Evolving status symbols from cars to AI models

Class and status have defined and disturbed civilisations for generations. In monarchies, a family monopolised power, privileges and status.

Political reforms, based on voting, watered down their power, while the rise of capitalism created a new class of privileged individuals who dine with monarchies and political leaders.

Recent events in the United Kingdom (UK) and Norway surrounding their monarchy are worthy following up. Remember Epstein files? The events could redefine constitutional monarchies.

I have mourned over the years over why the UK “killed” our monarchies and retained theirs. I could be Prince Iraki or Duke of Nowhereshire.

One key question in every society is what defines class and status, beyond inheritance. What are the emerging symbols of class and status?

The starting point is what’s visible, what one wears, from your haircut to your shoes. Add your accent, gait and walking style. Even the perfume and the way you smile can reveal your status and socioeconomic class. It’s very hard to fake a socioeconomic class; something will betray you!

One curious status symbol is the brownness from cross-racial marriages. Why did Kenya escape coloreds during the colonial era? Why the slow return? A hard-to-copy status symbol?  

Residency is a peculiar status symbol. One of the most popular questions I get from Kenyans is “unakaa wapi.” Where do you stay? 99 per cent will never visit you.

All they want is to classify me! We are the only country where citizens live on roads. Unakaa wapi, where do you stay? Thika Road, Mombasa Road!

The number of homes is another status symbol, more so if one is outside the country.  This symbol is hard to copy. The home excludes where you were born, the countryside or shaggs.

The car is the most obvious status symbol. The bigger the better. It can also be a sign of “forced class.” Do big cars driven by government officials elevate their class and status?

Am always fascinated by the small cars in Europe and Japan, yet they make cars. We love big cars; we don’t make cars. What happened to the Nyayo car?

Add holiday destinations, the place you worship, contacts on your phone, where you were schooled, and relatives abroad. How about club membership, jewellery, pets and wellness? And what you do with your leisure time. Enrich the list, please.

In the United States, status symbols have been taken to another level. With no monarchy, money and what you can do with it is the ultimate status symbol. 

Of keen interest is the status symbols of the ultra-rich. They leave our heads spinning. One is owning a space company. Think of the top US billionaires. Elon Musk owns SpaceX, Jeff Bezos owns Blue Origin, Richard Branson owns Virgin Galactic; never mind that he is British, a cousin to many Americans. 

Axiom Space was founded by Kam Ghaffarian and Michael T. Suffredini. Vast by Jed McCaleb

Add Sierra Space, owned by Eren and Fatih Ozmen. There are many other space startups that took advantage of opening up the space industry to the private sector. How much private capital is going to space in Kenya with our space agency?  One curious observation is that the State wants more control over the economy, yet it should be left to the invisible hand of the market. The first casualty of State control is innovation.

That is what clearly distinguishes the private sector from the public sector.

The US ultra-rich have lately shifted their status symbols back to the earth. Their newest status symbol is ownership of artificial intelligence (AI) models. Check who owns Grok, Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Llama, among others.

There is a big competition between open and proprietary AI models. Who will win? Curiously, each model is good in its own way, e.g., writing code, reasoning, creative writing, or data analysis.

The West and East also create status symbols. We just adopt them with pride and arrogance. Can we be co-creators of status symbols? We can only do that if we let innovation flourish and focus less on old money.

The upper class in Kenya seem to know innovation will gnaw on their status and privileges. Does that explain why there is an obsession with control in most public institutions?

Noted the muted status of intellectuals, innovators, scientist and academics?

What are Kenya’s ultra-rich status symbols? Owning banks, ranches? Hotels? Planes, helicopters? Skyscrapers? Why not something extraordinary like going to space or owning an AI model? What are abstract status symbols in Kenya? One is titles like Dr and club membership.  Any other?

We have missed the boat on status symbols several times while tethered to old symbols. We missed the search engines like Google. We missed cloud computing.

And it seems we shall miss the AI wave too.  When shall we lead tech revolutions and create our own status symbols?