Thinking about #AI, Paul Ford (@ftrain) proposes a quirky but plausible test to distinguish bubble technologies from normal technologies.
https://www.wired.com/story/ai-normal-after-ai-plateaus/
(#paywalled)
"The metric I use is the C/B ratio: conferences to blogging. If people are steadily attending conferences about a subject, it is not normal yet. If they’re mostly blogging about it, it is. I made this up, but I assure you it’s predictive."
By this test, he concludes that AI is a bubble technology.
I bring this up because it seems that this test also makes #OpenAccess a bubble something, even if not a technology. But I'd call OA normal -- here to stay, wanted for good reasons, widely accepted, widely implemented, and growing, though previously novel and still overcoming obstacles.
Now I'm wondering: Is Ford's test bogus? Is it valid in some domains but not for something like OA? If it applies to OA, am I applying it too loosely? Or is OA still not normal?