Your Kids Will Never Own a Phone, Says GaryVee

Gary Vaynerchuk tells BRIDGE Summit 2025 in Abu Dhabi that smartphones will vanish, smart glasses will take over, and AI-powered attention is the new currency.

Gary Vaynerchuk has seen a few tech waves come and go – dot-com, social media, mobile, crypto. At BRIDGE Summit 2025 in Abu Dhabi, he added another prediction to his list: your smartphone is basically on a countdown timer.

According to GaryVee, the next decade belongs to smart glasses, AI, and whoever understands that attention – not money – is the real power source. And he’s very clear: AI isn’t a side feature. It’s going to feel like oxygen, everywhere, all the time.

Smartphones will be “as obsolete as a pager” in a decade, replaced by smart glasses.
Gary Vaynerchuk says the real global currency isn’t cash or crypto – it’s attention.
AI will quietly sit behind every screen and feed, judging content instead of follower counts.
He warns many people will waste money on early AI plays, just like the dot-com bubble.
BRIDGE Summit 2025 in Abu Dhabi gets his stamp of approval as an “unbelievable” debut.

Smart glasses could kill your phone

GaryVee’s big swing: mobile phones will go the way of pagers and BlackBerry-style keyboards, and smart glasses will take over your daily screen time.

He says six or seven of the biggest tech companies are in an “arms race” to own smart glasses.
Meta is one of the frontrunners – and if its glasses win, it could lock out rival social platforms.
He believes your kids will live in a world where glasses replace phones, and tech is on 24/7.
In classic Gary fashion, he pushes it further: your grandchildren might even marry AI robots.

Meta’s already turning that vision into actual products, from Ray-Ban Meta and Oakley Meta to display-equipped AI glasses launching globally – with UAE availability on the horizon.

If you connect the dots, his prediction doesn’t sound so wild. We’re already seeing AI glasses that record 3K video, run assistants, and keep you connected without ever pulling out a phone. For users in the UAE, where wearables and premium eyewear are already mainstream, the shift to face-based computing feels less sci-fi and more like a matter of timing.

AI is oxygen – and attention is the only real currency

Gary’s core argument is simple: the most valuable thing on Earth right now isn’t gold, dollars, or Bitcoin – it’s attention. And AI is the engine that allocates it.

AI algorithms silently decide which posts, videos, and creators get seen.
Your follower count matters less than how each single post performs in the feed.
Social media is still “free media” – a once-in-a-century chance to reach people at zero ad spend.
He thinks we’ll look back at this 25-year window of free organic reach as a golden era.

We’re already seeing this in how TikTok, Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts and even LinkedIn reward content. Algorithms care about watch time, swipes and saves, not how famous you were last year. Google’s own digital marketing outlook for 2026 leans on the same logic: AI-driven content matching and short-form video are now the default battlefield for marketers in the UAE and beyond.

If you’re a brand, creator, or SME in the region, this means one thing: you either learn how attention works in an AI world… or you pay someone who does.

Same movie, new tech: from dot-com to AI hype

GaryVee has been early on a lot of platforms – investing in Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Coinbase and Uber before they were obvious. At BRIDGE, he made it clear the AI rush feels familiar.

He compares today’s AI hype to the early Internet and social media booms.
Many people will lose money on AI projects that go nowhere in the next 36 months.
That doesn’t mean AI is overhyped – it means the underlying shift is real, but messy.
He even compares fear of AI to how people once reacted to electricity.

If you lived through the crypto and NFT era, this should ring a bell. The pattern is usually the same: early chaos, scams, overpromises – then a smaller number of serious products that quietly reshape daily life.

In the UAE, we’re already seeing AI creep into everything from sports analytics diplomas to creator tools and productivity apps. The signal, as always, is under the noise.

Algorithms don’t care who you are – only what you post

One of Gary’s sharper warnings was about how people still underestimate social algorithms.

He says 8.3 billion people underestimate how powerful AI-driven feeds really are.
Platforms like TikTok, YouTube, Instagram and X judge content, not status.
A single strong post can outperform a big account with weak content.
Because posting is free, the upside for individuals and small businesses is still huge.

For UAE creators and marketers, this lines up with what we’re seeing on the ground: niche TikTok accounts, bilingual Reels and regional meme pages pulling more engagement than legacy brands with larger followings.

If you’re heading to BRIDGE Summit’s creator or media tracks, this is basically your homework: understand how short-form, AI-ranked content behaves, and test aggressively while the “free reach” window is still open. The summit’s Meta-led sessions are built around exactly that kind of platform strategy.

BRIDGE Summit 2025 gets a strong first-year review

GaryVee didn’t just talk tech; he also gave BRIDGE Summit 2025 itself a solid review, calling it an “unbelievable first-year effort” and praising the organisers and speakers in Abu Dhabi.

BRIDGE Summit 2025 is positioned as a major new global media and content event in Abu Dhabi.
It already features names like Priyanka Chopra Jonas and ChinaJoy alongside GaryVee.
Meta is a key partner, bringing AR/VR demos, workshops and multi-platform activations.
The event targets 60,000+ participants, 400 speakers and hundreds of sessions across tracks.

For Abu Dhabi, that’s another signal that the city wants to be more than a venue – it wants to be a hub for the attention economy itself. With BRIDGE pulling in Hollywood names, ChinaJoy’s first global pavilion, and now GaryVee handing out future predictions, it’s quickly becoming a calendar fixture for anyone working in media, tech, or the creator economy in the region.

FAQs

Will smartphones really disappear in 10 years?

Gary Vaynerchuk predicts that mobile phones will become “as obsolete as a pager or a BlackBerry” within a decade, with smart glasses taking over as the main personal device. In practice, that probably means a long overlap period – but the centre of gravity could shift from your pocket to your face, especially as AI glasses get cheaper and more common.

What does GaryVee mean by “attention is the biggest currency”?

He argues that attention – what people look at, listen to, and care about – drives everything from sales to politics. Money follows attention. AI algorithms now decide where that attention goes by ranking and distributing content across platforms like TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and Facebook based on signals like watch time and engagement.

Instead of rewarding accounts just for having big follower counts, modern feeds judge each piece of content on its own performance. A strong reel, short, or post can travel globally even from a small account. That’s why GaryVee calls this a golden window: posting is still free, and AI does the distribution work for you if your content hits the right signals.

What is BRIDGE Summit 2025 in Abu Dhabi?

BRIDGE Summit 2025 is a new media, content and entertainment gathering running from 8–10 December 2025 at ADNEC in Abu Dhabi. It aims to connect creators, platforms, studios, brands and investors, with tracks across media, gaming, creator economy, marketing, music, film and tech. Meta is a key partner, and speakers include global names like GaryVee and Priyanka Chopra Jonas.

Why does GaryVee think people will lose money on AI?

He compares today’s AI rush to the early dot-com era. Many startups and tools will fail or go to zero in the next few years, even while AI itself becomes more important and embedded in daily life. His point: the long-term technology is real, but not every early product deserves your time, money, or investment.

If you’re reading this on your phone, enjoy it. According to GaryVee, your next major upgrade might not be an iPhone 21 – it might be whatever you’re wearing on your face at BRIDGE Summit 2035.