzzword of our time: Artificial Intelligence. And honestly, he isn’t just gently prodding; he’s taking a sledgehammer to the entire premise, labeling much of it as nothing short of a “boondoggle,” a “grift,” perhaps even a full-blown “scam.”

It's true, the man has a knack for cutting through the Silicon Valley jargon, doesn't he? He sees past the shiny presentations and the breathless proclamations, straight to what he perceives as the cold, hard, profit-driven truth. And right now, for Galloway, that truth is that AI, at least as presented by the tech behemoths, feels a lot like smoke and mirrors. He posits that these giants, the Apples and Googles and Microsofts of the world, are, in essence, trying to distract us. Distract us from what, you ask? From the uncomfortable reality that some of their core products might just be, whisper it, stagnating or even, dare I say, deteriorating.

Consider Google Search, for instance. A product many of us use countless times a day, almost instinctively. Galloway argues – and you could say, not without some justification – that its quality has been quietly slipping. Filled with more ads, less relevant results, and now, with AI integration, sometimes even outright "hallucinations" – those confidently wrong answers that make you scratch your head. Is AI, then, really about making search better, or is it, as Galloway suggests, a new, expensive veneer slapped onto an increasingly rickety structure? A fair question, don’t you think?

He pulls no punches, does he? According to Professor G, these companies aren't just innovating; they’re engaging in a rather sophisticated shell game. They're investing staggering sums, billions upon billions – Microsoft’s OpenAI bet, for example, comes to mind – not purely for the sake of technological advancement, but to fuel a narrative. A narrative that says, "Look at us! We're at the cutting edge! We're revolutionary!" when, in truth, it might be more about keeping investors happy, driving up stock prices, and perhaps, crucially, avoiding pesky regulatory oversight.

And what about the human cost? That’s a dimension Galloway often brings to the forefront. He's genuinely concerned about the implications of this AI gold rush – the potential for massive job displacement, the creeping erosion of genuinely human experiences, and the concentration of even more power in the hands of a select few. He’s not alone in these worries, mind you, but he voices them with a particular kind of thunder. The recent drama at OpenAI, with Sam Altman’s very public ousting and subsequent return, well, that only served to fuel his point, didn't it? It showcased, if nothing else, a certain degree of internal chaos and a stark reminder that even the most heralded AI ventures are, at their heart, still very human institutions, fraught with very human ambitions and rivalries.

So, where does that leave us? Are we, the consumers, the general public, simply being sold a bill of goods? Is this AI wave just another iteration of a tech bubble, destined to burst much like the dot-com era, leaving behind a trail of dashed hopes and overvalued companies? Galloway certainly makes a compelling, if unsettling, case. He wants us to look beyond the hype, to question the motives, and to truly evaluate whether this new technological frontier is a genuine leap forward for humanity, or simply a convenient "grift" designed to enrich the already super-rich. And frankly, in a world often blinded by technological dazzle, his contrarian voice feels, for once, incredibly necessary.