Quote · The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway
No Mercy / No Malice: 1999.AI
Where this was said
Introduction: The AI Bubble Begins to Unravel
At 2:05 · chapter starts 1:45
Scott Galloway briefly frames the essay before handing off to narrator George Hahn. The thesis is stated plainly from the opening: the contagion pattern of the dot-com crash — B2C first, then B2B, then infrastructure — is beginning to form again in AI, with cracks appearing at OpenAI. Hahn then sets the philosophical scene, invoking Jamie Dimon's observation that financial crises come every 5 to 7 years, noting it's been 18 years since the last one. With age comes pattern recognition, and the pattern Galloway sees — slowly, then suddenly — is one he lived through personally in 1999.
The dot-com crash followed a predictable sequence: B2C companies fell first, then B2B, then infrastructure. That same domino pattern is now forming in AI. The echoes are unmistakable — and for anyone who lived through 1999, the moment is recognizable.
By 1999, 39% of all venture capital investments were being deployed into internet companies, a concentration that foreshadowed the eventual crash.
