Much AI-do About Nothing?

The Histrionics + The Hoopla + The Hype

Oct 21, 2025

Depending on who you ask, artificial intelligence is either the greatest thing since sliced bread or the end of civilization as we know it. Few seem able to find the middle ground, the nuanced space between utopia and apocalypse. But that’s usually where the truth lives — somewhere between panic and praise.

AI has become the latest cultural Rorschach test. Tech bros call it a revolution. Academics call it a threat. Artists call it theft. Politicians call it confusing. And the rest of us are just trying to figure out how to use it without accidentally deleting our hard drives or losing our jobs.

Like every “next big thing,” AI is being served to us with a generous helping of marketing spin and moral panic. Depending on the headline, it’s either writing sonnets better than Shakespeare or secretly plotting humanity’s extinction. But the reality, as always, is less cinematic. AI isn’t sentient, self-aware, or particularly wise. It’s clever code predicting patterns based on data we feed it — which means it reflects us, for better and for worse.

The hype cycle feels familiar. We’ve seen it with the internet, social media, crypto, NFTs, the metaverse, and just about every other “disruptive” technology that came before. Each promised to change everything. Each did, in some ways. But none lived up to the mythology.

To be clear, AI is powerful. It’s reshaping industries, democratizing creativity, and raising serious ethical questions. It deserves our attention, regulation, and respect. But maybe not our hysteria. We can be curious without being terrified, skeptical without being cynical, and hopeful without being naïve.

At the end of the day, AI is a tool — not a god, not a villain, and certainly not a miracle. Like fire, electricity, or the internet, it can illuminate or destroy, depending on who’s holding the match.

So before we declare the dawn of a new age or the death of human creativity, maybe we should all take a breath. The future isn’t written yet — and for now, at least, we still get to decide how much intelligence, artificial or otherwise, we bring to it.

Keep calm and ChatGPT on (or not)!
Clint 🌈✌️

P.S. Big thanks to Dr Ray Lightbown for joining me this morning (my time) for a friendly hangout. Since it was just the two of us, I decided not to record it. Our conversation went deep and I’d rather keep it private than turn it into “content.”

P.P.S. For me, not every conversation needs an audience. Some of the best chats I’ve had only live in the moment, shared between two or more people simply being human together.

That said, going forward, I’ll be scheduling at least one hangout (mornings my time) and one happy hour (afternoons my time) a month. Stay tuned for more details…

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FYC = FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION

ON THIS DAY = OCTOBER 21

BIRTHDAYS

1772 = Samuel Taylor Coleridge = English poet, philosopher, and critic
1833 = Alfred Nobel = Swedish chemist and engineer, dynamite inventor, and Nobel Prize founder
1891 = Leo Burnett = American advertising executive
1911 = Mary Blair = American illustrator and animator
1917 = Dizzy Gillespie = American trumpet player, composer, and bandleader
1917 = William Dale Jennings = American activist and writer 🌈
1924 = Joyce Randolph = American actor
1925 = Celia Cruz = Cuban-American singer
1927 = Howard Zieff = American director and photographer
1929 = Ursula K. Le Guin = American author and critic
1942 = Judy Sheindlin = American judge and tv host
1945 = Everett McGill = American actor
1953 = Peter Mandelson = British politician 🌈
1955 – Catherine Hardwicke = American filmmaker
1956 = Carrie Fisher = American actor and screenwriter
1958 = Greer Lankton = American artist 🌈
1959 = Ken Watanabe = Japanese actor and producer
1959 = Melora Walters = American actor, director, and writer
1964 = Megan Smith = American engineer and technologist 🌈
1976 = Andrew Scott = Irish actor 🌈
1976 = Jeremy Miller = American actor and singer
1978 = Michael McMillian = American actor
1982 = Matt Dallas = American actor
1983 = Aaron Tveit = American actor and singer

1988 = Glen Powell = American actor

EVENTS

1824 = Portland cement is patented.
1879 = Thomas Edison applies for a patent for an incandescent light bulb.
1940 = The first edition of Ernest Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls is published.
1959 = In NYC, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum opens to the public.
1964 = My Fair Lady, directed by George Cukor, is released in theaters.
1983 = Rumble Fish is released in theaters.
1983 = Mystic Pizza is released in theaters.
2016 = Moonlight is released in theaters.