ITCN Asia 2026 Made Me Question Whether We Really Need AI in Everything

Fatima Zehra Shakeel — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 13:03:54 +0000

I attended ITCN Asia 2026 in Karachi, Pakistan, expecting to see what the future of technology looks like.

After walking through all five exhibition halls, I came away with a thought I honestly wasn't expecting:

Why does everything need AI now?

There were hundreds of companies, startups, technology products, and ideas on display.

But after a while, I started noticing a pattern.

AI was everywhere.

AI-powered this.

AI-enabled that.

AI-driven everything.

And eventually, I stopped being impressed by the word "AI".

Instead, I started asking a different question:

What problem is this actually solving?

When AI becomes the default answer

I'm not against AI.

I work in technology. I use AI tools. I understand why businesses are adopting it, and I think there are problems where AI can genuinely make a huge difference.

But seeing AI attached to almost every product at ITCN Asia made me wonder whether we're reaching a point where "AI" is becoming a feature we add because we can, rather than because we should.

Not every application needs an AI assistant.

Not every workflow needs a chatbot.

Not every business problem needs machine learning.

Sometimes a well-designed piece of software, a good database, a simple automation, or even a better user experience is enough.

Technology doesn't automatically become innovative just because AI is involved.

What about the cost?

There's another part of the AI conversation that I think deserves much more attention.

We talk constantly about what AI can create.

We talk about productivity.

We talk about automation.

We talk about billion-dollar AI companies.

But we don't talk nearly as much about what it takes to run all of this infrastructure.

AI systems require enormous amounts of computing power. That means energy, data centers, cooling infrastructure, hardware, minerals, and, in many cases, significant amounts of water.

The environmental impact of AI is becoming an increasingly important topic, but there still isn't a simple answer for measuring the complete footprint of every AI system.

And that makes me uncomfortable with how casually we sometimes talk about putting AI into everything.

If we can use AI to solve a problem, does that automatically mean we should?

I don't think the answer should always be yes.

The part I found most interesting

Ironically, the things that stood out to me the most weren't necessarily the ones shouting the loudest about AI.

It was the handful of ideas that felt different.

Ideas that were solving a specific problem.

Ideas that had thought behind the product itself.

Ideas where the technology served the idea, instead of the idea being built around a technology trend.

That distinction really stayed with me.

Are we losing human creativity?

This is probably the part I care about the most.

We're entering a time where generating something is becoming incredibly easy.

Want an image?

Generate it.

Want some code?

Generate it.

Want a logo?

Generate it.

Want an article?

Generate it.

Want an idea?

Ask AI.

There is incredible value in these tools.

But I also wonder what happens if we start treating human creativity as inefficient.

Some of the most interesting things humans have created came from limitations.

Someone had to sit down and draw.

Someone had to write.

Someone had to experiment.

Someone had to make something badly before learning how to make it well.

There was a process.

There was personality.

There was a human behind it.

I don't want technology to remove that completely.

I want technology to give humans more room to be creative.

There's a difference.

Maybe the future isn't AI everywhere

Walking around ITCN Asia 2026 made me think that perhaps the most important question isn't:

"How can we add AI to this?"

Maybe it's:

"Do we actually need AI here?"

If the answer is yes, use it.

If it genuinely makes something better, faster, more accessible, or more useful, then absolutely.

But if a simple solution works better, use the simple solution.

Technology should serve people.

Not the other way around.

And perhaps as we move further into the AI era, one of the things we need to protect most isn't our ability to generate more.

It's our ability to create something ourselves.

**Maybe we don't need AI in everything.

Maybe we just need to become better at knowing when not to use it.**

I Built My Developer Portfolio as a Pixel-Art World

Fatima Zehra Shakeel — Sun, 20 Sep 2026 14:41:18 +0000

I wanted to build a portfolio that felt like something you'd actually explore, rather than another page with a photo, skills section, and a list of projects.

So I turned my career into a small pixel-art world.

Different islands represent different parts of my journey, with buildings and locations representing my education, work experience, projects, and other things I've built along the way.

The idea

The first version didn't work.

I originally built a side-scrolling coastal town, but after spending time with it, I realized it wasn't communicating my experience clearly enough. So I scrapped it and started again.

The second version became an island-based map where exploration is part of the experience, while still keeping the actual information accessible.

What I used

Next.js
TypeScript
Tailwind CSS
PixiJS
Framer Motion
Howler
Zustand

The interesting part wasn't just putting these technologies together. I had to think about how animations, interactions, navigation, audio, and actual portfolio content could coexist without making the site frustrating to use.

What I was trying to solve

A developer portfolio has two competing goals:

Show personality while still making your experience easy to understand.

I wanted someone to be able to explore the world if they wanted to, but also quickly find my experience, projects, skills, and background.

I'm still improving the mobile experience and performance, so feedback is very welcome.

Take a look

Portfolio: https://fatimazehrashakeel.netlify.app/
Story behind it: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7507031808652455936

If you build portfolios or interactive web experiences, I'd especially love to hear what you think about the balance between creativity and usability.

DEV Community: Fatima Zehra Shakeel

ITCN Asia 2026 Made Me Question Whether We Really Need AI in Everything

When AI becomes the default answer

What about the cost?

The part I found most interesting

Are we losing human creativity?

Maybe the future isn't AI everywhere

I Built My Developer Portfolio as a Pixel-Art World

The idea

What I used

What I was trying to solve

Take a look