Why do you expect people will be trying to build a general_ai.exe? Vertical applications of machine learning and light-AI are what most private comapnies that are getting traction are doing today, while big-cos and universities (and things like OpenAI!) are funding the research that could lead to more generalizable AI.
Often I imagine I had a technology such as general artificial intelligence or world-class NLP. Perhaps I lack imagination, but I have not yet thought of an exciting application. These are tools, much like Perl scripts, and it is not clear to me which will displace more jobs during my life.
