The Great AI Come-Down: From 'World-Changing' to 'Marginally Useful'

Let's rewind to late 2022. ChatGPT drops. The tech industry, perpetually in need of a new messiah, collectively hyperventilates. VCs who last week were funding Web3 dog-walking apps suddenly became AI philosophers. Every pitch deck contained the phrase "large language model" and a promise to "disrupt" an industry that, upon closer inspection, functioned just fine. Fast forward to 2025, and the hangover is real.

The correction isn't happening because AI is useless. It's happening because we finally ran the numbers. The electricity bill to train a frontier model could power a small nation. The cloud compute costs to run these beasts make CFOs weep. And for what? To auto-generate slightly better marketing copy? To create "art" that still can't draw a hand with the correct number of fingers? The ROI calculus has shifted from "infinite potential" to "this is really expensive for what it does."

The Pivot to 'Practical AI' (Or: How to Sound Smart While Doing Less)

Watching AI startups pivot in 2025 is like watching a contortionist try to fit into a carry-on suitcase. The grand visions of artificial general intelligence (AGI) have been quietly shelved, replaced by the far less sexy but more bankable concept of "Practical AI" or "Narrow AI Applications." Translation: "We've given up on creating a digital god; instead, our AI can slightly optimize your supply chain logistics or flag the weirdest 5% of customer service tickets." It's not glamorous, but at least it might turn a profit before the funding runs out.

The most hilarious symptom of the correction is the linguistic backtracking. Executives who two years ago breathlessly promised "human-level intelligence" now carefully clarify they are building "co-pilots," "assistants," and "tools." The goalposts haven't just moved; they've been loaded onto a truck and driven to another stadium. The hype cycle, in its infinite wisdom, has moved from "revolution" to "productivity enhancement." How very... corporate.

Meanwhile, Your GPS Is Being Attacked (And No One Cares)

While Silicon Valley was busy arguing about AI ethics and prompt engineering, a far more tangible threat was growing in the physical world: GPS jamming and spoofing. It turns out the global positioning system, the silent utility that guides everything from your morning jog to intercontinental cargo ships, is hilariously easy to disrupt. A cheap device from an online marketplace can blanket an area with radio noise, making GPS receivers see ghosts or go completely blind.

Why is this happening? The reasons are as varied as they are absurd. Truck drivers jam signals to hide their location from employers. Movie theaters do it to prevent piracy. Crypto-mining operations do it for... reasons that probably made sense after three Red Bulls. And of course, state actors do it as a low-cost way to harass aviation and maritime traffic. The result is a growing patchwork of digital dead zones where the fundamental trust in "where am I?" breaks down.

The Irony of Our Dual Crisis

Here lies the beautiful, tragic irony of 2025. We have one sector (AI) that promised too much, too fast, and is now being soberly re-evaluated. And we have another (global navigation) that delivers an absolutely critical, world-enabling service with near-perfect reliability, and we've taken it so utterly for granted that we've left it vulnerable to any hobbyist with a soldering iron and a grudge.

We spent billions making AI models that can write a sonnet about blockchain, but we apparently couldn't spare the change to harden the signals that prevent 400-ton aircraft from bumping into each other. Our priorities, as a species, are a constant source of wonder.

The fight against GPS jamming isn't about flashy startups or charismatic CEOs. It's about unglamorous, essential engineering: developing backup systems, hardening receivers, and creating international protocols. It's the tech equivalent of fixing potholes and cleaning gutters—vitally important, but nobody wants to put it on their Instagram.

The 2025 Takeaway: Glamour vs. Grit

So, what have we learned? The AI hype correction is a healthy, necessary market function. It separates the wheat from the chaff, the useful tools from the vaporware. It's a reminder that technology advances in S-curves, not vertical lines, and that adoption is often slower and messier than the keynote speeches suggest.

The GPS jamming fight, however, is a stark lesson in infrastructure fragility. It reminds us that the most important technologies are often the ones we don't think about until they stop working. They are utilities, and utilities require diligent, ongoing maintenance and protection.

In 2025, the most valuable tech mindset might just be the boring one. Instead of chasing the next hype cycle, maybe we should spend some time securing the foundational layers of our digital world. Because an AI that can't perfectly summarize a PDF is an inconvenience. A world where navigation fails is a crisis.