LAST week, I wrote about the Metaverse, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s new project. From what I understand, it’s basically a VR world where people can work, play and interact using their VR avatar. Imagine the Matrix, except that it’s still in its infancy.
But Zuckerberg’s efforts is part of a much larger trend – the AI (artificial intelligence) economy. This new economy will include data centers, automation processes, data integration, telemetry analysis, VR sets, and more.
It is also expected by some tech analysts that the AI economy will far outpace the real life one in terms of value. By how much? The value varies, but Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s founder, predicts that it will surpass the US GDP.
So if the AI economy does get off, it’s likely to be quite disruptive. In this sense, it would be best to think of it as a new internet, except larger and most likely more controlled.
Technological mediums tend to devour their predecessors. Think of radio and TV. When the latter was invented, it had rendered the former outdated. Radio stations still existed, but they were no longer as important as TV stations.
When the internet came, both radio and TV became redundant. You can see shows and movies on the internet much more easily than on TV.
I think that AI will do to the internet what the internet did to radio and TV. There will be the old internet – the internet of websites, social media and emails – and the new AI economy internet.
Now, how will this affect Iloilo? How will this affect the Philippines?
In my opinion, outside of Manila and certain industries, very little. AI requires infrastructure to connect with it, and the Philippines isn’t exactly at the forefront of technology. There may be cheap, knockoff VR headsets and VR stations where people pay maybe P30 for an hour on the Metaverse, but overall, little will change…at least on the short term.
If the AI economy will affect the Philippines and Iloilo, it will do so indirectly. It will affect us through trade, through remittances and through overseas job openings./PN
