AI adoption far outpaces that of the early Internet — report sheds light on worldwide AI penetration and usage patterns

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AI usage and growth is shifting even faster than we thought.

The world in an eye, a technology vortex
(Image credit: Getty Images)

Saying that AI is everywhere is an axiom by now, but a question that begets answering is "how much, exactly?" That's what the Financial Times (FT) set out to discover, by collecting data and interviewing execs from popular consumer-facing AI services. While most findings are expected, there are a handful of quite surprising pieces of information, including but not limited to the growth of adoption and shifts in usage patterns. As a minor spoiler, the rate of AI adoption is far outpacing that of even the Internet, as fast as that seemed in the early 2000s.

To illustrate that exact point, OpenAI notes that about one in ten people worldwide have already used ChatGPT in some capacity. Over the span of only three years, the service went from zero to close to 800 million users, a feat that took the Internet some 13-odd years. While there's an easy argument to be made that chatbots have it easy by relying on existing infrastructure (the Internet itself), a comparative ratio of over 4:1 is nevertheless shocking and potentially unseen in the modern world.

Interestingly enough, FT's report notes that 'shadow AI' — employees using AI tools without explicit company knowledge or approval — has grown substantially. MIT research posits the main reason is that corporate AI deployment initiatives often remain stalled in pilot phases, with companies having organizational trouble integrating AI tools into their workflows, or a general distrust in the potential productivity gains. The FT research does note that the media and technology industries have indeed "clear signs of structural disruption from AI", as anyone witnessing the gigantic layoffs in FAANG-type companies can attest.

Bruno Ferreira
Bruno Ferreira
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Bruno Ferreira is a contributing writer for Tom's Hardware. He has decades of experience with PC hardware and assorted sundries, alongside a career as a developer. He's obsessed with detail and has a tendency to ramble on the topics he loves. When not doing that, he's usually playing games, or at live music shows and festivals.

2 Comments Comment from the forums
  • watzupken
    Internet adoption was slow because it was new and costly. I remembered those days where we use those dial up modems that is uber slow by today’s standards, but cost more than a fast fibre plan now and there’s also a lack of content at the time. So it’s not a like for like kind of comparison in my opinion.
    Reply
  • Nick_C
    watzupken said:
    Internet adoption was slow because it was new and costly. I remembered those days where we use those dial up modems that is uber slow by today’s standards, but cost more than a fast fibre plan now and there’s also a lack of content at the time. So it’s not a like for like kind of comparison in my opinion.
    Exactly - the Internet required new hardware both at the infrastructure level and in each home and business - and into mobile devices.

    AI piggy-backs on the availability of the internet, and seems to rely on it, to an extent, for training material.

    Put differently, AI adoption would have been nowhere near as fast if developing the internet infrastructure was required as part of it.
    Reply