Google Docs co-founder and AI think tank Golden Gate Institute chair Steve Newman has released a Q2 2026 AI status report, using last year's widely discussed "AI 2027" scenario as a benchmark. He compares real-world progress against each prediction.
His core finding: the quantified forecast is about 65% complete overall, but the most critical metric — AI's acceleration of its own software development — is only at 17% of the predicted value. That 65% figure is mostly propped up by benchmark scores and data center buildout, not by genuine capability leaps in the real world. Newman concludes that AI is still a "normal technology," constrained by slow deployment and difficult enterprise integration.
But he also lists evidence pointing the other way. Anthropic's annualized revenue grew nearly 10x in 2025, then tripled again in the first three months of 2026 to reach $30 billion, and by April SemiAnalysis estimated it at $40 billion. Claude Mythos became the first model deemed too intelligent to release, capable of finding critical vulnerabilities in major operating systems and browsers and chaining them into executable attacks. OpenAI researchers reveal that GPT-5.5 can already work independently for days.
Newman presents two scenarios. Conservative: models start accelerating their own R&D in 2026, and AI's impact on the economy and science becomes impossible to ignore. Aggressive: the AI 2027 script slips by a few years, but then AI fully takes over its own development, quickly solving robotics and other problems, while adoption barriers are swept aside by competitive pressure and AI's own flexibility. The authors of "AI 2027" themselves updated their timeline in April, moving the median prediction for an "automated programmer" from end of 2029 to mid-2028, while still believing superintelligence within 18 months is possible.
Newman's takeaway: he increasingly believes the singularity will arrive within the next few decades, and the current dizzying pace of change is likely the slowest we'll experience for the rest of our lives.