They have a whiff of the possibility of AIG becoming a reality.
They also had a wiff of NFTs letting them sell and claim royalties on JPEGs. This isn’t about some grand vision if humanity’s future, it’s about becoming the next Silicon Valley billionaire, or dethroning the richest man in the world. If the next big tech get-rich-quick scheme comes along, the novelty of their very expensive autocomplete and JPEG mashup projects will be dead, and they’ll take their dollrs on to the next fad.
He’s looking at this as an echo of past Silicone Valley bubbles. It so much more than that.