On October 4, 1957, the USSR launched Sputnik, a 184-pound satellite, into Earth’s orbit. The satellite didn’t do much—it just “beeped” over radio waves. But those beeps sounded a wake-up call for the United States.
Fearful of falling behind its Cold War strategic rival, the federal government launched an expensive crash program to spur technological development. The U.S. went from a laggard in the space race to unified, fast-moving behemoth. By 1969, we had landed men on the moon, a feat the Soviets never accomplished. And more than that: The Sputnik moment began decades of across-the-board American dominance in science and engineering.
Now comes what many are calling a new Sputnik moment: the release of DeepSeek, a low cost, high-performing Chinese-created artificial intelligence (AI) model. The analogy is a bit imprecise though—and probably understates the significance of last week’s event.
Rockets are bounded by the laws of physics and the scarcity and movement of materials—which is why we say that hardware is hard. The only constraint on software development is the human imagination. Small, far-flung teams can accomplish extraordinary things. If a rocket explodes, it takes 12 months to get the next one built. Software can instantly be replicated 7 billion times into every human’s pocket. And updated seamlessly.