As I believe I have suggested here before, we are at a moment in the history of the North American economy where there are two paths forward, and both of them entail some pain. One path involves the continued growth of general (or "generative") artificial intelligence, a system that could render irrelevant most of the apps on many of the world's phones and devices, and destroy the companies that have made their income from those apps, and the other companies that have invested and lent too much in them. The destruction of the whole app-based ecosystem -- THAT is what is at stake on this path. Will the world be more than sufficiently compensated or condoled for that loss by the benefits that the growth of GAI will supposedly bring? The other possible path involves a bust and/or long pause in the development of GAI and the continued thriving of the apps ecosystem. That involves pain, too, since a lot has been invested there. Again: will the pain be collateral to a greate...