I’m attending FOSSAsia in Bangkok this week. As always, it’s a fire hose of fantastic content and great conversations.

The last few events I’ve been at, AI has been the Main Character. Every talk was about AI, for the sake of AI, Yay AI. AI will change the world. All that usual hype. One grows weary of it.

But this event has been different, in a not very subtle way. Yes, every talk is still about AI, either explicitly, or because it comes up again and again. But what’s been interesting is that AI is now a tool. It’s just part of the toolchain. It’s not the main character.

This shift is very welcome to me, and one that I’ve been hoping to see.  The talks incorporate AI as a tool in accomplishing the actual important goal, rather than being the entire point of the talk.

I sincerely hope that this is a trend that we see continue at other events.