With the advent of increasingly sophisticated AI models, we're facing a massive surge in words—a phenomenon we might call "wordflation." Just as economic inflation devalues currency, a flood of words diminishes the value of the average word.
Wordflation Was Already on the Rise
For most of human history, physical distance limited communication. Friends might talk monthly, making conversations more valuable on average due to the wealth of things to catch up on. Technological advancements gradually eliminated the buildup of things to discuss:
Calls, emails, and instant messaging enabled home-based communication
Mobile phones and texting allowed communication from anywhere
Social media gave us more to read
Each of these advancements created more words because the "cost" of communication decreased. No longer did we need to travel to tell someone something; now we can text them. This increases the amount of topics we discuss because we're not concerned about the cost.
This decreased cost has led to unnecessary complexity. Take the CCH Standard Federal Tax Reporter, which spans over 70,000 pages (just covering U.S. Federal Income Tax). Word processing made it so that people writing the code didn't have to think about the most important pieces. The sections from the beginning were certainly more crucial than those at the ever-growing end.
Before it, document length was bounded by the human capacity to copy long-form text & about to plateau.
After word processing, the tax & legal codes grew without check. And became incomprehensible to anyone but career experts.
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The Case for Conciseness
Given that our average daily word intake, much like our calorie intake, is higher now than ever before, we have an opportunity to stand out. The average person will use AI to employ vocabulary they don't possess and make their statements longer, mistaking verbosity for sophistication. Truly effective people, however, will value brevity over perceived intelligence.
This principle isn't new, but it's more important now than ever. As Einstein said, "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." Just as you would buy assets to fight inflation, be concise to fight wordflation.
