Hype Cycles Are a Feature

Where this goes

Hype cycles are not a bug. They route capital and attention fast, overshoot, and leave real infrastructure behind when they recede. The trick is knowing which part is the residue.

Calling every agent a copilot flattens a real distinction. A copilot suggests; an agent acts. Pretending the two are the same thing is how teams end up surprised by their own tools.

Benchmarks measure what is easy to measure, then quietly become the goal. A number that goes up is not the same as a product that got better, and the gap is widening.

The loudest predictions, in both directions, are usually the least useful. Doom and utopia are each a way of avoiding the boring middle, which is where the actual work happens.

Hype cycles are not a bug. They route capital and attention fast, overshoot, and leave real infrastructure behind when they recede. The trick is knowing which part is the residue.