AI academic conference descends into researchers claiming 'I did this 20 years ago'
rsalakhu · x · 2026-10-06
AI researcher rsalakhu shares an industry observation: the more senior AI academics get, the more convinced they become that every new idea is something they invented 20 years ago — or they wait until it works and claim they said it all along.
He recounts a conference moment: after a speaker's presentation, one academic stood up saying he'd done it a few years ago; a second said he did it 10 years ago and demanded a citation; a third claimed he'd done all of it about 20 years ago. "Funniest thing ever," he writes.
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