1、1Predicting the trajectory of AI itself is pointless.Nobody outside the walls of the biggest and best-funded arti昀椁cial intelligence labs really knows whats coming down the pipe in terms of capabilities.As evidence:weve continued to get periodic“future shock”moments despite analysts best guesses.And

2、 weve been seeing them faster,with fewer gaps in between,when,by rights,we should be getting better at forecasting them over time.Before late 2022,who saw the original launch of ChatGPT coming?In early 2023,who expected it to hit 100 million users in two months of general availability?This spring,wh

3、o thought the world would go temporarily mad for Studio Ghibli-style images,as the biggest manifestation of GPT 4os native image generation model?Ahead of last month,May 2025,who expected Googles Veo 3 video generation model,which combined audio and video into single prompts,to potentially blow the

4、doors off advertising?You only have to glance over the OpenAI blog post that accompanied the initial ChatGPT research preview to see just how quickly technology predictions can end up looking rather humble.And you only need to look back at the articles written at the peak of the Metaverse furore for

5、 a reminder of the opposite:how quickly the air can get sucked out of a room it sure looked like everyone was inevitably rushing into.So am I going to start this years AI Report with a prediction of what the fastest-developing technology segment will look like,capability-wise,this time in 2026?No.Th

6、ere is,though,a line of more productive prediction Im much happier putting my name next to.Im con昀椁dent that the commercial and cultural uptake of AI is going to generate a whole new class of products,services,devices,and experiences,irrespective of how many more future shocks 2025/26 brings us.Im a