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Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

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Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#271

Post by jaggederest »

intended wrote: post #254
xmprt wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're ever been to a third world country then you'd see how this is completely untrue. The dotcom boom has revolutionized the way of life for people in countries like India. Even for the average person in America, the ability to do so many activities online that would have taken hours otherwise (eg. shopping, research, DMV/government activities, etc). The fact that we see negative consequences of this like social…

It seems the crux is that we needed X people to produce goods, and we had Y demand. Now we need X*0.75 people to do meet Y demand. However, those savings are partially piped to consumers, and partially piped to owners. There is only so much marginal propensity to spend that rich people have, so that additional wealth is not resulting in an increase in demand, at least commensurate enough to absorb the 25% who are une…

> partially piped to consumers, and partially piped to owners.

Or, the returns on capital exceed the rate of economic growth (r > g), if you like Piketty's Capital in the Twenty First Century.

One of the central points is about how productivity and growth gains increasingly accrue to capital rather than labor, leading to capital accumulation and asset inflation.

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#272

Post by noduerme »

bluefirebrand wrote: post #231
Buttons840 wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the key. The poor are useful to business so long as they are a source of money and power. What happens if the time comes that the poor have nothing the rich want?

Historically in this case eventually the poor kill the rich Probably not this time though

It's strange that socialists seem more concerned with their material possessions than anyone else.

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#273

Post by lukan »

Gud wrote: post #235
palmotea wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It will benefit all people but it will disproportionally benefit more rich people. Yes: you'll be homeless and living under a bridge, but you'll have an LLM therapist on your phone to console you. That's a benefit!

Doubtful. More likely that there will be robocops to stop you from loitering in the scenic places.

For sure, but most bridges aren't in scenic places and robocops will still be limited in numbers, so no worries, just ask your LLM assistance in case of doubt under which bridge you won't get evicted from. Altough, that would probably be illegal advice, but they can try to help you with therapy should you end up in such a situation. Not the top model of course, but hey, it is a benefit.

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#274

Post by lukan »

petre wrote: post #228
SoftTalker wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But energy is essentially free also, at least on the margin, and if we're talking about sunlight.

Sure. And AI will only run at peak solar times.

Did you know, that there is always a place on earth enjoying peak solar time right now?

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#275

Post by Ekaros »

simonw wrote: post #56
zerosizedweasle wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The biggest problem is the infrastructure left behind from the Dotcom boom that laid the path for the current world (the high speed fiber) doesn't translate to computer chips. Are you still using intel chips from 1998? And the chips are such a huge cost, and being backed by debt but they depreciate in value exponentially. It's not the same because so much of the current debt fueled spending is on an asset that has ve…

That's true for the GPUs themselves, but the data centers with their electricity infrastructure and cooling and suchlike won't become obsolete nearly as quickly.

How much more of centralized data center capacity we actually need outside AI? And how much more we would need if we used slightly more time on doing things more efficiently?

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#276

Post by taormina »

jfengel wrote: post #174
pessimizer wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber didn't invent anything, they drove taxis out of business then jacked up the prices, squeezed the workers, and now everybody is riding around in regular people's crappy cars for more than a cab cost. And now I need a phone and to maintain my relationship with these two crappy companies rather than to wave at the street (which is what I used to do to get a ride.) That was literally what everybody said would happen…

I think Uber invented (or at least made widely available) taxi-by-app. Having scores of cab companies, accessed by telephone call, was supremely user-hostile. If the cab companies had gotten together on an app, they might have shortcut Uber and all of its many dubious practices. They finally are starting to but it's much too late.

Taxi-by-app existed pre-Uber, the innovation was making the taxi actual show up. Austin had the apps, and I would order one, and the taxis would get distracted on the way to my house and pick up other fares, so I couldn't go where I wanted. They had every chance to not be outcompeted by Uber, but they couldn't stop being taxis. And, here we are.

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#277

Post by lukan »

delusional wrote: post #266
Buttons840 wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the key. The poor are useful to business so long as they are a source of money and power. What happens if the time comes that the poor have nothing the rich want?

The poor will always have the only thing the rich want. Labor. Without labor Trump cannot slather the white house in gold. Without labor Zuck cannot smoke meats. Without labor Musk cannot troll people on X. The rich do not want anything you have, they want you. Body and soul.

Robots can take most of the jobs, but the feeling of power over other humans they likely cannot replace.

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#278

Post by mitthrowaway2 »

thewebguyd wrote: post #119
Loughla wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Faculty at the college I work for are kicking and screaming about AI and students using AI. They don't want to use new tools so they're just trying to outright ban students from using them. One smug English faculty said, "well it's not that hard. You just look for dashes in their writing." I responded with, "you know you can just tell it not to use those, right?" Blank stares. I hate it.

It's sad. I use dashes in my writing all the time. I've had to consciously pause and make an effort not to use them in my emails now.

Indeed, the very dashes the English teacher taught me to use.

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#279

Post by neel8986 »

squigz wrote: post #263
bluefirebrand wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I struggle to articulate the way that abundant cheap goods lead to that outcome. It has nothing to do with how cheap the goods are The problem is that at some point people won't be able to afford literally anything because all, and I mean literally all, of the wealth will be hyper concentrated in a super small percentage of the population

Do you have anything to support this hypothesis?

Simple hypothesis. Top 5percent of US wealth now belongs to top 50 richest American. Even if you ignore corruption, lobbying and any ill intent you can definitely conclude that this top 50 individuals have better way of getting return from money than rest of the population. Even if if their delta of return is 5% we can assume that withing next 50 years there is a high probability that these guys will own 30-50% of wealth. I have a strong belive AI will acclerate that further.

Re: Jeff Bezos says AI is in a bubble but society will get 'gigantic' benefits

#280

Post by Ekaros »

MountDoom wrote: post #167
nemomarx wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

are most people on HN making 170? I feel a bit less privileged now.

Entry-level total comp for SWEs in the SF Bay Area is probably $250k. A senior dev at a public tech company can easily clear $400k. Really senior engineers at FAANG routinely clear $1M.

And we aren't also in some other bubble. From rest of the world those compensation levels sound insane.
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