Unlike traditional product management that relies on existing user data, building next-generation AI products often lacks historical data. In this ambiguous environment, the ability to craft a compelling narrative becomes more critical for gaining buy-in and momentum than purely data-driven analysis.

The idea that AI development is a winner-take-all race to AGI is a compelling story that simplifies complex realities. This narrative is strategically useful as it creates a pretext for aggressive, 'do whatever it takes' behavior, sidestepping the messier nature of real-world conflict.

Unlike previous technologies like the internet or smartphones, which enjoyed years of positive perception before scrutiny, the AI industry immediately faced a PR crisis of its own making. Leaders' early and persistent "AI will kill everyone" narratives, often to attract capital, have framed the public conversation around fear from day one.

The scarcest resource in AI is a positive vision for the future. Non-technical individuals can have an outsized impact by writing aspirational fiction. Stories like the movie 'Her' inspire developers and can steer the trajectory of the entire field, making imagination a critical skill.

The tech community's convergence on a 10-year AGI timeline is less a precise forecast and more a psychological coping mechanism. A decade is the default timeframe people use for complex, uncertain events—far enough to seem plausible but close enough to feel relevant, making it a convenient but potentially meaningless consensus.

The AI boom can sustain itself as long as its narrative remains compelling, regardless of the underlying reality. The incentive for investors is to commit fully to the story, as the potential upside of being right outweighs the cost of being wrong. Profitability is tied to the narrative's durability.

The narrative around advanced AI is often simplified into a dramatic binary choice between utopia and dystopia. This framing, while compelling, is a rhetorical strategy to bypass complex discussions about regulation, societal integration, and the spectrum of potential outcomes between these extremes.

The overwhelming majority of AI narratives are dystopian, creating a vacuum of positive visions for the future. Crafting concrete, positive fiction is a uniquely powerful way to influence societal goals and guide AI development, as demonstrated by pioneers who used fan fiction to inspire researchers.

Derek Thompson argues that due to extreme uncertainty and a lack of real-world data, even high-level conversations about AI's economic effects are essentially storytelling, not rigorous analysis. Nobody, not even insiders, truly knows what will happen.