Why tech bosses keep sharing their manifestos about AI

This past week, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg published a 6,500 word open letter , external entitled "The Future is for Everyone".

To some, it's an expression of hope in AI's promise. To others, it's little more than a verbose public relations exercise.

Zuckerberg's manifesto is the latest example of a tech boss opining on why AI is the next big thing.

His vision echoes what AI leaders have expressed in various forms: the product they are building is among the "most important technologies in history."

Marc Andreessen, co-founder of early web titan Netscape, perhaps started this trend in 2023 with a 5,000-word essay he called "The Techno-Optimist Manifesto", which argued innovation was the way to solve life's problems.

“So they're writing manifestos now?,” I remember thinking to myself.

Andreessen's writing began with him recounting lies he claimed people were spreading, and called for readers to push back against this.

"We believe growth is progress – leading to vitality, expansion of life, increasing knowledge, higher well being," he wrote.