AI boom
rapid progress in generative artificial intelligence since the late-2010s
An AI boom is a period of rapid growth in the field of artificial intelligence. The most recent boom happened in the 2020s before seeing increased acceleration and media coverage. Generative AI technologies include large language models (LLM), which generate text and code, image models, and video models, and world models. This period is sometimes referred to as an AI spring, a term used to contrast it with previous AI winters.
Key advances preceding the boom include the transformer (2017), generative pre-trained transformer (2018) and reinforcement learning from human feedback. During the boom, LLMs have evolved via the reasoning model, mixture of experts technique, and multimodal learning.
Controversies of the AI boom include its environmental impact, dominance by US Big Tech companies, effect on copyright, proliferation of deepfakes, threats to cybersecurity and biosecurity, its use in warfare, a potential economic bubble, and existential risks such as AI takeover resulting from artificial general intelligence and superintelligence. Since 2018, observers including Ian Bremmer, Nicholas Thompson, and Kai-Fu Lee have argued an AI arms race or AI Cold War exists between the US and China. The boom has impacted the semiconductor industry, causing a global memory supply shortage. As of 2025, ChatGPT has emerged as the 4th-most-visited website globally, surpassed only by Google, YouTube, and Facebook.
“AI boom” enters the record as rapid progress in generative artificial intelligence since the late-2010s. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what boom, rapid and progress can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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