When I worked at Facebook, I used to give a talk to all the incoming product managers about science fiction. My message was that the role of product managers—and tech companies broadly—isn't to come up with new ideas. The ideas and inspiration needed are readily available in literature.
Instead, as tech practitioners, our role is to consider the technological tools currently at our disposal to determine which of these sci-fi ideas are ready to be built and to build them. The challenge is to have the judgement and sensitivity to determine the next logical step and the drive to make it happen.
In the last year or two, the big technology companies have been directly borrowing narratives wholesale from science fiction.
Google and IBM are all about artificial intelligence. Everyone is obsessed with VR and AR. Autonomous vehicles and drones are coming to redefine logistics completely.
The ideas are all very familiar to anyone who grew up reading “Snowcrash,” “Dune,” “Ender’s Game,” Asimov, Banks, and Vinge. So too are the debates on good versus evil AIs, social disruption caused by technology, basic income, and more.
What is new is that serious big companies are taking the narratives in these books and accelerating them, talking about them coming to life over the next several years.
They are telling the markets, and their employees, that their mission is now to implement the entire science fiction stack, not just cherry pick those ideas whose time has come.
Multiple Narratives
There is an argument that it is time for many of these science fiction visions to become matters of practical discussion.
Technology boosters make the case that as technology and computers have taken a more central role in our economy, it is reasonable that several new platforms will become important drivers in the next decade where historically there was one dominant platform narrative at a time.
So, in the bull case, if the story of 2000 to 2010 was the internet (with search in the lead position), and 2010 to 2020 is all about mobile (with social), then it is reasonable that 2020 to 2030 will see simultaneous real world flourishing of several important platforms. Those include VR and AR, a transportation revolution spurred by self-driving cars and drones and business intelligence revolutions around AI.
The bull argument goes that some of the visions of science fiction have been pretty accurately fulfilled in the last few decades, so why won’t all the other ideas come to pass in the next few decades?
Staying on the Treadmill
There is, however, a more cynical way to look at the increasing velocity of science fiction stories being put forth by big technology players.
The hypergrowth party is over and the biggest companies are forced to find a new, even more audacious, story to keep the party going.
We are clearly at the end of an incredible period of disruption and growth driven by the back-to-back growth of the internet and mobile. The party of massive growth and big multiples is nearing an end. And while there is still much more to be done around the internet and mobile and plenty of businesses to be built, none of the new platforms that technology companies are hitching their wagons to are going to be ready for meaningful deployment anytime soon. Growth will slow, multiples will compress, and there will not be a big next platform for years.
In the cynical case, the gap between the marketing message and the practical realities is growing, not shrinking.
Moreover, large companies have gotten so big, so successful, and so highly valued that the treadmill is running too quickly. The only way they can keep up is to tell the ultimate vision and then hope they can sustain the dream long enough with their teams and the market to get there.
This case suggests that, the further out tech companies push their narrative into the realm of science fiction tropes, the more we should be concerned that their actual businesses aren’t able to keep up with the massive growth, earnings multiples and expectations for which the world is currently giving them credit.
At the same time, in a competitive market for engineering talent and attention, in an era in which technology is newly “cool,” there is a literal arms race to tell the biggest story possible.
Writing Checks You Can’t Cash
If you believe in the long-term power of technology and that we will eventually build all that is being promised, the difference between the bull and bear case might not matter, save two big immediate issues.
First, framing these visions as near realities opens up a lot of potential for political backlash against technology.
For instance, when people like Elon Musk and others frame the issue of the safety of AI as a practical, rather than philosophical, issue, they unnecessarily scare people in ways that can hamper development. These people aren’t saying anything new about AI. But they are popularizing an abstract debate that is totally out of touch with the actual state of AI and the research being done.
Some may genuinely harbor the fears they espouse. But these proclamations are also a calculated marketing setup to establish power, awe, and respect, rather than denoting actual belief.
Second, and far more importantly, these big bold narratives open up the potential for serious disappointment over long periods of time, even if you believe that ultimately most of what is being worked on will come to pass.
Apple didn’t deliver us Dick Tracy watches in 2014 as everyone hoped when the Apple Watch came out. Most of the assistant AIs and natural language promises that have been made have turned out to be underwhelming.
And VR and AR experiences and adoption have so far lagged expectations. Self-driving cars, the darling promise of 2016, feels like the type of problem where getting to an 80% or 90% solution is easy compared to closing the gap to something that really works. If these projects take decades, not years, will investors, consumers, and teams have the patience to see them through?
Letting your ego write checks that you can’t cash on any practical timeframe is a dangerous game that usually ends in tears for all. And it is unclear how much patience the market and the world will have for the visions of the future being bandied about as near-in realities.
Conclusion
I believe in my lifetime we will implement much of the science fiction narrative as it stands today. But I hope to live a long time, and from a business perspective I am worried that most of the big tech companies are way over their skis in the promises they are making of commercial realities versus inspirational demos, and eventually will pay the price for it.
We have just lived through an anomalous period of growth. Over-promises in the next few years could, if the market turns, do more damage than good.
Much like expanding empires of old, each victory has to be followed up with even more grand proclamations and bigger works. At a certain point, these things tend to collapse on themselves because expectations get too big to be reasonably fulfilled.
In the meantime, there are plenty of amazing businesses to be built given the technology that we have today and the platforms that already exist. There is no question that there is more growth to come. But, just like we still don’t have flying cars, I wouldn’t be holding my breath for the full blown AI-AR-VR-self-driving-drone visions of the future we are being sold anytime soon.