AI Promised Magic, Then Investors Did the Math

It’s late afternoon in Menlo Park. Mark Zuckerberg’s senior infrastructure team is camped out in one of Meta’s glass-walled conference rooms. The slide deck peers back from the screen. Zuck, as everyone knows him, appears from 2,500 miles away, on the lanai of his 1,400-acre compound on Kauai. Palm trees tilt in the trade winds. The Pacific catches the last low morning light. He doesn’t need a virtual background.