One of the areas I am particularly fascinated in right now is how people and organisations are adapting the way they think and talk about AI and the “Agentic World”. It is a fast moving space (although some of original tech has been around a long time) with recent innovations and vastly improving cost models capturing peoples imagination.
All this has reminded me on how we use to talk about technology decades ago and how with a maturing market and customer base we’ve had to constantly adapt.
Lets take a look at a very early 1980’s advert for the Osborne computer. Computers at the time where niche, expensive and attracted a relatively small market. As a side note Osborne would go on to be infamous for the “Osborne effect” which is a good lesson of the caution one should apply to “roadmap sessions”. As you can see below it is all features and functions for an end customer that could understand what all of that means. I see similarities in the way we used to speak about cloud “e.g. we have X datacentres, Y storage, networking speed, etc etc”
We then move onto a later example from Radio Shack for the Tandy computer. We are now approaching mass market appeal. Prices have dropped considerably and you can see from the advert that is is far more inclusive and helpful for all people (not just technical) to start their journey with computers. Here I see similarities with the way we went from Cloud computing to Software as a Service. Here the usage and outcome was clearer for the end user we had “CRM systems, HR systems, Accounting software etc”. It was far cheaper and easier to buy.
Next we actually have an early advert from the 1970’s from Apple. Apple have always been great on how to speak to customers. I love this example because it is market making. It is not afraid to “teach” or explain how to use a computer. This is exactly what was needed at the time when most people didnt think a computer was relevant for them. This is where we are with AI, specifically Gen AI and Agentic AI. The messaging is what is it and how can I use it in my business. Customers want to be taught how, what are the use cases and how do you drive rapid adoption.
I hope this has been interesting, please do share your stories and how your messaging is evolving. Thank you for reading.
Mark Margolis 