Hype: A Primer

When it comes to creating a new technology, you need to sell a vision to attract the resources you need (people, investment, etc.).

Hype can act like glue. It can create a shared vision pulling the actors in the same direction and thus creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

One important component of hype is thus a set of promises of what the technology can achieve in the future for us.

These might range from solving a particularly annoying problem to creating new markets, making heaps of money, or even revolutionizing a whole field and changing society as a whole.