Ethan Mollick argues AI is shifting from chatbots to long-running agents

Mollick argues AI capability is improving at a better-than-exponential rate, citing METR, GDPval, Epoch, and his own tests showing models working autonomously for hours.

He says work is shifting from co-working with chatbots to assigning tasks to agents, with OpenAI workers managing multiple agents and experts getting the most from them.

He adds that open-weights Chinese models trail the American frontier by roughly 6-12 months.