Friday essay: despite the AI hype, some experts warn of a bubble – what happens if it pops?
Friday essay: despite the AI hype, some experts warn of a bubble – what happens if it pops?
Publish Date: 2026-06-11 16:11:00
Source Domain: theconversation.com
In the last few years, the hype around artificial intelligence has become stratospheric. Riding a wave of venture capital, tech leaders promised us AI would revolutionise work, boost productivity and lead to incredible new breakthroughs. OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, set a new record when it attained US$110 billion in investments several months ago – and its CEO, Sam Altman, recently claimed Australia could become a “data capital of the world.”
Sky-high promises have been accompanied by sky-high investment in data centres, the sprawling server farms that power the training, execution, and maintenance of these models. A monstrous new hyperscale facility proposed for Sydney’s west – 1 gigawatt across 52 hectares – would rank among the world’s biggest. It will join 162 existing centres and 90 in the works across Australia, which is projected to be the world’s third largest data centre market by the early 2030s.
But if AI backers are all in, public sentiment is far more mixed. A new study ranked Australia equal lowest on the scale of global AI sentiment, with 81% supporting stronger rules for how organisations use AI and 68% worried about losing control over decisions made by AI on their behalf.
Grassroots movements against AI are growing. Last month, a “Stop the Slop” event challenging the Sydney data centre was relocated to a larger venue due to high interest. It joins other campaigns like StopAI and PauseAI that aim to slow down data centre development, ask how AI is impacting jobs and the environment, and consider more equitable and sustainable alternatives.
And in the last few months, videos have begun surfacing of students at commencement ceremonies booing speakers like former Google chief executive Eric Schmidt, who speak in rapturous tones about “standing on the edge of technological transformation” and how AI will touch “every profession”, “every classroom”, and “every relationship”.
Faith in these…
