W31 •A• Obsolescence Is a Forecast ✨

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. But when he states that something is impossible, well, he is very probably wrong.

SPEAKER_2 (0:10)

Oh man, that is, wait, that's Arthur C. Clarke, right?

SPEAKER_1 (0:13)

Exactly, writing back in like 1962, in Profiles of the Future.

SPEAKER_2 (0:19)

Right, and it is absolutely wild to me how we still, I mean, we still commit the exact error he was warning us about over 60 years ago.

SPEAKER_1 (0:28)

Literally 60 years.

SPEAKER_2 (0:29)

We're just upset, like totally obsessed with pointing at complex technologies or pointing at entire business models.

SPEAKER_1 (0:35)

Or scientific theories.

SPEAKER_2 (0:36)

Yes, pointing at them and loudly with our whole chest declaring them impossible or dead. And we are, I mean, we are almost always completely wrong about the timeline.

SPEAKER_1 (0:45)

Welcome to the Deep Dig where we break down complex subjects with Token Wisdom.

SPEAKER_2 (0:49)

Love it.

SPEAKER_1 (0:49)

Arthur C. Clarke said that in 1962 and yet today, right now, in boardrooms across the entire world, executives are looking at perfectly good technology and just throwing it in the trash.

SPEAKER_2 (1:00)

Just because the calendar changed.

SPEAKER_1 (1:02)

Exactly. And look, yes, you, the person listening to this Deep Dive right now, you make these calls every single day.

SPEAKER_2 (1:09)

Oh, we all do.

SPEAKER_1 (1:10)

You sit in a meeting, you evaluate a pitch, and you say, nah, that's way too early. The market isn't ready. Or you look at a software stack.

SPEAKER_2 (1:17)

Or a marketing strategy.

SPEAKER_1 (1:18)

Right. And you say, that's a legacy system, sunset it, it's dead.

SPEAKER_2 (1:22)

Throw it out. And what we're going to do today is unpack this incredibly provocative essay by Khayyam Wakil.

It's called ACL taught 171 W31 Obsolescence Is a Forecast.

SPEAKER_1 (1:37)

Such a good piece.

SPEAKER_2 (1:38)

It really is. And it basically proves that every single one of those snap judgments you're making, they're likely totally fatally flawed.

SPEAKER_1 (1:45)

We are going to completely dismantle how you evaluate complex systems today, how you look at technology and how you solve problems. We're going to explore why calling something obsolete and calling something premature are actually the exact same mistake.

SPEAKER_2 (1:58)

The exact same mistake.

SPEAKER_1 (1:59)

They're the exact same fundamental misunderstanding of reality. They are just wearing different costumes. Can you dig it?

SPEAKER_2 (2:05)

I can definitely dig it. Because this directly challenges the core tension in the business world, the tech world, and frankly, just human psychology.

SPEAKER_1 (2:15)

Oh, absolutely.

SPEAKER_2 (2:16)

Let's get right into the first big tension here, this idea of the deadline. The deadline that you, me, and the broader market just file away is a cold hard fact.

SPEAKER_1 (2:27)

Yes. Let's unpack this immediately. Because there is this deeply entrenched conventional wisdom.

You look at a stack of software or specific strategy, you confidently slam your hand on the boardroom table and you just say, sunset it, it's done, it's obsolete.

SPEAKER_2 (2:42)

You say nobody ships that anymore, put it out to pasture.

SPEAKER_1 (2:45)

Exactly. We say it with so much chest.

SPEAKER_2 (2:47)

We really do.

SPEAKER_1 (2:48)

We get paid frankly for the speed and the confidence of making those exact judgments. I mean, think about the tech blogs that literally run graveyards of killed product.

SPEAKER_2 (2:57)

Oh yeah, the Google graveyard.

SPEAKER_1 (2:58)

Right. Celebrating their demise as if it's some like triumph of market efficiency.

SPEAKER_2 (3:05)

This is where Wakil's central thesis just rips the rug out from under all of us. Because he points out that we treat the word obsolete, meaning it lost and it's never coming back.

SPEAKER_1 (3:15)

Right.

SPEAKER_2 (3:16)

And the word premature meaning it just hasn't won yet. We treat them as if they are physical properties of an object.

SPEAKER_1 (3:23)

Wait, hold up. Break that down for me. You mean we treat market timing like it's a law of physics?

SPEAKER_2 (3:27)

Precisely. We are committing a massive category error.

SPEAKER_1 (3:31)

Okay. How so?

SPEAKER_2 (3:32)

Well, you look at a piece of software and you say, this software is obsolete. The exact same way you would say, this software takes up 50 megabytes of storage.

SPEAKER_1 (3:41)

Ah, I see.

SPEAKER_2 (3:42)

Or this physical server weighs 40 pounds. Yeah. You actually believe you are describing what the thing is.

SPEAKER_1 (3:49)

So you're saying if a piece of tech is garbage, it's not actually garbage. Garbage-ness isn't an intrinsic baked-in property of the code.

SPEAKER_2 (3:58)

I'm saying garbage isn't an intrinsic property of the tech at all. This is the fundamental translation we need to make together right off the bat.