AI, DEI, and…GLPs? Here’s what the tech elite were buzzing about at South by Southwest

Hi folks, Kylie Robison with the tech team here. I just spent the last week in Austin, Texas, for the famed South by Southwest festival and it was a lot more fun this year. Dare I say, we’re so back?

Last year, the vibe surrounding SXSW was notably subdued for both founders and venture capitalists in the wake of the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank. It didn’t necessarily stop the partying, but people weren’t too eager about the future.

Fast forward to this year, just a few hours after I landed, I found myself attending a dinner at a sprawling mansion nestled in the hills of Austin, filled with an eclectic mix of executives, technologists, and investors. Once we sat for dinner, a game started at our table: Say something you despise, cherish, and find just okay (the real name of the game is less decorous) concerning the future of technology.

Naturally, my contributions veered towards an adoration for journalism—an indispensable facet of our future—mixed feelings towards social media, and an aversion towards the latest hardware trends. The latest gadgets like Vision Pros, Rabbit R1s, and Humane AI pins seem too ahead of their times, if anything, primarily for the tech elite and likely destined to collect dust in a forgotten drawer.

Amidst the other opinions circulating, some advocated for a digital detox, saying they’d toss away their smartphones and social media accounts. Conversely, others professed admiration for cutting-edge hardware like the Oura ring, Eight Sleep, Apple Watch, lauding their capacity to monitor health metrics with precision.

Another person joined our table and started a rapid-fire question game, after each question we’d go around the table and deliver a one-word answer. Do we think there will be a TikTok ban? Mostly everyone, including me, said no. My favorite question was, which will have a greater impact on the U.S. economy in the coming years, AI or GLPs (weight loss medications such as Wegovy and Ozempic)? Almost everyone, except for me, said GLPs. The idea is that our economy relies so heavily on overconsumption, what happens when that stops?

Throughout the week, I often shared my latest scoop: Elon Musk's X, in a strategic maneuver to rival YouTube, is unveiling a television application for Amazon and Samsung smart TVs, which will practically be a clone of YouTube's existing TV app. The popular belief is that Musk wouldn’t actually succeed in rivaling YouTube or Twitch, and I was often asked if it’ll all come crashing down soon (no, I don’t think it will, at least not soon, and it’ll be a very slow process). I chatted with people about power users on X and Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI—everyone knew Musk had attended the Prime Video activation at the festival, and one person heard he had gone to a rave nearby.

This year was also my first time on a SXSW stage. I moderated a panel with Matthew Prince (CEO & cofounder of Cloudflare) and David Heinemeier Hansson (Creator of Ruby on Rails & co-owner of 37signals) about David’s startup leaving the cloud. Basically, just buy some servers and run your business that way, was the argument. The concept seems radical to many people, given how widely accepted cloud computing is these days, so it was a fun conversation to have throughout the conference.

Another prevalent theme that surfaced in discussions was the discourse surrounding diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). This discourse has been propelled into the mainstream by prominent figures such as Bill Ackman, Elon Musk, and Mark Cuban, whose exchanges on X often veer into terse debates on the topic. Several tech execs that I spoke with aligned themselves with the viewpoints espoused by Musk and Ackman, contending that the current emphasis on diversity has swung too far. However, such opinions were only expressed in hushed tones, with none willing to formally attribute them on the record.

Of course, the omnipresent topic of artificial intelligence dominated many conversations. Will AI destroy us or save us? And, more candidly, how much money will be made by the chosen few working on AI?

The magical advances of text-to-video AI tech, like OpenAI’s recently previewed Sora, was another frequent conversation topic. And, in a different vein, a video was widely shared on X that showed a film screening in which a pre-rolled trailer for SXSW AI panels drew jeers and boos from the audience—a telling example of the divide between the high-and-mighty AI executives and regular attendees.

What struck me as notably absent this year were discussions surrounding "e/acc" (acceleration) versus "decel" (deceleration)—essentially, the divide between those advocating for the rapid advancement of AI and those urging caution and restraint. When I brought it up to one public company executive, he rolled his eyes. Even though a few e/acc parties sold out well in advance, it seemed the arguments that once gripped Silicon Valley (and some speculated were connected to the ouster of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman) have now returned to their cliquish bubbles.

Overall, SXSW was bustling this year. The merchandise booth featured everything from DARE-style iron-on patches to hipster hats with cords. The most popular were pricey, holographic unicorn t-shirts, demand was so high that airport employees selling them after the festival struggled to keep them in stock (I almost bought one, but they ran out of my size).

Kylie Robison

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The rest of today's Data Sheet was written by David Meyer.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com